Within the first few seconds of any encounter you are evaluated by the prospect. Your appearance, demeanour and body language all contribute to quickly create a first impression. This judgement happens primarily on a subconscious level and once made is extremely difficult to reverse. The prospect's subconscious is asking the question "can I trust this person". Follow these twelve key lessons and learn to influence this judgement in a positive way helping you to make a great first impression.

Do your research

Do your homework, who are the key people? what are the products? who are their customers? Is there any big plans for the future. Today you can use the Internet to get lots of information about the prospect but its also always worth ringing ahead a few days in advance to gather any relevant insight.

Get focused

So the baby was sick and traffic is awful. Take a deep breath, leave your troubles behind and ensure that your focus is entirely set on the meeting.

Good time keeping

Plan for unforeseen events like traffic etc and aim to get there with time to spare. Lateness is one sure fire way of killing off any chance of a good first impression.

Be Confident

Expect to do business and your words, tone and body language will send out all the right signals. Successful people give off a successful image so even when you are having a bad month, approach every new business encounter in an open and confident manner.

Dress to Impress

This is the first visual clue that the prospect gets and making an extra effort will pay dividends. As far as the prospect is concerned If you look sharper than the competition changes are you are sharper then the competition.

Keep an open stance

Ensure that your stance is open particularly during introductions. Try to be aware of giving any negative or defensive subconscious gestures such as folding of arms, putting point of sale materials in front of your torso etc.

Smile, smile, smile

The most powerful subconscious tool you have at your disposal is your smile so use it. When you smile at someone, they will smile back and start to relax in your company. Remember, smiling is infectious.

Always offer a firm handshake

A firm handshake helps to imply that you are a confidence and honest person. A loose weak handshake says don't trust me, I got something to hide.

Keep good eye contact

Ensure that you keep eye contact when addressing someone and when they are talking to you. Good eye contact says, you can trust me, I'm interested in what you have say because its also important to me.

Slow down introductions

When you are introduced, slow down the process taking time to remember the names and positions of the people that are been introduced. We generally tend to rush through introductions and later find we cant remember the names and positions of the people we have just been introduced to.

Use first names.

Once the introductions are over, use people's first names when addressing your audience or asking questions. This helps to quickly build trust with prospects.

Be an obvious listener

Good listening skills require concentration, focus and effort. When listening to the prospect, let them see that your attention is directly focused on them through use of eye contact, nodding and by avoiding mental distractions.

The ability to create a good first impression is a potent skill in any business encounter but unfortunately is often not considered important. As with any skill worth mastering, it requires planning, practice and thought and while a good first impression can help overcome later difficulties or objections, a bad first impression is virtually impossible to reverse which effectively means you lose any opportunity to do business before you even start the business meeting.

Recording details on paper with the prospect during a sales meeting is a subject that divides a lot of salespeople. Sellers who fall into the "no to note taking camp" will say that note taking can be off putting to the prospect and only serves to stop the prospect from sharing information.

They say that it can ruin the natural flow of the conversation and can make questioning the prospect a disjointed process. I on the other hand am a firm believer in the value of taking notes Here is a list of ten reasons why I believe note taking works.

• Taking out a pen and paper creates an impression and makes the statement " I'm professional, I'm organised"
• Using a pad and paper allows you to have a questioning plan and a series lead questions written down ensuring that you cover all the points that are important during the course of the meeting.
• Physically recording the conversation through taking notes highlights to the prospect that you taking what they are saying seriously.
• Note taking serves as an effective visual demonstration to the prospect that you are listening to what been said.

• Taking out a pen and paper helps focus the prospects mind on the important details, in other words once they see you are recording the info, it helps to get them to think about and verbalise what they feel you need to know.
• Taking notes forces you to really listen to what's been said, in order to write something down you have to listen to the words and sentences being used.
• Note taking reinforces the prospects desire to speak and highlights to the prospect your role as an information gatherer.
• Having to concentrate on taking notes helps ensure correct selling structure. It assists you to gather enough information and establish needs before moving on to the actual selling piece.
• Because a lot of salespeople never take notes, if you do it allows you to immediately stand out from your competitors.
• Note taking allows the salesperson to go back over the conversation and look for clues that at first were missed. Sometimes comments by the prospect during the meeting that initially maybe seemed unimportant can provide insight on reflection.

