The Sales Valley of Death
Sales cannot run like a manufacturing production line. We are not making industrial cheese here. This is more like an artisanal pursuit, closer to art than science. Yet, every sales force on the planet has targets which are usually uniform. Each month, the sales team has to deliver a specified amount of revenue, rolling up into a pre-determined annual target. The construct may be logical, but sales is far from logical, as it is steeped in emotion, luck and magic.
Having said that though, sales is also a numbers game and to some extent pseudo-scientific. There are accepted algorithms which apply. You call a certain number of people, speak to a lesser number, meet a few and from that residual group, you conclude an agreement. There are ratios, which when calculated over time, apply as averages linking activity with results. So we call 100 people, speak to 80, see 20, strike a deal with 5. In this construct, to make one sale, on average we need to call 20 people.
With this type of precision available, you would think that we could industrialise the sales process and confidently set annual targets, neatly divided into units of 12, to arrive at a consistent steam of revenue achievement. Sales managers would be multi-tasking, sipping their afternoon martinis, propping their cowboy boots on the desk and carefully calculating their next car upgrade, as the sales team obligingly track to the revenue plan.
Sadly, it doesn't work like this. Sales flow without rhyme or reason, some months exceeding the target and other months missing it completely. Some sales colleagues are precociously consistent producers and others are annoyingly unpredictable and some are just annoying because they don’t seem to be doing much at all. Why is there this perplexing inability to automate the production of results? The valley of sales death is the problem.
This is the plunge between sales peaks. It is the lull in the fighting, the quiet before the storm, the brief interlude in the phony war of sales. Sales people work hard, usually because they are on commission structures which guarantee not very much if you don’t produce. Japan is a little different - basically here it is either a base and commission or straight salary and bonus system. Few sales people in Japan are on 100% commission. Why? Because they don’t have to and the Japanese preference for risk aversion means forget it! Nevertheless, they know they have to produce, so they tend to be diligent.
Commission structures vary but many “industrial structures” specify that you have to hit a monthly or quarterly target before your commission kicks in. If this is too industrial, it may fail to take into account seasonal downturns, because each target unit is the same throughout the year. This is hardly motivating and probably needs a bit more nuance around expectations and reality.
Sales people cannot be consistently successful unless they have two great professional skills. They must be machine-like time managers and they must also be highly disciplined. The two interlock. The ebb and flow of sales is based around customer activity. Networking, cold calling, following up with previous clients, chasing leads which come through marketing activities etc., all of this takes considerable time.
If we pump out enough client contact activity we will get appointments, sales and therefore generate follow up. Time starts to disappear from the mining activities that made us active in the first place. We can’t do the prospecting work, because we are too busy executing the follow up. Once the fog of being busy clears though, we suddenly see that we have a very pitiful pipeline ahead of us. So we work like a demon again to kick start generating new leads.
Downturns in activity lead to massive holes in revenue. This is the Sales Valley of Death. It is the messy counter point to industrial sales production, which is consistent, predictable, uniform, and when graphed for boss presentations, is beautifully shaped, balanced and ascetically pleasing to upper management.
To avoid this valley phenomenon, we need to make time to keep prospecting every week. Hence the requirement for excellent time management skills and the discipline to make sure we are doing it every single week. Otherwise, we find our time for pipeline development is stolen away by client demands, emergencies, mistake correction, more detailed discussions and results follow up with the buyer.
Sales people who do not block out time in their diaries for prospecting everyday will be Death Valley dwellers in short order. They will be joined there by those who don’t plan their day in detail. That means planning the necessary activities with numbered action priorities. Winging it, being “spontaneous”, living in the moment unshackled from schedules are all delusional activities which cannot be part a successful sales life.
If we don’t wish to enter the Sales Valley of Death, we must block time for prospecting and craft a carefully prioritised daily To Do list. Failure here is permanent, because the consistency of production will elude us forever. We will get lost in the harsh environment of the valley and perish by the wayside bleached bones in the sand.
Let’s commit to build the pipeline every day and avoid the Sales Valley of Death at all costs.
Action Steps
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcast “THE Leadership Japan Series”, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
Let’s Go For The Sale’s Bull’s-eye
Sale’s solutions are what make the business world thrive. The client has a problem and we fix it, our goods or services are delivered, outcomes are achieved and everybody wins. In a lot of cases however these are only partial wins. Problems and issues are a bit like icebergs – there is a lot more going on below the surface than can be spotted from the captain’s bridge. The salesperson’s role is to go after the whole iceberg and not just the obvious bit floating above the waterline.
The standard sales interview is based on two models comprising the outer circles surrounding a bull’s-eye. The extreme periphery is the “telling is selling” model. This ensures the salesperson does most of the talking. The client is subjected to a constant bombardment of features, until they either buy, die or retreat. The second model, the inner circle adjoining the bull’s-eye, is the solution model of providing outcomes that best serve the client, based on what the client has understood is their problem.
The latter is a much better tool and is in pristine condition because so few salespeople use it. The rapid fire of features at the client, rarely provides success because of the randomness of the proffering of alternatives. Welcome to the “toss enough mud at the wall and some is bound to stick” School of Sales. Aligning the fix with the client need in the solution model is the mark of the semi-professional. There is nothing wrong with this model but what are the rock star sales masters doing?
They are zipping up their wetsuits and diving into the icy water under the iceberg, inspecting things closely and really understanding the full scope of the situation. They are on a mission to try and find what nobody else is seeing. Their ability to deliver previously unseen, unconsidered insights is pure gold for clients.
Mentally picture our big red bull’s-eye at the center of a series of concentric circles. Stating the features of a product or service is the first level, the very outer circle. Our solutions constructed around what the client knows already is the next inner circle. The highest level is providing solutions for problems that the client isn’t even aware of yet.
A truly magical client statement would be: “Oh, I hadn’t thought of that or allowed for it!”. Think about your own experience. Anytime we have been a buyer and have uttered those words to ourselves, as a result of insight from the salesperson, we have experienced a major breakthrough in our world view. Now that is the bull’s-eye we want right there.
The salesperson who can provide that type of perspective, alerting clients to over-the-horizon issues, provides such value that they quickly become the client’s trusted business partner. Be it in archery or business, hitting the bull’s-eye is no easy matter. Insight can’t be plucked from the air at will. Plumbing one’s experiences, sorting and sifting for corresponding relevancies and then diving deeply into the client’s world looking for alignment are the skills required.
