DOYOU LOVE SALES?

Honestly, if you were offered a sales job, how excited would you be? For man, I can imagine you won’t be very thrilled but believe it or not, no matter the type of role you are in, or no matter what products or services you offer, you are in the business of selling!

If the sales process stresses you, I am sure you’re not alone.You want to make money but you don’t like selling right?

Here are some tips to help:

Listen before you speak – I can’t tell you how many sales reps and business owners I have met that just jump into a sales pitch or just start talking about what they have to offer before they even do any form of needs analysis.

This is a major turn off.

Instead of immediately telling someone what you have to offer, ask questions and listen. Find out their needs, and if your product/service is a good fit for them ask yourself how you can help to make the potential or existing customer’s life easier or better. Talk with them about their problems and think about how your offering can help them.

You may find that you have more than one product/service that can be of benefit to them.

Action: Ask multiple questions when you meet a prospective customer.What are their pain points? What are they looking for? Don’t try to solve a problem until you know what the actual problem is!

Build a sales funnel – A sales funnel allows prospective customers time to get to know and trust you, thus leading to a more authentic experience e.g. you can create a free lead magnet that leads into your sales funnel so if you are in the beauty business, you may want to create aYouTube channel to show your transformations or tutorials and then promote that with a call to action to book a makeover or a beauty transformation. You can promote it on your social media audience, website or through email marketing.

Action: Create a loaded lead magnet and promote it to your fans, followers and subscribers. In addition, you can also use it to build an email list which on its own is valuable online marketing asset.

Tell stories – Stories are an excellent way of capturing your audience’s attention without being ‘salesy’.

Stories can include: – Sharing personal experiences related to your brand/ business e.g. how did you get started?

How did a product/ service you offer help in a particular situation?

– Testimonials – Sell an experience, especially if it’s a lifestyle brand.

– Behind the scenes product stories Always ensure a Call to action (CTA) is included within or after your story.

The story captures attention but the CTA gets your audience to take action.

Action: Incorporate stories into your content marketing as much as possible.

Include a CTA as well.

Build relationships – One of the worst things you can do is focus solely on a quick sale and then on to the next! That’s not a longterm strategy. Instead build a long-term relationship by being a source of valuable information on social media for example. Provide guidance through your content.

This leads to your fans, followers etc. trusting you and when it’s time to purchase or even recommend, you’ll be first on their mind.

Action: Stop focusing on making on-off sales but instead nurture long term relationships. l Candice Sealey is the Founder & Principal Consultant at Ignite! a Full-service Marketing & PR Consultancy that helps businesses/brands to stand out and communicate the right message to the right people at the right time through Strategy, Marketing, Media services and Design solutions. She is also a freelance content writer, advertising copywriter, voice over talent, media personality. Follow us on FB & IG @igniteresults Phone:784-432-2223.

Email: igniteresults@gmail.com