Marketing Me! How to make sales

You are sales professional for a company with a real product (no vaporware reps, please).

You want to make money from commissions or compensation based upon sales.

Now that we have that established, I am going to tell you a few hints for making sales in today's consultive selling environment.

First, what I won't tell you is:
- how to get leads.
- how to make contacts, network or get referrals.
- how to market yourself for lots of inbound traffic (you should know that already by regularly reading Marketing Me!).

Now, how to make sales.

Love your product - sell it everywhere you go. Explain to anyone you meet (on plane, at events, picking up your kids at school, etc) what your products or services do and why you love what you do. This is practice which with repeated performances will make it easy when meeting real economic decision makers.

Talk and listen to your customers - Quit wasting time talking to the other sales folks, your secretary or friends. When working, talk with customers. Even if they have no intention of buying anything today, your customers and prospects will buy from you when they are ready IF you have invested hours getting to know them and understanding their needs.

Ask for sales - 99% of all sales fail because this simple rule is not followed by so-called sales professionals. Training, classes, consultive selling approaches and second guessing have decreased close rates for sales professionals. Practice asking for the sale. If you followed the second step and understand your customers and prospects, you will have no problem getting business when you ask for it.

Sell again - After the agreement is in place, thank youf customer and reassure them of their purchase. Do this frequently. Call (better yet, visit) your customer regularly and let them know the status of their order and when they can expect delivery. Let them know about upgrades, enhancements, new products and endorsements your product has received. Let their decision be validated repeatedly.

Sales is not hard. Closing is hard if you are not prepared. But sales is easy. Follow the steps above and make more sales every quarter.

Q2 is almost over. I hope you made your numbers. If so, congratulations. If not, go try harder next quarter.