In a way, ignorance is an advantage. Paraphrasing Peter Drucker, our success can come by asking a lot of “stupid” questions. A salesperson has an outside perspective, untainted and pure. There is no inner veil obscuring the view, no preconceived notions or ironclad assumptions clouding judgment.
Counter intuitively, the fact that we don’t know, what we don’t know, becomes our strength. Ignorance allows us to question orthodoxy in a way that insiders can’t because of inertia, groupthink, company culture or the internal politics of the organization.
When salespeople serve numerous clients, be it in the same industry or across industries, they pick up vital strategic and tactical commercial intelligence. Researching various client’s problems, experiences, triumphs and disasters is valuable – but only if you know how to process the detail.
In all of our companies, we can only see clearly what we are doing ourselves. We all exemplify that Japanese saying: “the frog in the well does not know the ocean”. Everything is too familiar and so we don’t ever question everyday normality. We don’t have the opportunity to peak behind the curtain and look into what our competitors are doing.
It is also very rare for company personnel to do study tours of totally unrelated businesses. If we classified industries alphabetically, in a standard business setting, representatives from A and Z would rarely meet, let alone get to trade ideas and experiences. Salespeople however are floating around businesses and therefore able to know many wells and oceans. The ability to select and apply one particularly successful thing in a different context is a commercially valuable skill.
How can salespeople get that skill? Some ways salespeople can provide over-the-horizon value include being highly observant. Take what you have seen working elsewhere for one client, in a different company or industry and then apply it for your current client. Sounds rather easy doesn’t it. The reality is pressured salespeople miss much, record little, remember less and blag their way through most of their client meetings. Let’s all slow down, listen, think, and then innovate. The answers are often right there, but we miss out because we are too busy and not looking for them.
Another way to get that skill is to do practical research. Based on what you already know, build up a point of view on an industry, check it against what your clients are telling you (or conduct company surveys). Delve into nascent potential problems, arrive at your hypothesis and be the first mover. The real time insight garnered from this type of activity, allows salespeople to become rockstars in the business world. They are providing “take it to the bank” added value for the buyer.
We won’t always be able to conjure up a bull’s-eye. However, in trying to do so, our aspirations, general direction and thinking will be correct. Our kokorogamae (心構え) or true intention will be on track. By comparison, our competitors will lag well behind, still waffling on about features or playing detective interrogating clients. We have to move on to a higher dimension, where clients seek us out. They do so because they recognize the value of what we offer. In sales, the inner-most circle, the big red bull’s-eye, leads straight to the winner’s circle and that is where we must be. Let’s make “insight” our springboard to success.
Action Steps
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcast “THE Leadership Japan Series”, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
Selling Ain’t Telling
He slid effortlessly into the chair and before I knew it, he had popped open the oyster shell of his laptop and was pointing his screen menacingly in my direction. Uh oh! Powerpoint slide after powerpoint slide bombarded me with detailed data, specs, diagrams and text information. After 20 minutes he stopped the torture. “Wow”, I thought, “he hasn’t managed to ask me even one teensy question during this session of our first meeting”. His business card announced he was the Sales Director – that seemed a definite worry if he was responsible for others.
The irony of this sales presentation was that I had requested it. I was in fact, a hot prospect. I had heard his President at a function talking about the new whizbang service their firm offered and I was intrigued. So intrigued, I approached the speaker and asked that he send one of his crew over to see me.
I should have suspected something was amiss though, by the reaction of the President when I made my “visit me” request. Did he become buoyant with anticipation of a sale and reassure me that this product was the best thing since sliced bred? Surprisingly aloof, I found him, in fact almost disinterested. Was this a Nordic thing, I wondered or just his personality? I will never know, but what I did think to myself was, how important it is in sales to be positive and upbeat about your product at all times.
So back at the meeting, after a death of a thousand powerpoints, I miraculously revived and questioned the Sales Director. Why? Well despite his incompetence, I still had a need. In the end though, I was not a buyer.
What could he have done with me? He could have asked me a few questions to ascertain what I was interested in. He could have holstered his weapon before drilling me with detail, dross and pap. Of the ten functionalities of the whizbang, there were only two or three that were of any match with what I needed. We could have dispensed with all the irrelevant detail and gone straight to the finish line with the “hotties”. We could have spent the bulk of our time talking about the aspects which were most likely to lead to a sale. We had limited time and he limited his own chances of gaining a new client by telling me everything, instead of only those things I needed to know, to make a buying decision.
Reading this little vignette, I hope you take immediate action and self-audit whether you are any better at questioning than this guy? Do you have a sales process in place. Are you spending the bulk of the client interface time, laser focused on where they have the greatest likelihood of success?
If you are a “teller”, then here is a simple questioning step formula that will help you get to the heart of the matter and uncover where you can be of the most assistance to the client. Start with either where the client is now or where they want to be – it doesn’t really matter which one you ask first. This is because what we are trying to understand is how big is the gap between “As Is” and “Should Be”. By the way, unless the sense of immediacy about closing that gap is there, then there will probably be “no sale” today. Clients are never on the our salesperson schedule and will take no action, unless they clearly understand there is a benefit to doing so.
Having plumbed the parameters of the current and ideal situation, next enquire about why they haven’t fixed the issue already. This is an excellent Barrier Question and depending on the answer, you might be the solution to fix what they cannot do by themselves.
Finally, check on how this would help them personally – what is the Payoff? They may need this fix to keep their job, hit their targets, get a bonus, get a promotion, feel job satisfaction, rally the troops – there are a myriad of potential motivators.
Why would that particular question be important? When we come to explain the solution to the problem, being able to address their closely held personal win, helps to make the solution conversation more real and relevant.
If my sales Powerpoint maestro had applied some of these basics, he may have had a sale that day. He was in his forties, so one can expect that he has probably been repeating this same flawed performance for decades. Adding it all up, the total amount of lost sales over that period would be mind boggling. Such a shame really and so unnecessary. If you want to see revenues go up, ask clients questions, before you mention one word about your magical widget. Do this one simple thing and watch the difference.