Beyond the Boardroom

Beyond the Boardroom is a leading business development consultancy and training provider based in Ireland. Working in the areas of recruitment, training and sales & marketing

http://www.btbtraining.com

BTB Business Development Blog

http://www.btbtraining.com/blog

About the Author

Niall Devitt is a training consultant, business mentor and facilitator. With over a decade of experience working as senior sales manager and trainer for some of Ireland's top companies his expertise lies in creating and implementing performance driven sales programmes. Niall is regularly asked to contribute business articles and his advice has been published through the National Press and broadcast on Radio.

BTB Training Courses

http://www.btbtraining.com/sales-training http://www.btbtraining.com/presentation-skills http://www.btbtraining.com/management-training

Copyright, © 2008 Beyond the Boardroom

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Writing and publishing online articles is a great way to both promote your business by increasing the numbers of visitors and backlinks to your website.

Here how it works

• Create an article or a series of articles offering advice in your area/s of expertise

• Alternatively, you could create an article reviewing a product or book or making observations about your industry sector.

• Articles should contain information about your products or services.

• Use your keywords in the text, so for Irish training company like Beyond the Boardroom, I could include words and key phrases like training course, business training in Ireland, Irish corporate training in the text of the article.

• You include either a link to your website or links to pages within your site example Beyond the Boardroom management training course.

• You can submit these articles to websites such as ezine articles which publish your articles for free. Other webmasters and bloggers can then publish these articles providing you with backlinks and additional visitors to your site.

• You can also approach industry related specific sites, in my case www. salesjobs.ie has published some of my articles from time to time in their advice section.

Writing online articles is a great way to get potential buyers to your website and promote your business. You can hire a marketing company to do it for you. Do it yourself however and its completely free allowing you demonstrate your expertise in your area to potential buyers at no cost other than your time and knowledge.

#Funny Sales Memory Number 5

This happened as part of an interview I attended early in my sales career with a rather grumpy sales manager. Towards the end of the interview, I was handed a chewed up ballpoint pen and he asked me to demonstrate how I would sell it to him . Being young and innocent I attempted to rise to the challenge listing one by one the benefits of this plastic saliva filled tube . When I had finished he looked at me with a kinda rye smile and said that he wouldn't buy from me because the pen was the wrong colour. It was blue.

#Funny Sales Memory Number 4

I was working as an in-house trainer for a telecommunications company and ran an induction course for their new sales starters every other month. An exercise I often used on these courses was to get people to write down three adjectives to describe their course mates. The intention being that people would highlight three positives that they saw in the individual. However on this particular course, there were two guys who had a grudge from a previous confrontation. When it came to describing the other, well just say that the words were choice to say the least, needless to say that was the last time I used that particular exercise.

#Funny Sales Memory Number 3

Working as a Sales Manager in IT, I was asked by my boss to attend a meeting with a disgruntled customer. My information was that this person was very upset in relation to a piece of software having malfunctioned the previous week and I was to attempt to calm the situation and retain the business. To my absolute surprise he gave my company a short overview when questioned and proceeded to spent most of the meeting giving out about a competitor. Not wanting to rock the boat, I listened intently although wary of not joining in in this slagging.

I left his office thinking that I had had done a wonderful although strangely unusual job of securing the business. Unfortunately I was to later find out that the poor gent had mixed both suppliers and names up and I was in fact the competition he had been giving out about.

#Funny Sales Memory Number 2

This one comes from my time selling insurance polices. I had sold this chap a income protection policy and he asked me to return later to collect a cheque to which I agreed. Later that evening I ran ahead to make sure he was still happy to proceed and proceeded to drive the thirty or so miles to his house. When I got there, his wife answered the door saying that he was at the neighbours and wouldn't be back for at least an hour. I explained that I had driven a long way and asked he she wouldn't mind me waiting. I could tell from her reaction that something was wrong and she asked to wait at the door.

To my surprise and amusement I noticed a ducked down body moving through the field beside the house, I watched as the guy I sold the policy to mounted a gate and proceeded to walk back up the road to his house. He greeted me with a forced smile, then apologising and telling me that a neighbour had just been taken ill. Without wanting to embarrass him, I explained that he didn't have to go ahead with the cover if he preferred to which he explained that he would prefer not to as his wife had already taken out a policy that he wasn't aware of. I wondered as I drove that evening why he needed to go through such dramatics but then the world would be a boring place if we were all the same.

#My Funniest Sales Memory Ever

Like number 5, its from a another sales interview only this time I was the interviewer. I was was asked to fill in for our telesales manager who was out sick and interview for spanking new telesales team. These were entry level sales roles so invariably it meant that most applicants came with little or no sales experience. I had a quick look at the CV of my next interview. It was very vague but he had just recently finished secondary school and had a huge interest in cars.

