PRE-LIMS REVIEWER

“Professional Salesmanship”

Marketing vs. Sales (Lesson 1)

*Marketing is sales but sales is not marketing
*Selling is marketing but marketing is not selling

MARKETING SALES

1. Is focused on consumer & customer needs 1. Focused on its products

2. Uses its marketing plan encompassing the 2. Uses aggressive selling & sales promotions
marketing mix, backed up by consumer w/ emphasis on price variations to close the
research w/ emphasis on service sale
3. Aims to maximize profits through increased 3. Aims to maximize the revenues through
customer satisfaction & raise market share sales volume
4. Researches customers’ needs before 4. Company manufactures the product first &
production takes place. Then, decides on decides to sell it at a profit w/o knowing the
how to deliver product or service to satisfy customers’ needs
needs before selling at a profit 5. Planning is short-term oriented in terms of
5. Planning is long term oriented in terms of today’s products & market preferences
new products & tomorrow’s market & future 6. Stresses their own needs (to sell the product
growth or service)
6. Stresses needs & wants of its customers in 7. Views the customers as the last link in
particular & the consumers in general business
7. Views customers as the very purpose why 8. Sees the sales promotion is the only effective
the businesses exist marketing communications tool
8. Looks upon marketing communication as a 9. Main job is to find the customers for its
tool for communicating the benefits & products
satisfaction the product will give consumers 10. Requires selling & communication skills
9. Main job is to find the right product for its 11. Is just part of marketing
customers
*Selling is only the tip of the iceberg*
10. Requires conceptual & analytical skills
11. Has a wider connotation & includes many
activities like marketing research, product
planning & development, advertising & sales
promotion, pricing, publicity, public relations
& sales
*Sales and Marketing are two complementary yet different disciplines*
WEEK TWO

Course Description:

This course provides an introduction to the principles and practices of professional salesmanship.

Professional Salesmanship is a basic course dealing with the fundamentals of trust-based personal
selling.
Areas specifically studied include:
 UNDERSTANDING THE SALES INDUSTRY AND CAREERS IN SALES.
 PROMOTING SELF-LEADERSHIP.

 BUILDING TRUST……AND CONDUCTING SALES DIALOGUE.

A sales dialogue describes the dynamic communication process that occurs between a buyer
and a seller (you) where each party works to define and understand the buyer's needs and the
ways the proposed solution will meet those needs. ... Asking questions are also a key part of the
Sales dialogue.

PROSPECTING FOR CLIENTS, QUALIFYING THEM, AND COMMUNICATING.

 Prospecting for clients. Prospecting is the first step in the SALES PROCESS, which consists
of identifying potential customers, aka prospects. The goal of prospecting is to develop a
database of likely customers and then systematically communicate with them in the hopes
of converting them from potential customer to current customer.
A SALES PROCESS is a set of repeatable steps that a sales person takes to take a prospective
buyer from the early stage of awareness to a closed sale. Typically, a sales process consists of
 5-7 steps: Prospecting, Preparation, Approach, Presentation, Handling objections, Closing, and
Follow-up.

 Qualifying prospects - Qualifying a prospect means to determine whether or not someone who
is interested in your services is a good fit as a customer. If yes, they are worthy of your time and
effort to turn them into a customer. Qualified sales leads have a higher return on investment
and higher close rate.
Qualifying is all about gathering insights necessary to make a good judgment.

Should you sell to a given prospect? What is the best course of action to close a deal? Is this
prospect a good fit for your offer? Is it a viable sales opportunity?

Only after you've qualified someone can you really know whether it's worth to invest your time
and effort into trying to sell to this prospect.
Wasting time
If you're not qualifying your leads properly, you'll waste a lot of time following up, and
attempting to sell to prospects that aren't a good fit for your company. Spend this time on
qualified prospects, and you'll close substantially more valuable deals.
…and communicating with prospects.
4 Tips to Mindful and Effective Communication
1. BE HUMAN
Scripts can be useful as they help you remember key points. But you don’t want to sound like a
robot. Put the prospective client at ease by adding a human touch to the conversation. This
could be as simple as small talk or adding a couple of personal details or humorous stories. But
the overall key to this approach is LISTENING — the better you listen to the prospective client,
the better you’re able to react.
2. STAY PROFESSIONAL
While you want to sound like a human, you have to remember that you’re not BFFs with the
client. Maintain the professional distance and avoid talking about any deeply personal subjects,
politics, religion, or using slang. (Professional distance  is the space a  professional  must keep
between their  professional  relationship with another, and any other relationship they have with
that person). You want the client to like you, but in the end, the relationship
is client-salesperson, so the emphasis should always be on your professional demeanor. This will
establish trust between you and the client.
3. LET THEM TALK
Now that you know everything there is to know about this prospect and you’ve done the small
talk and have them chatting, it’s time to let them talk. If you’ve got a client who isn’t just giving
you monosyllabic answers, you’ve hit sales pay dirt. Pay attention to what they’re saying and
make them feel heard. Whether or not they’re giving you information that can be used for the
sale, they’re establishing a bond with you and that’s already half the work.