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcast “THE Leadership Japan Series”, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
Principled Salespeople Win
In 1936 an unknown author, despite many frustrating years of writing drafts and receiving publisher rejections, finally managed to get his manuscript taken up by a major publishing house. That book became a classic in the pantheon of self-help books – “How to Win Friends and Influence People”. Surprisingly, many people in sales have never read this work. Plato, Socrates, Marcus Aurelius etc., were all around substantially prior to 1936 and we still plumb their insights. Dale Carnegie has definitely joined that circle of established thinkers, offering wisdom and valuable ideas. His aim was to help all of us be better with each other, particularly in a business context. He did this by laying down some principles, which will make us more successful in dealing with others, especially those people not like us.
Salespeople should definitely be friendly. Ancient Chinese wisdom noted, “ a man who cannot smile should not open a shop”. What this is saying is there are some pretty basic things we must do to be successful with people. We know all of this, but we forget or even worse, we know but we don’t apply our knowledge. Here are nine principles for helping us all to become friendlier with our clients.
Become genuinely interested in other people
Our buyers are actually more interested in what we know about what they want, than in what we know about our product or service. It is a common mistake though to be wrapped up in the features of our offering and lose focus on the person buying it and what they want. At the extreme, transactional thinking means you don’t care about the individual, you only care about their money from the sale. That is the hyper short career in sales option.
For a long career, we better get busy really understanding our clients. The key word in this principle is ”genuine”. Having a correct kokorogamae or true intention, means we will be honestly focused on understanding the client so that we can really serve them and build a partnership. We must be fully focused on their success, because wrapped up inside that outcome is our own success.
Talk in terms of the other person’s interests
Salespeople have a self-defeating habit of selective listening and selective conversation around what they want to talk about. Their kokorogamae is centered around their interests and the buyer’s interests are secondary. Sales talk is a misnomer - there is no sales talk. There are well designed questions and there are carefully crafted explanations around solution delivery, which are tightly tied back to what the buyer is interested in. Questions uncover interests and with laser beam focus, that is the only thing we talk about.
Sounds simple, but salespeople love to talk, they love the sound of their own voice and they become deaf to the client, often without even realising it. Check yourself during your next client conversation – imagine we were to create a transcript of your words, would they be 100% addressed to the buyer’s interests. If not, then stop blathering and start talking in terms of their interests. By the way, Japanese buyers are rarely uncomfortable with silence, so don’t feel pressured to fill the conversation gaps with pap!
Be a good listener. Encourage the other person to talk about themselves
Good listening means listening for what is not being said, as well as what we are hearing. It means not pretending to be listening, while we secretly think of our soon to be unveiled brilliant response, witticism or repartee. It means not suddenly getting sidetracked by a single piece of key information, but taking in the whole of what is being conveyed. It means listening with your eyes – reading the body language and checking it against the words being offered.
Talkative salespeople miss so much key client information and then scratch their heads as to why they can’t be more successful in selling. The client doesn’t have the handy dandy sales handbook, where the questioning sequences are nicely aligned and arranged for maximum efficiency. Instead the client conversation wanders all over the place, lurching from one topic to another, without any compunction.
I am just like that as a buyer. I have so many interests and will happily digress on the digressions of the digressions! Well designed questions from the salesperson keeps the whole thing on track and allows the client to speak about themselves at length. In those offerings from the buyer we learn so much about their values, interests, absolute must haves, their desirables, their primary interests and their dominant buying motives.
Japanese buyers usually need a level of trust to be developed, before they may open up and talk about themselves. It is exceedingly rare to wrap up an agreement in Japan with just one meeting. So salespeople, play the long game here and don’t be in a rush. We are limbering up for a marathon, not a sprint in Japan.
Arouse in the other person an eager want
This is not huckster, carnival barker manipulation. This is becoming a great communicator, someone who can arouse passion and enthusiasm in others. Sales is the transfer of enthusiasm, based on the salesperson’s belief in the “righteousness” of doing good, through supplying offerings that really help the buyer and their business.
One of the biggest barriers to success in sales is client inertia. They keep doing what they have always done, in the same way and get the same results. Our job is to shake that equation up and help them to get a better result, through doing something new – buying our product or service.
We have to help them overcome their fears and persuade them to take action. In Japan there is a penalty for action if something fails and less of a penalty associated with inaction, so the bias here is to do nothing. Having a need and taking immediate action are not connected in the client’s mind, until we connect them. We have to fully explain the opportunity cost of no decision, no action or no response to our proposal.
We achieve all of this by using well thought out questions, which lead the buyer to draw the same conclusion that we have come to – that our offering is what they need and that they need it right now. This Socratic method of asking questions works because it helps to clarify the buyer’s own thinking. Most salespeople don’t ask any enough questions, because they are too busy talking about the features of their widget. We can arouse an eager want if we frame the questions well.
Let the other person feel that the idea is his or hers
Telling is not selling. Ramming our proposal down the client’s throat is not selling. Being bombastic and dogged is not selling. Naturally, we will always have more information, data and knowledge about our solution than the client. Blabbing on about the fine detail won’t persuade the client to buy. Often Japanese buyers expect a sales “lecture” on the proposal, so they can slip into the role of the critic. Avoid that scenario at all costs. All you will get out of that type of meeting is the thin cheap green tea being served and little more. Instead, go and find some buyers who will accept your questions.
We all own the world we help to create. Our job is to help the client create a world we can share, that they feel deeply connected to and about which they feel some ownership. If I tell you some worthy insight I still own it. If I ask questions that spur your thinking and help you to garner some of those “lightbulb” moments, then you own that insight. We are always more likely to execute on our own ideas than other people’s.
Sales is about assisting client’s to see possibilities they haven’t considered. We have probably all had the experience of shopping for something and the store clerk’s explanation alerted us to something we hadn’t even considered, which immediately framed our subsequent approach to that purchase. This is the job of the salesperson – to help the client re-frame their worldview with rich and valuable insights that lead them to make the best buying decision – with us!
Try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view
We have reached the age we are today, built on a firm foundation of mistakes, errors of judgment and ineptitude. None of us were born perfect, we had to fail in order to learn what not to do, as well as what to do. We were not brilliant from the start with new tasks. We had to spend time to master the new and unfamiliar. In the beginning, we were inept until we gained some solid skills.
In other words, we are all hauling around prejudices, biases, painful memories and firm views on the world, built on our foundation of hard won experiences. Salespeople trying to inject their views into this construct, will feel like they are trying penetrate a block of marble. “Education” in the original Greek and Latin meant “to draw out”, not “inject in” information and ideas. We should embrace the classics and like Michelangelo, draw the hidden David out of the marble.
