Business and Money Tips

As I learnt from Duane Sparks, author of the best-selling book 'Action Selling'.    Research shows that it's more important to customers that the salesperson understand their needs than that they understand the salesperson's products and services.  Customers have a strong need to feel understood.  The mistake made by many salespeople is to assume that they know what the customer wants. Often the customer misleads the salesperson by stating what he is looking for.  The salesperson would jump the gun and go straight to propose his products and services.   This is a mistake. Even if the customer tells you what he wants, those may not be his needs.  A want is a preference whereas a need is a necessity.  We know that people don't just buy what they want, they must also buy what they need .  A good salesperson will convert all wants into needs , for needs are stronger reasons to buy.   Like you now want to upgrade your phone to iP...

Too much heaven or hell is no good, so is management.  All managers must avoid 2 deadly pitfalls or risk being redundant: 1. Control - Too little control or too much control is a problem.   Too little control would mean not having rules, but most often we see rules not followed and management never do much about it. For example, many companies have rules on working hours, but ask yourself how many management actually work to ensure that people come to work punctually? Many people have got used to being late, and the common excuse is they work late, so they can come late for work.  Many don't know that this is causing some issues in teamwork, e.g. if some people are not here by 8.30 am, how am I going to get certain things done without them? So as a manager, make sure that you set the rules of the game.  A good rules of the game is Values. Values like honesty and 'Go Extra Mile' must be laid down and followed by all staff.  2. Losing Their Voice: It'...

"You can make a great product, but you have to convince people that what you are selling is greater".   CEO John Sculley, in his famous speech to Apple Computer staff in 1983.  Sculley went on, "We are not selling computers, we are selling what people can do with computers.  A tool for the mind, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is limitless".  Indeed, in sales, if you just sell a product or service, you are very much limited in how much you can sell.  But  the moment you turn your selling into what your product or service can do for the customer, you can sell anything .  There is simply no limit in your selling.  Just look at the phenomenal sales of i-Pad, Xiaomi and Samsung smartphones and you will know what I'm talking about.  The following are the 5 most common ways to be limitless in your selling: The Money that Can be Made  with What You Are Selling.  As long as this money that people get is more than what they are paying,...

Dale Carnegie, the author of 1935's best-selling book "How to Win Friends and Influence People", taught us how to fish. Here's how he is able to fish for minutes and catch big catches.  "When I go fishing, I don't think about what I want. I think about what t hey  want.  I don't bait the hook with chocolates and peanuts, I dangle a worm or grasshopper in front of the fish and say, "Wouldn't you want to have that?"  So taught Dale Carnegie.   That's the approach you can take when fishing for customers.  Get the prospect to say "Yes" immediately by using the Socratic method of keep on asking questions .   Wouldn't you want to achieve more sales than ever with less work?  How about getting your customers to come back to you over and over again?  Can you win the price war without getting into a price war?  Is it possible to do limitless selling, where the only limits to your sales is your ability to serve your customer...

As a trainer and teacher, I know that my clients know more than me. They don't need us to teach them anything. But everyone appreciates someone to tell them something they don't know. Many times it is not new knowledge but a different way of looking at things.  This is what re-frame is about. It's about changing the frame or the way you look at things.  That's what everyone wants.  Here are 7 things that you can easily re-frame: Wealth is not measured by how much you have, but how much you can afford to lose and still not considered poor Sales: Selling is not about making people buy, but teaching people to want to buy from you Purchases is not about seeking the lowest possible price from your vendors but seeking the highest return from what you buy Management is not about managing people but managing time, money and resources Employment is not a entitlement but a service, and the biggest service is yourself.  If your employment is not serving yo...

The best managers are not those who are good in delegating work to others, nor are they the leaders that lead their organizations to winning battles.  The best managers are more than that. The best managers make people better than themselves.    They dare to take the challenge to challenge people.  You see most people have a fixed idea of themselves and what they can do.  But the best managers know that unless challenged, people will stay within their comfort limits . How do they do that? Well, the best managers teach people well . Not just teach them to do their job well, but how to become a better person .  Because the best managers know that only when people become better will their jobs become easier.   Other than teaching well, the best managers always take control of the situation .  By this we don't mean the best managers are aggressive or push, but are able to assert and control the situation, especially control any meeting or co...

Most sales trainers centred on one core teaching: you must understand customers' needs and sell them solutions to their needs.  Many sales training in Singapore and Asia teach people to ask better questions, like probing questions, financial questions, hypothetical questions, follow-up questions and open-ended questions so as to get the sale.   The idea is that if we just dig deep enough, we will find gold. This sounds very good, but does it work in real life?  Do people buy based on needs?   What if customers don't know what they need?  Like before Apple launched iPad in 2010, you cannot get anywhere if you ask questions on what type of tablet they need.   To me, the customer's single greatest need is to figure out exactly what they need.  So a better sales technique is to tell customers what they need.   Sales champions win not by understanding their customers' needs but by knowing customers' needs better than the customers thems...

