Sales Techniques That Really Work

I was reflecting the other day on how throughout my career using systems of work, such as the Friedman Sales system, has enabled me to be successful in developing and leading future leaders. Believe me, this system works and can be modified to work across web sites, retail, B2B and relationship building. Enjoy:

In my current position I manage 22 Retail Shops, an 80 seat Contact Centre, a direct B2C sales force and a web sales team. My teams sell insurance, security, travel, automotive products and merchandise for the entire Group. To have such as diverse multi-skilled sales force you really need a system to drive the performance of the team and to hold managers accountable. To enable the teams to be effective in 2006 I introduced the Friedman Gold Stars sales system.

The system is very simple, it is a process to engage with the customer, in essence to become their friend, so that you can match your products and services to their needs to save them time and money. Then to measure the effectiveness a simple red dots for under budget achievement, green dots for getting budget and gold stars for over budget performance helps keep the staff motivated towards success. For managers it is about understanding that you need to keep your people free and clear to sell with little distractions and to coach this behaviour, similar to Greenleaf’s servant leadership.

For sales people the 8 steps to sales success are:

1. Precheck – making sure that you are ready to sell & that the store is presentable

2. Opening the Sale:
• Acknowledge every customer
• 180 degree Walk Pass – this is acknowledging the customer, but walking past them rather than approaching asking ‘can I help you’ which always gets a ‘no,
just browsing’
• Non-business related opening – breaking the ice to build rapport, as simple as saying ‘that’s a nice watch you have, where did you buy it?’
• Moving into business – saying ‘so, what brings you into the store today?’

3. Probing – finding out about the customer & their needs to match a product

4. Demonstration – selling the value that the customer wants

5. Trial Close – getting the sale by adding on another product

6. Handling Objections – investigating what is the issue, working through any price objection and using the objection to close the sale

7. Closing – identifying buying signals, asking for the sale and closing techniques

8. Confirmations & Invitations – confirms the sales and helps the customer get over buyers remorse and inviting back for another visit

I was introduced to the Friedman system in 2001 and have used it ever since as an effective tool to drive sales behaviour and success. What has been your experience with sales systems in your career?