As 2010 looms with continued economic uncertainty in full bloom, it is imperative – now more than ever – to proactively address weaknesses in your selling team. The most serious weak areas, however, are difficult to spot. In fact, they are virtually invisible because they stem from how your salespeople think as opposed to what they do.
Here are 5 (invisible) reasons why your salespeople will underperform in 2010:
1. They have a need for approval
Many people choose sales after being told they have a perfect personality for selling. While that could be true, many of those same people feel complete only when other people like them. Salespeople who are easily liked have a great advantage, but salespeople who need their prospects to like them often make that a priority over getting the business. Salespeople with need for approval have difficulty asking tough questions, have a fear of rejection, and avoid confrontation.
2. They become emotionally involved
Salespeople who think, analyze, create, strategize or otherwise talk to themselves when prospects catch them by surprise become emotionally involved instead of remaining in the moment. When they are emotionally involved, their listening skills tend to be self-focused rather than prospect focused, causing them to miss important points and lose control of their meetings.
3. They rehearse self-limiting beliefs
Every salesperson has as many as 60 beliefs that either support the selling process (“I have the ability to be effective with company presidents”) or sabotage it (”I don’t like making cold calls”). Ineffective salespeople often have 10 or more of these self-limiting records playing over and over in their heads while more effective salespeople have very few.
4. They have a non-supportive buy cycle
The buy cycle refers to the salesperson’s own personal buying habits and how they make major purchases for themselves. Most ineffective salespeople have non-supportive buy cycles: they think it over before making a decision, they comparison shop, they shop for the lowest price, they perform research or perceive that a relatively small amount of money is a lot. When their prospects engage in this very same behavior, the salesperson unconsciously understands (has empathy), and their techniques for handling stalls and put-offs of this kind are either not used at all or are used ineffectively.
5. They are uncomfortable with issues involving money
Many salespeople are uncomfortable escalating a question about budget or whether a prospect can afford the product or service being offered to the next level. Their discomfort prevents them from helping a prospect figure out how to pay or even (more creatively) where the money could possibly come from. When prospects don’t have the budget, can’t envision increasing the budget or don’t know how they can find the money, the salesperson empathizes as opposed to digging deeper, asking questions, and making suggestions to resolve the monetary shortage.
Of the 21 dimensions we use to assess sales effectiveness and develop salespeople, these 5 are the most common and significant inhibitors to sales success. They are also the most challenging to detect and remedy.
You can stack the deck for 2010 in your favor by proactively developing current sales staff in each of these 5 dimensions and by modifying your sales recruiting process to screen for them before you hire. And by the way, if you don’t, the costs associated with an endless recruiting, training, and turnover cycle for your sales team could hurt you even more than the lost revenue!
Want more sales in 2010 and a stable, productive sales team? Then eliminate the 5 (invisible) reasons why your salespeople underperform!
One Comment
Reason no 6 perhaps? – Demonstrable Sales Leadership
Quite often we forget about our own ‘underperformance’ as a member of the underperforming team as managers and leaders. A sales leader who is mentoring, coaching, directing, teaching and provides clear, fair, attainable & consistant objectives, is less likely to have underforming team-members.
A sales leader who gets out more regularly into the field with their team and applies themselves to the team, may have underperformers for a shorter period of time. Sales accumen can be taught and performance can be improved through guidence!!
Knowing these 5 invisible weaknesses (thanks for highlighting them), of course, is vital information to the sales leader.
…an old but very true saying, “everytime you point a finger at someone else, you have 4 pointing back at you”.