When I was eighteen I started my own jewelery business in my bedroom. That Christmas I sold a lot of jewelery to my relatives and their friends. Why did they buy from me? Out of relationship, and I had no trouble in selling to them at all.

Then in my thirties I attended a two week sales training schedule with an insurance company and learnt the art of rebuttals – basically learning by memory an answer for every objection that a potential client would come up with. I had to throw out everything that I previously knew about selling from before and had to learn this system. But because this process went totally against all my previous sales experience, knowledge, success and my ability to relate with others in a personal way, I failed dismally. It took me quite some years to once again regain my confidence in selling.

However, the experts are now confirming that what I was doing when I was 18 was in fact right. Selling effectively is all about developing relationships and about developing trust. It’s not about how smart you are, or the greatest rebuttal argument that you can come up with. It’s all about consultative selling where it emphasizes client needs and how your product and service can not only meet those needs but actually provide more value to the client than just the face value of what they purchased. It is about working as a consultant who first determines the client’s needs and then provides them with a solution.

Here are some key points to remember:

• You are a professional facilitator, not a salesperson
• Learn to ask great questions. Get to the root cause of someone’s concern or need by asking more and better questions
• Focus on the client and not just on getting the order
• Not getting the deal is okay – think long-term
• Insist on open and honest conversation – and make sure that you clearly communicate the terms of doing business with you
• You and the customer must have equal business stature – maintain posture
• Play fair or don’t play at all
• Don’t do bad deals
• They sell you – you don’t sell them
• Believe in mutual degrees of commitment – qualify them along the way to see how ready they are to do the deal

Selling – consultative selling – should become a natural part of your day to day style. Be yourself. Know your products or services, and if there is something that you don’t know – then tell your prospect that and then seek out the answer, the more natural you can become, the more relatable you can become the better it will be for you and your business.

Source: Some of the above material has been drawn from Jay Abraham’s book ‘The Sticking Point Solution’ www.abraham.com