In order to be successful in doing this our communication skills are required to have empathy, to really get deep with the client’s worldview and experiences. We need to understand their concept’s creation platforms which reveal who they are today. Let’s get to know them at a more substantial level so that we really get where they are coming from and more importantly, we need to understand their WHY. Most Japanese buyers are not as open to being frank about what they want. To get there, we need to build trust through multiple meetings, big dabs of patience and a correct kokorogamae or true intention.
This requires we stop concentrating on ourselves and what we want and focus on the buyer instead. We need to suspend our own surety of our concept’s creation platform and see things fresh, in an open, unbiased way. When we can get that clarity, the words coming out of our mouths will be perfectly aligned with what resonates most deeply with the client’s needs and they will buy our offerings.
Get the other person saying, “yes, yes” immediately
“Yes momentum” is an old idea in sales. It works on the psychological principle that a series of positive responses will lead to an acceptance of our offer. A simplistic understanding of this idea would see our hearty sales hero designing a long set of killer questions, the only logical answer to which must be expressed in the affirmative.
For example, asking a question such as, “if you were able to reduce costs, would this be of help to your business?”. Everyone wants to save costs in business, so the only answer is yes. The problem with this type of approach is it becomes manipulative, as the salesperson belts a whole series of these “can only be answered by yes” questions.
It reminds me on those nodding animals in the back of cars, that bob up and down with the ride. Expecting to fast track your way into a sale through this client head bobbing subterfuge is a misunderstanding of the principle. The latter is saying let’s get “yes, yes” responses immediately, but not exclusively. In the Japanese language Hai means “yes”, but this is the “yes” of I hear you, not the “yes” of I agree with you. We need to understand this and ask the question in a way that differentiates between the two responses.
We do want to design questions that help the buyer clarify their thinking about our proposition. We should start with one or two “yes” questions that narrow the focus down to a positive investigation of the value of our solution, when judged against all the alternatives. It should not become a “Yesfest” though.
After getting some positive responses we should begin asking the WHY behind the response. This helps us to dig deeper into the drivers of an affirmative decision. Clients, as mentioned, will wander all over the prairie once they get going, so we have to shepherd them back on topic. A good way to do that is to ask a closed question to which they can easily answer yes. Now we can keep the conversation moving in the right direction, without the whole process being manipulative. “Yes momentum” – yes, but in moderation is the better approach.
Be sympathetic with the other person’s ideas and desires
Understanding the dominant buying motive of the buyer is the Holy Grail of sales. Of course we need to know the primary buying motive – the WHAT, but to really serve the client we need to know the WHY. In particular, how will this buying decision advance their career or their business? Where can we fit in, to become a booster for their success?
Risk aversion is a strong emotion in all of us, especially among Japanese buyers, concerning the buying process. We have all been burnt at some stage through a purchase that failed to satisfy us and which we immediately regretted. We paid too much or it broke straight away and the sales person’s spiffy spiel wasn’t matched by the good’s performance. Some people may have an MBA, but we all have an MS - an advanced Master’s Degree in Skepticism. The Japanese buyers by the way all seem to have a PhD in Skepticism Of Sales People, especially foreign sales people.
As salespeople, we need to be mindful of the client’s emotions and find ways to legitimately prove our solution will not disappoint. The client’s desire is to improve or defend their situation – no one wishes to go backwards in business. They have their own ideas about how that is done best and our job is to find out WHAT they think and WHY they think it. We may have reached a different conclusion on the HOW, but by understanding what is driving them, we can more easily explain where our solution gels with what they want to achieve. Getting them to do most of the talking and by prompting new thoughts through great questions, we can make that happen.
Dramatise your ideas
When we pick up the phone to speak with our client or when we sit down in the meeting room with them, they are bursting at the seams with “stuff” in their heads. They are wrestling with what happened yesterday, what they have to get through today and worrying about what will happen tomorrow. These days, we are all having much more face-to-device time than face-to face time. There is no down time any more, as we slip out our phone to check everything we ever wanted to know and lot of things we don’t need to know. Salespeople are competing for client brain space with all of this internal “noise”.
We need to be primed to break through all the clutter and grab the client’s attention or we will never be able to sell our wares. We need to be working out how our client likes to be communicated with. Are they micro or macro focused? Are they interested in people or task outcomes? Once we have established the form of communication which best resonates with them, we should be looking for various ways to dramatise our recommendations.
Verbal word picture drawing is a great skill for a salesperson, as we choose evocative words that our listener can see in their minds eye. Collect “power words” that you can pepper your sales explanation with, in order to register the greatest reaction with the buyer. We need to become great story tellers with lots of “colour and movement” to grab their nanosecond attention spans. In regards to the delivery it may vary quit a bit. We may be very direct or we may be very thoughtful in our expression, according to the client’s preferred style of communication.
We are giving them the floor for the bulk of the meeting time, so we have only a limited window for our words, so we need to be very deliberate in what we are going to say. Salesperson blarney is a thing of the past – you simply don’t have enough air time to blab on anymore. We need word injection precision when we speak.
The words themselves and the vocal range we use to articulate them, are both important. We need to use speed – fast and slow for emphasis. We need to put the power in for some words and take the power out entirely for others. Word emphasis can completely change the meaning of a sentence. Try this sentence: “I didn’t say he hit his friend”. Repeat the sentence seven times but on each occasion, emphasise one word, much more that all of the others. By doing this the inference of the words also changes. This simple exercise underlines that we have a powerful tool at our disposal – our voice. We also need facial expressions and gestures which are congruent with what we are saying and which add strength to amplify the key message.
Dale Carnegie was a leader in thinking about being good with people. His principles are universal and timeless. All of us in sales can adopt these principles and become more effective in our dealing with our buyers.
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcast “THE Leadership Japan Series”, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
Credibility Counts For Everything In Sales
Salespeople are carrying around a lot of baggage with them when they visit clients. The smooth talking, dodgy sales person trying to con us, is the folkloric villain of the piece. Reversing that doubt and hesitation is critical to gaining acceptance as a valuable business partner for the client. This entire problem is magnified when we meet the client for the first time.
Because the client’s don’t know us, their default position is one of caution and doubt. We have all grown up being rewarded for being risk averse and so we are resistant to change. The new salesperson represents “change” – because they are asking the client to buy something new or to change suppliers. So that we can properly serve them, we need to breakthrough that mental protective wall erected by the client and establish trust and credibility,.