I went out to bring in the individual and you can understand my amazement to be greeted with a very young looking chap with a lunchbox, not one you have in secondary but the ones from primary school with power rangers or something of that nature on the sides.

I brought this person into that interview room and started to ask questions. I didn't want to exclude someone on the basics that they looked very young or for that matter carried a lunchbox. To my relief, it quickly became obvious that this chap was indeed in primary school but wanted to leave because he hated the lessons. After I rang his mother, I put a call into the recruitment agency that had sent in the CV. I preferred not to give out to much as their utter embarrassment seemed to me to be punishment enough.

So what about you ?, have you got any funny sales or work memories that you would like to share? . Please refrain from mentioning either names of individuals or companies.

Everyone at one time or another has had an idea for what they thought would make a great business, however only a very small few ever end up turning this idea into reality. So what then are the most important bits of turning your idea into a viable business?

What's the Plan?

Without going into the nitty gritty of business plans, the point here is that even though they are boring, hard to do, and take forever, a business plan is a crucial first step to success and entirely relevant. Skipping doing a business plan is stupid because it flirts with failure where there is no need.

Research, Research and a little more Research.

This is another bit that people sometimes stupidly leave out. You may think that you have reinvented the wheel but will anyone buy this fabulous new product? The best ideas unfortunately don't always equate to the best businesses and often its just a slightly different slant on already proven concept that works best. Experience, costs, customer needs, competitors, delivery times, importers, distribution and compliance, these are the sometimes unforeseen factors can make or break whether your business baby.

Talk to as many people in the know as you can, potential customers, industry experts and businesses that already deal with your target market are all ideal sources of information. Carry out detailed surveys, post on blogs and business forums in order to get as much advice as you can and don't panic if you get negative responses rather take the advice on board and continue to refine your idea till it works. Here is a useful article that deals with researching your business concept.

S.W.O.T. on it

No, I'm talking about hitting the books here but rather where you identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of your potential business. Click for Free SWOT pdf template. Run one on you, the business, partners, competitors, markets and products and make sure to write it down.

Knowing your weaknesses at this stage is often the most valuable piece of information you can have because you will have identified where you may need future help and where failure is more lightly to rear its ugly head. For the cocky buggars among us, remember thinking you have no weaknesses is in fact the biggest weakness of all.

U.S.P. : Unique Selling Proposition, What is it?

So this bit should be easy, right! What makes you and your product different from the competitors?. Remember, It doesn't necessarily have to make people gasp at the though but it should be unique and most importantly it's got to be something that your potential customers will want to buy.

This will be the most readily piece of info to grab the attention of prospective customers. Think of your USP as your soldiers in the trench, your first line of attack and the stick you use to beat your competitors.

Marketing, How are you going to get your Message Out There?

Ok so now you got to figure out how you are going to get your message to potential buyers. There are 101 ways to do this but which one is right for you. Obviously budget dictates to large extent and while some forms of marketing cost a lot and others don't cost a penny, cost will not always be an good indicator of value particularly when it comes to a non science such as marketing.

For the majority of first time entrepreneurs, marketing simply means getting out there and meeting lots of prospects so having some presentation and selling skills will make a big difference.

How Deep are Your Pockets

The amount of money you have to spend while not the bee all and end all is pretty still darn important, in others word, the more the merrier. What is absolutely crucially critically more important however is how wisely you spent it. For now your focus should be about promoting and marketing your new business and products so as to generate as many sales as it possible. A swanky new laptop, top-notch furniture and an office in a nice part of town can wait till after you have made your first million.

And finally make the Jump.

This is often the biggest obstacle, the fear of the unknown, the leaving a good job, the mortgage repayments. Its time to stop thinking and start doing. There will never be a perfect time or the perfect launch so sooner rather than later you just gotta trust in yourself and jump.

The ability to create rapport with others helps to ensure success in almost every situation. Effective rapport building allows for more effective communication that is a crucial ingredient in all business interactions including but not limited to selling, negotiations and interviews.

Rapport usually happens at a level that we are unaware of so people will say that they had a gut instinct or a feeling to describe having a good or bad rapport with another person. Statements such as " I had a good feeling about her" or " There was something just not right about him" will be used to describe communications such as interviews or sales meetings.

We tend to identify and communicate better with other people who share our beliefs, have the same outlooks, share common experiences and goals, In short, we like people who are like ourselves. People who have rapport tend to act like each other in a number of ways so rapport therefore involves matching.

