9.1 The Reasons why you Need to Prepare to Sell

It makes sense to begin with the reasons why you have to prepare to sell because it is surprising how many people believe that they can simply throw themselves into the market and become a success in an instant.The truth of the matter is that not preparing yourself in an adequate manner is only going to lead to you making life harder and when you consider how tough the sales industry is, this is something that should be avoided.

You would be pretty unique if you were able to just walk into a sales job and launch a successful career without any backing or preparation. Indeed, to a number of people it would be completely unnatural and the chances are you may then fall flat on your face in the near future.

You have to think of it this way. How many professional careers require no preparation whatsoever before the working day?

The answer is that you are going to be hard pressed to find any career where the people involved in it are serious about making a success of themselves.Preparation is also important in that it means you will be in a position whereby you understand your products or service rather than going into things cold.

You must understand how this will come across to the client as it hardly inspires confidence in you or what you are selling if you mumble, make mistakes, and are unable to handle even the easiest of questions. All of those things are entirely possible if you do not prepare yourself prior to selling, but there is also another side of preparation that we have to discuss, preparation of your own self.

By this, what we mean is that you have to prepare your own person for selling, which means to look at your appearance as well as your demeanour. You have a certain impression to make regarding yourself, although the point regarding your demeanour is more important than you may realise. For example, you must think about why you wish to pursue a career in sales since this does play a role in your preparation and how you come across. Why do you want this career? What is your driving force for getting started in the business? How do you feel you will cope with rejection or coming across objections in the sales?

As you can understand, being aware of where you are coming from regarding this type of job and how you react in certain situations will play a major role in your preparation for actually dealing with potential clients. Furthermore, experience will help with your actual preparation even if that experience has merely been brought up in a family where a relative was in sales.

Their knowledge and experience is something you can pick up on as part of your own personal development within the industry as they can prove to be a valuable source of information. Indeed, this research into techniques and methods should form a key part of your preparation for selling simply because of

what you can learn as a result.

So, the key reasons why it is so important to prepare can actually be summarised as follows.

1. Preparation is going to make you sound and come across as far more professional

2. Preparation is going to give you more confidence about yourself.

3.Preparation means you need to better understand what you are selling.

4. Preparation gives you the confidence to deal with objections.

5. Preparation gives you the confidence to deal with any question you may be asked.

6.Preparation shows that you are willing to learn and develop.

7.Preparation has been shown to increase conversion rates leading to more commission.

As you can see, it does make a real difference to the entire job and even though you need to go through aspects of a preparation routine (especially parts connected to your own person) on a daily basis, the fact that it does improve the number of conversions into sales you can achieve does make it worth your while.

9.2 What Happens if you do not Prepare?

So, we have looked at the reasons why you must prepare yourself to sell, but what happens if you do not actually do this?

Well, to be quite blunt it is then going to be all too easy for your sales attempts to be nothing short of a complete disaster. You will discover that your conversion rates will start off low and that is where they will stay.You must remember that first impressions are what count and if you are not prepared the chances are you will get off to a bad start and things will just continue downhill. So do you think you would then be able to turn things around and close a deal under those circumstances?

It is important that you hit your stride from the get-go because anything else will undoubtedly paint you in a bad light and bang go your chances of completing the sale.You will also find that a lack of preparation will not exactly help you with your own approach to each sale. There is an increased chance of you being flustered and trying to remember or understand where you are in the process,

if you have not managed to get to grips with the different stages of the selling process or even being aware of how you are supposed to sell various products or services. Does this sound like the type of person you would like to buy from?Probably not!It is almost guaranteed that a lack of preparation and understanding of your products or services will lead to you running into potential buyers who appear to have the ability to conjure up various objections or questions that you yourself will be unable to answer.

You are the expert representing the company on those products, so even though you may have to take a matter of seconds to think of the answer, not having anything constructive or helpful to say regarding their issues or objections will only turn them against you and it will prove to be almost impossible to pull this sale back from the brink of it being lost.

As you can understand, it is hardly painting a bright picture regarding your potential success and the crazy part is that we are also not stating you need to do that much in order to make a difference. Instead, it is merely a case of being professional in not only your approach, but also everything connected to your job and the results you achieve will speak volumes.

Other salespeople are going to be going through the exact same thing and if you spend time talking to them, then you are going to hear a number of rather weird and wonderful ways in which people prepare themselves for the selling process. It can take time to figure out what works for you, but once you hit that winning formula, it is important you stick to those preparations to make your life easier.

9.3 How to Prepare Yourself

Now that you are aware of the importance of preparing yourself to sell, how do you actually do it?

This is certainly an important question to answer and we can only provide general ideas because it is a rather personal thing as we are talking about not only learning your products or services, but how you prepare yourself as an individual.

1. Check and check again that you know your products or services

There is no reason for you to even think about trying to deal with clients without knowing your products or services thoroughly. You have to remember that you are regarded as being the expert, and you really should have all of the required answers at your fingertips as it will not go down well if you are unable to deal with even quite straightforward questions.

