Digg it UP - Business

Enthusiasm, Energy and Success Are Critical Keys For Providing Excellent Customer Service
There are basically 5 different reasons why nothing great is ever accomplished without enthusiasm.First, no great success is ever attained in life without the surmounting of obstacles. In every life there are challenges. Some people view challenges as problems, others view them as opportunities. This marks one big difference between those people who give up and those who move up. You need to understand the positive role obstacles can play in your development. Challenges will push you. They stretch you. They make you develop your potential. Because you cannot leap a hurdle without energy, you need to value energy. You need to understand and embody the power of enthusiasm.Secondly, without the motivation that comes with enthusiasm, you will never dig deep enough to discover and develop all the talents you have that can lead you to the greatest accomplishments of which you are ultimately capable. Developing your talents is itself sometimes an arduous task. Without enthusiasm for what you are doing and what you are becoming, it could be at times an exhausting and dispiriting task. It takes energy. You will often need to push yourself to find that you are capable to find what you're capable of doing, and what you are capable of being.There is a third reason why nothing great was ever accomplished without enthusiasm. Great success requires great risk. It does n

have all the information in the world about a product and that won't teach them how to make a buying decision if they believe that they are doing as well as they can be doing given all the factors involved.

What do you need to be doing to help them understand that they need to buy your product?

WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Let's take a look at how your prospect experiences his/her environment - those areas that you don't necessarily think about when you are selling your product.

1. it's working the way it's always worked.

People can't always tell that there is something wrong. When a software company called me recently to bring Buying Facilitation in to their call center, they claimed they wanted to become more 'customer centric.' Yet they only had an incoming call center: they were presenting a problem to their prospects by giving the prospects a one-way buying channel. It's hard to be customer centric when you are limiting the ways that buyers can connect.

2. the work environment is created around maintaining the problem.

The call center folks did not notice there was a problem; it had always been that way. All of the six sigma measurement tools and the sales teams and the management initiatives were based on this particular type of sales strategy.

Was it customer centric? Not at all. It needed to be changed - but first the client had to recognize there was a problem.

A more conventional sales approach would be to say:

"Gee. You've got a problem. Buyers can't call you back if they have questions, or if they need to

There's A Lot To Be Said For 'Please & Thank-You' Training
Once, in the middle of a major consulting assignment I chatted with two managers about the prior customer service training that they had sponsored for their staff.With derision in his voice, one described the program as “Please & Thank You” training.Well that’s pretty mindless and wasteful, I recall thinking.But now, I have a different viewpoint. I believe every customer interfacing person should be taught the importance of saying please and thank you at least five times more often.It was either Aristotle or Plato who reportedly said that education is the one good thing in life that we can’t get too much of, though I don’t think they encountered chocolate.But we can definitely add to that short list, courtesy.Customers love hearing please and thank you, repeatedly, because it makes them feel important. And by uttering these words, we remind ourselves who comes first, in business.Over the years, there has been a steady democratizing of the employee-customer relationship, and I’m not sure it has been that productive. One sign of it is when a banking CSR asks you who he is speaking to, and you reply with your full name, and he then uses your first name through the remainder of the conversation.Who authorized him to take such a liberty?Growing up, the etiquette I learned was that we use someone’s formal name, i.e. Dr.

I'll play a seller, using conventional selling methods, selling something difficult to understand; you be the prospective buyer. As we go through the process together, note your reactions, how your beliefs are being challenged, what 'objections' and emotions come up for you as I try to 'sell' you. Once we're done with that component, I'll review how it would be different using Buying Facilitation; hopefully you'll be able to take that to the bank.

Here we go (and please excuse me for being a bit playful and provocative. I can't pass up the opportunity!):

CONVENTIONAL SELLING

As a subscriber and reader of my newsletter, you have probably garnered some understanding of the Buying Facilitation process. You have probably read Selling with Integrity, or gone to our site, or read several of the past newsletters.

So... Just out of curiosity... What's going on with your sales effort? Your sales training effort? Are you getting the numbers you want? Are you meeting your projections? If not, why are you still using that same sales program you're using? Have you thought of doing something different? What would stop you from using a new method to get better results?

You must know by now, obviously, that my methodology would bring in the best results of any 'sales' training. So why aren't you calling me and purchasing a training program?

Why aren't you buying hundreds of copies of Selling with Integrity to give to your sales people?

Here I could offer you a pitch as to why Buying Facilitation is better than SPIN or Solution Selling or Sandler. I could tell you why and how it works better - to close more sales and make your sellers brand ambassadors, not to mention give pure value-add by making your sales people true consultants to the buyer. Yadayadayada.

Hey. Maybe you're not buying because you don't believe or understand that Buying Facilitation would help your sales people be better consultants. Or bring in more revenue.

