Unfortunately, the ‘soft sell’ revolution has created salespeople who in the main are just providing a service…..and what that means is that many sales are lost.

Let me explain the difference.

Recently I went to buy a new high definition digital video camera.  As usual, I received the typical customer service that I’ve come to expect.

The so called customer service person was almost apologetic in his approach to help me, almost expecting me to say “I’m just looking at the moment”……But to his surprise I said that I would like some help in choosing a camera.

He then immediately started to tell me about the differences between four cameras……I have no idea how he knew that any of them might be what I was after, because he didn’t ask me any questions at all.

He was capability selling…..just telling me about all of the products.

Now here’s my point……

 Choice Without Advice Kills The Sale!

When I go to buy something that is important to me, I don’t want someone just to ‘serve me’.  I want someone to provide me with the advice I need to make a wise buying decision.

You can’t give advice and a confident recommendation as a customer service (sales) person, unless you have found out about my situation, expectations, experiences, concerns, wants, needs, and goals that I’m seeking to achieve from buying a product or a service.

The difference between typical customer service and someone who steps up and provides advice and recommendations is what selling is all about.

Buyers today, whether business to business, or business to consumer are looking for sales and service people to help them sort out the most appropriate purchase from the many choices they have in front of them.

Expert advice wins sales.  Choice and capability, without advice loses sales and creates buyer apathy.

Now this was back in the sixties and seventies when we didn’t have a lock on any door or window.

I can’t remember the exact days or how often this would happen, but I do remember it like it was yesterday.

As a child and teenager, I remember hearing a loud knock at our back door and it would either be Mr Huxtable shouting out “Grocer”. And he would just enter the house with a big box of fruit and vegetables that Mum had ordered. Or it would be Mr Bell knocking on the door yelling “Butcher” and he too would just enter the house with our supply of meat that Mum had ordered. I seem to remember more regularly we’d hear Mr Otto knock at the door, always early, shouting “Baker” and entering to leave us with our yummy fresh baked bread.

And most mornings the Milko would have delivered the milk and cream well before we were awake and fortunately he didn’t yell out “Milkman” and wake the household while we were all sleeping.

Well, this conversation with my son got me thinking about how things have changed……or have they?

Could we recreate this type of wonderful service in today’s busy world where even the thought of leaving our homes unlocked would send shock through most people’s veins?

I reckon the answer is yes……and it’s spurred me on to a new level of thinking about the way we fulfil our promises as sales professionals.

The internet has created some fantastic opportunities for Liz, myself and our teenage sons. We recently bought a fantastic selection of high quality lamb and beef via the web from a recommended farming family south of Sydney who provide their meat direct. We get a knock on the door from one of their distributors who was so excited about meeting us and looking forward to delivering more to us……what a great service.

This is just one of many ways the web is creating communities of trusted buyers.

Regardless of what business we’re in, here’s my current thinking, challenge and source of motivation.

How can we reproduce that ‘knock on the door’ (whether metaphorically or in reality) and create that wonderful sense of trust in our customers where they feel part of a community and not just a customer?

More on this to come as I start to discover more ways that I can provide this myself, investigate what others are doing and reporting back.

Onwards!

An article on UPI.com’s Health News reports that researchers at the University of Alabama and the University of Louisville have been studying the affect of consumer attitude when in buying situations.
Basically the research suggests that it is becoming clearer that a shopper’s level of happiness or positive feelings could be more important to selling than sales prices, sales people and the pitches they make.

A Shift In The Psychology of Consumerism

I’ve been talking about this major shift in the psychology of consumerism for some time now, and it is becoming more and more apparent to me that unless salespeople and customer service assistants are consciously aware of what they need to be doing to create positive buying experiences for their prospective, current and repeat customers, they will be unintentionally creating buyer apathy.

Buyer apathy is created because of the sameness syndrome – that is, in the global and competitive markets that most businesses operate in today, consumers have more choice about where they go to buy their products or services. If the salespeople, customer service assistants, the prices and even the ‘pitches’ all sound the same, it creates buyer apathy.

Where buyer apathy is created, the usual dominant deciding value of the consumer, whether business to business or business to consumer will become an economic buying decision. In other words, buyer apathy focuses the consumer on the cheapest price they can find.

