Hold Your Position

In sales, you can frequently be knocked off of your position by your prospect which can lead to no sale. What I mean by this is that sometimes the prospect will push you on a negotiation point that you attempt to handle and cater to, only to realize that this didn't close the sale.

Bending over backwards and allowing every request from the prospect will not close the sale. You must have the ability to hold your position and stay true to what you sell and what you can or cannot do. Use tactful communication to steer the conversation where you want to go and handle objections rather than just buckle to them. It's OK to say "no". In fact, it can be an incredible negotiating tool and sales tool to simply say, "I'm sorry but we can't make that work but here is how we can address this..." or simply walk away from the deal if you can't handle the concern. You would be amazed at how walking away from a deal can be a powerful tool to close the sale. Many prospects will reach back even stronger after you have walked away from it.

The key point here is to stay strong on your position. For example, if the price of any item is $1000 and the prospect wants it for $900, you can simply say, "we can't do it for that price but the truth is, the market price for this is $2000 so you are already getting the best rate and dealing with us, we will provide a best practices guide at the end to help you with this which will help you dramatically improve sales from this service...." With this example, you hold your position while selling them and concluding the deal with a value add. Be smart about how to handle each situation and just keep in mind that buckling under pressure from the prospects demands will not help you make a sale. You're better off to hold your position and use tactful communication to steer the deal toward the desired outcome.

- Robert Cornish

CEO, Richter10.2 Media Group

Care

It's a simple concept but few recognize it or actually apply it to sales or business in general. Care. You have to care about your prospect. Care about your client. Care to be interested. No, not the fake kind that comes across as awkwardness on the receiving end. The authentic kind. Actually be interested in your prospect or client. Ask them questions. Take some time to study their site to clearly understand their company and where they may need help and where you may fit in.

See, all too many salespeople clearly only care about one thing - their commission to fatten their pocket but the truth is, that is the longest and hardest route you could take. Instead, focus on caring authentically about the prospect. There is a reason or purpose or need that they are trying to handle or resolve which is why they called you. Care to find out what the reason or purpose is. Understand it. Ask questions. Problem solve with them to help handle it. Get excited about them and their company and focus on helping them attain their goal faster. Be genuine and care. This is your fastest route to actually making a sale.

It's actually difficult to express this one factor in text format in a blog but all I can really tell you is that you have to care genuinely about the prospect or client enough to be truly interested in them and focused on helping them. Care enough to have engaging dialog, even if it goes off track leading to things like family, travel or life - care to listen, care to be interested and care to genuinely help. Believe me, it will come across to your prospect and they will love you for it. You want faster sales? This is the way. Care.

- Robert Cornish
CEO, Richter10.2 Media Group

Contraction and Expansion

Just a note on how contraction relates to expansion and why contraction is neccessary. When you expand at a large level in a short amount of time after a lot of hard work, push through and ultimately attainment of the expansion goals you set out for, it's natural for some level of contraction to follow right after. It doesn't have to of course - there are ways to quickly stabalize and increase the expansion even further but don't get beat up by the contraction should it occur. Rather, use the time to evaluate what flaws or weaknesses the expansion helped reveal, define what the new expansion goals are, get the team re-organized and energized and put in systems and operations that help bolster the current level as well as allow for the new level you plan to expand to.

This constant ebb and flow of expansion and contraction continues while you grow. It's natural. There's no need to freak out about it. Just ensure that you organize behind all expansion to stabalize the growth and help contribute to new levels of expansion. Otherwise, the contraction will stick and the whole activity becomes a little shakey which hurts your momentum.

So use the contraction to quickly identify what needs to be addressed, address it, plan for new expansion and hit the ground hard to push the next major targets through to complete. You will find your contractions will become larger and larger to soon become bigger that your previous highest ever expansion levels. So as long as the overall stats in the area are trending up - just keep doing this over and over to handle both expansion and contraction accordingly.

- Robert Cornish
CEO, Richter10.2 Media Group