Or is it because you are comfortable with what you've got in place now? Or that you don't want to go through the change process? Or that you think you are already doing the best you can do? Or that you love your current vendor? Or is it because you think that if you add something new you'd have to throw away the huge investment you've already made in sales training?

Of course, I can handle the objections to all of the above!! I can tell you that if you are thinking any of the above, you've made an error in judgment - and obviously my job now is to dispel these objections and make you see the TRUTH - that my product will be better.......

Got it?

How did that feel? What do you know now that you didn't know before? About my product? About your needs? About your choices? About your willingness to change? About what your decision team needs to notice or consider before you do anything differently?

How do you feel about being pushed into a corner? About being 'wrong' on the end of my 'right'? About feeling dumb to my being smart? About your confusion and need to defend your beliefs?

By 'selling', I end up juxtaposing our belief systems and our behaviors. Even though I set this all up 'nicely', and am willing to be your 'consultant', you know darn well that my overriding desire is to sell you my training and get you to see that using my stuff would be better than what you've got.

PRODUCT VS. NEED VS. DECIDING

Obviously, the fact that I have a 'great product' is not good enough. As a prospective buyer you'd have to figure out:

--If you are ready, willing, and able to make a change now;

--If there is anything you are actually missing;

--How to get your team to want to change;

--Whether or not to believe that doing something different would make a difference;

--What you'd want to get out of a training that's different from what you have now;

--What you would be willing to put up with to get that change;

--How your culture/company would handle a shift at this point in its life cycle.

And even if you don't mind change or the chaos change brings, you would have to convince your team to buy in to the need to do something different - and that doing something different would include an out-of-the-box buying-support method vs. a sales method.

In other words - and I know I've said this - it doesn't matter what your product is or how you sell it if the buyer doesn't know how to align the culture and buying team around a decision. And it's NOT just a decision about the problems your product solves - it's about the entire environment that holds and maintains the problem.

NEED AND PROBLEMS AND DECISIONS

Let's take a bit more time now and look at the system here.

You've got a great product. Worked hard at creating it, testing it, piloting it. You've gotten good press and your competition can't touch you.

But those prospects you've targeted - those exact people who need your product, who are suffering because they are not using your product - don't think they need you. They kindly listen to your pitches. They admit they are having problems in just the area your product handles. They even know they cannot fix the problem doing what they are doing. But they aren't buying.

What's stopping them? What's making it more viable for them to keep doing what they are doing - losing money or time or market share or employee/partner good will - rather than buy your product and solve their problem?

I've heard many, many sales folks say that the reason their product isn't being purchased is because buyers don't understand the product or why they need it; or they get confused between your product and others that perform almost-similar tasks and believe them to be comparable.

What's going on?

Sellers often think they need to educate their prospects. Call centers and financial institutions are famous for spending huge amounts of time and money in giving their reps lots of product training, believing that if they can pitch or present the features and benefits skillfully, buyers will know how to buy. Yet information does not teach someone how to make a decision (see Newsletters of 3/7/01 and 1/17/02 about the differences between information and criteria).

As we saw in my initial example, people can have all the information in the world about a product and that won't teach them how to make a buying decision if they believe that they are doing as well as they can be doing given all the factors involved.

What do you need to be doing to help them understand that they need to buy your product?

WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Let's take a look at how your prospect experiences his/her environment - those areas that you don't necessarily think about when you are selling your product.

1. it's working the way it's always worked.

2. the work environment is created around maintaining the problem.

Was it customer centric? Not at all. It needed to be changed - but first the client had to recognize there was a problem.

A more conventional sales approach would be to say:

"Gee. You've got a problem. Buyers can't call you back if they have questions, or if they need to g

The Law of Attraction In Business
Entrepreneurs work harder than most Americans. They spend countless hours and enormous amounts of energy trying to reach business and financial goals that are often elusive. They seem to be doing all the right things: attending seminars, scouring the latest business books, networking, guerilla marketing, hoping, and praying.We all know of business owners who go through the same motions yet they are far more successful and don't work nearly as hard. And, they seem to have more fun. Surely you've seen situations where two people are in the same business, sometimes within a block from each other. The owner of the first business can be successful beyond measure. The other business can be close to bankruptcy.What is the difference? The difference is that the first business owner is allowing their natural brilliance to run the business. That natural brilliance is the Law of Attraction. We are all far greater than we think and we have truly amazing potential that most people are not even aware of. The real key to success in life and in business is accessing your "miracle mind" and unleashing your capacity for abundance.The best way to do this is to learn how to make the Law of Attraction work for you. The Law of Attraction is the most powerful law in the universe. It works just like a magnet. Our thoughts are energy and we attract and are attracted to the people

er. I could tell you why and how it works better - to close more sales and make your sellers brand ambassadors, not to mention give pure value-add by making your sales people true consultants to the buyer. Yadayadayada.

