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No matter what your line of work, one thing to always keep in mind is that you get paid consistent with you ability to solve problems. The more problems that you solve and the bigger that the problems that you solve are, the more that you will get paid.

Think about that the next time that your boss or your customer brings you a problem to solve. If you’re like most people, your inclination is probably to put up some resistance when confronted by a problem of some sort. Even if no one is accusing you directly of necessarily having caused the problem, our human nature is to become defensive and protective about our serenity. Our lives were going just fine before this situation reared it’s ugly head. But challenges are where the opportunities are. If it wasn’t for problems, most people wouldn’t have a job, because after all, that’s really what you’re paid for, to solve problems. And if you show a propensity for tackling problems that nobody else can tackle or wants to tackle, somebody’s going to notice you eventually.

Doctors solve health problems. Lawyers solve legal problems. Mechanics solve auto problems. Business people solve business problems. Average salespeople solve average business problems and get average pay. Good salespeople solve big business problems and make above average pay and great salespeople solve the biggest business problems and get paid handsomely and promoted often.

If your customers and prospects didn’t have any problems, they wouldn’t need your help. That’s what you’re there for. If they didn’t need you, they could just buy directly from the internet without any human interaction whatsoever and you wouldn’t have a job.

So the next time your boss or your client calls you with a problem situation, don’t let it bring you down. Just keep in mind that you’re working on building your skills as a big problem solver. And as you get better at solving business problems, the more money you will earn. The key word being “earn”.

Life is alot like golf in many ways.  First of all, the average golfer has a hard time making par.  That’s because we haven’t invested the time and the effort required in order to play the game at our highest level.  The typical golfer is a week-end hobbyist with very little professional training and a non-existent practice routine.  You can same the same about how most of us approach our careers.  We would much rather go home and watch television or surf the internet every day than invest any time in improving ourselves. 

Another observance that I have about golf is that in order to play well, you have to be loose, rather than tight.  By staying loose and not getting too tense, something happens during the swing that allows you to access some inner part of you that just “feels” right.  For one thing, a slower swing makes it easier to keep your eye on the ball as you strike it, a requisite for ensuring solid and accurate contact.  And for another thing, being loose while hitting the ball makes for a really nice feeling.  You golfers know what I’m talking about.  It’s when you’re the most loose that you hit those balls that keep you coming back.  That’s the way golf is supposed to be played and that’s also the way that life is supposed to be played.  Why would you want to go through life stressed out and tensed?  By staying loose and having fun, both life and golf are much more enjoyable. 

And another thing.  A round of golf takes a while to get through.  Eighteen holes takes approximately four hours, and then there’s the time spent eating and drinking after the game at the nineteenth hole.  I don’t know about you, but if I’m going to spend that much time with someone, then it better be people that I enjoy being around.  AFter all, at the end of the round, much like at the end of your life, what score your shot, or how much money you made isn’t really what it’s all about, is it?  It’s about trying your hardest to be your best, taking your time, enjoying your self and being surrounded by people that you love, enjoy and have fun being around.  
        

Good sales questions can help you better serve your prospects.  By understanding your prospects situation, you can better meet his needs, and the best way to understand his situation is by asking good, probing questions.  This is where a great salesperson separates himself from his competitors. 

If you just allow your prospects to control the selling process, and if they are talking to two or three of your competitors, the prospect is going to get the same information from everyone.   The only way that you can wrest control away from your prospect is by asking questions.  Whom ever is asking the questions is in control of the process. 

Plan your questions ahead of time.  Don’t wait til you are in front of the customer to come up with your questions.  With a little bit of pre-call research, you can anticipate your customers situation enough to have planned some good probing questions ahead of time. 

Your questions should be designed to get your customer to open up.  Most prospects won’t willing provide you with enough information to help you sell them.  That’s your job.  Most customers won’t come right out and tell you how good or how bad their company is doing.  How competitive they are in the market. Where their weak points are.  Some customers may not even know the answers to some of these questions and others won’t understand why the answers should have any affect on your services.  It is your job to make the customer understand and the most effective way to do that is by asking well thought-out, intelligent questions. 

 At the time of this writing, Tibet is under a great siege from the Chinese government.  Chinese military troops have been clashing with Lhasan protesters since March 10.  The clashes have turned deadly and the protests have spread to other provinces.  The Tibetan people are fighting to retain their culture.  Since the 1959 Chinese take over of Tibet, the Tibetan culture is disappearing.  It’s comparable to the way that the American Indians were conquered and subsequently vanquished to reservations in the late 19th century and the early 20th century.  Since then, of course the American Indian traditions and cultures have either changed dramatically or disappeared all together.  I hope we Americans can look back and see what a real tragedy that was for our entire country.  Once lost, like toothpaste in a tube, it can never be reclaimed. 

