I want to share with you one of my key rules for salespeople.
Selling internally is more important than selling externally.
You could change that and say it's equally important. Maybe not for you, but for many sales people, I've seen them being held back by themselves. They thought if they just go close business and sell, that's all that's required of them from a selling perspective.
A perfect example happened a couple weeks ago. I'm working with a team at a company that provides custom solutions and projects. A few of the sales people are of a mindset that they go sell, bring the order back, and kind of throw it over the fence and delivery just happens. With that mindset comes an attitude that, internally, people get a little uncomfortable with on an emotional level. It's almost like some people internally (not in sales) will sabotage it.
They wouldn't consciously do this but there's an emotional component. I've seen a lot of career killers where sales people got to a certain point, and they didn't advance. Over 30 years of observing this. I have someone recently, where he clearly knows he needs to change. His mindset is “I just bring it in, they should do their work.” I agree with that, but the reality is we're dealing with people.
Consider this. Consider applying selling principles like the Sandler process to selling internally.
Bonding and rapport. It sounds obvious, but how are bonding and rapport skills internally?
How about upfront contracts? Setting agreements internally for next steps.
Even if we look at talking about “okay, not okay.” Not making people uncomfortable, getting ahead of conflict and dealing with objections before they come up.
There are so many principles. As you're looking to apply this, really look at the Sandler system and process and ask yourself, which of these principles do I need to better use to better implement the solutions I'm selling internally?
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