Stepping Up and Into Value

To step up and into their value, salespeople and customer service assistants need to work hard at creating buying experiences before, during and after any customer purchase that sends loud and clear messages to their clients that they are valued.

This is the reciprocal nature of successful businesses. The more clients feel valued, the more valuable they become to the business from which they choose to buy, and in return the more valuable those businesses become to the clients.

Click Here To read the full UPI.com article discussing the research

When you’re hired by a company as a salesperson, it’s your role to sell the products that you’re hired to sell.  No argument there….and while there are still some potential ethical issues if a company hired salesperson is selling a product to a customer that they know isn’t really going to meet that client’s needs and expectations….that’s not the ethical situation that I want to focus on here.

The Current.com.au article discussed how Panasonic Australia recently launched a major trade promotion, ‘LUMIX – Shoot for New Zealand’, where the top performing salespeople from around Australia will win a great photographic opportunity in New Zealand.

Now, this has nothing to do with Panasonic, Lumix or cameras.  We could be talking about wine, other electical goods, hardware tools, and the list can go on and on…..even into discussions on the ethics of on and off line affiliate programs and partnerships.

This opens up the question of when salespeople have the opportunity to sell a number of different brands from different companies – and that the incentives the suppliers are offering to the salespeople can potentially sway their advice when making buying recommendations to their potential clients.

If you’re a camera salesperson, what a great opportunity…..but what if that opportunity, if not handled well when you’re talking to potential customers, could cause buyer apprehension, leading to no sale as the result?  What if not handled appropriately, could do serious damage to your own reputation and that of the store where you’re working (or own)?

Here are two scenarios – which would you be more comfortable and confident with if you were selling cameras?

Scenario One:  A potential buyer enters your store and has no knowledge about Panasonics trade promotion that incentivises camera salespeople to sell their Lumix cameras.  You’re keen to win one of the top 100 spots for a trip to NZ, and you make sure that you sell the benefits of the Lumix camera over and above any of the others.

Scenario Two:  A potential buyer enters your store and has no knowledge about Panasonics trade promotion that incentivises camera salespeople to sell their Lumix cameras.  You’re keen to win one of the top 100 spots for a trip to NZ, but your approach doesn’t change.  You ask the questions you need to discover which camera will be right for this particular customer’s specific situation, and based on what you learn, you make  a recommendation – if it’s the Lumix camera that’s what you recommend…if it’s another brand, you recommend it.

What if anything would change if you knew that the customer was aware of the Panasonic promotion?

I personally do not have any issues with incentives for internal company salespeople.  I also do not have any issue when suppliers of different brands offer incentives for retail salespeople to sell their products.

Where ethics comes into it, is when the recommendations and advice are solely based on the incentives, and not meeting the customers’ needs, wants or expectations.

If you have an ethical selling situation that you’d like to share (your anonymity is assured), please email me at info@salescoachcentral.com

The change has occurred because of the ‘sameness syndrome’.  Increasing competition and globalisation has provided an amazing range of choices for potential buyers in most situations.  They can pretty much get the product or service with the features and benefits they’re after, from a range of suppliers, and all for about the same price.

When a potential buyer is confronted by choice, unfortunately, if they are also being ‘served’ by a ‘passive-reactive’ sales or service person, usually, the only focus for the buyer will be on the price of the product.

When people want or need to buy something that is of importance to them, what is required is a sales or service person who will confidently advise and recommend the most appropriate product, service or solution…..of course the final decision is always with the client, however, customers need better advice than they are currently receiving in many of their purchase situations.

It’s not the principles of selling that need to change…..it’s the underlying philosophy.

The principles of successful selling arguably haven’t changed.  Sales and service people are still required to build rapport, ask questions, show value, identify obstacles, confirm and close sales and stay in touch to create advocacy, repeat and referral business.

What needs to change is the underlying philosophy that each sales and service person has about the value of their expert advice in helping potential and existing customers make comfortable and confident buying decisions.

Soft sell approaches are currently the cause of underperforming sales and service people across a range of industries, and in the current economic climate, and even when boom times return, sales and service people need to reframe their thinking about what it is they’re really selling and what it is that people are really buying.

When buyers have choice they require expert advice….not just a conversation!

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