You may be wondering why I am even bothering writing about the Tibetan situation.  It’s on the other side of the world and it certainly doesn’t have anything to do with sales.  And on top of that, not only does it not concern you, but even if it did, you probably are thinking that there isn’t much that you can do.  Well, let me address all of these questions.

First of all, I am a passionate person.  Without passion, you cannot succeed at anything.  Whatever you decide to devote your time to, if you don’t do it with some passion, you will not be successful. One of my favorite sayings is “…if you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.”  

Second, you might not think that an event that is happening half-way around the world doesn’t impact you, but it does.  As John Doan put so beautifully:

…No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend’s or of thine own were. Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee…

And finally, what can you do about it?  All I ask if that you offer up a prayer to the Tibetan people.  A prayer of peace.  A prayer of hope and a prayer of charity.  Pray that the Chinese government find it in their hearts to prove their might to the world by their observance of love.  Pray that the world unites in their intention to create love and peace for the Tibetan people, the Chinese people and the world at large.

God Bless you all this Easter week-end. 

Nobody succeeds at anything their first attempt.  Or at least nothing significant and worthwhile, anyway.  Everybody fails at something, sometime.  And typically, many failures come at the beginning of a new venture.  But the biggest difference between success and failure is persistence and tenacity.  Just don’t give up!  There’s a old saying that goes something like this: “Defeat is only temporary.  It only become failure if you quit.” 

Sales is one of the hardest careers that you can have.  Especially when you first get started.  It’s so easy to think that you know everything and that everyone likes you.  There are also many misconceptions about sales, like salesman are born and not made or that you need to have a natural gift of gab in order to succeed in sales.  Neither of these two statements are even close to the truth.  Yes, some people do seem to be born with more likeability than others, but being liked can be learned.  And talking isn’t necessarily the best trait to have for a successful sales career.  In fact, sometimes it can work against you.  Listening is the greatest attribute that a master salesperson can possess and anyone can learn to listen.

My point is that before you will ever be successful in sales, you will more than likely be a failure first.  Early on in your new sales career, you will encounter many temporary defeats.  Nobody likes to lose.  What you do after you lose a few times is what determines your character and your character is what determines who you are.  If you fold up your tent and give up at the first sign of defeat, you will never learn from your mistakes. 

Fear is our greatest enemy regardless of the situation.  Fear is the invisible voice inside your head that wants to save you from future pain.  The problem is that in life, some pain is inevitable.  No one gets through life unscathed.  But if you listen to that voice in your head, it always blows the future pain our of proportion, because the pain is never as bad as your fears anticipate it will be.  But the thing to keep in mind about fear and pain is that the best lessons in our lives always come from our fiercest battles.  Remember, anything that doesn’t kill you only make you stronger.  So go ahead and make that sales call that you’ve been putting off and fearing.  After all, it’s not going to kill you.     

Written any cards or letters lately?  If you’re like most people, then probably not.  I mean, what’s the point you ask?  E-mails and faxes and telephone calls are much faster and much easier, right?  Well, that is precisely the point.  The fact that sitting down and actually taking the time to write a letter to your customer or to a prospect or just to a friend for that matter is sort of a hassle makes it have the impact that it has. 

I mean, think about it.  When was the last time you received a hand written letter from someone?  How did it make you feel?  The thought process when you get a letter from someone forces you to think about the person that sent it and that fact, in and of itself makes it worth the effort of the sender.

The art of letter writing is a lost art.  It’s an art worth reviving.  Try it.  It only takes a few minutes.  Pick someone special that you like and send them a hand written letter.  Share your thoughts with them.  It’s an intimate way of connecting with some one in a way that they will find pleasantly surprising.  Once you get into the habit, it could become addictive.  If you’re lucky, you might even get a letter back.  But don’t count on it.

Not all customers are created equal.  When it comes to profits and customers relationships, some customers are much more valuable to you than others are and vice versa, you are more valuable to some customers that you are to others.  In order to break out of the commodity price trap, you have to be able to create more value for your customer.  But you cannot create value unless you have access to your customer and you won’t get access to your customer unless you have a strong relationship. 

