Monthly Archives: March 2009

Squeeze Pages – Are They Just Business Tools or Are They Manipulations

By John Aberle | Internet Marketing , Sales and Marketing

For a lot of people, it’s not an issue at all. For me and for some of my friends, it’s been a quandary. I don’t like squeeze pages. In fact, I think the very term reeks of manipulation. Squeeze pages are designed to give you two choices: opt-in to my mailing list or leave. Invariably there is a sense of urgency, like sign now for this limited time offer or lose the chance to get this information that will help transform your life. The offers of free information are seductive. And as a result, I’m on numerous mailing lists. By the way, I’ve found some wonderfully helpful material this way.

Yet, I’ve been puzzling over using them myself. In fact, I have one set up on my Smart Money Websites site. After all, they apparently work. Despite that, something has bothered me about them. I teach that a salesperson should help the customer buy through selling as a service. Sales can be done without controlling prospects, manipulating them or pressuring them. I’ve done it throughout my career. This approach makes for better relationships after the sale if you follow through.

So what is the problem? Why the quandary? Continue reading

Soft Sell Marketing Resembles Farming More Than War

By John Aberle | sales , Sales and Marketing , Sales Calls

If your expressions about selling sound like a military commander planning for a battle, you probably learned from someone who taught traditional sales and marketing techniques. Their terms sound like a military engagement: overcome objections, take control of the prospect, and conduct a marketing campaign (which I still use to describe the multiple aspects of a coordinated program to find and sell to customers). Internet marketers have added a new one, squeeze pages. What a controlling sound for something as simple as inviting you to sign up for an ezine (electronic newsletter), usually in exchange for a gift. It’s no wonder business people call “old school” sales and marketing tactics hard sell.

People who believe, like I do, that selling is a spiritual service prefer farming analogies to war and fighting because, like farming, soft sell marketing sales and marketing nurture and cultivate relationships with perspective customers. Like farmers who care about their crops, soft sell marketers care about taking care of their customers.Continue reading

How to Give a Compliment that Builds Trust

By John Aberle | sales , Sales Calls

Have you ever noticed how little things in life can mean so much? That’s the way it is with compliments. How you give a compliment tells whether you’re sincere or just trying to make points. For some people, it seems they’ve read a book that says if you want to be a good manager or a good sales person or a good date, compliment the people you meet.

Personally, if it’s not sincere, skip it. Believe it or not, I’ll like you better for being more real. Insincere compliments come across fake. They put people off. Watch your own reaction when someone is “kissing up.” Your immediate reaction will normally be, “What’s he (or she) want?”  And nowhere is it more important to come across authentically than on a sales call.

How then do you give a compliment so that it builds trust rather than destroys your credibility? Continue reading

Freakonomics Provides Huge Lesson for Sales Managers

By John Aberle | Sales Management , Sales Motivation

At first glance, Freakonomics: A Rouge Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything, seems like a strange book for sales managers. It was a book with no unifying theme. It was more like a collection of essays. However, these stories did indeed have a theme: motivation.

Finding the Underlying Motivation Can Be Challenging

The key point is that motivation is a complex issue. Sometimes money provides the motivation to take great risks, like street corner drug dealers or, in the case of real estate agents, to not risk losing a sure sale for the potential of getting a better offer for their clients later. Sumo wrestlers demonstrated that sometimes maintaining their close knit relationships outweighs the potential dishonor if you are caught throwing a fight.

Hard Sell Sales Organizations Rely Heavily on Money, Recognition, and Material Rewards

The same is true in sales management. The predominant motivator in hard sell organizations is money, lots of money. They also use recognition and other material rewards, like rings, watches, cars, and trips to exotic places.

True Soft Sell Marketers Won’t Push Their Customers Just for a Material Incentive Continue reading

If You Don't Like Selling, It May Be Due to Forcing Yourself to Do Hard Sell Sales

By John Aberle | Sales and Marketing , Sales Management

When You Sell as a Service, You’ll Be Unhappy in a Hard Sell Company

Have you ever felt out of place? I have. I find it happens most often when I seem to share nothing in common with the group where I am. Despite having been in sales and marketing since 1979, I feel uncomfortable in a company or a conference where the sales style is hard sell. I have friends who excel at it. They like the game of jockeying for control. My orientation instead is a service one. I like affirming the client and working with him rather seizing control and dictating. It was really challenging working in a company where I was expected to take control of the client and to prescribe what he would do. One executive told me that I’m the doctor. It’s my job to tell clients what to do.

Had to Find a Way to Satisfy My Boss While Acting Consistent with My Values

I spent 40 months dreading talking to my office because I had to find a way to take their orders and attempt to carry them out using my style of working in partnership with the client. I believe that lasting change comes from buy-in, which comes from agreeing with the objective and contributing to the solution. That’s hard to do when you are ordering instead of proposing a course of action and discussing.

