Although Ralph is a Sales Genius, he’s not infallible, so he encourages his key people to give him feedback ‘They have to be able to tell truth for your success to be long lasting,’ he explains. ‘You can’t hire people to give you advice and then ignore it.’ He admits that some of feedback occasionally wounds his ego and that his initial response is often ‘I can’t believe I said that!’ but after initial sting he considers what has been said and makes changes if he feels they are justified.

One such situation involved changing Ralph’s strict policy that business attire should be worn at all times. One of his managers suggested establishing a casual day to help office morale. Ralph finally gave in after agreeing a dress code he was comfortable with, and everybody was happy.

Being truthful has helped Ralph’s business succeed, he says ‘There’s no shame in making an honest error of judgment, but dishonesty will hurt you in long run. The only way to be successful is to tell it to people like it really is: here’s problem and here’s solution and only suggest solutions in their best interest, even if it means you makes less money or none at all.’

Ralph set himself high standards in being an expert: ‘I make sure that I know more than anyone else. This starts by surrounding myself with knowledgeable people, going to professional meetings and reading all time.’ Ralph scans newspapers and magazines for articles of interest, highlights salient points, rips them out and reads or rereads them later. He considers himself to be a ‘speed scanner’. Recently, before being interviewed about foreclosure – a topic he knows extremely well – he nevertheless had an assistant research subject for latest information. Being less than very best simply won’t do in Ralph’s book!

Another source of information for Ralph is his advisory board. Four times a year he meets with six friends and acquaintances from different lines of work. He tells them what he has done and what he plans to do and they give him feedback. One valuable outcome was persuading Ralph to put a monetary value on his time so he could use it more wisely. He also gets together twice a year with a group of agents who all make a $1 million year or more in commission to discuss same sort of topics.

Because he only sleeps three or four hours a night Ralph has mastered ‘power-napping’. He closes his eyes for 15-20 minutes, visualizing whatever situation he is involved in and his brain works on problems and ideas, such as going to high school football games and throwing his business cards up in air first time crowd jumps out of their seats. ‘I don’t have brainstorming days, I have a brainstorming life’, he says.

Adapted from: Tony Buzan & Richard Israel, Sales Genius, (2000), pp. 3-9.

Richard Israel: President of Inner Modeling Inc, sales training consultants to corporations on four continents. Visit http://www.Richardisrael.net

One of first things I go over with our students regarding our telephone script is that they must learn to listen, and I mean really listen. You can tell a lot about your customer just by hearing what they are saying. Also be sure you ask their name, and then use it now and then. Don’t overuse their name because this can become very annoying. My philosophy is if I hate it, so will someone else.

Be sure to ask questions to encourage them to talk about themselves. Empathize. However, don’t do a lot of talking until you are sure you understand. Let them do majority of talking.

If you pick a certain time frame to make your calls, or do a certain number of calls in a row, try to say it a little differently each time. If you don’t you will start to sound stale, lose your happy voice and sound as if you are reading a script. So if this starts to occur, take a break, or stop for day.

As we discussed earlier in this article if your product is a high end one you will make several calls to establish a relationship. Once you have done this, and they remember who you are, introduce something new about your product. Keep a record of your calls, and details of what you discussed previously, so that you know where you stand when you call again. When I worked for a franchise company, I kept a record of every call that came in from franchisees or calls I made. First, my employer was amazed at amount of knowledge I had about franchisees at my fingertips, and more important franchisees felt like they were only one, I knew them so well.

Using telephone can help you get repeat business. For certain products, you can call customers to see how they are doing with product. Maybe there are additional questions you could answer or problems you might be able to solve.

If everything is going well, you have a excellent opportunity to introduce your newest product, and hopefully, make another sale. This is also a great time to ask for referrals. Even if follow up call doesn’t pay off right away, you are building a relationship with this customer. Remember it is a lot easier to keep a customer happy than to find another one. Your follow-up also builds credibility with your customers.

Doing above will give your business a boost.

Copyright 2003 DeFiore Enterprises