Business and Money Tips

Yes, it has been getting more competitive today to sell. In the process of Pitching, i.e. multi-stage selling, every detail must be well executed if you want to clinch that coveted deal that everyone is eyeing for.  The stages involved in the sales pitch starts with a meeting, followed by a formal, stand-up presentation. Even if the prospect decides in your favour, you need to follow-up till the end, as anything can change until you sign the deal.  It should be noted that pitching is process that is cumulative, this means that each stage must be completed to the satisfaction of the other other or you will be wasting your time and effort . To pitch successfully, you need to press the prospect's hot button.  Hot button is not to be confused with Benefits or Emotions, nor is it about Fear and Force. In sales, a Hot button is a Trigger that once activated, the person will NOT go back to the original state of mind . This means that when you press the hot button, a sale will re

1. Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart to give yourself to it. 2. Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Just as the candle won't be shortened, one's happiness never decreases by being shared. 3. The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, nor to worry about the future, but to live the present moment wisely and earnestly. 4. Words have the power to both destroy and heal. When words are both true and kind, they can change our world. 5. If we could see the miracle of a single flower clearly, our whole life would change. 6. Let us all be thankful for this day, for we have learned a great deal; if we have not learned a great deal, then at least we learned slightly; if we did not learn slightly, then at least we did not become sick; if we did become sick, then at least we did not die. So, let us all be thankful. 7. On life's jou

Whenever I ask business owners the question, 'What is the purpose of a business?' I often get the following response: 'To make a profit!’ That answer pinpoints why so many businesses struggle to survive, let alone grow. That answer is centred on the desires of the business owner, not on the needs and desires of their customers. Imagine walking up to a potential customer and saying, 'Hello. My purpose is to make a nice, big profit from you today!'   That would be what we call a 'repelling' action, not an 'attracting' action.  Here's a much more powerful and profitable definition of the purpose of a business: To attract and serve the needs of as many customers as possible at an acceptable profit. Did you notice where the profit came in? Not at the beginning where most people put it, but at the end. Profit is the 'result' of how well you serve your customers needs. Focus on serving your customers better than your competition --

Buddhism officially came to China in 67 CE. The Eastern Han Dynasty Emperor Han Ming sent special envoys to India to invite Buddhist monks to come to China to preach. Since most South-East Asia Chinese came from China, to the Chinese Buddhism is almost 2,000 years old. Buddhism in that period was regarded as an Educational System and not as a religion. Indeed in many ways Buddhism is considered as an education and not religion, primarily because Buddhism is not about faith or belief, but about seeing the world in the right way . It is about questioning everything, including the teachings of Buddhism . Only when one has wisdom can one question, thus Buddhism is an education. This is the unique thing about Buddhism as compared with other faiths, religions and schools of thoughts. Not only that, Buddhism is also about the how to live the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama who ‘founded’ the religion of Buddhism in 563 BCE in North-East India that is Nepal today. Commonly referred as

Your purpose as a manager or employee is to get things done, not to impress your boss. But we know that to get more things done you need to impress your boss so that he will trust you and pass to you more things. Here are the 7 Easy Ways that Anyone Can Impress their Boss Without Licking his Boots: Be Frank and Open . Admit mistakes. Never shade truth.  This is key to gaining long term trust Help Your Boss to Be Right . This is not being subservient or time-serving, but means you support your boss in whatever ways so that he can be right.  For example, you help him to improve his writing so that he will not be mis-understood.  Respond Fast or at least Show him Enthusiasm .  Show a Can-Do attitude, not 'See-What-I-Can-Do' style Handle your personal problems well so that he knows you can be trusted to handle the organization's problems. For example, don't have frantic calls from your family members frequently. Protect him with your willingness to take the '

Customers are demanding lower prices. Factories are moving overseas. How can salespeople survive?  These are tough times for salespeople. Customers are demanding more services and lower prices.  Many are purchasing directly through the internet and from manufacturers. Salespeople find themselves caught in the middle - doing more for customers, making less money and wondering about their paycheck. The solution is simple.  Salespeople Must Add Value. How?  Salespeople add value in many ways - before, during and after the sale.    These services include product availability, problem solving and technical support, just to name a few. But customers often do not realize how these services translate into dollars-and-cents value. Why? Because salespeople are generally not trained in how to calculate this value for customers. Beyond product training   Customers are interested in more than product features and benefits. They want to know how these benefits translate into   dollars-and-cents