Judith and Jim Seek to Make a Space for Soft Sell Sales and Marketing PeopleContinue reading

I Apologize for My Having Removed My Last Three Posts

By John Aberle | Blogging

I love WordPress, however. Nothing in life is bullet proof as I demonstrated to myself almost a week ago. I decided to delay the post publishing until 8:00 AM. When I editted the time to post, WordPress showed me the date. I wanted to post at 8:00 AM – my time. 12:30 AM or 1:00 AM I was too tired to realize the “time” was there under the time I last saved. It was already after 8:00 AM UTC. So later in the morning when I checked to see if “How to Reframe Memories of Sales Calls Gone Badly” was up, it wasn’t there. Now refreshed with a night’s sleep, I saw my error. Unfortunately, not knowing what I was doing, I decided to move the time a few minutes from then, using UTC now, and told it to publish again. Not a good move. Now that post disappeared and messed up two others.

This brings me to why I am reposting the last three. And crossing my fingers that I don’t have to do a restore.

Sales Training: When You Walk the Talk, Expect to Stub Your Toe Occasionally

By John Aberle | Sales and Marketing , Sales Training

I admit to having egg on my face. You probably gathered from this headline that I believe in walking the talk. I have put in hours on the copy in my website to be sure that I approach everything – as best I know how – from the viewpoint of “What’s in it for me?” where the “me” is you the reader. Additionally, when I do sales training, I constantly emphasize the importance of benefits instead of features.

Well, last night I sent off a prospecting letter for a job I would like to get, even if it means convincing the prospect that they need such a position. Typical salesman, I see the need or suspect there might be a need. Now I have to find out if the prospect agrees that they do indeed want such help. I was really excited about approaching them to sell them on my services. There in lay the potential problem. I got so excited that I didn’t double check my benefits statements.

It wasn’t until I was listening to DeBorah Beatty’s interview of Barry Friedman of GetMoreCorporateGigs.com that I realized I failed to do what I teach clients to do. I sent a list of my accomplishments, which I expected my prospect to translate into benefits instead of my doing it for her.

Now in my favor, I did propose a benefit in the first part of my email. It could have been stronger though, like, “Would you like to take more time off to enjoy your success? My management skills and experience will enable you to leave the office with peace of mind that your business will be thriving when you return.”

The other positive was that the tone of my letter carried the viewpoint of what I wanted to be able to do for them. So that’s why I only take credit for stubbing my toe instead of scraping my nose, elbows and knees. Ah, well, that’st the other part of what I tell clients to do. After a sales call, ask, “What could I have done better?”

Here are some quick tips of how to improve on our sales and marketing letters:
• Have people you respect for their writing ability, especially marketing copy, review your letter or email before sending it.
• Sleep on it and re-read it – preferably with a notecard in front of you that says: “So what?” (If it doesn’t answer the question, “So what?” it’s not a benefit.
• Have a checklist for what you want each propsecting email to contain:
o Benefits — be sure you stated them clearly.
o Call to action — “Request your gift download now.”
o Ways to contact you — set up your email signature to include phone and email address at the least.

Recognize that despite your best efforts, sometimes you won’t do everything “right.” Accept it as a learning experience: review it then take action to ensure you avoid that mistake in the future. I gave three suggestions above that I hope will help you – as well as me – be sure your communications with your prospects are as effective as you can make them. And while you’re at it, request my report, “Easier Sales: 7 Steps to Winning Customers,” in the box at the top of the righthand column. May your sales be fun and mutually rewarding.

Master Sales Call Reluctance to Become the Hero in Your Own Story

By John Aberle | Prospecting , sales

The Main Character in a Novel Is Much like a Salesperson
Because I decided to take a break from the genres I normally read to relax, I finally recognized the parallel between the protagonists in my novels and making sales calls.

The Protagonist’s Internal Conflict Makes the Story Interesting
In every genre I read, the main people in the stories must be likeable enough that the reader will care about them. At the same time, they must have some flaws that make them human. Ideally, these weak character traits will help set up the tension for the conflict that they must overcome. Especially among Dorothy’s favorite authors but also in many of my preferred sci-fi/fantasy novels, the conflict takes place within the protagonist’s mind and emotions. In other words, the central character must overcome some fear or other weakness to win the prize, which can be anything from a kingdom to a battle to a relationship, such as a happy marriage.

All Salespeople Must Confront Call Reluctance
This is the very thing that I found when I started out in sales. Sales managers call it “call reluctance.” It’s a fear of cold calling and prospecting. Continue reading