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B2B Sales Training & Performance Improvement

Sales Training Brisbane Sydney Melbourne
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Your clients want to be led

You may not believe it, but your clients want to be led. They want to follow you.

Of course they don’t want to follow you blindly.

They want to follow you because they believe you can help them.

When it comes to conducting sales conversations I find that many professionals, technical staff and business owners think, “I don’t want to be like a sales person”. So they stay quiet. They don’t probe. And they wait for the client to make a move.

That one negative thought has the potential to prevent professionals and technical people everywhere from being successful in their sales activities. And usually that negative thought is based on their perception of selling as being where you ‘push’ a product or service at your client whether they want it or not.

That’s an old-fashioned and outdated view of selling.

In reality the opposite is true – professionals need to be conducting proactive sales conversations to truly help their clients.

Remember this:
The only reason your client will want to talk to you is that they believe you can help them.

If they already knew what to do, and had all the information they needed, and were confident about making a buying decision, they wouldn’t bother talking to you.

They are relying on you to understand what they need and lead them through the process of making the right decision for them.

It may be that your client has already checked out your website; read one of your articles; seen a testimonial; heard about you from a friend… but they still need you to take the lead.

Ask yourself: How can I help this client?

So instead of thinking “I don’t want to be like a sales person” and shying away from the sales conversation, you should ask yourself “How can I best help this client?”

In reframing your activity – from ‘selling’ to ‘exploring’ – you will set yourself free of the presumption of having to be pushy.

When you start exploring you will find out what your client really wants. You will gain confidence from having a clear understanding of their needs. You will find new ways of helping your clients, and you won’t be scared of making inappropriate recommendations (because you will understand what they want).

How do you explore? By asking questions.

The art of asking the right questions the right way is a learned skill. In fact that is one of the main learning outcomes from my sales training programs.

It is a good idea to start by asking relatively general questions, and then move on to questions that become more specific. The best questions probe deeply (but with sensitivity) to reveal where the value lies for the client.

Every sales conversation should be run according to your strategy.

Unfortunately many sellers undertake sales conversations and simply rely on ‘going with the flow’. However the flow often doesn’t go your way unless you plan for it. Having a strategy for your sales conversations is essential.

Your clients want to be led. To do that properly you need to have a philosophy of exploring the clients requirements using a pre-planned question-based conversation strategy.

If you need assistance to develop an effective sales conversation strategy for your team contact me.

 

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Recommended for Sales Leaders

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As featured in Sales & Marketing Management magazine cover story

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Overview of client feedback

The week following the 2-day training, the team had already commenced implementing some of the learnings from Stuart’s training.
Camille Johnson, CEO

Sales figures have increased by 20% on last year to date!! The team also continue to pick up new customers.
Sharyn Moran, General Manager

Our sales results have increased since incorporating Stuart’s sessions into our sales conference and this has been during a downturn in the market.
Justin Zakaras, National Sales and Marketing Manager

The content of the sessions was customised to suit our customer interactions, with a lot of preparation on the part of Stuart.
Dr. Sunil Kadri, Head of Sales and Business Development


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Thank you so much for a brilliant session on Thursday. I think the format and content was ideal.
Rennie Colston, Sales Director

We had a very positive result from involving Stuart in our Managers Conference last year.
Russell Varley, Human Resources

The training got us thinking more strategically about how the business is structured. It has really built our capabilities as a management team.
Mia Graham, General Manager


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Stuart was patient, flexible and knowledgeable. He took the time to truly understand our business.
Helen Zwicker, Executive Officer

The best thing is that I now have a road map of specific marketing activities that can be implemented with confidence.
Donna Cazzolato, General Manager Sales and Marketing

The participants immediately felt engaged as Stuart demonstrated his understanding of our needs and challenges.
Frederic Vanhove, Principal Engineer, Pacific Delivery


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With only one day we had a lot of material to cover and Stuart created a positive learning environment for all involved.
Kylie Kinsella, Sales Manager Australia & NZ

Bad ideas are expensive in business however with Stuart Ayling, it was money very well spent.
John B. Lonergan, Sales Manager


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By the next week, sales of this product had doubled from 10% of all new sales to 20%. The extremely cost effective session with Stuart paid for itself within the first week.
Maria Triggs, General Manager

We have already seen a new client on board as a result of the two-day workshop.
Mark Mahoney, Managing Director


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Stuart put the sales training across in a way they could accept as a part of our service offering with out them feeling like “salesmen”.
Gary McDonald, Managing Director

We were impressed by the approach of Stuart and the simplicity of the program without the hype generally associated with these courses.
Dirk Kuiper, General Manager


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Read the latest on the blog

  • How to manage sales negotiations – will AI help? Jan 26, 2021
  • How to say ‘No’ to clients and still have them buy May 18, 2020
  • Recruiting a sales person? Stop, until you have done these three things Nov 28, 2019
  • Understanding the emotional experience of clients Aug 1, 2019
  • What does your sales team really need to learn? Apr 29, 2019

About Marketing Nous

Marketing Nous was established in 2000 by Stuart Ayling, Director and Chief Sales Strategist. Stuart works  with expertise-based businesses to develop customised sales training and … Read More >>

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PO Box 5320
Daisy Hill QLD 4127 Australia

Tel: 0407 588 468

Email: info [at] marketingnous.com.au
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