Great – but how do we do that? Try crafting a Credibility Statement. This is a succinct summary that will grab the attention of the client and help to reduce their resistance to what we are offering.
It unfolds in four stages:
First we give an overview of the general benefits of what we do. For example, “Dale Carnegie Training helps to deliver the behavior change needed in the team that translates into improved results”. Next we need to quote some specific outcomes, as evidence that we are a credible supplier of services. So we now might say something like this, “An example of this was where we helped XYZ company, a very high end retailer with training their entire sales staff. They are now enjoying a 30% increase in sales”. Now, we introduce an important suggestion that makes this benefit and result summary relevant to the listener. “Maybe we could do the same for you?”
Finally, we need to create a “verbal bridge” so we can move on to questioning the client about what they need. In Japan, a lot of buyers expect to control proceedings, such that the seller turns up, gives their pitch and then the buyer happily shoots it full of holes. What Japanese buyers are doing is trying to ascertain the risk factor of what you are proposing, by disparaging everything you have just said. They now want you to provide answers that eliminate their fears. You are immediately on the back foot. The client, not you, is controlling the sales process. Good luck with that and let us know how that is working out for you?
To break this pattern (which has a very low success rate), we need to ask pertinent questions and find out what they really need. In order to do that, we need to get their permission to ask questions. This transition into the questioning part of the sales process is absolutely critical. Don’t miss this: in Japan the buyer is God. Hence, buyers here may feel our questions are impertinent, intrusive and unnecessary, so we must gain their permission to proceed.
Every single time I have been forced to just give my “pitch”, because the buyer has denied me the opportunity to ask questions, there has been no sale achieved. We need to better skilled, to get them to allow us to fully understand how we can best serve them. That is why we need to be asking questions and listening carefully to their answers.
So that we can make that transition, after saying “Maybe we could do the same for you?” , we softly mention, “In order to help me understand if we can do that or not, would you mind if I asked a few questions?”. We say this, almost as a throw away line. No big deal, nothing to see here.
When they agree, we are now free to explore in detail their current situation, what they aspire to, what is holding them back and what would success mean to them personally. If you don’t ask these questions you have little chance of convincing the client you can help them solve their problems.
Amazingly, the majority of sales people don’t ask any questions, but just blab on about the features of their product. I had a sales presentation given to me recently here in Tokyo by the Sales Director of a software vendor and after some initial pleasantries, he plunged straight into walking me through his powerpoint presentation of the functionality of his solution. Forty minutes later he finished. Not one question about my needs or about my difficulties – nothing. Amazing – he was an experienced guy who had always been in sales! Come on - as salespeople, we all have to do a lot better than that!
So putting it all together, the sequence flow would be like this: “Dale Carnegie Training helps to deliver the behavior change needed in the team that translates into improved results. An example of this was where we helped a very high-end retailer with training their entire sales staff and they are enjoying a 30% increase in sales. Maybe we could do the same for you. In order to help me understand if we can do that or not, would you mind if I asked a few questions?”.
This Credibility Statement should be short (under 30 seconds), delivered fluently and confidently (no Ums and Ahs). This takes a lot of preparation and practice because it is so short. Every word is vital in the design stage and we must deliver it perfectly. It can also be multi-purposed as an ideal “elevator pitch” for those occasions when we have to briefly explain what we do. This might be face-to-face or over the phone.
If it is over the phone, then we would drop the permission to ask questions part and instead ask, “Are you available next Tuesday or is Thursday better?”. Unless your product is specifically suited to being sold in that way, don’t sell solutions over the phone. Instead, secure a day and a time to meet. That is all we should be aiming for – the appointment.
I was talking to some clients in the pharma industry and recently hospitals here in Tokyo are restricting salespeople to just one day a week to see the doctor. See the doctor being the key word here because they only get one minute of the doctors time! I gave them some Credibility Statement strategies for dealing with that nanosecond window using our Dale Carnegie sales system. What is said in that brief encounter has to have a hook so sufficiently attractive, the doctor wants to hear more. Therefore the design is so important and so is the delivery in this extreme case. Regardless of the industry, turning up and blurting out your random whatever is a joke. Are you properly planning your sales conversations or are you constantly winging it? Stop winging it and get serious about sales.
The driving objective of sales is to solve client’s problems. We need to establish the client relationship based on a professional, competent first impression. The Credibility Statement does just that and opens the door to permission to find the issues, offer solutions and serve as a trusted business partner.
So key action items from today:
Apply these ideas and join the top 1% of professionals in sales.
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcast “THE Leadership Japan Series”, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
Sales Certainty
The hardest sales job in the world is selling something you don’t believe in yourself. The acid test is would you sell this “whatever” to your grandmother? If the answer is no, then get out of there right now! It is rarely that clear cut though. The more important test is whether what you are selling solves the client’s problem or not. Selling clients on things that are not in their best interests is a formula for long-term failure and personal and professional brand suicide.
There are elements of the sales process which are so fundamental, you wonder why I would even bring them up. For example, believing in what you sell. There are lots of salespeople though, trapped in jobs where they don’t believe but keep selling. You don’t have to look far to find them. They are going through the motions but you never feel they have your best interests at heart. They usually don’t have any other sales process than blarney and BS. We may buy from these people, but we come to bitterly resent being conned and we don’t forgive or forget. Today with social media, your “crime” is soon broadcast far and wide, warning everyone to be very careful when dealing with the likes of you.
The more common problem is that they actually do believe in what they sell but they are not professional enough to be convincing in the sales conversation. They often have a sales personality deficiency, where they are not good with people or not good with different types of people. They get into sales by accident. They should have been screened out from the start but sadly the world is just not that logical.
When I joined Shinsei’s retail bank, I recognised immediately that 70% of the salespeople should never have been given a sales role. My brief was “we have 300 salespeople and we are not getting anywhere – come in and fix it”. The vast majority of people in the role of convincing wealthy Japanese customers to buy our financial products were really suffering. They lacked the communication skills, the people skills, the persuasion power, the warmth, the concern for the customer, etc., which they needed to be successful. Why on earth were they there then, you might ask?
