How to Write the Perfect Sales Proposal
How many times does this happen? You build the perfect DECK. (That’s slang for SLIDE DECK for some of you—LONG, BORING, MEANINGLESS POWERPOINT for the rest of you.) You rehearse it. You know it in and out. You anticipate OBJECTIONS and have an armory’s worth of ammunition to overcome them. You get to the meeting to present your proposal. You hand it to the two buyers. They completely ignore your attempted opening and turn to the price page and start reading.
Proposing is one of the most misunderstood sales elements we know.
Insights on the Sales Proposal 2.0
- It should always articulate the specific PAINS, PROBLEMS or OPPORTUNITIES. The proposal is about THEM not YOU. It should be specific. If the client said, “Our current system sucks!” then you type in your proposal: “Tom thinks the current system sucks!” More than anything else, this demonstrates that you’re both listening and hearing. Novel idea for a salesperson.
- It should be free of surprises. I got this from one of my clients. He calls it the NO SURPRISE PROPOSAL. That flipping to the back of the page stuff stops when you’ve talked about everything in your previous conversations. Let them flip. They should find exactly what you’ve talked about. If you agreed to a $560 a month fee, they should flip to the back and see: “Fee-$560/month.” This isn’t Christmas morning. It should be boring.
- It should include ALL ALTERNATIVES—including competitors AND doing nothing. This is the best new idea I can share with you. Too often proposals are done too soon and in a limiting fashion. They leave no room for tweaking, creativity or input. We actually title this ALTERNATIVES DISCUSSION DOCUMENT. It used to be called a proposal. Proposal sounds so final. Labeling it alternatives/discussion allows buy-in and input. It helps the prospect write the “proposal” and sell the deal for you.
Take a look at your proposals. Are they full of lots of useless fodder, or are they short, meaningful and relevant to the person reading them?
Get Smart
I imagine most people are freaking out about the start of 2009. If you’re not, your mind will start to play tricks on you as people ask: “How does this economy affect your business?”
This is not the time to panic. In fact, it’s a great time to gain clarity and work smart.
When is the last time you looked at your network and used it to grow your business? I know you might have a lot of “business friends” and clients that love you—you go to lunch, you invite them to a sporting event, meet with them once a month to take care of business. When was the last time you asked them to help you grow your business? I don’t mean the casual “Hey, if you know of anyone else I should be talking to…” I mean, giving them a process from start to finish that puts you in front of qualified prospects. I’ve recorded the steps in an audio. Take a minute to listen.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
How To Be A Top Sales Performer
What makes someone a great sales performer? Here are a few ideas:
- THEY THINK BIG: High performers think beyond the transaction—they think long term, big picture and any other overused corporate jumbo you can think of. You get it.
- THEY WORK: While I don’t believe effort = output, I do believe there is a positive correlation. The one basic element that we’ll never be able to disprove: the more people you talk to, the more clients you’ll have. Period.
- THEY ARE TERRIFIED OF FAILING: The highest performing salespeople (surprisingly to me) are often driven by fear—not a paralyzing fear, but a motivating fear. It could be a fear of failure, a fear of going backward or a fear of stagnation. Whatever, they do an amazing job channeling that fear into focused effort that produces results.
- THEY MAINTAIN ECONOMIC INTEGRITY: High performers know that THEY are a part of what their customers buy. They also tend to have very high self worth. Because of that, elite performers rarely discount what they do. They may negotiate, but they have a true, strong, intrinsic belief that they and their service command a premium fee.
- THEY EXPECT TO BE A HIGH PERFORMER: When the stack order ranking comes out, the best performers expect to see themselves on top. Average performers just hope they’re not in the bottom 1/3.
- THEY WORK AROUND FACTORS OUT OF THEIR CONTROL: High performers look objectively at situations and work around conditions they have no control over. Average performers tend to see these factors as insurmountable road blocks, excuses or paralyzing detriments.
You’ll not likely become a top performer by reading this, but it might spur you to e-mail me and ask what you CAN do to start to move yourself into the elite club. bneale@caskeytraining.com if you’ve got the burn.
How To Be A Top Sales Performer
What makes someone a great sales performer? Here are a few ideas:
- THEY THINK BIG: High performers think beyond the transaction—they think long term, big picture and any other overused corporate jumbo you can think of. You get it.
- THEY WORK: While I don’t believe effort = output, I do believe there is a positive correlation. The one basic element that we’ll never be able to disprove: the more people you talk to, the more clients you’ll have. Period.
- THEY ARE TERRIFIED OF FAILING: The highest performing salespeople (surprisingly to me) are often driven by fear—not a paralyzing fear, but a motivating fear. It could be a fear of failure, a fear of going backward or a fear of stagnation. Whatever, they do an amazing job channeling that fear into focused effort that produces results.
- THEY MAINTAIN ECONOMIC INTEGRITY: High performers know that THEY are a part of what their customers buy. They also tend to have very high self worth. Because of that, elite performers rarely discount what they do. They may negotiate, but they have a true, strong, intrinsic belief that they and their service command a premium fee.