The following easy to use matching techniques will help create an instant rapport so that you can communicate better and achieve more in the business environment.

Posture and Gestures.

If you observe people locked in conversation, you will see that their bodies tend to mirror each other including their gestures. For example two people may both lean forward when sitting with hands open on the table or both may cross their legs and lean back in their chairs.

Now that you are aware of this you can consciously make adjustments during business meetings to your own posture and gestures to help stimulate better rapport with the other person . You can start to match the overall way the other person sits or stands including making the same sorts of gestures with your hands or crossing your legs to mirror the person as you see them.

Voice

When a salesperson makes a call to a customer, he or she cannot see the other person so mirroring the posture and movements is impossible. It is still possible to use matching however as another important part of any communication involves the pitch and tone of your voice. According to some research, this may even have more impact than the actual words been used.

Things to look out for include:

Volume: Do they speak quietly or loudly?

Tempo: How fast or slowly do they speak?

Pitch: Is it high or low?

Tone: What emotions do they convey?

Language: Listen to the types of words been used, do they have characteristic sayings?

When you try out these techniques for the first time, you may feel a bit silly so start by only making very small adjustments until you feel comfortable. With some practice, matching will start to become almost second nature and you will instantly be able to create better rapport and enhance communications skills during any type of business encounter.

Beyond the Boardroom

Beyond the Boardroom is a leading business development consultancy and training provider based in Ireland. Working in the areas of recruitment, training and sales & marketing

http://www.btbtraining.com

BTB Business Development Blog

http://www.btbtraining.com/blog

About the Author

Niall Devitt is a training consultant, business mentor and facilitator. With over a decade of experience working as senior sales manager and trainer for some of Ireland's top companies his expertise lies in creating and implementing performance driven sales programmes. Niall is regularly asked to contribute business articles and his advice has been published through the National Press and broadcast on Radio.

BTB Training Courses

http://www.btbtraining.com/sales-training http://www.btbtraining.com/presentation-skills http://www.btbtraining.com/management-training

Copyright, © 2008 Beyond the Boardroom

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Presenting to a group can potentally be a daunting experience even for the most confident of sellers. It is easy for these nerves to contribute to basic mistakes so a little preparation and a few simple guidelines are key to success.

Preparation

You will have a chance to prepare, and this is crucial particularly if presenting is not one of our strengths. Try to find out what will be important to those attending and plan your structure and content accordingly.

Get there early

Arrive early so that you have a chance to set up and familiarise yourself with the layout and structure of the room.

Introductions

When you are introduced, slow down , take time to remember each person by name. One of reasons that we don't remember names is that we rush through this piece. Before you start , check that you can be heard and that tools can be seen. Briefly introduce  your objectives, the topics and the running order of the presentation.

Delivery

Speak more slowly than you would with your friends but remember to also mix up both the speed and tone of your voice , slowing down to emphasise important points and speeding up when giving less important details.

Power Point

Most of us still rely on power point as our delivery tool. The big problem being that it is one-dimensional so much that it non interactive as far as the audience is concerned. Its up to the presenter to compensate and encourage interaction and particapation. No one wants to hear power points slides being read word for word unless they have trouble sleeping, so my suggestion is to only use it as a guide or prop and where possible use your own words and meaning to communicate the message.

Movement

Make sure that you move around. A moving person is a much more stimulating target to our eyes than a stationary person.

Body Language

Be aware of both your own body language and of those attending. Ensure that you spread your eye contact and focus involving everyone not just the DM.

Q & A

Encourage questions and in a situation where you don't have the answer at hand, tell the person you will find out and come back to them with the answer at a later date.

Difficult Behaviours

Where one person is overly difficult or using a disruption behaviour pattern. Agree to park this issue for now by promising that you will speak with them one to one at the end of the meeting and resolve the concern.

Disruptions

If there is a disruption, e.g. someone needs to leave the room etc. Simply just stop and wait for them to return.

Finish with Actions

Before you leave, agree a next or serious of next steps tying in a time-frame. Thank everyone for their input and shake hands with all present.

Presentations to groups need not be the daunting experience that we sometimes expect. It is important to inject our own personality into the task and to not depend solely on tools such as power point. You never know, you might start to enjoy it.