Many of them had never been in a sales role, many had been in backroom jobs, never facing customers. When Shinsei moved all of the operations components out of the branches they gained tremendous efficiency. The operations part became centralised and worked like a charm, but the operations staff were still there and were given sales jobs. Disasterous for them! How about your sales team? Are all of your colleagues in the right role? Are you in the right role?
As Shinsei, we worked out who was best suited for a sales role and gave those people the proper training to equip them for success. The remainder were given a role elsewhere in the bank. What training did we give them? Before I arrived, mathematics was thought to be really important for bankers. It probably is for certain roles but the ability to ask good questions, to fully understand wealthy customer’s needs, was much more important. So was the understanding that first impressions should not be left to chance but need to be created. If I don’t like you or trust you, why would I want to buy anything from you?
At Dale Carnegie we do a lot of sales training and we see the same client issues come up continuously. Certainty around the thing being sold must be in evidence. Selling is the transfer of your enthusiasm for the product or service to the buyer. Your body language must naturally exude belief. Your face needs to be friendly. This sounds a bit ridiculous except that many people in sales roles don’t smile easily. They don’t exude warmth, coming across as cold, hard, clinical, mercenary and overly efficient. We all love to buy, but we hate being sold and “efficient” sales people make us nervous.
Fluency in communication is critical. Be it Japanese or English, a lot of “filler words” like Eeto, Anou , Um, Ah, etc., might help you to think of what you want to say next, but you come across as if you are not sure or convinced about what you are saying or proposing. We definitely don’t buy sales person uncertainty. Record your own sales conversations and check if what you are saying is coming out in a professional manner, bolstering the confidence of the buyer in what you are saying.
A totally canned sales speech is the opposite problem. I sold encyclopedias for Britannica as my first sales job and we had to pass a memory test, where we could recite the entire 20 minute presentation precisely. Having passed, we were then dropped off in a forlorn, working class outer suburb in my home town of Brisbane and turned loose on an unsuspecting public. There were no questions involved, but a lot of data dumping going on in that canned speech.
Astonishingly, despite all we know 40 years later, there are still people trying to make careers in sales while wading through minute after minute of the features of the “whatever”. Where are the client questions, the needs understanding, the explanation of the benefits, the application of the benefits, the evidence – the proper sales basics?
Success in sales is based on following a sales process. That process is based on three powerful foundations – your belief in what you are selling, your ability to fluently articulate back to the buyer what you heard they need and how your solution satisfies their need.
If you want to be successful in sales, make sure you introduce a proper sales process, get certainty, get fluency and get going!
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcast “THE Leadership Japan Series”, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
You Can’t Cold Call in Japan. Really?
The pressure for increasing results is not constant. It is just keeps surging “higher, faster, further”. We in the sales team do work hard. We are polite, conscientious, quite customer focused. Great! So why can’t we grow sales fast enough to meet our targets. What is the problem?
There are some simple reasons. Current customer numbers are too few. Current customer volumes are not growing. Current customer share of wallet is not changing. As sales we will often blame marketing for not generating new leads for our sales team to go after. We can be surprisingly terrific advocates for all the reasons the customer puts on the table about not being able to buy at all, buy now, or buy more. Blaming everyone else for insufficient sales volumes is a well developed skill here in Japan (and everywhere else salespeople walk the earth) .
Helpfully, your boss pipes up with a shiny idea: “what about going after new customers?” At this point marketing’s lack of lead generation gets recycled as our excuse. Innocently, your boss mention the “C” word! Shock, horror and pity drains the blood from the Sales Director’s face. “Don’t you know boss, this is Japan, you can’t do cold calling here”. Case closed.
Having been through this scenario a number of times here as the boss and having also seen plenty of cold calling getting done, “skeptical” doesn’t even come close to describing my reaction to this useful intervention to explain the finer points of Japan to me. Walking into a new organization with a crystal clear recollection of salespeople in the previous company, phones taped to their wrists so they get through their cold calls, always concentrates the mind in these circumstances.
What is usually meant is not that you can’t physically cold call companies here, but just the effectiveness is so low, it a major waste of time. This is too true, when the cold calling is done poorly.
Curiously, the same “experts” who tell you that you can’t cold call by phone, accept the tobikomi eigyo technique of just dropping in unexpectedly. Why suddenly turning up at a couple of companies and dropping off some business cards and literature in a day is thought to be more effective than sitting at desk and calling 100 prospects a day is a quaint curiosity.
This always reminds me of the same arguments you hear about you can’t get referrals in Japan. “Do you know anybody who might be interested in our widget?” must be one of the most criminal statements to ever escape from a salesperson’s lips. The problem is when the way you ask is rubbish, don’t be surprised with a pathetic result. Design is critical to increasing the success rate for cold calling and referrals. Amazingly, hardly any sales people ever plan their conversations. They just sashay from one failure to another wondering, why this approach doesn’t work.
Cold calling works much better when we are very clear about the outcome we can expect to achieve. There are products and services you can sell over the phone, however these are very, very, very few. The main aim should be securing a face-to-face appointment. That means you are only selling a date and time over the phone – nothing more.
Before you even get to that point, you need to be able to speak to the person who has the diary spot you want a piece of. There are armies of hapless young Japanese women occupying the bottom rungs of the machine, whose only joy in life is getting rid of salespeople like us trying to see the decision maker.
If you are persistent then they have this great technique of passing you over to the next most senior male in their section. Usually some spotty faced, no authority nobody completely afraid of their own shadow, and seemingly able to go to retirement, without ever having had to make a decision in their entire career.
This is where you need a blockbuster credibility statement that summarises who you are, why you are calling and why speaking to their boss will change the world. Design is everything. By the way, you only have to design the one credibility statement, because you use the same one on their boss when you eventually get through to them.
You might refer to some recent research you would like to share which will be a big help to their business now and into the future. You should mention that you can’t share it over the phone because you need to show it to them, to head off the “Well tell me now!” or “Email it to me!” comebacks.
This phone conversation might sound like this:
“Thank you for your time on the phone, I know you are super busy. We have just received the results of our global survey into the buying perspectives of your buyers. It was a global comparison that included Japan and the results are quite striking, especially for what are the key motivators for making purchasing decisions in Japan.
It also investigated where the buyers believe the industry is moving and this insight is very valuable to make sure we are always keeping in lockstep with the buyers, given business conditions constantly change. I can take you through the results, would this week suit or is next week better?”.
