Positive belief has a direct impact on everything we do in Telephone Sales. It will increase our motivation to achieve higher sales results and our drive to perform well on each telephone sales call. It will improve our skills and abilities with each potential customer – they will HEAR that we believe in our products, our Company and ourselves. It will increase our sense of achievement and job satisfaction. Above all, it will increase the number of sales we achieve each day, each week and each month.
Telephone Sales can be a tough game – monotonous, boring – even frightening! Whether it is incoming or outbound sales, we hearing negatives all day long –‘I’m not interested’, ‘You are too expensive’, ‘I like your competitor’ and worse!
Pretty soon the negativity gets inside the Sales Person, and deeply embedded in the Sales Team. No-one will ever buy from us; these prospects never buy anything; our products / services are no good anyway; our prices are far too high; we are working for a rotten company – and so on. When this happens, sales go down dramatically, and personnel start leaving. The low morale feels very powerful within the Team – something that can’t be changed. But it can!
How do we turn it round? We create a positive force field round ourselves and / or our Team. Negativity is powerful and comes from all directions. It is like a multi-faceted force field. We can’t combat it with a new monthly incentive – that is like throwing down a grain of sand to hold back the tide, it will not work.
Every good telephone sales person or sales team builds their positive belief force field. They work at it – it is planned, structured and managed. They identify each essential belief – each point in the force field – and they work actively at increasing each.
Some Positive Beliefs are critical to success in Telephone Sales – work on these essential beliefs first.
1.Belief that Prospect’s can and do buy. This is number 1 – if I don’t believe they will ever buy I won’t try to sell. People really do buy insurance, cars, cleaning products or whatever. They are definitely going to buy from some sales person – either you or a competitor, but they are going to buy. Collect stories, facts and figures that reinforce this message.
2. Belief that my product / service is of value – that it is worth buying. Good sales people have to be able to make themselves believe this fact to sell successfully. They gather positive evidence, learn every strength and benefit of their products, talk to Customers who are happy with their product /service and do everything they can to see the value of their products. They walk positive, talk positive and don’t let any negative thoughts take hold in their heads.
3. Belief that my product / service provides good value for money. The good sales person gathers evidence to confirm that the price of their products is fully justified – they get really comfortable knowing that we are worth every cent of this price. This belief requires constant effort – doing real research that shows the value of our products against our competitors.
4. Belief that success in Telephone Sales is about skills rather than luck – this one is critical to keep the Telephone Sales person motivated and continuously improving. The evidence that will support this belief are things like ‘war stories’ from the good sales person, new skills or techniques that are tried and found successful, Team workshops on our approach and techniques with customers etc.
5. Belief that I am good – I can sell. This is a personal ‘self talk’ issue – and every good sales person must work on this every day, every week. The best of the best can look so confident and perform so well – but they have their moments quaking in the wash room! What they have is the skills to build up their confidence – to tell themselves they are good, they are worth listening to and they have the skills to lead the prospect through the sale. Each will try different techniques each week to build this self-belief – work with your Team members to share these ideas.
It is really important for each sales person or sales manager to work brainstorm ideas to build positive belief – it work wonders on the bottom line!
Kate Tammemagi is a well respected Consultant and Trainer with Focus Training. She has extensive experience designing and delivering customized Telephone Sales Training Courses and Cross Sales Training.