5
February
2009
One of the major benefits of sales automation is building a sales pipeline for business. The concept is really simple. You take a series of events that you would normally do to initiate a relationship and automate them. If you want to follow the best practice of selling, we can look to personal examples. With Valentines Day around the corner, I’m thinking about how I initiated a relationship with my wife over 21 years ago.
Start with Good Research
In many ways, selling is like dating and we should approach selling and building relationships in the same way. I can remember when I first became attracted to my wife, Sallie, whom I’ve been married to for over 21 years now. Little did I know that I would follow the best practice of selling to win her heart.
I met my wife in a Sunday school class and I was immediately attracted to her. I wanted to know more about her. I did what anyone in my position would do, I did a little research. I asked questions and learned that she was a single mother and wasn’t in a relationship at the time. Not that is would have mattered to me. I say this because in selling, we often come across prospects that already have a relationship in place. Would this stop you? This shouldn’t stop us when we learn that a prospect is already involved.
What we need is a set of criteria that helps us determine whom is a good prospect for us. This criterion is vital to making good decisions on which we place on our all important prospect list. Trust me, I did quite a bit of research and determined that Sallie was a good match.
Getting Noticed
There are countless ways we can use to generate interest in our prospects. In my case, I used networking. I attended many of the Church events for singles and found myself talking to Sallie in casual conversations. When I’m doing this for business, I do the same thing. Sometimes it requires attending a Chamber of Commerce meeting or a Business Expo where I know my prime prospect will be attending. We can also use social networking with LinkedIn, Facebook and many others that help us create and generate interest in our prime prospects.
The goal at these networking opportunities is to get noticed and initiate a connection. In sales and in dating, it might take a while. For my wife, it took a few months before she actually noticed me and we started dating. In business, there have been many situations that I have tried to generate a response. It could take months and sometimes years to be noticed. In each case, we need to be on our best behavior and we should be persistent in what we will do. I say this because; we never know what will spark the interest we need to initiate a relationship.
Don’t Give UP!
The sad part about selling is that most salespeople will give up after the first contact. A few will move on the next steps. However, it will only be a few who will be persistent enough to get noticed. This is where a selling process and a sequence of events need to be choreographed to develop a relationship. What do you do that generates interest and are you persistent enough to get noticed on your prospects timing, not yours.
sellingmagic 
Sales Lesson 
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4
February
2009
If you played baseball, do you remember getting into a batting slump and not being able to get a hit? It is going to happen and it happens to professional baseball players too. What sports professionals do to get out of a slump is the same thing we must do if we want to get out of a sales slump.
Perfect Practice and Focus
A baseball player who wants to improve hitting will spend time in the batting cage to hit more baseballs. While he or she is in the batting cage, a batting coach will watch and critique the swing of each bat. With technology, they can film the swing with slow motion actions to break down the swing. When the batting coach or batting experts can do this, they can analyze small details of how the batter swings at the ball.
The goal of batting practice is to correct the small details. Anything and everything that will improve the batters swing at the plate. The batter might be taking their eye off the ball as it streaks across the plate. The batter might be dropping their elbow as the ball approaches. It could be a leaning back and way from the ball instead of leaning into the ball. All of these small details can be corrected to improve the results.
If the batter is in a slump because they got away from the fundamentals, the player must retrain their body and approach so they return to the form that gets results. The perfection of practicing each move will get the results they want. This improvement strategy is the same in selling.
Practice and Perfect Your Selling Process and Approach
When a salesperson gets out of rhythm in selling and is not following a proven selling process, they can quickly get into a sales slump and not know why. Their confidence level will drop and the salesperson will begin questioning themselves. When this happens, salespeople need to re-focus on the fundamentals of the selling process. A selling coach can help in determining what is wrong. If you are able to record what you are saying on sales calls or the telephone so you can play back your words, you might discover simple ways to improve selling techniques. You might even hear it in your voice.
When I am on fire with selling, it is like a baseball player who is in a hitting streak. When this happens to you, you don’t want to change anything and you look forward to stepping up to the plate so you can repeat your actions. Your confidence will rise and it creates an unfair advantage of sorts against the pitcher. You will expect to hit the ball out of the park each time.
If we are talking about selling, your prospects will sense your confidence from your voice. Prospects will close themselves because they want what you have. I know from experience that when I have a high confidence level in what I’m selling and I have an expectation of closing business with my prospect, the closing is simplified. Following a proven selling process is also fundamental to success. I know when and where I am in the selling process of a prospect. When you have confidence in your selling process, you are one up on your prospects.