Or you might mention that you recently came across some ideas that seem to be working extremely well for others in their industry. If possible, mention actual numbers that you can later provide as concrete evidence when you meet. You need to refer to the cost of not speaking with you – the opportunity cost – of not investing 30 minutes with you. Fear of loss is a strong driver of action in some, often more so than greed for gain.
For example,
“Thank you for you time today, especially when you are so very busy. In our work, we are speaking with a wide variety of companies in many businesses. As a result we are constantly picking up industry insights and perspectives, which are not widely known or shared. I came across some information recently on key emerging trends, which have the potential to really make a difference in your industry.
The three companies I met have adopted some new approaches which have grown their collective market share by a factor of three times in the last six months. I can see why this is working so well for them and I thought this type of insight might also be of assistance for your business. The early movers are clearly going to take the lions share of the market as the industry changes. On the other hand, it looks like those late to the changes needed to be made will suffer. Is this week open or shall we meet next week?”
Only ever ask for 30 minutes – less sounds flakey and more sounds burdensome. Asking for “18 minutes” or “23 minutes” etc., sounds like you are a total conman, and warning lights and bells will go off in their head. If you can’t convince them face to face in 30 minutes to hear more, stop wasting everyone’s time and get off the phone and on to the next prospect. Often you go in expecting a short meeting because the prospect is super busy and has absolutely no time. They tell you they can hardly even spare 15 minutes and yet you find yourself discussing your solutions for the next 90 minutes!
The reason is simple – you are bringing value to their company to help them succeed. If we always have in our mind that “inside the client’s success is wrapped my own success” then we will be able to build trust and credibility.
What we say and how we say it will be congruent with putting the client’s success ahead of our own.
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcasts “THE Leadership Japan Series”, THE Sales Japan Series and THE Presentations Japan Series, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
How To Be Likeable and Trustworthy In Sales
The first few seconds decides all
It has always been astonishing to me how hopeless some salespeople are in Japan. Over the last 20 years, I have been through thousands of job interviews with salespeople. We teach sales for our clients and so as a training company we see the good, the bad and the ugly - a very broad gamut of salespeople. We also buy services and products ourselves and so are actively on the receiving end of the sales process. Well actually that is a blatant exaggeration. There are almost no salespeople operating in japan using a sales process. But there are millions of them just winging it (badly).
Why? On The Job Training (OJT) is the main training pedagogical system in Japan for training the new salesperson. This works well if your boss has a clue and knows about selling. Sadly, there are few sales leaders like that populating the Japan sales horizon. So what you get are hand-me-down “techniques” that are ineffective and then even worse, these techniques are poorly executed in the hands of the newbies.
We like to buy, but few of us want to be sold. We like to do business with people we like and trust. We will do business with people we don’t like and very, very rarely with people we don’t trust. Neither is our preference though. The million dollar question is, “what makes YOU likeable and trustworthy?’
Building rapport in the first meeting with a prospective client is a critical make or break for establishing likeability or trust. When you think about it, this is just the same as in a sales job interview. In both cases we enter an unfamiliar environment and greet strangers who are brimming over with preoccupation, doubt, uncertainty, reluctance and skepticism. If a sales person can’t handle a job interview and build rapport straight away, then it is unlikely they are doing much better out in the field, regardless of what is glowingly written down in the resume.
So what do we need to do? Strangely, we need to pay attention to our posture! Huh? It is common sense really - standing up straight communicates confidence. Also, bowing from a half leaning forward posture, especially while we are still on the move, makes us look weak and unconvincing. So walk in standing straight and tall, stop and then bow or shake hands depending on the circumstances. Smiling at the same time would also be good, depending on the situation..
If there is a handshake involved then, at least when dealing with foreigners, drop the dead fish (weak strength) grasp or the double hander (gripping the forearm with the other hand). The latter, is the classic insincere politician double hand grip.
Some Japanese businesspeople I have met, have become overly Westernised, in that they apply a bone crusher grip when shaking hands. Recently I have met a couple of Japanese businesswomen, who are trying to out man the men and are applying massive grip strength when shaking hands. It sounds very basic advice, but please teach your Japanese team how to shake hands properly. Too weak or too strong are unforced errors which impinge on building that all important first impression.
By the way, we probably only have a maximum of 7-10 seconds to get that first impression correct, so every second counts. We are all so quick to make snap judgments today, we just can’t leave anything to chance. When you first see the client, make eye contact. Don’t burn a hole in the recipient’s head, but hold eye contact at the start for around 6 seconds and SMILE. This conveys consideration, reliability, confidence – all attributes we are looking for in our business partners. We combine this with the greeting, the usual pleasantries – “Thank you for seeing me”, “Thank you for your time today”. Now, what comes next is very important.
We segue into establishing rapport through initial light conversation. Japan has some fairly unremarkable evergreens in this regard – usually talking about the weather or about the distance you have travelled to get here, etc., etc. Don’t go for these bromides. Try and differentiate yourself with something that is not anticipatory or standard.
Also be careful about complimenting a prominent feature of the lobby, office or the meeting room. I was in a brand new office the other day and they have a really impressive moss wall in the lobby. I will guarantee that my hosts have heard obvious comments about the moss wall from every visitor who has preceded me. “Wow, what an impressive moss wall ” or “Wow, that is a spectacular entry feature”. Boring!
Teach your salespeople to say something unexpected, intelligent and memorable. In this example, “Have you found that team motivation has lifted since you moved to this impressive new office?”, “Have you found your brand equity with your client’s has improved since moving here?”. This get’s the focus off you the salesperson and on to the client and their business. For example, if you are a training company like us, you definitely want to know how the team motivation is going, as you may have a solution for them.
Having a good stock of conversation starters should be basic for every salesperson. It might mean imparting some startling statistic that they may not have heard. For example, “I read recently that the number of young people aged 15-24 has halved over the last 20 years, are you concerned about future talent retention as demand exceeds supply?”.
We might educate the client with some industry information they may not be aware of but which would be deemed valuable. An example would be: “Dale Carnegie’s recent research into Engagement amongst employees found three critical factors impacting motivation. The relationship with the immediate supervisor, the team’s belief in the direction being set by senior management and the degree of pride in the organization – what are you seeing in your organisation around the area of engagement and motivation?”.
We face a lot of competition for the mindspace of our prospective clients. Busy people have a lot on their mind and we are an interruption in their day. Some of our prospective clients may be moving continuously from one meeting to another, so the attention span is shredded and the details begin to blur. They may have their eyes open but don’t imagine their mind is in the room and focused on you. To counteract that possible external pre-occupation and to get them back in the room with you, use a question.
