Selling with Purpose

I love sales and consider this as one of the best profession for leading a good life ( of course , it depends on an individual to define “Good Life” )

If you look at mechanics of selling, a typical salesperson would consider it to have these steps :

•  Meet people
• Present your product or service
• If customer likes – he will buy

I am sure many of us would have experienced a sudden Spiel from a tie clad young and enthusiastic person, trying to sell a book, a new gizmo or a holiday package , while you and friends were walking down the road for having your lunch .

The problem with this approach is that the salesperson doesn't spend time in understanding the requirement & ends up focusing on perfecting his “Sales Pitch” & becomes mechanical whenever he or she comes across a person whom he or she can repeat his/her Sales Pitch

This can end up being very “Mechanical & Boring “.

As a sales professional, “What’s your endgame?” Closing a sale and collecting your sales check or is it trying to make a difference?

This is an important question & in today’s high pressure selling environment, sales team & their managers, in many case , end up losing sight of this question and the objective is to simply sell with “Whatever it takes” approach .

This approach creates negative vibes – for the customer as well as for the sales person as the selling & buying process becoming transaction, rather than a means to resolving a business problem .

The Bigger picture is lost and its common to hear these types of remarks:

• “Ah … quarter end , now you have got time to think about me “
• “Sir , this is my year end and I am under lot of pressure for my numbers . Please help and buy something.”
• “Let’s wait till year end. I know it’s the best time to extract a deal from these guys . They will be ready to sign the deal at any cost.”

If we are looking at selling as means of creating impact, we need to re look at our sales process & this is where Selling with Purpose comes into picture.

Thanks to the internet and availability of information, customers are knowledgeable  and as a buyer they are well informed . This means that as a seller you need to be able to exceed his knowledge of the solutions in the market & be able to clearly articulate how your solution can add value & bring the anticipated benefit to the buyer’s organisation.

Selling with Purpose provides the required goal to the salesperson to strive for his customers success and benefit. This helps the salesperson to build a long-term relationship with the customer, as the interactions result in building trust between the buyer and the salesperson

Companies where Selling with Purpose is the way of life, you will find that  emphasis has been put on learning about customers business, creating value in the sales process and building relationship at all levels in the organisation.These companies focus on value creation & help in solving ‘real-world’ business problems.

Needless to say - The companies  where Selling with Purpose is the way of life , leave their competition behind as the trust that they have build with their customers , is long lasting and they end up being the “Partner of Choice” for their customer .

Selling with Purpose not only provides great opportunity for the salesperson to be successful but his/her organisation is able to build long term relationship with their customers.