The more access you have to your customer, the more information about your customer that you have access to.  The more information that you have access to, the better able you will be at crafting a value creating proposal.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that some customers are easier to bond with than others.  Your ability to pinpoint which customers are willing to develop a relationship with you and which ones are not is your key to higher profitability.

You’ve heard of the 80/20 rule before.  The 80/20 rule applies to many situations.  For instance, on average, the top twenty percent of the salespeople in this country make about eighty percent of the sales.  Another example is that twenty percent of your customers account for eighty percent of your profits.  Using the 80/20 rule as a guide can help you decide which accounts to focus your resources of time, energy and effort.

Company culture is your window into your customers thought processes, their purchasing processes and also their relationship processes.  Company culture, for those unfamiliar with the term, is the overall psychological profile that a company has manifested through its employees by virtue of the management profile of the company leadership.  In other words, whatever characteristics the leadership of the company emphasizes to its employees will be the same profile exhibited by those employees to its vendors.  If top leadership emphasizes and rewards an open and accessible leadership style, then those traits tend to be inherited by the employees that work under them.  If the top leadership emphasizes closed thinking and protective politics, then the company culture will generally follow suit.  Sometimes by design, but mostly by accident, a company passes down their culture to their employees, simply by rewarding specific behaviors or sometimes by failure to reward other behaviors.

It can sometimes be easy to spot a company culture that isn’t very open to forging relationships.  The typical signs are low employee morale, lots of office politics and a self-centered psychology focused on individual goals rather than on corporate goals.  This type of company culture results into low profitability, low quality output and a commodity pricing mentality for their product offerings.  It should go without saying that if a company has a commodity pricing mentality for their own products and services, then their purchasing processes will also focus on commodity pricing mentality as well.  By recognizing your customers company culture, you can make better decisions on how much you want to allocate your time, energy and efforts.  The quicker you learn to recognize the culture of a commodity pricing mentality, the quicker you can decide to get out of the selling process before you’ve invested too many resources on a little or no profit account.  This frees you up to better focus your resources on the twenty percent of clients that understand that you have more value to offer them other than just the lowest price.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t ever go after any business with companies that are focused on commodity pricing.  This is just a way of helping you identify what type of purchasing thought processes that you are dealing with so that you can make the appropriate selling strategy.  Remember, according to the 20/80 rule, you will always have some portion of your clients that are transactional focused, meaning that they are only interested in price.  But by thinking about company cultures and how they affect your access into their business, you begin to recognize your ability to provide value creation solutions and you can re-allocate your time appropriately.  Ideally, you will probably want to spend eighty percent of your time with twenty percent of your customers.   

I’ve written a lot about customer relationships in the past.  But a good relationship with a customer or a prospect doesn’t guarantee automatic or continuous success for any new business negotiations.  A good relationship is only a doorway that gives you the opportunity to grant you the access that you need in order to probe for information and formulate a value proposition in order to better present your case.  The better the relationship, the better the information that you will have access to, the better the feedback that you will receive in order to formulate a better value proposition, which should all lead to you being able to present a better, stronger case for your customer to select you, your firm and your offering.

So at this point, there’s no further point in discussing your relationship to your customers anymore.  I hope it’s safe to assume that you understand the value of building strong customer relationships.  So let’s address how you can best utilize the access that a good relationship with your customers and prospects present.

Selling is all about information.  The better your information, the better the chance you have of making the sale.  If your information about your customers and prospects is better than your competitor’s information, then it stands to reason that your chances of winning more sales are also better than your competitor’s chances.  That is because if you are trying to make a fair profit then you need to be able to justify your price and the way that you justify your pricing is by creating value for your customers.  The more that you understand your customers, your customers buying motives, your customers business, your customers markets and customers competitors, the easier it will be for you to create a value proposition.   And you cannot possibly get all of this information without first having a strong relationship with your customers.   

Let’s talk briefly about a value proposition and what it means.  If you are in sales and you don’t understand what the term “value proposition” means, then I suggest that you do some more research in that area.  In fact, if you are involved in any facet of business, from accounting to operations, it’s imperative at some point that you understand a little bit about creating value propositions.  But that is fodder for another time.

Anyway, value propositions are ways that you can build up your product and/or services in the eyes of your customers and prospects by other means besides just lowering your price.  One example of a value proposition can be that your product has lower long-term maintenance costs than the competing offering of your competitors, which means a higher Return on Investment rate for your customer over the lifetime of your product.  This has the effect of long-term lower costs and higher savings overall to your customer.    

