“When you take the time to improve your emotional intelligence, you’ll increase your ability to trust and persevere, and when you take the time to learn a sales process, your prospects will realize that you are more than a solution provider.” – Jeff Ruby in today’s Tip 456
What separates good salespeople from great salespeople?
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Transcript
Scott Ingram: You’re listening to the Daily Sales Tips podcast and I’m your host, Scott Ingram. Today’s tip comes from Jeff Ruby. Jeff is the CEO of RedRock Leadership and author of RedRock Leadership: Transform Your Company Culture and Unleash the Potential for Exponential Growth. After a successful sales career, Jeff founded RedRock in 2010 where he helps companies develop leadership and sales strategies. Here he is:
Jeff Ruby: Becoming a great salesperson is a process and it requires a process. I’m Jeff Ruby, founder, CEO and author of red rock leadership. So what separates good salespeople from great salespeople? Think about it. A great salesperson has the ability to show up as a solution provider and lead as a trusted advisor. For over the past 20 years, I’ve been building sales teams and growing salespeople. Here’s what I conclude.
Prospects see sales people three different ways. They either see them as solution providers, consultants, or trusted advisors. Let me explain what I mean in a little bit more detail. When a salesperson and a prospect first meet, the sales person is always seen by that prospect as a solution provider. In other words, they’re nothing more than a glorified Google search. This is someone that the prospect uses to provide answers and pricing to fix their perceived problem. Unfortunately, this is where the majority of sales people start and finish.
Good sales people understand the importance of uncovering the needs and wants of their prospect. They learn how to ask appropriate open-ended questions to extend their conversation, taking it to a deeper level and building trust. These sales people become seen by their prospects as consultants. It’s good while it lasts. However, it’s unfortunate that this is where many salespeople lose control of the deal because they don’t know what to do next. Then they end up reverting back to being a solution provider or worse, they wear out their prospect and the deal collapses.
Great salespeople remain conscious and attentive to their prospect through the entire sales process, and ultimately they become a trusted advisor to their prospects. While many believe that this is intuitive in nature for a great salesperson, I assure you it’s not. In fact, some of the most successful salespeople I’ve worked with over the years who are the most insecure and most needy, the furthest thing from a trusted advisor. In fact, many of them struggled out of the gate just being a solution provider.
Becoming a great salesperson is a learned process. It’s a process of learning how to trust and persevere. Great salespeople are trusted because they trust first. They have learned how to go beyond being dependent on the needs of others to get their needs met. They’re now learning how to be interdependent so they can meet the needs of others.
Great sales people take the time to overcome and deal with their insecurities by working on five key skills. The five key skills of emotional intelligence, personal awareness, integrity, internal motivation, empathy and social skills.
Let me break each one of these down for you just in a little bit of detail. Personal awareness is your ability to recognize your influence on others. Integrity is your ability to let your intentions match your actions. Internal motivation as your ability to do the right things for the right reasons. And empathy, the foundational skill in leadership is your ability to recognize and respond others emotions. Social skills is your ability to build positive relationships.
Now, not only is becoming a great salesperson a process, but it also requires a process that allows you to move from being a solution provider to a consultant to ultimately becoming a trusted advisor. Solution providers listen to their prospects. Consultants understand their prospects. While trusted advisors empathize with their prospects, your ongoing commitment to becoming a great salesperson will net you big time results, not just monetary results either. Results that will help you help people. There are a few things in this life that are more rewarding than helping people and that’s what trusted advisors do. They help people.
Remember, becoming a great salesperson is a process and it requires a process. When you take the time to improve your emotional intelligence, you’ll increase your ability to trust and persevere, and when you take the time to learn a sales process, your prospects will realize that you are more than a solution provider. Your prospects will realize that you are a trusted advisor.
Scott Ingram: You can learn more about Jeff Ruby by clicking over to DailySales.Tips/456. There you’ll find links to check out Jeff’s new book: RedRock Leadership: Transform Your Company Culture and Unleash the Potential for Exponential Growth. You’ll also find a link to his own RedRock leadership podcast.
Once you’ve done that. Be sure to come back tomorrow for another great sales tip. Thanks for listening!