The Golden Rule Of Personal Selling

THE GOLDEN RULE OF PERSONAL SELLING Personal selling refers to when a salesperson gets directly involved in helping a customer select a product and purchase it. It’s the opposite of impersonal selling, which is what happens online or in a supermarket where you make your own sales decisions by yourself. Golden rule selling is focused on the customer and his needs, rather than being focused on the salesperson’s desire to earn a commission. To improve your sales performance and become a better sales professional, adopt the Golden Rule mentality. The Golden Rule says to, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” It also says, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” The Golden Rule mentality in sales, says simply, “Sell unto others as you would have them sell unto you.” What does this mean? Aren’t there all kinds of different personalities that require different sales performance techniques? Well, yes and no. Practicing the golden rule in selling simply means that you sell to other people the way you would like to be sold to. The successful sales professional uses the golden rule to sell with the same honesty, integrity, understanding, empathy and thoughtfulness that they would like someone else to use in selling to them. – A strong Sales Belief.. – A willingness to go all out to help the prospect.. – Putting the needs of customers first.. – Totally committed and dedicated.. – Focus on customer’s expectation.. Three Types of Salespeople All salespeople can be grouped into one of three categories: 1. The Commodity Salesperson 2. The Price Salesperson 3. The Solution Value Salesperson  The Commodity Salesperson The Commodity Salesperson sells things which have features. This salesperson lacks in these key areas:  Fails to understand the problems of their prospects  Fails to make their company unique  Is an order taker rather than a true solution provider Commodity salespeople are easy to find and the need is decreasing as businesses are ordering via the internet, saving valuable time and money. In addition, companies do not have to pay sales commissions. And, finally, a commodity salesperson’s commissions generally do not increase because they have not learned the techniques of cross-selling and up-selling to a prospect, thereby losing valuable sales  The Price Salesperson The Price Salesperson really sells on having the best price … and if they do not have the lowest price, they will drop their price in order to get the sale. The price salesperson has these major flaws:  They do not truly understand that the best prospects actually want the best value, not the lowest price  They do not have enough confidence in themselves or their company, so the only way to win a sale is to offer the lowest price  They really do not understand that sometimes when a prospect says “your price is too high,” the prospect is giving them an objection to see how the salesperson will react Again, there will be little demand for the price salesperson in the future business world. Companies need to have profitable margins to reach their corporate goals and selling low price does not meet these objectives.  The Solution Value Salesperson The Solution Value Salesperson is truly unique and probably represents only 10-20% of all salespeople. Solution salespeople do not sell things or commodities – but they sell customized solutions to their prospects – realizing that every sale is really a solution to a problem. The solution salesperson also has these general characteristics:  Excels in the probing portion of a sales presentation, concentrating on finding problems that the prospect may have  Is very comfortable selling a service, realizing that is where the future growth is and that the commissions are generally higher than for selling most products  Realizes that by providing customized solutions, the prospect ends up buying vs. having the salesperson close the sale