Colleen’s Blog

There are still many sales leaders, sellers and companies that are not embracing social media. At this point in 2014, social media has been integrated heavily into our personal and professional lives. It’s no longer a “nice thing to have” but rather a necessity to reach maximum success with your sales. Here are a few common reasons that I hear for not using social media: It’s too difficult to learn My company bans social media at work My buyers are not on social media While these may seem like legitimate reasons to avoid social media at first, if you change your mindset and approach, you’ll realize that these issues can easily be overcome.

Have you ever lost contact with a client and wondered why? It’s easy to lose touch with people. We all have personal relationships that we wish we could maintain and nurture more often. But, when you allow your business relationships to fizzle out, it can have a negative impact on your career. Keeping regular contact with your clients is an essential practice for any successful salesperson. ← Click To Tweet How can you stay in touch with your clients on a regular basis? Try incorporating the following habits into your sales regimen:

Are you selling the same way you were five years ago? Many salespeople have not adapted with the times and have not updated their sales process. As a result, their sales are suffering and they’re not selling as much as they used to. When it comes to your sales processes, it’s important to constantly stay on top of what’s working and what is not. ← Click To Tweet That way, you can identify and stick with the strategies that yield the best results for you and kick the “sales trash” to the curb! Here are five common practices that, in my experience, hurt sales and are often not addressed by salespeople! If your sales results are struggling, consider reviewing these five practices and identify whether or not you have recently updated these points in your sales process.

Have you ever just wanted to fire a client? Perhaps they demanded too many things, were consistently rude, or did not fit well with you, your team or your services. While you are sometimes able to tweak your own services or set out guidelines that are mutually acceptable to all parties, there are times where you simply need to get rid of certain clients so you can focus on other customers who are more profitable on both a financial and a personal level. However, many salespeople are hesitant to fire a client because they don’t know how to approach the situation without the fear of burning bridges or causing a massive argument. These feelings are natural, but if a customer is taking time away dedicated to other areas of your business and causing massive headaches, it may be time to sever your business relationship. By following a few key steps, you can let go of customers easily without causing too much commotion.

You will often hear that the best way to maintain and grow your current client base is to ensure that you have the best product on the market, or the best customer service. While these factors surely contribute to client success and loyalty, they are hardly the most important factors. The best way to create client loyalty is by building and maintaining trust. ← Click To Tweet If you have average products and customer service yet you have built trust with your client, the likelihood is that they will still want to work with you. However, even with the best products on the market, you will be unable to maintain and grow your current client relationships if your clients do not trust you. There are two keys to building and maintaining trust with your clients. They are so simple, but they are often overlooked!

You did it. You made the sale. The paperwork has gone through and you’re ready to move on to the next prospect and close yet another deal. Little do you know, making the sale was the easy part, maintaining a mutually beneficial relationship with your new client is where things start to get messy. One of the biggest problems salespeople face is dealing with the amount of issues that come up with clients after the initial sale is made. Many clients can be high-maintenance, or can be difficult to please. The good news is you can take steps before the sale is made to ensure that you are drastically reducing the chances of such scenarios arising. 1) Don’t Sell To Everyone There is a certain amount of information you can gather about your prospect prior to making a sale. The problem is, salespeople get so wrapped up in trying to close a deal that they disregard their judgment as to whether or not the prospect will be a right fit. Don’t fall into this trap! Be confident enough in your own judgment and abilities to become selective with who you choose to work with. Think about it, if you make a sale with a client who wastes a considerable amount of time (you could be using to close more deals), is that initial sale even worth it?

You could be the world’s greatest salesperson selling the world’s best product, but if you can’t connect with your prospects, will your sales results reflect your expertise? If you can’t open a dialogue with prospective buyers, it becomes very difficult to sell a product or service! This is a common problem for many sales professionals, the inability to secure a conversation with potential customers. A certain feeling of frustration creeps in and it can become difficult to maintain the focus or motivation to keep trying. When you’re passionate about your product and its ability to help your prospect, the frustration tends to grow even more. Can you relate to these feelings? Chances are you have felt this frustration at one point or another. Want some good news? I have a few points worth discussing that will hopefully drive you to keep trying to initiate contact with your prospects:

You have the best product on the market, the best price, and the best service available. Yet, you still feel a void between yourself and your client. Emails and calls are short and to the point, and you may even feel anxious about your client ending the business relationship unexpectedly. You never really know where you stand with your client, professionally and personally. Have you felt like this before? I've said it before, and I'll say it again. What truly defines a great salesperson isn't what happens during the sales process, but what happens afterwards.