Solving Problems
According to the World Class Selling book "New Sales Competencies", Solving Problems involves "Creatively bringing new or alternative perspectives forward to overcome difficulty or uncertainty."
How do we make it easier for you to manage solving problems? Let's break it down to a manageable effective action.
The best way to approach solving challenges creatively is to find a fresh perspective and focus on the key actions that bring about change. Change and knowledge transfer can be can be effective with the right focus and planning.
Access Resource Intelligence to Solve Problems
Learn about changes in your business from all angles possible. Salespeople need to be PROACTIVE. You need to respond quickly to change in the marketplace and find problems to solve that your product and service can address.
Watch or read community and industry news reports, subject matter content and published customer opinion discussions where you can introduce the use of your products, or services to provide valuable solutions. Business research done externally and internally will always show you business challenges that you can inquire about. Be creative and have fun getting the "who, what, where, why, when and how".
Set Your Daily Top (5) PRIORITY Objectives
- What is your top 5 objectives for the day? WRITE THEM DOWN.
- What are the OBJECTIVES of each of those priorities? WRITE THEM DOWN.
- What is the OBJECTIVE of each of your sales calls? WRITE THEM DOWN.
- What SYSTEM are you using to chart sales performance and log progress on solving problems?
Bring value to your customers. Decision makers and customers want to understand how to reduce costs, increase revenue and optimize performance.
Know what Decision Makers want ahead of time
There are many types of decision makers. To solve their problem you simply need to find out their pain and what challenges they are experiencing that can be directly addressed by the product or service you are selling. Decision makers want you to get to the point. Make sure you know AHEAD OF TIME how to ask the RIGHT questions that will get them emotionally involved in sharing their challenges with you. This can be done by analyzing the behavior of other decision makers in their industry and offering solutions. But, more importantly, you must get involved in making them tell you what their personal challenges are. Otherwise, your efforts are pointless and you will not sell a thing to them.
Identify and Develop Options for Decision Making
Identify ways to make quality assessments during the decision making process and how to act on decisions. Understand how do develop a key word SWOT Analysis and marketplace review with the PEST Analysis. Group workshop programs and online virtual conferences are great problem solving "think tank" resources! Look for ways to assess and grow your sales skill level. Become more creative, learn new decision making techniques, hone in on your language clarity, sense of timing and judgment, and LEARN HOW TO IMPLEMENT action plans. This will separate you from the rest of the Sales Experts in your industry.
