Category Archives: Sales Skills Articles

There is an interesting phenomenon that you can observe in sales people. If the morning has proved extraordinarily successful for them, they tend to expend a little less effort on closing sales in the afternoon. They may call one customer less than they had planned, or show less persistence in securing an order. Remarkable! Normally…

In selling you can never rest on your laurels or past successes. You must constantly work on developing a sales plan that drives you forward to the next profitable sale. Our sales trainers have drawn up the following list of tips to help you improve your turnover and profit margin. (more…)

A lot has been written about managing Gen X – those born between the mid 1960’s and the early 1980’s. But less has been written about selling to Gen X. This blog addresses that gap. (more…)

Why do so many new sales people make such little use of the telephone as an aid to selling? The answer is because, like many people, they harbor a secret fear of the ‘phone. The reason for this is that they feel subconsciously that they lack the skills that will make them effective when using…

Customers are, quite rightly, cautious these days. If they have not purchased from your company before it is natural for them to feel that they are taking a risk when placing their first order with you. As a professional sales person you have to convince the new customer that the risk is slight in order…

In selling the results of your efforts are highly visible and your performance, whether superior or just average, easily measured. Sales managers know their sales people need to be highly motivated to achieve superior sales results. But sales people face many set-backs every day – the cancelled meeting, the smaller than expected order, a lost…

Despite the rise of the internet and improvements in mobile technology, there is still a need for sales people to visit their existing and prospective customers. This means that most sales people spend a large amount of their time “on the road”. Without effective journey planning a significant amount of “selling time” is lost. (more…)

Some sales people have fallen into bad habits, or have not been adequately trained, and so unconsciously use expressions when talking with their customers that have the effect of reducing the customer's receptivity to their sales presentation rather than building it. (more…)

Many sales people are very competent at presenting their product to a potential customer but are not so good at the stage in the sales discussion when it comes to presenting the price. This is particularly true where the price of the product they are trying to sell is relatively high. (more…)

If you sell products rather than services then the answer to the question “What do your customers buy from you?” would, at first sight, have a very simply answer: the product. But if we look at this question more carefully it quickly becomes apparent that this simplistic answer is, in fact, wrong. (more…)