By Steve Martinez – the Sales Magician for Business Development
http://www.sellingmagic.com
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30
January
2009
I am sure you have heard the fable about the Tortoise and the Hare. It is a story about an improbable race with an unexpected outcome. The lessons we learn from this fable is not to diddle dawdle when we should keep moving persistent and consistent toward our goals.
Well, let’s twist this fable a little. What if it was a story about two salespeople and one of the salespeople had the qualities of the Hare. You know what I mean, a salesperson that appears to have everything going right. This would be someone with all the qualities of a super star. The image that comes to my mind is the vision Hollywood would likely cast for the role of a superstar salesperson. You can spot this person in a crowd as someone with good looks, charming to everyone and impressive in stature.
For the Tortoise role in this story, Hollywood would cast someone short, over weight and probably not too attractive. Whomever they picked, this person would not have the leading role character features and he or she would be expected to lose the race.
As the fable goes, the Hare and the Tortoise are challenged to a race that the Hare could easily win. To keep the competition fair, the Fox is selected to map the course and the race begins. Along the race course route, the Hare is so confident of victory that a nap is foolishly taken. Time passes and when the Hare awakens from the nap and sprints to the finish, the Tortoise has already won and is found victoriously napping at the finish line. Don’t you just love this!
Why the Tortoise Wins
One of the features I like about the Tortoise is that in order to move forward, the Tortoise must stick its neck out. This is a wonderful quality that we can all learn from. The natural pace of the Tortoise is slow and steady. This is like the best practices of drip marketing sales activity for a salesperson or a business - slow, steady and consistent.
In my travels, I have consulted with thousands of business owners and salespeople. Some of my more successful contacts have been like the Tortoise and the best qualities I have grown to appreciate of these winners are goal oriented, persistent and focused.
When we examine successful businesses today, we will find success in those with the Tortoise action plan. What I mean is that those businesses that have stuck their neck out and pushed forward with consistent forward action.
Fable Thoughts and Actions
If we read the papers, we are in a down economy; the opportunities for business are significantly reduced today. Unless a salesperson or business has been steadily building and nurturing a pipeline of warm prospects, it is going to be tough. This means that if you adopted the Tortoise strategy with persistent and consistent sales and marketing campaigns, you will thrive and survive. If you are more like the Hare in your selling and marketing activities, you may end up losing and missing out on with limited opportunities.
The moral of this story is the same for children and salespeople. You don’t have to be a superstar to win. If you apply consistent, persistent activity and stick your neck out toward your goals, you will be the winner.
By Steve Martinez - the Sales Magician for Business Development
http://www.sellingmagic.com
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27
January
2009
By Steve Martinez - The Sales Magician for Business Development
Have you ever been in a situation where you could be the hero or the goat? Preparation is the key to success in moments where you are confronted with your greatest challenges. Here is a quote from Juan Pierre – Los Angeles Dodger about preparation.
“It’s a lot of preparation. I need to do some things to get ready for the game. And stay after the game to get ready for the next day. It’s not work for me. There’s nothing better in the world to come out here and take extra batting practice and fly balls. I consider that trying to make me a better baseball player.”
When You are in the Big Game
It’s late in the game. The final inning and you need to score 3 runs to win. You are tired and you are on deck to hit next. The player ahead of you gets walked so the bases are now loaded. At this point the bat feels like it is a hundred pounds. The other coach calls time out to talk about the situation and changes pitchers. This gives you more time to think and wait for your first swing and you start thinking about the situation. You can become the hero or the goat. Your mind is racing and you wonder what the first pitch will be. Your friends are in the stands cheering you on but you are the visiting team so the heckling is louder than normal. You start thinking to yourself, will it be the fast ball you can hit out of the park or the curve you have trouble seeing late in the game. Worse yet, could it be the knuckle ball that confuses you. At this point, self doubt may try to enter your head or your preparation for this moment will impact the outcome.
If there was ever a situation where preparation for a golden opportunity comes into play, this is it.
This is where all the extra time you took in the batting cages pays off. This is where the research you did on the other team’s players and specifically the pitchers will impact your confidence. This is a time to step back and pause. The sound of the umpire shouting, to you – batter up awakens you from your trance. The pitcher is now ready, the pitcher and the catcher know what they are going to send you as the first pitch.