Beyond the Boardroom

Beyond the Boardroom is a leading business development consultancy and training provider based in Ireland. Working in the areas of recruitment, training and sales & marketing

http://www.btbtraining.com

BTB Business Development Blog

http://www.btbtraining.com/blog

About the Author

Niall Devitt is a training consultant, business mentor and facilitator. With over a decade of experience working as senior sales manager and trainer for some of Ireland's top companies his expertise lies in creating and implementing performance driven sales programmes. Niall is regularly asked to contribute business articles and his advice has been published through the National Press and broadcast on Radio.

BTB Training Courses

http://www.btbtraining.com/sales-training http://www.btbtraining.com/presentation-skills http://www.btbtraining.com/management-training

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We recently recruited a senior salesperson for a top company in the construction industry. Needless to say, there was a lot of interest in the role and it carried a great salary and fantastic benefits package.

Eventually two outstanding candidates were short-listed, however it was proving difficult to separate between the two. After a final series of interviews the Sales Manager decided on the person he wanted and I was interested to find out why.

One of the candidates had brought along a hard copy breakdown of all sales in his previous roles. In other words, during the interview he was better able to demonstrate his track record. He showed a month-by-month break down of his sales and how they had grown over time.

Selling is a results business and successful salespeople use their results in sales to advance their career. The better able you are to prove this to potential employers, the more chance you will have of securing any sales role. It also affords you an opportunity to not just talk about your track record but to present your track record in a professional and impressive way. Having your results at hand can also assist when answering potentially difficult questions during the interview.

Remember, sales CVs are sometimes treated with suspicion by employers so keeping a hard copy of your sales and track record is a great idea to help you prove to potential employers how good you really are.

Beyond the Boardroom

Beyond the Boardroom is a leading business development consultancy and training provider based in Ireland. Working in the areas of recruitment, training and sales & marketing

http://www.btbtraining.com

BTB Business Development Blog

http://www.btbtraining.com/blog

About the Author

Niall Devitt is a training consultant, business mentor and facilitator. With over a decade of experience working as senior sales manager and trainer for some of Ireland's top companies his expertise lies in creating and implementing performance driven sales programmes. Niall is regularly asked to contribute business articles and his advice has been published through the National Press and broadcast on Radio.

BTB Training Courses

http://www.btbtraining.com/sales-training http://www.btbtraining.com/presentation-skills http://www.btbtraining.com/management-training

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I'm not a big fan of so called tricks of the sales trade but here;s one that is worth mentioning called the thermometer close.

This is what I would call an upfront closing technique, by using the technique the salesperson is not trying to close the sale out but merely attempting to move the conversation and the opportunity forward.

It goes like so

Salesperson: Hi (Prospect), this is (Salesperson). How are you today?

Next the stall

Prospect: Oh Hi (Salesperson) I'm good, unfortunately I didn't made a decision yet so perhaps if you could leave it till next week, that would be great.

Here comes the upfront closing technique which allows the salesperson to test where the sale is relative to a successful close.

Salesperson: No problem, I will put you down for a call on Tuesday. Obviously (Prospect) I would like it be a yes on Tuesday but if was to ask you say on a scale of one to ten, ten being we definitely will be doing business and one being we definitely won't be doing business, where would you say you are right now?

Depending on the number, the salesperson knows how much convincing is left to do. An Answer of five or less means lots and and an answer of six or more means not so much.

Prospect: Oh I say a seven or eight.

This is good, but there are still some issues/objections remaining, Next the salesperson needs to find out what these concerns are.

Salesperson: Great, can you tell me what are the concerns that remain or how might I help to get you to Ten

Prospect: Well (Salesperson), really the concern relates to delivery times, and while you may have a more cost effective solution, our current supplier never misses a deadline so we feel there is an element of risk involved.

Now the salesperson has found out the remaining concern(s) and has an opportunity to do something about that.

Salesperson: Thanks (Prospect) for your honesty and I appreciate and understand your position, How's about to help you resolve this concern, I set up a call between you and one or two of our major and longstanding customers, you can ask them how we have performed in relation to meeting their deadlines.

Prospect: Yeah, for sure that would help.

Salesperson: OK so, Ill speak to them immediately and set up the calls before the weekend. That should leave you with enough time to consider what has been said before our call on Tuesday. Does that sound reasonable to you (Prospect)

Prospect: Yeah, that sounds good, Ill look forward to speaking to them.

Try the thermometer close for yourself. Remember its most effective in situations where the opportunity is stalled or when the prospect is not forthcoming with concerns or issues that they still may have.

