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Selling during an Economic Turndown (Part One of Two)
How an Economic Turndown Extends Selling Cycles, creates pipeline bloat, impacts your margins and de-motivates your sales people

CEO's, Presidents and Business Owners, Attend Our Upcoming Complimentary CEO Seminar:

Converting the Lackluster Sales Person/Hiring Real Producers Conferences
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Most Business Owners, Presidents and CEO's are frustrated with:

• Sales teams that are run like fraternities
• Sales managers who focus on poorly qualified pipelines instead of on closing deals and the bottom line
• Sales managers who rely on sales person optimism instead of holding sales people accountable to objective performance standards
• Sales people blaming their poor sales results on a bad economy, bad leads, or other external factor.
• Sales people not being proactive in the selling process—not making cold calls, not confronting objections, not calling on/meeting with top level decision-makers, not qualifying prospects before providing costly proposals.

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What is an Economic Turndown?

The US Government defines tough times as two consecutive quarters of negative economic growth. However few of us need to wait for a government bulletin to realize things are tough. We see it before they do. We know the shift has taken place when buyers become more skeptical, negotiating harder resulting in extended selling cycles or margin erosion from price dropping. Either result is devastating for your sales people and your bottom line.

However, the biggest impact business owners suffer during an economic turndown is the shift in their sales people’s attitudes—they accept the excuses provided by their prospects. Then the externalization for their poor performance begins: It’s the economy, there is nothing I can do about it or My prospects have no money, or They’re going to buy, just not now. What can you as an owner do about it?

For more solutions on navigating in a negative economy call us at (610) 878 9400 or visit us at: http://www.peakperformancesalestraining.com/

How Do you Deal With these Problems?

You can either accept these excuses and the lackluster performance that comes with them or implement change. First let’s look at the problems and ramifications of doing nothing. Extending the selling cycle negatively impacts sales people in several ways:

Increased Rejection: The extension of sales cycles inevitably increases a sales person’s time investment with each prospect. The more time, energy and expertise provided increases the sales person’s belief that a positive outcome is inevitable. At the end of the cycle when they determine they have been used by the prospect for their expertise and pricing, only to get the incumbent down in price, they fall so much harder, the rejection is greater and the long term impact to their attitude can be both devastating and contagious!

For more information on attitudinal training visit: www.http://www.peakperformancesalestraining.com/how-we-differ.htm

or call us at (610) 878 9400.

Decreased effort: The extension of the sales cycle causes pipeline bloat which results in complacency within the sales team. The sales person with a bloated pipeline begins to tell himself that the proactive behavior required to develop new accounts is not necessary. This is because they are so certain new business will come from their pipeline which is often full of unrealistic possibilities. Without consistent, objective criteria to differentiate the true possibility from the waste of time you are left to rely on opinion only.

For details on implementing a real sales process and consistent sales criteria contact Peak Performance at 610-878-9400.

Where does your Past Success Lie?

The great majority of sales people today have only sold during great economic times. We also have
seasoned veterans who are relying on what might have worked 20 years ago. Often your past success becomes your future failure. What they fail to consider is that externally serious change has taken place. Economic conditions have changed, market conditions have changed, the competitive landscape has changed and buyers are buying in a completely different manner—they have access to resources and information like no time in the past—we can’t rely on obsolete business methods if we want to reach the next level. Remember, you don’t become a geologist simply by spending twenty years in a cave.

One out of four will fail in negative economic times. Seventy percent will survive and five percent will thrive. Which category do you fall into? How many of the five percent do you have on board?

Visit: http://www.peakperformancesalestraining.com/ceo-diagnostic.htm for more information on implementing a system to overcome the obstacles associated with a negative economy.

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As a Business Owner you deal with this dilemma on two fronts. First of all you must stop “driving behavior” (doing more of what isn’t working) and change behavior through knowledge, skills, training and un-training. Yes, un-training!

Secondly you must deal with the situation in your mind—your attitude. Attitude drives behavior. If we think we can, we do! The question is how effective are they when they do. If your sales people think they can’t, then you are dealing with a group of resistant sales people and your job becomes convincing and motivating them instead of running your company.

To reverse the downward spiral of a negative economy contact Peak Performance today at 610-878-9400.

Look for Part Two of this Sales Tip later this week.

PEAK PERFORMANCE SALES TRAINING, LLC
630 Freedom Business Center, King of Prussia, PA 19406
(610) 878 9400
www.peakperformancellc.com

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