A course in Salesmanship!

What makes us an effective salesperson?

This much-talked-of topic is most misunderstood too. Everybody has an opinion on the same and the variety of available tips seems to qualify for being called noise. Recently i was reading a book 'What they still don't teach at Harvard Business School' and got a very simplified answer to the same. The formula suggested is refreshingly simple and precise.

The book presents four direct priciples to learn to sell effectively:

1. Know the Product

2. Meet a lot of people

3. Ask them to buy

4. Use common sense

That's it.

It made a lot of sense to me. The first point clearly tells every salesperson to be sure of always staying in the know of everything that the prospect may expect from him or her. Knowledge is power and it wins trust. It creates confidence. People always tend to prefer knowledgeable sales persons.

The second point is the most obvious one and the most commonly ignored one too! Meeting new people either by way of cold calling or through some promotional events is very important. Meeting them in normal course of life is even better.

The third point is all about focus. To the first timers it also teaches the importance of being on target - at all times. Some initial hesitation must be overcome if one wants to practise this point of action.

And the last point is the most important one. It's all about common sense but common sense is so uncommon these days! If one ventures to list out the mistakes one has committed in sales meetings a very vast majority of them can be covered under the heading 'lack of common sense'. Possibly a very narrow focus causes many to ignore what is visible to the neutral eye.

Try to apply these priciples in whatever you sell and see the result. And of course, we all know that selling is omnipresent!