OK, let me ask you a question …what are the first few words that spring to mind when I say “salesperson”? Is it something like “professional, organised, well-trained and popular”?
Or is it more like “pushy, sleazy, slimy, aggressive and arrogant”? This is a question I ask in lots of my workshops and I can pretty much guarantee that 90% of responses will be negative.
Let’s cut to the chase here. Most people really don’t like salespeople. But wait …that’s not true. Most people really don’t like what they THINK a salesperson is. And if most people believe that becoming good at sales means that they’ll have to behave like that awful image they have of salespeople then why would they actually want to become good at sales? Who wants other people to think of them as slimy or pushy or arrogant? Not me! And I’m pretty confident not you either.
But here’s the crux of the matter. If you’re running your own business you’re going to HAVE to get good at making sales if your business is going to succeed. So, how do we get past the sales phobia? Let’s look at this a different way.
What if being a great salesperson actually meant you were popular, likeable, warm and friendly? Because that’s entirely possible as long as your approach to sales is all about helping and educating your customer so that they are in a position to be able to make an informed decision about whether they ought to buy from you.
So to summarise. If you want to make more sales in your business without having to become a sleazebag, first you need to change the picture you have in your head of a good salesperson to an image that is really positive and professional. Something you would genuinely aspire to. Then think about how you can stop trying to sell at all and simply help your customers to buy.
After all, we all love buying stuff we want!