If I suddenly asked you, “what month were you born in?”, I will guarantee I have your 100% attention. So questions are powerful disrupters of pre-occupation and we should have stock of little beauties we can wheel out when needed. For example, “most people I talk to say Abenomics is not having any significant impact on their business as yet. Have you seen any benefits yet?”.
Another might be, “My clients’ opinions seems to have changed – they are becoming more concerned about the possible future increase in consumption tax – is that an issue for your company?”. We want them talking about their business, because this is going to provide us with insights for a later line of questioning, as we try to uncover their performance gaps, needs, aspirations, etc.
The very first seconds of meeting someone are vital to building the right start to the business relationship. In modern commerce, we are all so judgmental and quick to make assumptions. Dressing the wrong way may even disqualify us before we get to open our mouths. Simple initial errors in posture, greetings and conversation can be our undoing. Let’s get the sales team’s basics right and make sure they totally nail that first impression.
So key action items from today:
This is the rapport building stage of the sales process and it is both a science and art we need to perfect.
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcasts “THE Leadership Japan Series”, THE Sales Japan Series and THE Presentations Japan Series, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.
Salespeople Need To Care
Do you subscribe to various sites that send you useful information, uplifting quotes etc? The following morsel popped into my inbox the other morning, “People don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care–Anonymous”. Wow! What a powerful reminder of the things that really matter in our interactions with others. This piece of sage advice should be metaphorically tattooed on to the brain of every single person involved in sales.
Don’t miss it – we all know selling stuff is a tough gig. Rejection is the normal response to our spiffy sales presentation and follow up offer. You have to be mentally tough to survive in a sales job. You need other things too. Product and technical knowledge is important. Total command of the detail is expected by clients. This has to be a given, so if you don’t know your stuff cold then get studying. However, we also need to be careful about what we focus on. Are we letting the product details and features confuse us about what selling is really all about?
I am a buyer too and am constantly amazed by what some people get up to. Some salespeople I have encountered remind me of an icy mammoth trapped in a time warp from the past, still trotting out the product brochure and seeing if I will go for one of their goodies? You don’t like that one, well then how about this one, or this one, or this one, ad nauseam? I want “blue” but they keep showing me 50 shades of “pink”. They are playing that pathetic, failed salesperson game named “process of elimination”. Why on earth are they doing this?
I want to buy, but are they really showing me they are focused on understanding me? Are they demonstrating to me that they foremost care about my benefit? Are they communicating to me that, “in your success Greg, is my success”? Or do they come across not with stars in their eyes, buy $$$$ signs?
I can recall seeing them sitting across the table from me, mentally salivating at the thought of the big fat commission this sales conversation is worth? I can sense they have already bought their new Beemer before the ink is dry on our agreement? Actually, there is no agreement, because I don’t buy from these types of amateur salespeople and that is the same reaction from most people.
The quote at the beginning, “People don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care” reminds me of a great Japanese word, which should be embraced by everyone in sales - kokorogamae (心構え).
It can be simply translated as “preparedness” but the Japanese nuance goes much deeper than that. Anyone studying a martial art or a traditional Japanese art (道) will immediately be on my wave length, when they hear this kokorogamae term. I would prefer to translate it as “getting your heart in order”.
This means to really hark back to your most basic principles of true intention. What we can call True North – the purity of our intention. What is the spark in our heart driving our behavior? Is it the money or is it the serving? Is it what we want or what the client wants? Is this going to be a long-term relationship or a fleeting transaction?
Salespeople need to start by searching their heart for their true intention. Huh? Does this sound a bit too “hug a tree” California emotional for you? Why do I recommend searching your heart? Because clients can sense your motivation isn’t centered on their best interests and therefore they won’t buy from you. The trust is never established.
Of course, there are the exceptions – the Hollywood image of the “smooth talking” salesperson who could sell you anything and will certainly try to. They are like skyrockets that initially blaze through the night and then explode! They are here for a good time not a long time and they give the profession of sales a bad brand.
The best Japanese salesperson I ever interviewed for a sales job was a criminal. The criminal part didn’t surface immediately, but came up later through some background checks (note to Sales Managers – do background checks!). He was absolutely brilliant in the first two interviews, polished, genius personified in the role play, and WOW, what a fantastic closer! I thought “Yes!” at last, I have found my perfect Japanese salesperson. Actually, he was a liar, a thief and a baddie. He had zero True North orientation and his kokorogamae was plain wrong. What a wake up and smell the coffee for me.
When you have the client’s best interests in mind, you do all the right things. You ask well designed questions to fully understand how best you can serve the buyer. You present your solution in such a way that the buyer feels this is exactly what I have been looking for. You calmly handle any hesitations or concerns from the client, reassuring them that what you have is exactly what they need. And you are confident to ask for the order. That is the sales professional in action
So let’s ignore the outliers, those riff raff of push sales and come back to the vast majority of salespeople who are not evil, just inept. Change your heart, focus on True North, purify your intentions, show you genuinely care about the buyer’s best interests before your own. If you do that every single time you meet a client, you will have get success in sales and build a power personal brand.
Action Steps
Engaged employees are self-motivated. The self-motivated are inspired. Inspired staff grow your business but are you inspiring them? We teach leaders and organisations how to inspire their people. Want to know how we do that? Contact me at greg.story@dalecarnegie.com
If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.
About The Author
Dr. Greg Story: President, Dale Carnegie Training Japan
In the course of his career Dr. Greg Story has moved from the academic world, to consulting, investments, trade representation, international diplomacy, retail banking and people development. Growing up in Brisbane, Australia he never imagined he would have a Ph.D. in Japanese decision-making and become a 30 year veteran of Japan.
A committed lifelong learner, through his published articles in the American, British and European Chamber journals, his videos and podcasts “THE Leadership Japan Series”, THE Sales Japan Series and THE Presentations Japan Series, he is a thought leader in the four critical areas for business people: leadership, communication, sales and presentations. Dr. Story is a popular keynote speaker, executive coach and trainer.
Since 1971, he has been a disciple of traditional Shitoryu Karate and is currently a 6th Dan. Bunbu Ryodo (文武両道-both pen & sword) is his mantra and he applies martial art philosophies and strategies to business.