According to best-selling book "The Challenger Sale" author Matthew Dixon, most salespeople are very hard-working, some are relationship builders and the rest are passive problem solvers.  But few of them are able to out-perform over a sustained period. (You can read a 5-minute summary of his book at here) As we know, pure consultative selling based on relationship building does not work anymore for large sales, complex sales and sales to MNCs. This is because of corporate governance. Other than that, most buyers now little power for the actual decision-making is vested in a committee that does not even want to see the salesperson. Those that were trained in consultative selling often end up providing free service to their prospects as they lose control of the sales situation and the prospect end up buying from another vendor.  The hardworking salespeople do close many sales, but they often get burnt out beca...

Following yesterday's blog on 'The First Love Language at Work', here are the other 4 Love Languages per Dr Gary Chapman that we use in our management training : Words of Affirmation Quality Time Acts of Service Gifts  Touch Today we shall dwell on Quality Time Quality time is simply giving someone your undivided attention . It is a very obvious expression of love and no one in this world dislikes it. Quality time need not be quantity time, and Ken Blanchand said in the "One Minute Manager" book, all it takes is an EXTRA MINUTE of your time and that's quality time. When your staff talks to you, do you listen with your computer screen on? Focused Attention is another aspect of Quality Time. It is not we have to spend our time together moments gazing into each other's eyes. It means we are doing something together and that we are giving our full attention to each other. Incidentally, the activity that we do is not important. What's im...

From Dr Gary Chapman's best selling book "The Five Love Languages", many people tried to apply this relationship love concept in the workplace.  While many have met with success, some have found the ideas too complex to transfer them to the workplace effectively.  At Asia Trainers, we have, since 2006 in management and leadership courses, applied such concepts successfully.    Chapman's 5 Love Languages are as follows: Words of Affirmation Quality Time Acts of Service Gifts  Touch Chapman's book claims that this list of five love languages is exhaustive but we should not use the love languages that they like the most but rather the love languages that their loved ones can receive.  So in the workplace, which love language you use would depend on who you are dealing with.  Today I shall only talk about the first love language: Words of Affirmation .  Come back to our blog at www.andyngtrainer.blogspot.sg for the remaining 5 love l...

Often during our sales courses people ask me what's the number one skill of a successful salesperson.  It must be assertiveness. Assertiveness is not to be confused with aggressiveness.  When you push your customer to buy based on your own reason (like you have to hit your target), you are aggressive. But when you push your customer to buy because it is in the customer's interest to buy, you are assertive.   There are 3 steps to be assertive in your selling: Step 1: Teach Here you teach your prospect not just about your product's features and benefits but challenge his assumptions .  You also teach him how to take action base on what he desires. Your teaching must offer an unique perspective and must be a two-way communication .  That means asking questions and listening Step 2: Tailor After the prospect is taught on what is the right way to do things, you tailor what you have to what he desires.  It means that you have to a...

One of the most crucial job of a sales manager is to ensure that the business has a constant supply of new leads or new clients.  This is because we know that there is a natural attrition rate of 20% every year,  that is, 20% customers going away every year even if we do nothing wrong.   Chasing new business is often thought of by many as something to be done by marketeers and bosses.  In reality, getting new business is easy.  But it is even easier not to get any new business.  This means we get our customers to do the selling for us, or use referrals.   You see, the difference between a promotion and a business is simple - when you have to go out and find yourself another customer, what you have is a ongoing marketing promotion, not a business.  A business is where you buy a customer and then sell them many things over and over again, that is, you have an ongoing income stream. How to have an instant Referral System?  There are 5 elem...

We all work primarily to earn income. Other than that, work fulfils additional needs like give us status, identity, power, approval of others, social interaction and the simple satisfaction of keeping busy.   The problem is that while we work to accomplish our goals, we seldom find value in the process of working itself.  In our training courses like How to Be a Better Manager, How to Be a Great Boss and Effective Selling Skills, many people have come to the point where they question the value of what they have been doing.  They asked if work has deepened their sense of meaning and purpose.   Even for people who work for a cause they believe in, or they are working on their passions, ultimately the same pattern persists.  Although we may work with much more energy and commitment, we look past the actual activity of working to its results.  Although we believe in what we do, we are focused on the results, hitting KPIs and earning a living.  In oth...