There’s been a great deal of research into the dynamics of salesperson-customer interaction over the years, and the results are typically pretty depressing. Studies regularly show that prospective customers regard only a small minority of the conversations they have with salespeople as being a valuable use of their time.
It’s not much better from the salesperson’s side: most of the interactions they have with potential customers result - at best - in an agreement to continue the dialogue, with the customer declining to extend the conversation being the most common outcome. Only a small minority of conversations actually result in an advance in which both parties commit to moving forwards in a tangible way.
By the way, I’m not talking about cold calls here, but about potentially meaningful interactions in which the customer has already expressed interest in having a conversation.
The outcome gap between the best and worst sales performers is particularly stark: top performers tend to either advance the sale or disqualify the opportunity as a result of their conversations, whereas weak performers tend to either stumble along with a vague agreement to continue the process at best or (more likely) being disqualified by the prospective customer at worst.
Some of this disparity can clearly be attributed to talent or skill. But I’m happy to agree with Neil Rackham (of SPIN® Selling fame) when he concluded that the biggest single difference between the best and worst sales performers was their commitment to invest in preparation and planning.
I’ve had the good fortune to learn from some top sales performers, and I’ve identified five key things that they consistently do better than their weaker colleagues...
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