Beyond the Boardroom

Beyond the Boardroom is a leading business development consultancy and training provider based in Ireland. Working in the areas of recruitment, training and sales & marketing

http://www.btbtraining.com

BTB Business Development Blog

http://www.btbtraining.com/blog

About the Author

Niall Devitt is a training consultant, business mentor and facilitator. With over a decade of experience working as senior sales manager and trainer for some of Ireland's top companies his expertise lies in creating and implementing performance driven sales programmes. Niall is regularly asked to contribute business articles and his advice has been published through the National Press and broadcast on Radio.

BTB Training Courses

http://www.btbtraining.com/sales-training http://www.btbtraining.com/presentation-skills http://www.btbtraining.com/management-training

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Here I will be looking at how to effectively rapport build with a new prospect.  I will also be looking at some traditional rapport building techniques and why they might in fact be damaging your overall sales approach. I am not going to be dealing with body language and subconcious communication techniques.

Traditional Methods

The traditional(old-style) techniques largely relies on the salesperson making small talk with the client i.e. How was your weekend? Did you see the match? or an old favourite, How is business?

The theory behind this being that by making conversation and asking non-threatening questions about the prospects interests, the seller is able to get the prospect to relax and open up. Another perceived benefit of this approach is that it helps the prospect to like the seller during these initial conversations.

While there can sometimes be merit is these techniques , a lot of salesperson either feel awkward doing it or worse overcook it, trying to be the prospect's best friend. Another factor against using this technique in the B2B environment is time, a salesperson simply cannot afford to spend much time on anything other than talking business. You probably will only get one shot at pitching for this business so you need to spend any face-time wisely.

So what then is rapport building is really about?

Simply put, building rapport is about giving the prospect the confidence to trust you, the salesperson

• Confidence to trust that you understand their business
• Confidence to trust that you can understand their problems 
• Confidence to trust that you handle their account
• Confidence to trust that you overcome any problems

So when does rapport building start?

It starts before you meet the client, do your homework , get to know as much as you can about their business. Rather than ask about their business as per the traditional approach, impress upon the prospect that you know about the big deal that they secured last month and how that it lightly to impact the business.

How do you build rapport in the first meeting?

After introducing yourself and your company, use the next few minutes to demonstrate what you know about their business, try to stay away from the obvious. Don't be afraid to tell the prospect that you have done some research. that's OK, what's going to be more important is that you took the time to find out.

Next, really try to understand where they are at as a company? Where do they see themselves going in the future? Have they any new products planned? new markets? etc etc. Demonstrate that you are interested in the overall picture not just the piece that applies to you and your product.

NLP- Neuro-linguistic programming

NLP is an advanced form of rapport building that works at a subconscious level. It is a complex subject and takes a lot of practice to perfect. Using NLP to build rapport is based on the concept on matching, in other words, we humans feel better around people who are similar to us. The NLP practitioner slowly attempts to match the body launguage and gestures of the prospect, the tome, pace of their voice, even the words that they use. As I said earlier, while effective, NLP takes time to master and anyone who is interested should go along to a course or read up on the subject.

Its Easy

Prospects often want to trust that a salesperson can provide them with a solution but  Its up to the salesperson to provide this evidence.

1. Do your homework on the company
2. Demonstrate that you know lots about their business
3. And ask questions about more than the bit that relates to your product

If you do all three, you will have developed a initial rapport with the prospect and importantly a great start to a potential sale.

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Beyond the Boardroom - what some of our clients have said

"After hiring Beyond the Boardroom to give our staff customized Sales Training for our Delivery Business our company has seen a 200% growth in sales in this area. For a company like ours with no sales experience it was without doubt one of the best moves we’ve made"

"Beyond the Boardroom has helped us over the last year to grow the business by teaching our sales department how to effectively target new clients and manage each sales opportunity as it happens. So far we have had two separate courses on new business development and account management, each being insightful and educational. I am in no doubt that the sales know how that Niall teaches will help any small business grow their customer base and profits"

"I did not come from a selling background and was looking for practical advise in seeking out new customers and growing the business. Niall from BTB training has worked with me one on one and I am happy to report that the sales side of my business is something I am no longer apprehensive about and have secured many new customers as a result of his advice. He also designed a point of sale presentation that is very useful when talking to new prospects"

"Beyond the Boardroom invested time and energy in understanding our product and people and then gave a training course that was specific to selling software to our target market. The sales team reported that the trainer had a strong grasp of where difficulties might occur and was able to offer straightforward solutions. In all, an extremely worthwhile experience and we look forward to working with Beyond the Boardroom in the future"

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In the today's business environment the Internet has become an extremely powerful business tool. At a minimum it can be used to generate plenty of juicy new sales leads or at its full potential delivering a full e-commerce sales vehicle and revenue stream.