Often in my training courses, my participants would like to share with me their problems at work and ask me for advise. The advise I gave them is to solve problems in a 3-Step SAD way:  Step 1:  See the problem as what it is, not what you wish .  Reason is that if you  don’t exactly see what the problem is, you're going to perpetuate it.  Y ou are already in reality, all you need to do is to see it. All problems at work, be it sales, cash flow or people management, can be summed up in two words: Human Problems. Settle the human problems and you'll settle all problems.  Human problems can be in the area of motivation, morale, competencies, distraction, complacency, leadership, communication, inter-personal skills, teamwork and compliance.  Step 2:  You don’t lack ideas, strategies or solutions to your problems. S o stop blocking yourself and attend to what’s going on .   When you really attend to the problems, the solution is obvious.  For example, my clie

I learnt this very powerful 5-word phrase from Singapore's highest ever box-office movie ever: "Ah Boys to Men II". In one scene, the recruits were about to start their 3-day field camp.  Their Officer-in-Command asked them, "Before we moved out, anybody not feeling well?"  All the soldiers replied loudly, "No Sir!!!" "Gentlemen", continued the Officer, "Every time the training gets tougher, one thought comes to your mind, 'Why Must I Serve National Service?' "My answer to you is, 'If Not You, Then Who Else?'" Wow!  What a powerful phrase!  If Not You, Who Else may mean: You are the most suitable person, and we can't find anyone better than you.  This is appreciation at the highest level How can you push this responsibility to someone else? I am making a request to you specifically, please don't reject my request Can you find me another person more suitable than you? Please refer me anot

Interview any customers and they will tell you that Over-Promise Under-Deliver is the number 1 reason that they don't trust and like salespeople.  In fact, over 55% of salespeople that we trained confessed that they have to resort to Over-Promise Under-Deliver in their bid to close the sale. If you too want to have long-term relationship in business, you need to avoid Over-Promise Under Deliver at all costs.  The following are the 7 Ways: Know Your Product and Your Customer's Expectations Well  and you will only be promising what your can deliver; Lead the customer and not let him lead you .  Many a times customers lead salespeople to say yes to their requests and that's how over promise happen.  Instead a salesperson could take back control by simply asking a question like, "What do you think?" Deliver + 1 , that is, over deliver on your promise and you'll end up with "Over Promise, Over Deliver" Go the Extra Mile , better than Deliver +1

If I were to now transfer US$10,000 to your bank account, would you be richer? If you are like most people, you would say, 'Yes, of course". Yet we know that money by itself has no value . If I transfer money to you and you don't do anything to it, the total wealth has not increased. It is just merely a transfer of wealth from me to you, no difference to mankind's total wealth. Money has to be circulated in order for it to create value and wealth. Same for knowledge. What if instead of me transferring US$10,000 to your account, I ask that you transfer US$10,000 to my account? For that I'll give you the tools and resources for you to go on to create many times more than US$10,000. Is this a better deal? If you were like most smart people, you would say "yes" to this. Just like training. I have been doing training (part-time since 1996) and full-time (my own business) since 2001. I have paid thousands of dollars to acquire knowledge, a

Another brief but value-packed e-book by Andy Ferrari Norman 1.      Sales is not a function, a goal or a number but an outcome, the outcome is customer satisfaction.  Regardless of how solid your product or service is, nothing happens without a sale.  If you did not make the sale, there is no customer satisfaction but instead lots of frustration for salespeople! 2.      Today customers are all suffering from Frazzled Customer Syndrome (FCS): a state of extreme exhaustion , that’s why they are not returning your call and give you the cold shoulder.  They are extremely checked out because of heavy workload, too many choices, rapidly changing market and past bad experience with salespeople.  How can we blame them for this? 3.      The result: customers keep you at a distance, brush you off, dismiss you entirely and stick with the status quo, no matter how undesirable the status quo is. Once you can empathize how customers feel, you can help them to improve and get out of this