There are lots of other ways of creating value propositions, but that conversation is outside the scope of this discussion.  Suffice it to say, that as a salesperson, your job is to provide your customers with optimum business solutions to their problems and to do it in such a way that you can make a reasonable profit for you company.  Unless you want to just keep playing the pricing discount game, value propositions are your only other alternatives. 

So how do you decide what your value proposition will be?  That’s where your relationship comes in.  Through that door, a strong customer relationship is the access that you will need in order to gather enough information to formulate a strong value proposition.  Most customers won’t just come right out and tell you where their pain is.  In fact, without an existing relationship, you might not even get in the door at all.  But a strong relationship opens the door for an honest exchange of dialog.  The dialog provides information for you to find the customers “points of pain”.  Without knowing the points of pain, you cannot formulate a value proposition for your product offering and you are left to assume that only by lowering your price can you bring any value to your prospect and his firm.

Once you find their points of pain, you customize a proposition that emphasizes the value of your product offering.  Your relationship with your customer should also provide you with enough feedback so that you know if your solution is addressing the correct points of pain.  If your feedback is positive, then you are on track to making the sale, if it’s not so positive, then you need to revisit your solution and address the shortcoming by tweaking it some or by scrapping it entirely and starting over.  Either way, your relationship needs be strong enough or you won’t get sufficient feedback.   

Across the entire country, the rising price of gas and the record setting price of a barrel of oil has been front page news for the past few weeks, if not months.   

This Tuesday morning, when I first arrived at work, I was greeted with the news about a price increase in a different commodity, copper.  If you haven’t been paying attention, the price of all precious metals has under gone drastic increases just in the last few weeks.  Copper in and of itself is up more than 25% year to date, with the lion’s share of that increase coming within the last few weeks.  Gold, silver, platinum and aluminum have all followed similar patterns. 

Wednesday morning, I turned on my television just in time to hear the news that grocery prices were rising.  A gallon of milk is now more expensive than a gallon of gas, and I don’t have to tell you how expensive that is. 

Thursday morning there was even more bad news.  The stock market had taken a severe tumble the day before.  And to top it all off, there was an article in the Austin American’s Stateman today detailing the woes of the American dollar.  It seems that no one wants our dollar anymore. 

Where am I going with this?  Well, the reason that I’m telling you all of this is because it’s an election year and I want to make something perfectly clear.  “It’s the economy, stupid.” 

Don’t let yourself be swayed at the voting booth by political rhetoric about abortion or race or religion or gun control or any other sleight-of-hand issues.  Owing a gun won’t protect you from political tyrants.  There are so many guns and gun owners in the United States and little by little we’re still losing our country and our right to self-determination, not to a military coup, but to shysters and swindlers with a pen and a suit. 

So I want to urge you to vote with your pocket book.  The middle class in this country is shrinking and the amount of people living paycheck to paycheck keeps on growing, and yet, election after election we let ourselves be side-tracked by political issues that have very little impact on our daily lives and our quality of life.

It’s been a while since I’ve touted a new book in my blog, but I’m in the middle of reading a great sales book and I just couldn’t wait to get to the end before I told you about it.  It’s called What The Customer Wants You to Know by Ram Charan.  If you’ve never heard of Ram, he is a former CEO of Honeywell and has co-authored two great books with Larry Bossidy, former CEO of Allied Signal and C-executive of GE.  Larry and Ram’s books are Execution and Confronting Reality, both excellent books and must reads for business managers.  Execution was written first and is about operations and Confronting Reality is about Business Models and and plotting business strategies.  Being a big fan, I was suprized to find Ram had written a book about sales.  Nothing that I have ever read by him indicated a background in sales, but since his other books were so inciteful, I decided to puruse it and I liked what I read. 

It’s a very short book, less than 200 hundred pages, and the book itself is very small.  But I am only up to Chapter 4 and it’s very informative.  One of the main reasons that I decided to invest in the book was because I thought it might give me a bird’s eye view into the world of selling into the C-Level of companies, since Ram is a former CEO.  I hit the bulls-eye.  It builds on what I have always preached and practice, relationship selling and goes even further.  The book articulates much of what I have already been practicing in my sales career, but it crystalizes the process by focusing on Value Creation.  Focusing on your customer’s customer is one example of how you would create value for your product or service offering. 

As a student of sales, I’m always looking for ways to enhance my value to my customers.  If you want to move away from selling commodities and chasing RFP’s, What The Customer Wants You To Know is a must read.