The difference between being an average sales performer, consistently below quota, and a superstar is sometimes hard to understand. Sure there are some obvious signs (often displayed by consistent under performers) such as failing to work hard, not caring about results, asking the wrong questions, or the right ones too late. I could go on and on. But even superstars can have tough stretches. Being successful in sales, or not, is often separated by a Thin Green Line.
So what makes the difference?
I started thinking about the differences after reading this excellent post on Shamus Brown’s Shameless Sales Blog, Why Rookies Get Sales Objections (and Old Pro’s Don’t).
Shamus’s points were very clear:
- selling by pitching, constant closing, and objection handling one by one tells the customer you only care about this single deal
- customers hate to be pitched and pushed by sales people
- stop thinking of customer “concerns” as objections (thinking of their concerns as “obstacles” means you care only about yourself)
Wow – seems such common sense I had to think about it for a minute. To win more deals and have greater success you have to actually care about the customer, their concerns, their issues, and their challenges!
I’ll go one step further – I call this caring about the customer the “Thin Green Line” of sales success!
(this is something superstar performers tend to do instinctively)
To end up on the winning side of the Thin Green Line means:
- Active listening to the customers issues, concerns, and challenges (“How can we help”)
- Avoid projecting or guessing how you wish the customer will react or think, simply ask them directly (“Is this an acceptable solution?”)
- Become part of the problem solving team with the customer (“Product X sounds like it won’t work since you have have few Linux servers, how about Product Y? With an extra 3 days of onsite services we can configure it to do the same thing but it’s windows based? Will that work?)
- Make flexibility and discussion a key component of your approach (“You lost the funding for the project? Can we sign now to lock in and delay payment until your next fiscal starts in 3 months?”)
Being on the winning side if the Thin Green Line doesn’t mean that you roll over to everything the customer asks. In fact it’s the opposite. Now that the customer knows you are not in this for a quick sale and “see ya later”, they actually value your input and participation.
The result – you can recommend difficult options to them because they value you and trust you.
If you honor their trust and continue to add value the Thin Green Line will reward with a long time customer and lots of revenue!
If you forget about the customer and all the history of the relationship and start thinking only about one transaction at a time – the Thin Green Wall will become a thunderous divide with revenue and customers on one side, and you on the other.