Unfortunately this been said it still tends to be the very large business groups or industry specific groups such as the hospitality sector that use the Internet to anywhere near its full potential.

Using the Internet for your company's business advantage need not be either a complicated or costly measure. I believe armed with a little knowledge you can start to develop your company's web presence so that it will quickly become an important part of your business strategy and ultimately deliver plenty of new sales and customers.

Your Website 

Your website is your both your company's shop front and product showroom on the web. Therefore it's critical that you put in some work beforehand and plan for its design, wording and creation so that it delivers your company, people and products in their best light. Start by asking yourself questions.

What do you want to achieve from this process?

Can your on line presence add to your bottom line?

Goal

Once someone visits your site they become a potential customer so the primary goal of a business website needs to be to guide and encourage the visitor to make a positive next step such as giving contact details (leads), picking up the phone to call (leads) or making a decision to purchase on line (sales). Don't forget a web designer's business is the look and feel of the site not what your customers will want so you are the one that is best placed to manage the process.

About

Keeping your primary goal in mind your site is also a source of information to your potential customers. In other words, it's like a sophisticated on-line brochure providing potential buyers with relevant information about the company, its people, products and existing customers. What is a potential customer likely to want to know about your business to help them to buy your product?

Text

The text needs to contain a decent sprinkling of the key words (search terms) that your potential customer is going to type into the search bar when searching for your product. In this way it's very different to a standard hard copy brochure and that why it's never a good idea to just replicate existing hard copy text on line. This bit requires some research beforehand from you. You may feel you have a good idea of what people are lightly to be searching for but you also need to consider and research less obvious keywords and search terms. Not doing this is lightly to be cutting off large numbers of potential visitors and ultimately customers. Include all these keywords in the text of the site and where possible in the text of your home page. It is also worth considering that search engines love new information so where you can stay away from coping or replicating existing on line content.

Pictures and Bios

A good idea is to include pictures and bios of the main people within the company. This allows you to demonstrate to the potential buyer the levels of experience within the organisation and show off any relevant qualifications and achievements.

Graphics

Buck the latest trends and keep graphics to a minimum. While they can look good they sometimes create more trouble than they are worth. Heavy graphic dependent type-sites are extremely difficult to get a good ranking on Google or the other search engines due to the nature of how websites are indexed. Remember Information rich sites rather than flashy sites usually win the ranking battle within the search engines.

E-content

Newsletters, blogs and free advice are a great way of keeping your potential customers on the site while also giving you an opportunity to demonstrate your expertise in your chosen field. The process of having a visitor sign up for a newsletter also provides you with sales leads.

Links Page

You also need to create a links page in your site. This is to allow you to add relevant links to other sites within your site. You include this page so that you can start to exchange links with other sites and build up the back links to your site

SEO

Now that you have created your website you first need to get it listed in Google, Yahoo and DMOZ. You can wait for the search engines to discover your site or alternatively you apply to have your site listed. Yahoo charge for the privilege but if you wait they will pick it up. Once this is done your next task is to ensure that your site appears high enough up the search engine listings so that people actually click through and visit your home page. This is called search engine optimisation or SEO for short.One way to do this is to pay an SEO specialist company to do this for you or alternatively you can do it for your self. In simple terms search engine ranking is decided by three factors

1. The number of links backs to your site
2. The quality of these links
3. The relevance to your site of the sites linking in

Online Directories

Your first port of call should be on line directories. There are literally hundreds of directories out there that will list your site. Some charge for the privilege but many don't. Be warned this can be a time consuming process because you have to enter the details about your site with each application and many take months to list your site. Remember try to target directories that are in some way relevant to your site i.e. Irish, Industry, business or product related.

Link Exchange

Exchanging links with other sites is another extremely effective way of building up the number of quality back links. Again target sites that are relevant to your business. Contact their web or IT person by e-mail or phone and propose to list their site provided the return the favour. Ideally you want to target sites that have a better or at least similar page rank than yours. To see what page rank a site has download the Google toolbar.

Online Articles

You can also write articles within your area of expertise and get them published online including a link to your site. One way to do this is to set up a free account with a site such as www.ezinearticles.com. These types of sites provide a service that allows their visitors to publish your articles on their website or blog therefore creating additional links back to your site. Alternatively you can target relevant sites and directly request to have your article published. Well-placed articles also deliver quality additional visitors and potential customers.