4. BE WELL-INFORMED ABOUT WHAT YOU’RE SELLING (Product Knowledge)

Just as you need to know your client, you also need to know your product or service. The ins and
outs, what’s negotiable and what’s not negotiable about it, who it’s appropriate for and who it
may not be so appropriate for. Product knowledge  is the ability to communicate information
and answer questions about your  product  or service. It is considered an important knowledge
area for your role in Sales that puts you in front of customers. investors or the media.
If you have the client’s attention, you need to be prepared for their questions so make sure you
have all the information at your fingertips before you reach out to make the sale.

Additional topics include:

 Retail and Industrial Selling
RETAIL SELLING - A retail sale occurs when a business sells a product or service to an individual
consumer for his or her own use. The transaction itself can occur through a number of different
sales channels, such as online, in a brick-and-mortar storefront, through direct sales, or direct
mail.
INDUSTRIAL SELLING includes all forms of personal selling to organisational and industrial buyers
of products for resale, or for use in manufacture, or for use in the operation of their businesses.
Industrial goods include: Equipment, Materials, Components, Sub-assemblies, Services, Supplies.
 Methods of Market Analysis
  Professional Salesmanship and Innovative Sales Techniques

WHAT’S IN IT FOR ME LEARNING ABOUT PROFESSIONAL SALESMANSHIP

 Understand consumer and business markets - In marketing, the term market refers to the group
of consumers or organizations that is interested in the product, has the resources and
willingness to purchase the product, and is permitted by law and other regulations to acquire
the product
 Understand the role and the nature of selling as a tool, as well as an important function, in the
marketing of products and services.

 Learn and develop personal selling skills as well as the new strategies that will ensure the
successful marketing of the product in a given environment, either as an entrepreneur or as a
sales person.
 Develop your sales negotiation and active listening skills.
 Understand the nature and the scope of work of a Sales Executive (or manager) responsible for
a group of sales persons tasked to promote and sell a particular product;
 Understand the concepts of Sales Management as a Sales Executive (or manager)
 Understand and discover new selling techniques for an effortless and enjoyable, “no fear selling”
in a highly competitive and technologically advanced marketing environment.
 Understand Consumer Buying Behaviour as well as that of major influences in business buyers
and the business buying process. Consumer behaviour is the study of individuals, groups, or
organizations and all the activities associated with the purchase, use and disposal of goods and
services, and how the consumer's emotions, attitudes and preferences affect his buying
behaviour.
PROFESSIONAL SELLING – WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT

 Sales professionalism refers to the commonly expected behaviors, etiquette and mannerisms for
sales professionals.
 Salespeople increasingly rely on personal and professional attributes to build long-term
rapport* with customers. (*A close and harmonious relationship in which the people or groups
concerned understand each other's feelings or ideas and communicate well).
 Salesmanship can be defined as the skill required to convince people to buy or in persuading
people to do something.
 Selling is the process of transferring your enthusiasm for an idea, product or service to a
customer or potential customer with a need to be satisfied.
 Emotion is created in the sale by your enthusiasm for what it is you’re selling. Enthusiasm is
contagious and your positive emotion will be transformed to the prospect. Selling  is and always
will be a conveyance of feeling. If you can get the prospect to feel the same way about your
product as you do, they'll buy it.

 Professional Selling is all about solving problems and fulfilling needs.

 Selling is about asking questions. Selling is not about fast talking, trickery, lying, or pushing a
product to everyone. Selling is about understanding your customer, solving problems and
building client relationships. Telling is not selling; only asking questions IS selling. Never make a
statement if you cannot phrase it in the form of a question!


 A true professional salesperson knows his success is in direct proportion to his ability to help
others get what they want. That’s what his goal is: help others get what they want, help them
get what is in their best interest.
 Professional salespeople understand that selling is not about him or the products/services he is
offering. It’s about the customer; about solving the customer’s problems, fulfilling their needs,
being a partner to them to help make their world a better, more successful place. 

