Selling Professional Services

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Business Acumen, Education in Sales, Sales Skills, Sales Training

This article first appeared on June 12, 2013 on BRW (now closed magazine as of 2016)

Professional services providers face a challenge that many within the sector are struggling to come to terms with. For centuries the sector – comprising doctors, lawyers, accountants engineers and the like – enjoyed a somewhat exalted position in society.

Ignorance among the general populace, fuelled primarily by the high cost of education, made studying to be a doctor, lawyer or other profession out of the reach of most, and created an impression that being a professional made the individual somewhat special.

However today, wide, relatively easy access …

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Buyer Beware of Trademark Scams & Scammers

By / / Brand & Reputation, Ethics & Values

As much as we promote and encourage honourable and effective selling and buying practices it is just as important to keep an eye open for the latest scams and scammers looking for unsuspecting victims. One of the latest scams dogging businesses and business owners is the area of the registered Trademark where business are receiving unsolicited invitations or requests from companies purporting to be from official government agencies.  As you may be aware Trademarks are the new real estate in the world of brands, slogans and 140 character messages that flood the market every day. Capturing people’s attention in a …

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Is your business Customer Focused & Customer Centric?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brand & Reputation, Education in Sales, Sales Culture, Sales Driven Organisations

As with many things these days, words or expressions get bandied about with little regard for what they really mean.  For instance, when we ask people how they define ‘Prospecting’, the overwhelming response is ‘Cold Calling’. Prospecting is far more than cold calling: it can happen anywhere with new, existing or lapsed accounts – anywhere you are trying to uncover and develop new business opportunities.  And with social networks abounding, very few people ever have to make a true cold call.  See what I mean?

And so we enter the confusing world of …

Is your business Customer Focused & Customer Centric? Read Post »

Customers are in control of the buying process

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Complex Selling & Transactional Selling, Sales Results

In December 2012, we published the 12 Sales Trends Report for 2013 and released a brief summary of each trend. This month we are focusing on the Sales Trend “Customers in control of the buying process”.

It is good practice for salespeople to control the sales process. At least that is the conventional wisdom driving the way salespeople behave. Salespeople see themselves as experts, educators and advisors. They see their customers as ignorant and anxious recipients, waiting for their wisdom. The reality however is vastly different!

Customers aren’t waiting for salespeople …

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Questions deliver answers. What questions deliver sales?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Education in Sales, Sales Results

It is well known that questions deliver answers.  The real question in sales is ‘What questions deliver sales results?’

Asking questions and listening are at the heart of any effective selling situation.  Questioning and listening are critical; without them you have salespeople conducting monologues to an audience of bored, disengaged, frustrated customers.  Any self-respecting sales person couldn’t image not asking questions in a sales situation, yet many well intentioned salespeople still fail to sell effectively because of poor question choices.

is selling about making friends?

like me …

follow me …

tweet me …

poke me …

WHY?

Many salespeople describe themselves as ‘people …

Questions deliver answers. What questions deliver sales? Read Post »

Breaking the Chain of Ignorance – upping the pace of transformation

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Communication, Sales Driven Organisations, Sales Forecasting, Sales Measures - Inputs & Outputs, Success, Vision, Mission & Purpose

In December 2012, we published the 12 Sales Trends Report for 2013 and released a brief summary of each trend. This month we are focusing on the Sales Trend “Breaking the Chain of Ignorance – upping the pace of transformation”.

It is not enough to adapt to change, we need to keep ahead of the curve and continue to transform ourselves before the change arrives – opting to stay conservative will be a riskier strategy than taking risks to transform.  But the risks don’t need to come from the unknown.  The key to …

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Does your sales team or culture need a detox?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Ethics & Values, Sales Culture, Sales Psychology, Uncategorized

It doesn’t take much to sow the seeds of discontent in business today, and the potential for creating dysfunctional, “toxic” sales teams and culture is much easier than you think. There are so many things that can and do go wrong.

We at Barrett have met and worked with a great many sales teams across all sorts of industries over the years. In all honesty, we are yet to come across the ‘perfect’ sales team. That doesn’t mean to say that there aren’t great sales teams operating out there, because they do exist, but like every great team, their greatest can ebb …

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How many clients and sales are you losing out the back door?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brand & Reputation, Customer Service, Sales Culture, Sales Driven Organisations, Sales Forecasting, Sales Measures - Inputs & Outputs, Sales Pipeline

Are you aware that it is six (6) times more expensive to acquire a new client than it is to retain an existing client?

Keeping clients onboard and engaged with your business is just as important as your sales team finding new business sales with new and existing clients, however many businesses do not pay enough attention to the back end of their business leaving client retention to chance.

Have you ever mapped the whole value chain of your business and looked at where your clients engage with your company?

How many client touch points are there?

The more …

How many clients and sales are you losing out the back door? Read Post »

Delivering Real Value beyond Product & Price

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brand & Reputation, Business Acumen, Competition, Sales Forecasting, Sales Measures - Inputs & Outputs, Value Proposition & Value Add

In December 2012, we published the 12 Sales Trends Report for 2013 and released a brief summary of each trend. This month we are focusing on the Sales Trend “Delivering Real Value beyond product and price”.

For many years most of a product’s value came from the production processes that converted raw material into useful forms. Now real value is coming from supply chain logistics, partnership agreements, overall business improvements, shared innovations, technological improvements, styling features and other attributes that only people can create.

In the 21st Century the intangible is now more …

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Are your invisible sales managers losing you sales?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Sales Measures - Inputs & Outputs, Sales Results, Sales Skills

The number one priority for any sales manager is to lead and drive the effective sales performance of their sales team.  The only way a sales manager can achieve this is by being AVAILABLE and RESPONSIVE to his/her sales team.  What does this actually mean in real world terms?

This means getting out from behind your desk, ditching any excessive administration, leaving internal meetings and getting out in the field and working with your sales teams. If you want to drive and lift sales performance you need to be out …

Are your invisible sales managers losing you sales? Read Post »

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