Are you selling to yourself?

Last week, a great friend of mine, Trevor came to stay for a few days. Previously, Trevor had decided that I needed to buy a Humax box-a piece of kit that turns my TV into a Smart TV. No, I didn’t know what that meant either.

Well, to be fair, Trevor chose a great moment to make this sale. We were three pints into a bike ride and there was the local branch of Richer Sounds, so why not take a look? Trevor kept repeating that the difference in picture quality would be amazing. The chap in the shop demonstrated the picture quality with and without the box operating and to be honest, I couldn’t see a lot of difference. Anyhow, I left the store with my shiny new box and we continued our bike ride.

Back home, Trevor wired up the box of tricks and proceeded to tell me how much the picture quality had improved…hadn’t it? I still couldn’t see much difference and thought that I would return the box later in the week.

When he left, I started to play with the machine and realised that not only could I watch television with it but I could also record programmes too. Now this is a really useful feature for me because I often miss out on a series because of work or travelling commitments, and I don’t remember when the next episode of a series is being shown.

And that is the point of this post. If I had been told the benefits of watching films and keeping up with series, I would have eagerly bought the box and never considered returning it.

Now Trevor is not a professional sales person and genuinely thought I would appreciate the feature of higher quality pictures so he is not really at fault.

However, as sales professionals, how often are we emphasising the feature that we really like rather than listening to our prospects and talking about the benefits that they are interested in and would prompt them to buy?

Next steps …

I focus on getting to the source of any performance issues. It’s unlikely that I’ll teach your people new techniques, I’ll uncover what is holding your people back and then each individual will establish their own system to achieve what the business needs. When people come up with their own solution, they drive their own performance.

To find out more about my approach and how your business can benefit from it, call me on 07789 077 571.