- THEY EXPECT TO BE A HIGH PERFORMER: When the stack order ranking comes out, the best performers expect to see themselves on top. Average performers just hope they’re not in the bottom 1/3.
- THEY WORK AROUND FACTORS OUT OF THEIR CONTROL: High performers look objectively at situations and work around conditions they have no control over. Average performers tend to see these factors as insurmountable road blocks, excuses or paralyzing detriments.
You’ll not likely become a top performer by reading this, but it might spur you to e-mail me and ask what you CAN do to start to move yourself into the elite club. bneale@caskeytraining.com if you’ve got the burn.
Sales Professionals – The Next Typewriter
Typewriters.
Seen one lately? Used one in the last 11 years? The answer above is “probably not.” If you had polled an audience in the 1960’s and asked if they thought typewriters would someday be “extinct,” I’d suspect the vast majority would say, “NO WAY. How could we ever live without typewriters?” And here we sit 40 years later and 99.8% of the people on the planet couldn’t find a replacement ribbon to save their lives.
So, what if I told you that salespeople will be extinct? NO WAY. IMPOSSIBLE. Aah, be careful. I predict that salespeople as we know them WILL be extinct. The antiquated process of rapport selling, relationship building, presenting slide decks, consultative sales—you name it—will all be replaced by unbelievably efficient data-based tools that will make today’s salesperson and sales process obsolete.
For us, that won’t be a big deal. In 40 years, I’ll be long retired and enjoying time with my grandkids. But what about them? What can we do now to ensure that our grandkids still have the opportunity to become effective, productive sales professionals? Here are some ideas:
- Knowledge and Wisdom: Accumulate these and you become inherently indispensable.
- Live technology: Utilize technology in your sales process. The role of technology in the sales and buying process is going to exponentially increase to levels we can barely imagine.
- Be a business person, not a salesperson: This is one of our primary objectives with our clients. Be a business person first and a salesperson second. 90% of salespeople have it backwards.
Do what you can to save our profession from extinction. My grandkids will thank you.
If I Had a Million Dollars
If I Had a Million Dollars–this is not only a great song by Barenaked Ladies, but also a predominant thought of many highly commissioned salespeople.
In the “money” portion of our sales training programs, we often ask the question: “who wants to double their income?” or “who wants to make a million dollars this year?” It’s amazing and puzzling to me how EVERYONE wants to make a $1,000,000 a year, but very few do. Why is that?
Here are a few observations I’ve made in my little petri dish (I mean sales training room):
- Belief they are worth it: Those who earn more tend to have a different economic self image than average commission earners. They tend to value their time more and are more discerning of clients.
- They expect it: Spend some time with a person who makes $100K and then with another who makes $250K. The difference: the $100K person HOPES that they’ll make $250K and the $250K person EXPECTS to. Expect it vs. hope for it.
- They don’t THINK about it: While high commission earners are always aware of where their income is, they don’t let their income enter into the sales process. They are typically very PRESENT in the sales interaction with a buyer and not sitting there adding their commission in their head and then mentally spending it before the deal’s even done.
- They HANG OUT with others who earn high incomes: Most average commission earners hang out with other average commission earners. High commission earners hang out with other high commission earners and senior leaders. You’ll see this in action at your next national sales meeting.
If nothing else, be aware that you and your thoughts are in control of your income–not your territory, your experience or grand economic conditions. Those all INFLUENCE your income, but YOU control it.
Taking Accountability SERIOUSLY
I can’t stand when people don’t take accountability for their outcomes. Sales managers, I don’t know how some of you do it – listening to excuse after excuse after excuse after excuse…you get the picture. I know many CEOs want nothing more than to create a more ACCOUNTABLE work team. But no one has seemed to come up with a magic bullet that gets everyone on the accountability track.Here are some top of mind ideas for you and your sales team:
1. Start from the TOP. If you want others to be accountable, guess what, you have to go first. Every single business success or failure includes responsibility from everyone. Think about this. Tom is a salesperson. He’s been struggling—hasn’t hit quota in 5 quarters. Most would say Tom’s the problem. ERRRRR (Price is Right Buzzer). YOU’RE the manager. YOU hired Tom and YOU kept him. I’m not letting Tom off the hook (read below). I’m just trying to help you get in the mindset of accountability.
2. “What did YOU do to affect the outcome?” Ask this question over and over and over. If you display behaviors of accountability, you give yourself permission to ask the same of your sales group. DON’T LET THEM OFF THE HOOK. Keep asking until they give you an answer that comes back to them. Not the market. Not your pricing model. Not their territory. THEM!
3. GIVE CREDIT and TAKE BLAME. Encourage your entire company to practice this saying, “Give credit and take blame.” Make it a slogan that you live by in your firm. Don’t just say it, DO IT.
I’d be happy to come into your company and take your group through an accountability boot camp. Just be sure you’re ready for it before you call. Oh, and I’ll take accountability for its success or failure. Call me-317-440-6391.
