After many years of both conducting sales training workshops and personally selling, I have come to recognize six popular misconceptions about selling. And, I must say, every time I broach those myths during a sales training session I get push-back, disbelief, the wagging of heads and several audible “No Way!’s”. So I am braced for your blog comments.
I have chosen to address each myth as a separate blog post, to make it more convenient to get through in the smaller and smaller free time chunks we all seem to be experiencing these days. Here’s the first.
Myth 1: A Sales Person’s Job is Just to Sell
We understand that sales people are under a lot of pressure to spend time face-to-face with customers and on the road – rather than behind a desk. But pushing, or allowing, a sales person to only sell is counterproductive. That approach would be the equivalent of saying, “A soldier’s job is just to shoot and kill the enemy.” Good soldiers do a lot more than simply shoot. They are part of a team that sometimes requires them to play different roles and take on different duties. Here are some examples, along with their contrasting business function.
They collect and report field intelligence: Good soldiers are trained, not only to shoot, but also to observe and report on the enemy (competitors), their armaments (competitive advantages and value propositions), their location (markets and customers) and their strong points (where they have impenetrable positions – be it markets or accounts). Soldiers also report on the enemy’s weaknesses and gaps in their lines (under-serviced customers and under-served markets).
Any General, coming onto the battlefield needs, first and foremost, intel – to be able to formulate a strategy. Business managers need intel as well, for the same reason.
They report on the effectiveness of their own, and the enemy’s, weapons: The business equivalent is reporting on customer receptivity to the sales tools in use, the sales approaches, product capabilities, product reliability, product effectiveness, installation problems, quality, training problems and a host of other relevant experiential aspects of selling, delivering and using the product.
They dig in and defend the ground already captured: In business terms they defend their current accounts through disciplined customer service and make sure they are secure.
They exploit a victory, charging after a retreating enemy, or pouring through a breach: When something works in the field they use it again and again, winning repeatedly over weak competitors and landing new customers until the territory is “owned” and they move into a temporary “hold and defend” mode – until the next opportunity for an offensive.
They share techniques and victories: In World War II, shortly after the Normandy invasion, the allies, having driven off the beaches into western France found themselves in bocage country . Bocage country is best described as countryside spotted with crop and grazing fields that are edged on all sides by 6 foot earthen walls entangled with scrub brush, vines and trees. These barriers have been built up over hundreds of years, a result of field-tending by farmers. From the air, bocage resembles a bunch of egg-cartons set side by side as far as the eye can see – each carton with deep, rectangular recesses. (Though at the time of the invasion, aerial observers did not recognize the impenetrable nature and height of the actual barriers.)
Capturing each field required soldiers to climb up one side of the barrier wall, scramble through the brush, trees and tangled vines, enter the field and charge across it to the bocage wall on the opposite side of the field. Tanks could not climb and penetrate these natural walls. The soldiers had no cover when entering the field. Casualties were high. The enemy simply placed machine guns at the opposite side of the field and mowed down any soldiers coming over the opposite wall. Progress in liberating France, ground to a halt.
That was, until some innovative engineer found that welding a fork-like scoop on the front end of a tank allowed it to tear through the walls, enter the fields ahead of the Allied soldiers and place heavy covering fire on the enemy gun emplacements on the opposite bocage wall. The success of that technique quickly spread to other infantry units. The casualty rate dropped. Progress accelerated. Eventually France was liberated.
When a sales person finds, discovers or invents something that succeeds and creates breakthroughs – it must be shared with all.
They train: To think that basic training is all that soldiers go through is a myth. Soldiers constantly repeat their training and hone their skills to a razor’s edge. They train on new techniques, new weapons, new systems and capturing obstacles and enemy positions in different terrains. Then they re-train on what they learned in their first training. Sales people, sadly, might train once a year. New sales people joining the team, may have to wait as long as 11 months before undergoing their basic training. Lack of training puts the team, the company and the product reputation at risk.
One more point: Training has two parts: basic physical conditioning (sales skills and disciplines) and weapons training (product and sales tool training).
Yes, there is more …
We could go on with the “good soldier” analogy, but by now, if you are a salesperson, you’ve probably reached your reading time-limit and need to run to do something else.
Have a good day.
Read the complete set of The 6 Common Sales Myths.
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