Before you take the first pitch, you step back away from the batters box and the umpire raises his hand to stop play as you take a little more time. This time, the pitcher has to wait for you. At this point, you start your ritual again. You developed a habit you developed when you watched your favorite baseball hero step up to plate. Baseball is a game where players develop rituals for special moments like this. You pick up dirt from the ground and rub it between your palms 8 times. You take position in the batting box and dig your cleats into the ground taking extra time to swing the bat three swings. Now you are ready. In the last few moments you visualized and mentally prepared yourself for the first pitch. You saw it streaking across the plate in the low outside and imagined yourself hitting it to the open left field.
The pitcher looks down at you from 60 feet away. The Catcher gets ready, you are ready and the ball leaves the pitchers hand. As the ball streaks toward you, you see it like it is charging in slow motion. You have already started your swing and your body is compensating for the speed, angle and the direction of the ball. The loud crack of the bat hitting the ball is felt in your hands and the sensation tells you it was a solid hit in the location you expected the ball to be.
At this point, you know from past memories that the ball won’t be restrained by the confines of the ball park. You have released the pressure of the moment with the proper execution of your preparation. Life is good!
The Power of Preparation
The story I just told is almost real, I was a young man when an event like this played out for me. My father was in the stands when I rounded third and the proud smile he had was magic to me. On this glorious day, I hit two home runs and two doubles. I stole a few bases and fielded the ball without errors. I cling to this memory for obvious reasons – it is one for the books. I use this memory when I am confronted with a challenging opportunity to remind myself that I am a winner.
If you don’t have a visual memory like this, I encourage you to commit to memory a successful moment or two in your life and apply them to memory so you can replay them in your mind for confidence building when you need them. The power of visualization cannot be over stated. We should also prepare for life’s moments through practice of our craft of influencing others when we sell. Not just practice, perfect practice of how you introduce yourself and tell prospects who you are and what you do. You should practice for moments of tough questions and situations. When you do this, you are ready for anything. If you need a ritual, develop one. For me, I like to rub the palms of my hands eight times like I’m ready to hit a home run. Good Selling.
Visit us at:
http://www.thegameofselling.com or http://www.sellingmagic.com
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23
January
2009
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Mmmm, there is nothing like a great fish taco on a Sunday afternoon. Particularly, when the taco is a Baja fish taco, made fresh from a great recipe with all the right ingredients. At our house, my wife is often experimenting with Rachel Ray recipes. Rachel Ray has become a favorite of her viewing time on television. The recipe for Rachel’s Baja fish tacos delivered excellent results and I highly recommend you try them on a warm summer afternoon with a cold Mexican beer soon.
I shouldn’t be too surprised that my fair skinned wife, a Tacoma, Washington native of German heritage could fix the best tasting Baja fish taco I’ve ever tasted. It wasn’t the cook, although I will never tell her this, it was the successful recipe she followed. The same is true with selling. It isn’t the salesperson; it is the selling process they follow. This week I was in Las Vegas at the PODi App Forum. I sat in a session on the s3 solution selling program. It was great to hear this printing selling process, because having a selling process saved my sales career.
The Recipe For Sales Success
Years ago, I was interviewing a struggling salesperson who was enjoying sales, but didn’t like the up and down roller coaster sales results. My goal was to uncover the root of the problem. Following my instincts, we began talking about her selling process only to discover that she didn’t have one. We began talking about her successful selling experiences and tracing her steps to the sale. I asked her to carefully retrace each of her sale successes, so I could map them out for her. We did this for several sales to confirm my suspicions. What she didn’t realize is that she was following a consultative, solution selling process each time she was successful. Naturally, she was elated to discover her recipe for selling success. We mapped out her selling process like a road map to success, so she wouldn’t get lost in difficult selling situations.
As a result of her discovery, she began following her sales process for every sale and her roller coaster ride in sales ended. As her confidence grew, she mastered her selling process. Nothing could get her off track from following the six steps to the sale. She also began applying the magical seventh step of getting referrals, which boosted her success off the charts.
Automating the Selling Process Delivers Greater Results
I lost track of my sales student when she took a new job as sales manager for another company. She would enjoy learning how the Selling Magic selling system automates the process she used to correct her ailing sales. She is a perfect student for the system. She learned that following a recipe for success is better than winging it and she would appreciate the advantage of technology to perform her daily tasks.
It is unfortunate that the business owner of the company she worked for won’t return my telephone calls. I want to introduce the Selling Magic selling system to him, so he will never have to worry about a salesperson leaving again. Why, because my automated selling system follows the selling process and is tied to the company not the salesperson. If the salesperson leaves, the system stays and it is the Selling Magic system that follows the selling process. Actually, in many cases a salesperson will find it difficult to leave a selling system that does 80% of the work for them. We invite you to learn more about our selling process and our automated selling system.
