First, you must recognize that it is a process with a beginning and an end. Find out where your customer is at in the process and meet him and her there. You’ll then be able to more easily guide him or her through the rest of the process through to closing.

Should You Use a Sales Process?

Zig Ziglar swears that if you want to be successful in the sales profession, you need a process. This is the best way for you to know what your client is thinking.

Your Sales Process Should Be Logical and Client-Oriented

If you follow your logical sales process, the closing will be the logical conclusion and in no way will be forced.

Your sales process will help you identify if your prospect is receiving the message that you think you are delivering. Often times, the customer hears something different than what you actually say.

Your potential customer uses both words and intent to communicate. Do you understand both the words and the intent? If you don’t, you’re at risk of losing the sale.

Zig Ziglar’s Selling Principles

1. Selling is a process, not an event.

This means there is a beginning, a middle and an end. Do you know where your customer is in the process? Do you know where you are in the process? If the answers to these questions don’t match, then you won’t sell.

If you’re not at the same place with your client, you’ll be frustrated. But worse, your client will be frustrated. Chances are that a frustrated client will not be a buying client.

To find out where your customer is at, you need to listen to words and intent. It’s the only way. You won’t get to your customer by talking over her needs.

2. You make more money solving problems (needs, issues, concerns) than you do selling product.

Find your prospect’s problems, and then solve the problems with your product.

3. People do things for their reasons, not yours.

Look for those reasons. Cater your sales process to those reasons.

4. Learn more about your prospect than about your product.

You don’t need to be best friends, but you need to know them as people. You need to know their buying trigger, their interests, where they’re at in the sales process, and their buying points.

Do you have a process for your sales? If you don’t you’ll need to start implementing one immediately. Zig Ziglar promises that you will see your sales soar once you put a sales process into place, identify where your prospect is at in that process, meet your client where he’s at, and lead your client to the conclusion.

Like most people who don’t like something when they first start out, Zig Ziglar’s son didn’t like playing golf, at first. This was of course until he ended up with his first chance at Birdie.

This was his first chance at a Birdie. Zig lined him up and his son knocked it in. Naturally, his son was jubilant. Next it was Zig Ziglar’s turn. It was also on the green with a shot at birdie.

If he missed the shot, his son would know that he missed on purpose and it would be a hollow victory. So Zig Ziglar putted the ball right in.

Zig made the shot and asked his son, if he was able to pull for him, even though it meant that he wouldn’t beat him at the hole. Of course he pulled for him, his son told him.

Zig Ziglar’s son demonstrated pure love for his father. He pulled for him because it would be for his father’s benefit to sink the putt.

Zig Ziglar developed the acronym H.E.A.R.T.:

Honesty

Empathy

Attitude

Reserves – Mental, physical and spiritual

Toughness – love is the toughest.

As a salesperson, your job is to persuade. Don’t be a slimy salesperson, trying to persuade prospects to buy what they don’t need. Instead, learn to have the client’s best interest at heart.

Once your heart is right, you learn to pull for the prospect to buy for their benefit and not for yours.

Zig Ziglar says this is the pure love you should use in your selling.

Zig Ziglar once said, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care about them.”

Learn to want your prospects to buy because you know they win with your product. Communicate with your feelings and beliefs.

The minute you start pulling for them to buy for their benefit, you become more professional, more effective, more loving and you sell more. And you’ll be able to sell them again and again and again. Before long, they’ll send you to their friends and relatives

When your client is the big winner, so are you. Learn to pull for him. Learning this kind of love will put you on the path to becoming the person you want to become. Good luck.

I don’t know if Zig Ziglar was the first to coin the phrase “Auto University”, but he’s definitely one of the strongest proponents of it. In fact, he claims, “It’s the most important university in America.” I agree with him.

Naturally, the Auto University’s classroom is your car. If you have a CD, tape, or MP3 player, then you have all of the equipment you need to enroll in Auto University. Auto University will teach you some of the most important skills you need to be successful at your job.

Should you enroll in Auto University?

The truth is that most of us spend our time mindlessly listening to our favorite music stations with their countless useless commercials. My favorite music station has a truly trivial trivia question at the top of every hour. Questions like, “How much cheese does the average American consume in a year?”

If you want more than a mediocre life, you should be listening to a continual stream of successful audio programs.

So if you want to join the highest ranks of your profession, start your own collection of motivational and skills-oriented CDs or tapes.

When Should You Listen to These Programs?

Every time you have to drive somewhere, even if it’s only 5 minutes, you should be listening to some kind of inspirational audio program. If you have a daily commute, there’ll be plenty of time to listen.

IBM just released a study that shows that “45% of all drivers surveyed report traffic congestion increases their stress levels”. You could lose some of that stress by concentrating on learning something that will have a positive impact on your life.

If you’re a sales professional, you should be listening in between each and every sales call. Can you imagine how much more successful you would be if after every call you listened to a tape about the skill you needed to improve? If you’re having trouble closing, listen to a sales training program on closing.

Top salespeople often apply skills they learned in the cars in between appointments. If it helps you close more deals, that would be worth the price of admission, don’t you think? You’ll want to listen to the programs often enough that they become second nature. Until you can complete the sentences.

Where to Start?

There are a lot of good audio programs out there, but I would start with the world’s leading trainers. You will know that you are getting the best. These trainers include Brian Tracy, Zig Ziglar, Denis Waitley, Earl Nightingale, Tony Robbins, Jay Abraham, Jim Rohn, and Napoleon Hill.

But above all else, find audio programs that will help you grow. If there ever comes a point in your life when you become stagnant, return to Auto University.

To finish, I quote Jim Rohn. He says, “Formal education will earn you a living. Self-education will gain you a fortune. You decide how much fortune by how much self-education you get.” Start your self-education today at Auto University.

60% of all sales are made by only 4% of sales people. This is an incredible number. These 4% close so many deals, because they persist. They know how to close the deal.

But let’s back a bit. Before you can close you need to establish yourself as a problem solver to the prospect’s problems. You need to ask questions first to find out the problem. Then you need to ask questions to help the customer discover how your product solves their problem.

The number one reason people don’t buy is that they don’t trust you. It’s probably not that they think you’re an out-and-out liar. They might have some sub-conscious thing going on about salespeople. They may have heard something that just doesn’t gel.

They bottom line is that you can’t close until you have established sufficient value in the client’s mind. Don’t do it too early. If you do, the client won’t buy. You know how it is on the buying side. If you don’t see the value, no matter how persuasive the salesperson, you’re not going to buy.

To start the close, Zig Ziglar, a leading sales training coach, says, “Start with your most valuable point”. This point should align with the prospects most valuable buying point. You can only find this out by asking questions.

Once you’ve started with your most valuable point, you can start adding trial closes: How do you feel about what you’ve heard so far? Are you interested in saving money? When would you like to start saving money? These types of questions will help you get inside the mind of the customer and help you understand what kinds of questions you need to address.

Ziglar also says, “When the client says no they are not going to change their minds. They make new decisions based on new information.” What does this mean? It means that when the customer says “No”, it’s because they don’t have enough information to say yes. You must provide them with that additional information so that they can say yes.

Persistence really does pay. If you really believe you have a solution to their problem, you will persist until they understand what you have. Hone your closing skills and you’ll find yourself rising to the top of your profession. Zig Ziglar has many more programs on selling and personal development that will help you in your personal and professional aspirations.