5 Ways to Make Your Selling Irresistible: State your price using the smallest unit of measure , like per month, per week or per day. Courts always use this method, but just stating the weekly instalment at $14 for a Samsung Galaxy S4, (spread over 24 months), their actual selling price is as high as $1,456! Do not compare your price with your competitor, instead compare your price to Do-It-Yourself or something totally different but offers the same benefit . Like people don't compare Mercedes with BMW or Audi but swimming pool, for the rich man's consideration in buying another Mercedes is should he install a swimming pool instead? Pre-empt the Price Objection , and once you warn people of the price, people cannot give you the objection. Proving Financing . Yes, instead of outright sale, why not sell via leasing?  Not only is there no more downpayment, but the customer get to replace the machine when the lease expires, a win-win for all. Be a Irresistible Salesperson. H

Selling is base on nothing but needs and wants. A need is something that is basic and cannot be done without with, i.e. a necessity. A want is a preference , something that can be done without with but because it is preferred, it is considered important and often become a necessity, i.e. a want becomes a need. Like smartphones, it is not a need but a preference, but who can live without a smartphone nowadays?  If you sell base on both needs and wants, you have a customer. If not, you have a prospect. There are prospects in prospects. Using SNAP Selling, you can sell anything to anybody with the following 4 steps: 1. Situation . Find out what is the situation of the prospect now, what are his concerns, problems and issues that need to be addressed now. Like my prospect now has high staff turnover that is bothering him. 2. Need . From the situation, you uncover his need. So my guess that my prospect needs to learn how to hire the right people and retain hired

This is very common: You've given clear written or verbal instructions to your team and they have repeatedly done things in their own way and not follow your instructions.  Should you give up or fire them up? Based on training and coaching over 81,131 people in 13 countries, we found at www.AsiaTrainers.com that there are 5 reasons why people don't do what you said: They don't understand the importance of following your instruction .  They think that doing things their own way is okay because you as the boss, manager or leader may not know or bother about it.  Your Action: Educate them that it is not okay to not follow instructions and you will bother about it all the way.  There is no negative consequence for not following your instruction . Because it is more comfortable for them to do things their own way, they will naturally not follow your instruction. This is human nature! They don't buy-in to the benefits of following your instruction . In short, they don&

To sell is human and everyone is a salesperson, because selling is about not selling but moving people. Most people are in non-sales selling, that is, they are not defined as salesperson but their job involves communicating, influencing and persuading people. We call these Moving People. Moving People is not about getting your way with others but helping others to get their way. And when others get their way, you'll get your way too. Moving people is not about how much conviction you have but about conveying your conviction to people. Moving people depends more on the creative, heuristic, problem-finding skills than the reductive, algorithmic, problem-solving skills. From Caveat Emptor to Caveat Venditor. We've moved from a world of cavet emptor (buyer beware) to caveat venditor (vendor beware). This is because of the information age we're living right now, buyers have more information than vendors and thus buyers will mislead vendors more often than the other

Of course here we are are talking about a boss that is not easy to manage, like micro-managing, bossy, very demanding or frequent change in temper.  There are several practical steps that you can take to Manage Your Boss with Ease as follows: Look for Patterns - watch for behaviour swings, like Mondays or month-end or quarter-end when the boss is under tremendous pressure to perform.  Be prepared and don't do things that will add pressure, like applying for leave or asking for day off.  Pre-empt Needs. Once you know what triggers them, it's good to be pre-emptive by flagging potential problems before they escalate and offer solutions. The simplest way you can be pre-emptive is to ask the question: "What are the one or two things that I can do to make your work life better?" Show Empathy . Your boss is under pressure to produce and if you understand this plight that he is facing, you will be more understanding and there will no issue of how to manage your bos

Me teaching the audience the Jim Rohn's 5 Puzzles of Life  Like you, I as a Coach and Trainer am also human and very often are concerned of what makes me feel good that I sometimes forget what makes me great. Yet I know that a successful life is one that is lived through understanding and pursuing one’s own path, and not chasing the dreams of others. I also know that Character is not made of sunshine and roses. Like steel, character is forged in fire, between the hammer and the anvil. So I find the ‘Thick Face Black Heart’ concept by Chin-ning Chu so useful. Because Thick Face Black Heart is not about ruthlessness. It is about adapting and adopting non-destructive ruthlessness, to gain the freedom in action necessary to achieve effectiveness in the execution of your task. We all have the innate power within us: Thick Face is the Shield while Black Heart is the Spear. A Thick Face person has the ability to put Self Doubt aside. His confidence instills