At a recent National Small Business Chamber Sales Indaba, business guru, Gavin Sharples asked the delegates: “Who of you are salesmen?” Only about a quarter put up their hands. “If you run a small business, you have to be a salesman. Your product or service won’t sell unless you sell it.”
Your product or service won’t sell unless you sell it.
Sell with confidence
Now it’s ‘easy’ for Gavin to be a salesman, he’s an extreme extrovert, he’s funny, engaging and he really knows his stuff. He doesn’t just know his stuff. He actually lives it. When he explains a sales principle, he demonstrates it – on the audience. And it works.
And he exudes passion for what he does.
I’m not like that. Are you? Can you stand up in front of the company management and sell your product or service? Can you do it persuasively, with confidence? Why not? Is confidence the problem?

Your customer’s needs
Do you really know what you have to offer? And more importantly, do you know what your prospective customer needs? Do you understand your customer that well that you know how what you have to offer will address their needs?
This article first appeared in SME South Africa
Once you know what will turn them on, can you present that in a ‘Twitter pitch’ (in 140 characters or less)? Gavin doesn’t stand up and ad lib, he is so practiced that it looks like it comes naturally. He has been practicing his routine for about 20 years. So he can adapt when someone throws him a curved ball.
Then there’s Sam. You know Sam, he’s so confident, he can “sell ice to a eskimo”. Get Sam a drink and you won’t stop him talking: he can talk the hind leg off a donkey. Want it or not, he will sell it to you.
Killing the sale
But heaven help you if he’s selling you something that you do want. When he’s told you about all the amazing features that you “just have to have” and you have had to figure out the benefits for yourself, and you have decided to buy, he doesn’t stop. “Shut up and close the sale” you want to yell. But he just keeps talking.
Samson killed a thousand Philistines with the jawbone of an ass. Every day, Sam kills a thousand sales with the same instrument.
Here are four key sales principles.
Four key sales principles
One: successful sales people do the least talking and the most listening. Ask the correct questions and present your solutions with passion.
Two: understand your customer’s needs. Make sure that what you are selling answer’s those needs. Sell what they need, not what you’ve got.
Three: you don’t need the gift of the gab to sell. You need the gift of caring and love for people and believe that what you do makes a difference.
Four: Close. Know your product or service benefits so well that you can sell it in a ‘Twitter pitch’. Practice your pitch over and over with someone who asks difficult questions. Answer the objections. Then Close!
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And as Gavin Sharples says: “People do business with happy people.” So sell with a smile in your voice.
Rick Ed
thanks for lovely articles