Portions of this is a post from an article I submitted to Ezine Articlesa few years ago. I was coming back from Las Vegas and stopped to have a fish taco at Rubio’son my way back. I really liked the analogy of following a good recipe and thought it would be a great blog post for today. The concept of having a selling process is as important today as it was a few years ago - maybe more important.
By: Steve Martinez, your Sales Magician for Business Development http://www.sellingmagic.com
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15
January
2009
A salesperson asked me – “how long should I keep someone on my prospect list?” I think the best answer to this question comes from Napoleon Hill, who wrote - “Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success”.
Having patience in sales is definitely a virtue. Unfortunately, many salespeople and businesses in general don’t have the patience or the persistence and apply the perspiration to achieve success for long term sales and marketing results. The temptation for quick results and an immediate response is what keeps many salespeople focused only on the HOT leads.
When you have a long term plan for prospecting and developing relationships, you will reap the rewards of your investment in time, persistence and effort. When the salesperson asked me this question, I quickly remembered several situations where prospect took over two years to develop. Time was needed to nurture trust and wait for the right timing for a relationship to mature.
When the question of how long will it take for a prospect to purchase comes up, we should ask ourselves, how long we are willing to wait and nurture the relationship. I can think of many situations that last as long as or longer than two years. One example is a Canadian customer finally succumbed to my nurturing a relationship after two years. When he finally purchased, I looked back at my records to realize that it was over two years of consistent mailings and an occasional telephone call that kept this prospect interested. If I had stopped my efforts, the sale would have been lost.
One of the ways to nurture long term relationships is to have a sales pipeline of events that don’t require you to expend energy or time to execute. There are many systems that can do this for you and I want to show you what a drip marketing event might look like. When you have a system that does this for you, you can keep track of hundreds of prospects who aren’t ready to purchase now, but will at some point in time. You just have to be patient.
Here are a few features your sales pipeline system should have:
1. If you use email, use a system that will track and notify you when the prospect is active in their interest with you. This can be done by several companies that monitor open and clicks on links to the email message you send.
2. Your communications should be personalized so you maximize your impact with each letter or email you send. The timing of these events should also be consistent with the best practices of selling and marketing.
3. You should have a reminder system built into your sales pipeline so you are reminded to call the prospect when they should be called. This would be based on best practices too.
By: Steve Martinez the Sales Magician for Business Development
Http://www.sellingmagic.com (951) 277-0080
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13
January
2009
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If you like fresh orange juice in the morning, join me on a morning walk. I live in California and hike to an orange grove. I will search for and select the juiciest orange I can find. Savoring the explosion of taste from a fresh, ripe navel orange is almost a religious experience. I’m not breaking any laws because my community allows this. During the harvest season, I enjoy this morning treat for weeks because oranges ripen at different times. If I visit the orange grove every morning, I will savor ripe oranges for months. The grove is large, so I can explore it to find the perfect, juiciest oranges from the best trees.
When you think about it, it is the same as a field of prospects. There are thousands, maybe millions of prospects out there. Somewhere, someone is ripening for your product or service. If you’re there, you can pick it and savor the bounty of a sale.
7 Steps To Prevent Spoiled Sales:
One of the sad parts of my hike is to see spoiled oranges on the ground. It is the same with my sales territory. If I’m not around when a prospect is ripe for my services, the opportunity will spoil. Worse yet, my competition will capture the sale. Here are some tips to prevent this.
• Visit the grove of prospects regularly and contact every tree for ripe opportunities.
• Increase your contact activity so prospects remember who you are and be consistent.
• Use more than one method of contact. Use the telephone, personal visits, letters and emails to capture the attention of prospects. They may contact you when they are ready.
• Learn the traits of a ripe prospect or someone close to being ripe. The best way is through key questions and asking for the order. They won’t buy if you don’t ask.
• Explore the depth of the grove and profile the best prospects to know when the best fruit will ripen. Measure the characteristics, so you can maximize your prospecting time.
• Develop a system that reminds you when to go back to the ripening fruit tree of sales.
• Finally, automate your selling system so it does most of this work for you.
When you follow these 7 tips, you reap the rewards of the tantalizing fruit of your efforts.
By Steve Martinez - the Sales Magician for Business Development
www.sellingmagic.com (951) 277-0080
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12
January
2009
We can learn a lot from professional and college sports. In both cases the objective is to develop a winning team that will achieve the ultimate goal of a national or world championship. When I have a favorite team, it makes the games more fun to watch. I love it when the stronger team loses and the more spirited team takes advantage of opportunities that develop. There could be a bad call, a fumbled opportunity or a lucky break that shifts momentum in the game.