It is best for you to be over prepared to a certain extent rather than underprepared when it comes to your knowledge of the things you are selling.

2. Prepare your sales pitch

Aside from having a real understanding of your products and services, it is pretty clear that you also need to have prepared a sales pitch which will make whatever it is you are selling sound so appealing to people that they feel the need to own it or use your services. You must have a sales pitch prepared, but remember it is a pitch and not a script as that is too rigid, whereas there is a need for there to be a sense of flexibility.

However, knowing your basic pitch in advance will certainly give you the upper hand.

3. Make sure you have had adequate training

Part of your own preparation has to be understanding that you have had adequate training ahead of going out there and making contact with any potential clients. If you feel that something was lacking in what you have been taught by your company or sales manager, then it is regarded as being pro- active on your part to address the issue as quickly as possible and seek further help with the areas that you believe you are weak in. This is not you causing trouble, as some people may view it, but rather it shows your company that there is a determination to succeed and a willingness to leave no stone unturned in an attempt to give yourself the best possible sales platform to launch from.

4. Do your own research in order to improve your skills

Following on from point 3, we also recommend that you carry out your own research to try to improve your skills because even though your sales manager or company can help educate you on what you are selling, the actual way in which you put across those all-important points will come entirely from you. This means that it is up to you to work out the way in which you should word things or even the tone of your voice when selling. Each person is unique in their delivery and that is something that can come from your own research and personal development.

5. Rehearse in advance

This makes it sound as if you are preparing to appear in a play, but rehearsing your sales methods in advance, and even having somebody playing the role of a potential client and firing objections at you, is a fantastic way of preparing yourself for selling. Yes, there may not be the same pressure as you will get in a real life situation, but that is not to say that it will be unable to help you when it comes to having to think about answers to questions or how to deal with the issues potential clients may have.

6. Create notes

This is something every salesperson should do, especially when they are trying to learn about new products or services, as there is no doubt that taking notes is something that is going to both help you with your preparation as well as make life easier for you in general. Clearly you are not going to stand there in front of a client with notes as that is really frowned upon, but instead you should see it as your opportunity to run over the key points prior to a meeting to just refresh things in your memory.

Do not write reams and reams of information as that is going to do nothing for you, but rather bullet points of key things will suffice.

7. Refer to feedback and comments

This point regarding preparation is connected more to those people who have already been out to see clients and have had to deal with objections or comments. There is the real belief that you need to refer back to what was said or to analyse the reasons as to why a sale was perhaps not forthcoming in order to learn from it. Learning from your mistakes is a major part of your preparation to sell because you clearly do not want to be doing the same thing over and over again or else you will merely go around in circles and get nowhere.

Now, we are not saying that these are all of the ways in which you can prepare to sell because you will develop your own personal tricks and tips which can make all the difference to your level of success.However, doing nothing is simply not an option. No preparation, or a failure to even be aware of the need for it, will only ever result in missed opportunities and when competition is so difficult, those potential customers will only go elsewhere as a result.

FACT

The most memorable part of a presentation is the last 5 minutes.

Lesson: End with a bang!

Source: slideshare.net

9.4 Putting the Steps into Action

Talking about the preparation required for selling is one thing, but putting things into action is really something else and that is where a number of people are going to fail as a result. It is one thing knowing what you need to do in order to prepare yourself, but at the same time you also need to have the motivation to follow through with those plans or else what is the point of even going out to try to sell your products or services?

You must remember that putting these steps into action is something that is done on a daily basis, as each day is a brand new moment and indeed you could take it even further by looking at each sales opportunity as being a brand new chance to follow through with whatever it is you need to do in order to achieve that sale.

To put these steps into action it is essential that you are completely honest with yourself and your approach. You must be honest regarding your weak points and those areas you need to further develop to really reach the targets you have set yourself. In addition, you should never be afraid to ask others for feedback and also ask any questions you may have regarding your products, services, or even your approach in general to going out to those clients.

Never think that you know everything as that is simply not true. Instead, this belief is actually slightly more arrogant than you could perhaps even intend to be. At the same time, never see preparing yourself as a chore as it is actually an integral part of the sales process that you need to follow through with, simply because of the way in which it directly affects the outcome of the sale.

You must remember this point at all times. Would you ever expect even a computer repair guy to just go ahead and try to fix your computer without having the prior knowledge of what to do or to spend time investigating the problem with your machine? Would you even expect a builder to start work without understanding what to do or the latest methods and technology that is being applied in their industry? Of course not, so why would sales be different, especially when you are trying to convince people to part with their money?

The best way in which to make progress and to put the steps into action, is to actually write down in advance what you need to do in order to be in tip top condition for the sake of being able to complete that sale. A checklist is going to make life easier because in the pressurised environment that is the sales industry, it is all too easy to be swamped and overtaken by stress and the desire to just get out there and get selling.

Taking a few moments to just manually work through each step is going to make life easier even if you do believe that it is rather tedious.Remember that preparation reduces the chances of you making mistakes and when you look at what is at stake regarding missing out on that all-important sale, then you can understand why you need to do this in advance.