4.1 The Origin of Professional Sales

It can be argued that the concept of professional sales dates back to the start of having an economy, which even comes before the creation of money when barter was the currency of the day.People had to act as professional salespeople in order to get people to purchase their goods in the market, or those that travelled as merchants had to understand that they would be required to sell their items or they would not be able to earn a living.

A number of scholars have argued that selling is the second oldest profession in the world and there is no doubt it has indeed evolved over time.

The exact origins, and the dates we are talking about, will vary in different parts of the world and it is important to remember there is no set date where the skill of selling would spring up from. It is easy to understand how the idea of professional sales would begin as soon as cultures and communities would grow. However, it is also known that those at the very beginning of the sales process were mainly travellers moving between communities trading their wares for items that they could exchange and then take to other communities along what would become known as trade routes.

However, in the early days there were no real regulations to take control of the industry and indeed even the laws in general had no bearing on the concept of sales. There was no sense of there being any protection for either side, although clearly the merchant had the upper hand at least in thetransaction. The problem for them was connected more to their travel with being a merchant, and therefore a professional salesperson, being regarded as one of the most dangerous professions at the time.

So, we may not have an exact date as to when professional sales actually began and if you thought that it was connected to money, then you are wrong as it extends further back into history than that. However, even though the origins may be relatively unknown, it is interesting to look at how it has evolved through the ages to show how we have reached this particular point in the development of both the salesperson as well as the sales process.

4.2 The Evolution of Sales Through the Times

So, we have mentioned the actual origins of professional sales, or as close to it as we can get, and it makes sense to look at how it has then evolved through the times.We stated how it all began with bartering and this was something that lasted for some considerable length of time and indeed there are still a number of communities where this is the primary localform of selling on the market.

5,000 years ago

However, things did change slightly when coinage was introduced in what we now know as the Middle East, some 5,000 years ago. Suddenly, people were interested in these pieces of silver and what they represented and, of course, money as we know it did begin to take hold in a number of industries and markets as well as spreading outwards from the Middle East.

Sales in general did not evolve that much for several thousand years simply because the way in which we manufactured anything or created a market really did stay the same. This did alleventually change with the Industrial Revolution as that is where the sales industry itself began to change with it evolving into a more working model of the thing we understand and have at this moment in time.

Industrial Revolution

With the Industrial Revolution, it was commonplace for people to exaggerate the claims that were associated with products or services to get the contract. This could perhaps be the origins of those ideas that salespeople were not to be trusted, especially after it became known that they would rather embellish the truth, so you learn to really work on trying to believe what it is you are hearing and taking your time to determine if it actually is something that makes sense.

1916

The next major leap in sales was around 1916 when a convention in the United States declared that, when it came to sales, there was a requirement for the needs of the customer to be taken into consideration, rather than just trying to push products or services without much due care or concern for what it was they wanted.

The fact that this was even discussed at a sales convention is rather surprising to us in the modern world as we are always told how understanding what the customer wants is going to be at the absolute heart of the entire sales pitch. This is not actually something that has been around for too long as it was often the case that it was the salesperson who was in complete charge, although as we will see later on in the module it has changed and done a complete U-turn thanks to the advances of technology.

Furthermore, at the same time there was a new understanding as to the role of trust in the sales relationship and that, in order to complete an all-important sale, you had to really work at the relationship with the buyer even if you had just a matter of minutes to do this.

1936 is regarded as being a big year for the development of sales thanks to the appearance of a single book, 'How to Win Friends & Influence People' by Dale Carnegie. This book really got to work on the psychology of not only sales, but on how to deal with people in general. It is a book that continues to have a major impact on the sales industry, even though it is decades since it was published, due to the fact that the information contained within it is timeless. It is an absolute must- read for anybody who is serious about getting into this particular industry as there is something for everybody to learn no matter the products or services they are going to be selling.

Indeed, this one single book has been credited with really launching the careers of so many successful salespeople, that it could almost be regarded as being the absolute handbook for a successful career. Do not worry about it being 80 years old as it is still extremely valid in the lessons it teaches and prior to going out on any sales pitch, make a point of reading it in order to further expand your knowledge of how to deal with people.

The 1950s

As we move into the 1950s, we see yet another change in the sales environment whereby there was a real shift in who held the power in the transaction. It was seen as being the decade where the salesperson started to gain more control and it was also the decade where the concept of the fast talking salesperson coming to your door began to emerge. This means we can trace the roots of the theory of the hard sell to this decade where companies really began to go to the potential customer rather than waiting on the customer coming to them.

This was due to an increase in competition within the market and a need to get out there to those buyers before anybody else had the chance. The door to door salesman had arrived and this approach to sales would hang around for decades, even though the success rate of it varied a great deal from area to area, product to product, and salesperson to salesperson. This in itself is regarded as being a real watershed moment for sales as previously it largely involved a customer going to a shop or making the initial approach themselves.