In most cases the development of a championship team takes years and sometimes decades for the team to reach peak performance. In team sports it starts with the recruitment of players who will fill strategic positions. Building a winning team requires years of planning, coaching and time to nurture and develop. The successful teams start with a dream to reach the goal and take the first step.
Where to Start
I want you think about where you are today business. Are you building your future – strategically, dynamically with a long term plan? If you can’t look at a single piece of paper that has your business, sales or marketing plan, it isn’t too late. You can start today. The Chinese have a proverb for this:
“The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago.
The second best time is today.”
The To Do List
The best time to set your daily goals was yesterday. If you don’t have a plan, start a daily to do list of the things you need to accomplish today. Having a daily list of goals is where winners start their day.
The Business Plan
Three months ago was the best time to write your business plan. The second best time is today. If you want to be a winner, you need a business plan with sales and marketing strategies and tactics outlined. Just like in sports, there will be times when you must adjust your game plan, make the adjustments.
Blogging Plan
The best time for starting a blog was in 2005, the second best time is today. Blogging could be the business building tool you need that gives you two way communication with your customers and prospects. Having two way communications with clients is changing the way business is done. What are you waiting for if you don’t engage in social networking?
Sales Pipeline Plan
The best time to start a sales pipeline was last year. The second best time is today. It takes time for prospects to develop and you must plant the seeds and nurture the relationships. When you have a plan of action that performs these activities, you will convert more prospects into clients.
Referral Process Plan
The best time to start a referral process was 3 months ago. The second best time is today. Getting referrals is one of the best ways to retain and maintain clients and develop new ones. It takes more time and expense to create new accounts than if you have a referral process in your business. If you don’t have a plan, what are you waiting for?
If you find yourself at a point where you wish you coulda, shoulda but didn’t. Now is the time to take action. It is the winning teams that take action and the losing teams that wish they coulda, shouda. What do you want to be? Take the first steps to become a winner.
By Steve Martinez, the Sales Magician for Business Development http://www.sellingmagic.com
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9
January
2009
The journey this week is what I call, a fire extinguisher week because when I’m focused, excited and hot with activity I need a fire extinguisher around me to quench the flames. I hope you get the picture I’m painting. Just be sure to add a giant smile on my face.
It is Friday and I’m sorry the week is coming to a close. This might be a little foreign to some people. I really enjoy what I do and this has been a particularly great week. I call this a fire extinguisher week because I’m very busy coaching and sharing information that can help others. I feel like I’m on fire – a good thing. What is particularly nice is being a business owner with an opportunity to live my dream.
I know that when I help others achieve what they want, they will help me achieve my goals with new business and profits. The important point here is to focus on helping my clients reach success first.
I have been reading “The Secret”, a best selling book on how you attract what you want in life and stay positive. I am also reading Jeffery Gitomer’s Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude. Additionally, I have spent time in my Bible and made time for quiet meditation. I also spend time reading blogs from my friends and look for the positive things in the news.
When I nourish myself with empowering thoughts and exercise my positive attitude with a focus on helping others, life is great. Sure, there is bad news out there and some people believe we are in a recession. I just don’t want to participate and I like living a positive life.
One of the particularly interesting results of being positive is that it attracts business like a magnet. Let’s face it; nobody wants to do business with a loser or a negative person. We want to do business with successful people and companies with a positive outlook.
Be the Bright Reflection
Have you looked in the mirror lately? A mirror is one instrument that reflects what everyone else see’s. If you haven’t taken a good look lately, take a cleaning cloth to the mirror and dust off the grime that might be on the surface so you can get a clear reflection of YOU. You want to see what image you are projecting to those around you.
We live a life of attraction and if we are positive about life, good things happen. Good things happen when things are bad and we are positive. Yes, the world is in turmoil and we can’t control what happens outside our sphere of influence. I can and will do what I can to make a difference and I invite you to join me in making a positive impact on others today. There are a lot of folks out there that need a positive person in their life. Be that person and good things will happen as a matter of reflection.
What will you do today that will make a difference?
By: Steve Martinez, the Sales Magician for Business Development
http://www.sellingmagic.com 951-277-0080
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4
January
2009
We can’t sell everyone. It would be nice, it’s just realistic. Here is a fun story about three people you might know. One is a business owner, another is a salesperson and the third is a sales manager.
We will talk about Bob, Kim and Chis in this episode of a sales tale. For more information on this story from a blog post, go to: http://www.sellingmagic.com/sales_journal
Thank You,
Steve Martinez
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