SELLING “The most difficult thing to do is selling” – is that true?

Is it Selling, or getting people to Buy from you?

Or maybe we should not “sell” at all?

May be the “difficulty” people have in selling their product derives from exactly that “selling attitude”, and a lack of active listening, in extreme cases trying to foist something on somebody?

What if customers came to us?

What if they wanted to buy from us (that is the opposite: getting people to buy from you)?

“a good product sells itself” – “if I make a very good product people will want it” – True? … FALSE

You probably have seen this before, people developing a product and then trying to sell it. In that order. That’s the WRONG order! Probably requiring a lot of effort and certainly a waste of energy and time.

You first need to know your market and your customers and only then you develop a product. Possibly developing together with one or several key (pilot) customers. <Customer Development>

In that way you are sure that there is a “fit with the market” and that there will be people who will be interested in buying it. To actually pay for it.

If we just get these basics right, we can then try to get people to want this product (or service), which we now know is truly saleable, and saleable in an organized way. So, getting people to want your product is part of the process.

A fine line exists between “selling to someone” and making someone buy.

There are many ways in which we can improve our selling, with systems and tools. For example, by using better methods and by organizing ourselves in a better way, but also by continuous training and learning from each other.

On our homepage we write “Total dedication to the satisfaction of your customer’s needs is at the base of every success. … but it is not enough; doing the right things at the right moment, to exceed your customers’ expectations, requires an organization.”

“The most difficult thing to do is selling” … so, the more “organized” we are the better:

•     Identify business pain: sell to people who want to buy – create a product people need and want! –

  make people wanting to buy

•     Sales Organization: be organized and save time and effort to your salesforce – with sales methodology and a sales structure (and sales procedures)
•     Teach: you sell more with a trained salesforce – who “listen” to customers, who identify their “pain” > and then, and only then, “get customers to want to buy“, once they truly understand … , salespeople who can also persuade
•     Retention: it is much cheaper to keep customers – happy customers “come back for more”, and then there is their “word of mouth” which is precious, and very actionable, from all point of view.
•     Measure every step: “what gets measure gets done” (metrics and KPI’s) and, as selling is a process, it needs to be measured
•     Learn: continuous improvement & learning from mistakes + feedback – formal and informal & “record it all”

All very basic stuff but very often we can improve on these systems and do things (much) better. With the right attitude!

“Nothing happens until Someone sells Something” Business development & sales organization – https://www.marnixgroet.com

“Lab Creative Thinking” Acceleration programme in Milan, Italy – http://www.labcreativethinking.com

“Link and Grow” Startups in pre-seed stage and advisory – http://www.creativethinking.ventures