Do You Want to Remain an Amateur or Do You Want to Become a

Professional?
 An amateur goes out on a presentation and dives right in, telling the
prospect/customer all about her wonderful wares—its history, what it’ll
accomplish, on and on without pause.
 The professional does extensive research before going out on the presentation,
and then, before saying word one about her products/services, asks a series of
pertinent questions, in effect interviewing the prospect/customer, to ascertain
the information necessary to accomplish his goals.


FINALLY, DID YOU KNOW THAT…

Sales plays a key role in the building of loyalty and trust between customer

and business and can have an impact on the growth of the business. 

How to make selling easy (Lesson 3)

SALES
SELLING
1. Is a department
1. Is everyone’s responsibility
2. Are results
2. Activity that drives sales
3. Is one transaction
3. Continuous relationship
4. A broad professional
building and value delivery
designation
4. Is a skill and a privilege

*If you can’t sell yourself, your ideas, experience, skills /

talent, product / service then you are doomed to fail
*Selling is not about tricking anyone; it is about helping people own products that make their life better

COMMON MYTHS ABOUT SALES

*paradigm shift is a fundamental change in an individual’s or a society’s view of how things work in the
world
MYTHS
1. Sales people are born, not made.
*when someone does or doesn’t become a sales person is by a reason of the environment. Life
experiences & personal choices

2. Sales is all about good talkers and extroverts

*A good talker makes a good liar

3. You need to be aggressive to succeed in sales (you only need to be assertive)

4. Sales persons are good liars

5. Sales is the most important function of the company
6. Closing a sale is just a matter of luck and guts

7. Sales people are motivated solely by their quest for money

8. Sales persons are doers: not thinkers.

*Doer – a person who acts rather than merely talking or thinking
*Thinker – someone who uses the mind or intellect in an effort to reach a goal or decision

*Ensuring success in sales through self-motivation, spotting opportunities, finding ways to

exploit them, overcoming obstacles, and controlling the business requires sales persons to do a
lot of thinking
*NATO – No action, talk only person
*Hence, a sales person is not only a doer but a thinker as well

9. Sales persons must always remember their ABC’s (Always be closing)

*Selling is about relationships
*It is impossible to do business today unless you build an excellent customer relationship
*Engagement is the basic quality required in the modern business world
*Interaction is the most sought after thing today

10. Sales is a numbers game

*More is the only path to success. More leads, more calls, more visits and more presentations.
*More everything leads to more sales
*Sales success is based on quality – not quantity

11. Customers don’t want to deal w/ sales people

12. Name-dropping sells

13. Social media selling is ‘it’

*Social selling is a powerful tool for salespeople, but it needs to be coupled w/ traditional sales
tactics

14. The average buyer line

*There is no average buyer, there are teams of buyers
*Three types of buyers
1. Tightwads – stingy, overly cautious or defensive w/ money
2. Spendthrifts – reckless & wasteful w/ money; driven by emotions
3. Average spenders – spending tendencies fall somewhere in the middle

15. Always identify and focus on the decision maker

*Influencers share their research & recommendation w/ the decision maker who makes choice
Selling Power (Lesson 4)
Buyers are:
*The hard sell is dead; This has happened because customers are
becoming more educated and empowered ever than before *In control of the process

*The new paradigm is here *Educated about options

*Looking for solutions

Then: Salesman *Tired of canned pitches

Now: Business Transformation Associate *Asking their peers

Advanced Business Development Specialist *Often familiar w/ competitors’ products

and price
Solutions match-maker
Client Interface Facilitator The customer is a partner who needs…
*a trusting relationship – keeping them,
*The customer is not the opponent – not someone to be building trust, strong & positive relationship
overcome or beaten *insights, solutions, big ideas
*If we want to grow in the market, we have to understand *Business, personal needs & wants are met
customer needs and expectations
*Concerns addressed
*Customers need your product / service to function the way they
need in order to solve their own problem or desire *Win-win fair agreement (one that is good
for everyone who is involved)
*Your product or service needs to be a convenient solution to the
function your customers are trying to meet
*Concerns should be viewed by a salesperson as an opportunity Customer insight is understanding them
*Personal selling is not a we versus they process based on…
*Buying behavior

There are many reasons to pay attention to the customer *Experiences w/ you
insights: *Beliefs, needs and expectations
1. By asking specific follow-up questions, you can create
specific solutions that improve our business & satisfy customer’s concerns
2. Do not assume that a customer who doesn’t complain feels he is getting a quality service or
produc
3. Customer retention strategies depend heavily on all customer insights

Customer retention
-Refers to the activities and actions companies and organizations take to reduce the number of
customer defections. The goal of customer retention programs is to help the companies retains as many
customers as possible, often through customer and brand loyalty initiatives
-Depends heavily on all customer insights
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