Hey. Maybe you're not buying because you don't believe or understand that Buying Facilitation would help your sales people be better consultants. Or bring in more revenue.

Got it?

How do you feel about being pushed into a corner? About being 'wrong' on the end of my 'right'? About feeling dumb to my being smart? About your confusion and need to defend your beliefs?

PRODUCT VS. NEED VS. DECIDING

Obviously, the fact that I have a 'great product' is not good enough. As a prospective buyer you'd have to figure out:

--If you are ready, willing, and able to make a change now;

--If there is anything you are actually missing;

--How to get your team to want to change;

--Whether or not to believe that doing something different would make a difference;

--What you'd want to get out of a training that's different from what you have now;

--What you would be willing to put up with to get that change;

--How your culture/company would handle a shift at this point in its life cycle.

NEED AND PROBLEMS AND DECISIONS

Let's take a bit more time now and look at the system here.

You've got a great product. Worked hard at creating it, testing it, piloting it. You've gotten good press and your competition can't touch you.

What's going on?

What do you need to be doing to help them understand that they need to buy your product?

WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Let's take a look at how your prospect experiences his/her environment - those areas that you don't necessarily think about when you are selling your product.

1. it's working the way it's always worked.

2. the work environment is created around maintaining the problem.

Was it customer centric? Not at all. It needed to be changed - but first the client had to recognize there was a problem.

A more conventional sales approach would be to say:

"Gee. You've got a problem. Buyers can't call you back if they have questions, or if they need to

Tips and Tricks For Looking For a Job When Online
For quite a while now, looking online for a job is ever more popular. According to research study 66% of HR professionals are now using the Internet for their recruiting. And this has been an increase of 45% from the year before. So if you are currently looking for a job, there never has been a better time than now to look towards the internet for possible job options.In this article we are going to take a look at different types of job search sites that you can use to locate new jobs. The three areas we will look at are the large database websites, more specialized sites, and some smaller underutilized sites.Large Database Job Search WebsitesWith the advent of the Internet came along the opportunity to get information from people in an efficient manner, and a lot of companies took advantage of this. Monster, Careerbuilder, and hot jobs.com are probably three that you have the most extensive database of job openings on the Internet. These websites also have a lot of valuable resources for you to take a look at to help you with subjects such as your resume, cover letter, and interviews.Specialized Job Search WebsitesThere are a number of specialized job search websites that are specific to an industry or a niche job. These websites may not be as abundant as a large database websites but the opportunities will

ors. Even though I set this all up 'nicely', and am willing to be your 'consultant', you know darn well that my overriding desire is to sell you my training and get you to see that using my stuff would be better than what you've got.

PRODUCT VS. NEED VS. DECIDING

Obviously, the fact that I have a 'great product' is not good enough. As a prospective buyer you'd have to figure out:

--If you are ready, willing, and able to make a change now;

--If there is anything you are actually missing;

--How to get your team to want to change;

--Whether or not to believe that doing something different would make a difference;

--What you'd want to get out of a training that's different from what you have now;

--What you would be willing to put up with to get that change;

--How your culture/company would handle a shift at this point in its life cycle.

NEED AND PROBLEMS AND DECISIONS

Let's take a bit more time now and look at the system here.

You've got a great product. Worked hard at creating it, testing it, piloting it. You've gotten good press and your competition can't touch you.

What's going on?

What do you need to be doing to help them understand that they need to buy your product?

WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Let's take a look at how your prospect experiences his/her environment - those areas that you don't necessarily think about when you are selling your product.

1. it's working the way it's always worked.

2. the work environment is created around maintaining the problem.

Was it customer centric? Not at all. It needed to be changed - but first the client had to recognize there was a problem.

A more conventional sales approach would be to say:

"Gee. You've got a problem. Buyers can't call you back if they have questions, or if they need to

Imagine You Sitting On A Beach While Raking In Money
Boy, I bet that got your attention! We have all seen the ads for hundreds of money-making schemes. You wonder if the stories really are true. The pictures of the family at the beach or the couple standing in front of the Mercedes tell us that they made it big, why can’t we.Several times, I have come close to purchasing these ebooks, but have not. I keep thinking that the only way that they have all of this stuff is to sell information to people like me that dream of one day making lots of money by working at home selling on the internet.I have owned several retail establishments – some successful and some not so successful, but I have had to work at them whether or not they made money. I have not found anything yet that I can only spend a few hours a day and get rich, although I am trying.One thing I have realized, though, is that the internet is the way to go. Just think of it this way, you do not have to hire employees; no one coming in late or calling in sick; the plumbing does not stop-up; the air conditioner and heat don’t break down; and, it works for you 24 hours a day, 7 days each week and it does not require bathroom breaks.I know what you are thinking. We know all of this stuff, why is he retelling us the same information that we have known for years. But have you ever thought power the internet truly has. For i

tem here.

