Heard at Sales 101 event in TiE Chennai

My notes scribbled down at the Sales 101 event organized by TiE Chennai. Some pearls gathered at the event which is mainly directed at small entrepreneurs.

  • Your business should be based on your personality
  • Automate first rounds of customer engagement
  • Sell value, never sell boxes
  • No one really cares about your product. They care about the value they derive from your product/service.
  • Customer is the ultimate winner in any sale
  • Selling is about creativity. Being creative in selling is an important skill.
  • Lack of trust is the number one reason why people don’t buy from you
  • People buy from people
  • Always sell one to many (selling one on one is very expensive)
  • Use the information you know (about the customer, industry) while selling
  • You are actually selling a dream (that your product or service is going to help the customer in some way). Getting into the customer dream is an important aspect of selling.
  • Selling is about the transfer of feeling
  • Your product should create social value
  • Always have a reason to meet the client again
  • What is the unconscious hidden message that encourages the next level of interaction? (the next meeting with the customer for example)
  • You will lose 100% of the sale, if you don’t know how to close.
  • ASK is the most powerful word for the sales person (ASK about problems, past history, current solutions, what bothers them, what keeps them awake at night)
  • Speak to at least two of the 5 senses while selling
  • Build curiosity
  • Picture words are the emotional part of close

While I captured some of the ideas, I don’t think I can really capture the feeling of being there or participating in the group exercises. You walk away with your head full of ideas. It was a great session and the questions and comments augment the experience as well. Raj is a business coach. What we got at the TiE event was a small taste of what he normally does in his two day seminars.