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You Can’t Challenge Your Way to a Sale with Meridith Elliott Powell #231
Our guest is Meridith Elliott Powell, an award-winning author, keynote speaker and business strategist. Meridith is the author of four books, including Winning In The Trust & Value Economy and her latest Own It: Redefining Responsibility – Stories of Power, Freedom & Purpose. Today we challenge the Challenger Sale and discuss better ways to engage, qualify, and build client relationships that last.
The Challenger Sale
The Challenger Sale advices sellers to take control of the sale by taking on the role of teacher. This doesn’t work in all situations. The sales conversation is a dance where we learn about our prospects AND they learn about us. You can’t teach your way through most sales!
Sales is not a task to win according to Meridith. If a prospective client is a fit, that’s great. If they’re not a fit, that’s OK too. We’re not a match for everyone. The goal is find those that DO see your value. It’s a case of learn not teach!
Sell From A Place Of Power vs a Place of Need
Our responsibility as sellers is to make people aware of our amazing product and its benefits. Meridith believes we are driven by the desire to love people and help them. Yet we can’t be a human specification sheet. Instead we need to build a relationship and explore the buyers needs and desires. For example:
- slow down at the beginning
- sell aggressively on the subsequent sales
- sell an urgent need
- remember it’s unlikely you are top of mind when first meeting a prospect
- customers need to be heard
- sales training doesn’t apply to everyone
Take Action Advice
Lastly, listen, learn and allow the buyer to talk. If you do that they will tell you what you need to do
How To Find Meridith Elliot Powell
LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/meridithelliottpowell/
Website – www.valuespeaker.com
Twitter https://twitter.com/meridithpowell
Facebook –https://www.facebook.com/meridith.powell
This is the link to the FREE ebook 42 Rules to Turn Prospects Into Customers that Meridith mentioned in the podcast.
Sales Skills Training
Below are a number of past episodes that talk about mindset, rapport and generating genuine conversations that lead to closed sales. Enjoy!
- Selling Boldly with Alex Goldfayn #209
- What’s Not Working In Sales Today with Brandon Bruce #204
- Birth of a Salesman with Carson Heady #198
- Sales Jokes That Don’t Fall Flat with Jon Selig #195
- Sales Success Triangle of Attitude Behavior Technique with Glenn Mattson #187
- How Salespeople Overcome Procrastination with Eric Twiggs #178
- How To Sell The World with Karl Weaver #177
- Selling In A Skirt with Judy Hoberman #170
- Memory Hacks for Sales Professionals with Brad Zupp #169
- How To Write A Successful Sales Plan with Jamie Irvine #168