This was turned on its head in an instant and the concept of the travelling salesman certainly took off like never before. This entire idea would continue to expand throughout the 1960s, although there would be further changes to the entire approach of salespeople throughout the next few decades.

By the 1970s the world was changing and the customer was becoming more aware that they did have options available to them when it came to the products they were able to purchase. They were aware that there was a larger market out there and they would become more involved in the entire sales process. This meant that professional salespeople had to develop a much more intricate knowledge of what they were selling as the public were now more likely to ask searching questions and would expect answers pretty much straight away, and answers that they could believe.

The big concept at this time was spin selling whereby there were attempts to make the buyer see the problem they were having and tie that in with their need and how the product or service the salesperson was selling could solve those issues immediately. This approach began to use different aspects of sales psychology in order to attempt to get into the head of the buyer to make it more likely that they would then appreciate what it was you were selling, as you made it clear that you had the perfect solution. In this instance, spin selling is similar to the concept of the spin doctor in politics with them having the ability of turning things around in their favour no matter what has

gone on before.

However, it was not finished there because in the 1980s there was another move in sales with the concept of solution selling. With this, the idea is that the salesperson would try to put into place a solution to suit a need and to then show why your product or service is so much better than what is on offer from the competition. The only thing to take into consideration is that there was a need to be careful with how the salesperson spoke about the competition as it was regarded as being a bad thing to do if you are seen as being too abusive about them in front of the buyer.

The 1990s

Moving into the 1990s, we saw a real increase in the number of sales partnerships taking place along with a brand new concept which was known as strategic selling. This move into partnerships led to the idea of the complex sale and the building of accounts to work from.

After the millennium, we saw what became known as the dot.com bubble beginning to burst. We also saw a real shift from what was going on in the 50s where the power was with the salesperson as this was the time where the customer was in the driving seat. This is largely due to the ease with which they can uncover a lot more information about products and services thanks to the Internet and the

way in which anybody can uncover any kind of details they want to before they go ahead and spend any money.

4.3 Current Status

All of this brings us up to the modern day and it is useful to look at what the current status of professional sales is to see how it has got to this exact point.According to various experts, we are at a point where everything is being automated and gradually more and more online with this being a market that is growing at a phenomenal rate. This all started with the Internet and the gradual move online and with the advent of things such as the cloud, which allows companies to store information that is easy to access by all sales agents, then sales is going to become ever more reliant on tablets, smartphones, and being able to get answers for buyers in an instant.

This should, by all accounts, make life easier for salespeople as they are going to be able to cope with whatever their clients ask them as information will effectively be on call rather than them having to go away, ask people, find out answers, and then get back to them at some point in the future.

Industry experts are referring to this as being the age of the informed customer and indeed with social media it is easier for people to uncover the truth about not only products or services, but companies themselves.To that, we can add review websites where it is possible to get tips and advice on who to use and who to avoid and this has had a direct impact on the way that salespeople have to approach their entire job.

It is now harder for a salesperson to hide the truth of what they are trying to sell. It is harder for them to only say what they believe the potential buyer wants to hear as the customer is going to have already done their homework and they are ready to fire back with comments and questions that the salesperson may never have expected.As a result, that means a salesperson has to be better informed about what they are selling an understand the product or service inside and out before they even venture into the sales field.

FACT

By the year 2020, 85% of the buyer-seller interaction will happen online through social media and video.

Source: TeleSmart Communications

4.4 Where is it Heading?

Finally, we need to look at where this profession is going to be heading because being aware of this is going to allow people to better prepare themselves for advances in the field so they are not left behind and floundering.

It is reasonable to assume that things will become more automated and there will be a greater reliance on technology to get us through the sales process to the point where the buyer is going to actually be able to spend their money. Now, automation is something that can be a benefit to you as well as a problem and it is entirely up to you as to how you allow it to affect you. However, most companies that employ salespeople will have a tendency to try to keep up to date with technology in the belief it will give them the edge over their competitors, so a willingness to make relevant changes is something that you really should have as a personal skill.

There will perhaps be a price for all of this reliance on technology in that some companies may  remove some of the jobs set aside for the sales team, but that is not to say the industry will die off. There is always going to be a need to have people to interact with one another in order to push services or products to those people who are interested in buying them.

However, it is also possible to predict that the speed at which the sales process moves at is going to increase as we see faster payment options, faster delivery of products or services, more options, and at the same time, even though this sounds good for salespeople, that may not actually be true.

Instead, the fact that there is a need to go ahead and understand the product or service more intricately rather than ever before does mean that it is harder for a salesperson to blag their way through the process. In addition, there will be a better understanding of the entire sales process with companies being able to fine tune their training programme to ultimately make it easier for their sales team to go out there and secure those deals.

In other words, the future of sales is looking quite rosy in that technology will make life easier in a number of ways, although as we said earlier - it will be harder for salespeople to skip along without having significant knowledge of what they are selling as it will be all too easy to be found out. However, it is easy to presume that companies will make advances in their training to make sure that their staff are well aware of how to take advantage of every aspect to help them complete the sale.