Google AdWords

AdWords is an online advertising service provided by Google. You pay to have your site listed for specific keywords and search terms. In effect you bid for relevant keywords and your site appears somewhere in the sponsored listing section. Where it appears depends on the popularity of the specific search term and the amount that you are prepared to pay. AdWords is a good way to get visitors to your site while you are building up your search rankings.

Google Page Rank

Page rank goes from 0-10 (10 being the highest) and is how Google views the importance of your website. Building up the number of quality back links is the easiest way to achieve a higher ranking. Results take time but it is worth the effort over the long term. Download the Google toolbar and you can watch your rank increase over time.

Summary

Your website should be an effective on line marketing and selling vehicle for your company. It can be used to generate good quality leads or be full e-commerce revenue stream for your business. Creating a professional business website is only the first step, it also needs to appear high enough up the search engine listings so as to attract sufficient visitor numbers. Lastly it will then need to hold these potential buyers attention and guide and encourage them to make a positive next step. This process doesn't have to be costly provided you are prepared to invest some of your time and energies. What you will get back depends largely on what you are prepared to put in.

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Selling using the phone is different from the face to face sale in two distinct ways namely the seller as a much shorter time to get their initial pitch across to the prospect and you only have one means of communication to deliver your message, your voice. These factors should be given serious consideration when selling over the phone.

It is also worth noting that it is much easier for a prospect to object early in the communication so there is strong need to grab attention and involve the prospect very quickly.

Remember if you are not happy to be calling, the prospect wont be happy that you called so get yourself in the right frame on mind and make sure that you sound enthusiastic. First impressions will happen extremely quickly over the phone so the tone and emotion of your voice will have a big influence on the prospect in those initial seconds.

Phone introductions need to be quick and contain only relevant information, your name, company info, some well known customers, a piece of information to demonstrate that you have done some research on the prospect and something to grab the prospects attention, a reason why they should continue the call.

After your intro you need to ensure that the conversation is flowing both ways and the easiest way to achieve this is ask lots of open questions, you need to gather as much relevant information about the prospect as possible so that you can establish any existing needs and tailor you sales pitch for the person at the end of the line.

When you have gathered all the relevant info you are now in a position to sell. Communicate to the prospect where you feel your product will benefit him or her and how it can positively affect his or her organisation. If you have done a thorough fact-find you will know the pain-points or benefits that you should emphasise with this particular person. Try to make the pitch as personal as possible and refer back to the earlier answers to your questions.

Deal with any objections ensuring that you empathise and qualify each objection before reselling the corresponding benefits, ensuring that you cover additional extras such as quality of customer service and reputation etc.

We know that it can be difficult to get decision makers over the phone so when you do and you have got this far, ensure that you close. It amazes me how good some sales people can be at getting the sale to this stage but freeze when it comes to closing. Asking prospects to buy products is the definition of what we do so make sure that you close.

Other factors to consider when selling over the phone are people can be rude so prospects can be rude, its not personal so don't take it personally. The minority of calls made will lead to sales but its this minority that count as regards to target, commissions, promotions etc etc.

As a rule of thumb if the conversation is going one way, that's not good, if its flowing both ways that's good. As with all selling, good questioning technique is the best way at achieving this conversation flow. Try to stay away from selling until you have gathered enough information to make the pitch uniquely personal to the prospect.

In my opinion sticking word for word to a scripted intro rarely is a good idea, where scripts can be useful is as a guideline to what to say as part of your initial intro but unless you are Colin Farrell or Jodie Foster, use your own words to convey your message. Where the prospect is busy try to secure an agreed time and date where you will call back and ensure that you do.

Selling over the phone can seem difficult at first but for those who become experts are highly sought after and quickly progress up the ranks within organisations.

Beyond the Boardroom

Beyond the Boardroom is a leading business development consultancy and training provider based in Ireland. Working in the areas of recruitment, training and sales & marketing

http://www.btbtraining.com

BTB Business Development Blog

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About the Author

Niall Devitt is a training consultant, business mentor and facilitator. With over a decade of experience working as senior sales manager and trainer for some of Ireland's top companies his expertise lies in creating and implementing performance driven sales programmes. Niall is regularly asked to contribute business articles and his advice has been published through the National Press and broadcast on Radio.

BTB Training Courses

http://www.btbtraining.com/sales-training http://www.btbtraining.com/presentation-skills http://www.btbtraining.com/management-training

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