See the People…This little piece of advice has floated around in my brain for the past 22 years. My sales career started in 1989 when I picked up Tom Hopkins book, How to Master The Art of Selling. I started reading every book, and going to every seminar on sales and marketing after reading it. One of the goals I always have is to try and implement a nugget of knowledge from each book or seminar. The one thing that resonated with me from Tom Hopkins was STP. In the age of social media, See the People has never mattered more.
Staying connected with people is the lifeblood of sales. “Liking” Facebook posts, connecting on Linked in, an email here and there. These are all good ways to connect and should be part of every business person’s arsenal. However, deep, lasting connections only come from seeing the people. Social media is a great way to keep the pump flowing and to kill off the dreaded beast of “out of sight, out of mind”. Before you can keep the pump flowing, you need to prime it. Trust is what primes sales, and it only comes when the relationship has time to grow. You can’t come across as clingy, pushy, or needy. One coffee at a time, slowly growing a business contact into a client. Belly to belly. … eyeball to eyeball.
If the average salesperson engages in all the ways to properly market themselves, and makes it a point to visit at least five prospects a day, (every business is different, five seems to work for radio salespeople) eventually things will begin to click. A good analogy is a train. It takes a lot of energy to get a train rolling down the track. Once it does, it takes a lot of energy to stop it, because an object in motion tends to stay in motion.
Trust doesn’t come easy or cheap. Learn everything you can about your clients. Another great book that changed my life was Harvey Mackay’s Swim With The Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive. Harvey takes the STP concept to a whole new level…..to the point of even knowing your client’s kids birthdays. How’s that for a powerful concept?
Tell your story…be passionate…..listen…..learn……grow . If you can grow relationships with sincerity, authenticity, and transparency, you will build a world class client list. Just be patient and be genuinely happy to help your clients win. As Zig Ziglar says, “You can get anything you want in life, if you help enough people get what they want”…
Go See the People! (After that you can get back to your Facebook posts)
How To Master the Art of Selling
Sync & Swimm 