You've got a great product. Worked hard at creating it, testing it, piloting it. You've gotten good press and your competition can't touch you.

What's going on?

What do you need to be doing to help them understand that they need to buy your product?

WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Let's take a look at how your prospect experiences his/her environment - those areas that you don't necessarily think about when you are selling your product.

1. it's working the way it's always worked.

2. the work environment is created around maintaining the problem.

Was it customer centric? Not at all. It needed to be changed - but first the client had to recognize there was a problem.

A more conventional sales approach would be to say:

"Gee. You've got a problem. Buyers can't call you back if they have questions, or if they need to

An Entrepreneur Article For Serious Contenders
There are hopers and dreamers then there are entrepreneurs. To really understand how a genuine entrepreneur makes money you need to study the difference between these two groups and why hopers and dreamers fall by the way side, while the real thing go's from strength to strength."For the lack of a horse shoe, a kingdom was lost" Knowing what to look for is the mark of an experienced entrepreneur, however without experience you become at risk of simply running around in circles with nothing to show for it. For example the romantic "inventor entrepreneur wannabe" This type of hoper believes success lies in the power of one idea. They have bought into the romantic notion that all a man needs is one good idea and the world will beat a path to your door. The world is full of failed inventor entrepreneurs. They spend most of their time dreaming of building the perfect mouse trap. One that all the world will want. They spend precious seed capital and even more precious time in their spare hours (usually after their day job) building and testing prototypes. They usually enjoy it and consider it recreation. A hobby.The danger comes when they get bored with tinkering and begin to believe they have achieved their goal so they begin to look for seed capital and that's when they start to spend money on their invention. They give it to all kinds of submission services and mar

What do you need to be doing to help them understand that they need to buy your product?

WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Let's take a look at how your prospect experiences his/her environment - those areas that you don't necessarily think about when you are selling your product.

1. it's working the way it's always worked.

2. the work environment is created around maintaining the problem.

Was it customer centric? Not at all. It needed to be changed - but first the client had to recognize there was a problem.

A more conventional sales approach would be to say:

"Gee. You've got a problem. Buyers can't call you back if they have questions, or if they need to go speak with their bosses before making a decision. You're cutting off a huge range of buying possibilities."

The Facilitative Question I asked was: "How do you plan on mitigating the distance between being customer centric and having a one-way buying channel?"

This Facilitative Question offered the understanding that:

1. there was a problem that needed to be fixed and that needed several layers of management and skill to fix it;

2. they had some decisions to be made around what 'customer centric' might look like;

3. an action had to be taken in order to be congruent with their goals;

4. I was a consultant who would support them in recognizing problems and support them in discovering their own internal solutions.

5. a change means examining all the decisions - including all the peripheral areas that convene around the problem - that got them where they are, and recognizing that something's not working efficiently. By using my expertise to walk with them in their own field of expertise, and by using a Facilitative Question to help them recognize and potentially fix the problem using their own resources, I actually taught my prospect how to notice that they were less than efficient and they needed to think differently.

If I had just told them I had a product that would help them become more customer centric wouldn't have gotten them closer to a decision.

CHANGE

When you are selling a product that folks don't seem to understand, it's not a problem with your product, or with your marketing material. It's a decisioning problem: how will folks know what they need to consider to be ready, willing, or able to decide to change, and having made that decision, how to choose the ways they are willing to change.

What needs to happen in their environment for them to recognize:

1. what's missing and how it got that way;

2. that they can/cannot fix it themselves;

3. the cultural/internal issues that need to be addressed in order for them to do something different and have an environment that does not get destroyed through the chaos of change.

Make no mistake: when you suggest that a prospect should bring your product into an environment that has worked very well without it, you are suggesting major change.

HELPING PROSPECTS MAKE A DECISION

I can't express strongly enough that you can't sell without a buyer (People laugh when I say that, but sales is based on selling - not having people buy!). What needs to happen to have you start considering making your sales people neutral navigators to help the client make their best decision? And I'm not talking about consultative selling.

Consultative selling does not go far enough: it only uses questions based around the problem that is solved by the seller's product. There is a whole environment/culture that has created and maintained the problem that needs to make changes before it's willing to address a fix.

I'm going to go back to my tag line, as it seems to fit here: Do you want to sell? Or have someone buy?

It's time to become facilitators. Then buyers understand exactly how to purchase your product.

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Aspiring franchisees often find themselves in the situation of having plenty funds, not wanting to work for somebody else, but lacking basic business skills to start a business on their own. What exactly is a franchise?

Is your career stagnant? Expand your network! This article shows you how building a career network can help you find your next job!

Finance accounting outsourcing has become an integral part of the business. There are lots of things and finance documents that have to be tallied before you are required to pay the taxes. Outsourcing has eased the work to such an extent that you can get your work done within the budget and pay taxes on time.

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