Sales: the most important part of your business.
by Fred Roed on 06/10/08 at 6:45 am
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I remember watching a discussion a few years back on SABC 3 with Pete Carruthers and some other guys. The presenter asked them what they thought was the most important facet of a small business was, and the one guy said: ‘Without question: your people!’
Pete practicallly leapt down the guy’s throat and said ‘Hogwash – Sales is the most important. Without sales, you can kiss your people goodbye!’
People and Sales are both critical elements of business. Having run businesses for the past 10 years, I know how important it is to have the right people (and how dangerous it is to have the wrong people).
However, I agree with Pete: sales is ultimately the most important.
Your business grinds to a halt when sales don’t happen.
So, my advice to small business owners is to go and read Fortune’s special feature focusing on sales (if you haven’t done it already). Here are some of the best articles…
- How to sell in a lousy economy
- 10 bizarre and daring feats of salesmanship
- IBM’s all-star salesman
- Nordstrom’s No. 1 salesman
They’ve also written a great article called ‘Top 10 Sales Slip-ups’ – for the lazy Ideate reader, here’s a precis:
- Not feeling the customer’s pain (i.e. try to understand what problem your offering is solving)
- Making money the goal (be passionate about what you’re selling, rather than just the money you make from the sale)
- Seeing sales as just a job (it’s a life!)
- Getting upset (smile, brush yourself off and send the person who rejected you a letter thanking them for their time)
- Failing to prepare (don’t wing it!)
- Preparing too much (don’t be too rigid, be flexible and listen to your customers!)
- Treating customers as adults (we’re all kids at heart)
- Acting phony (be authentic)
- Neglecting the relationship (keep in touch with your prospects)
- Forgetting that we’re all basically reptiles (pander to the ‘reptilian’ side of the personality – shower praise, warm them up, etc.)
Fred Roed is the marketing guy in the Ideate crew. Fred is the CEO of web marketing company World Wide Creative and the co-founder of online learning portal Heavy Chef. Fred loves writing about people out there doing marketing right. Follow Fred on Twitter here. View more articles by Fred Roed.
