Sales Innovation Does Not Occur By Looking In The Mirror
In the past, sales leaders attempted to innovate by looking for best practices. That is to say, they look at what top salespeople are doing and implore others to go and do likewise. In other words, we attempt to innovate by replicating what others like us are doing.
What have the results been from these attempts to use the mirror as a tool for innovation? Not good. The data reveals that nearly half of all salespeople fail to meet their quota and many of the most commonly taught sales behaviors hinder potential customers from making a positive buying decision. In short, there is an alarming problem!
Because of this focus on replication as a means of innovation the way salespeople are taught to sell is grounded in selling, not buying. Salespeople are shown sales activities and behaviors and then taught to make their buyers conform to their model of selling. It’s the exact opposite of how it should be.
Think about it: shouldn’t selling be focused on how people buy? How can salespeople guide their buyers through the brain’s decision-making process when they do not know how it occurs? I know these are deep questions, but nevertheless, they are important ones. If salespeople, managers, and trainers do not know how buyers mentally construct buying decisions, how can they know if a sales behavior is aligned with or violates that process? The obvious answer is they can’t. Is it any wonder that the majority of the behaviors that salespeople engage in drive down their performance?
The reason that we as a profession have struggled to find real solutions is because we are looking at the wrong group of people. We need to stop looking at ourselves for answers and start looking at how buyers are influenced and construct buying decisions. And that’s where science comes in.
Innovate Through Science
The time has come for the profession of sales to look to science as its single source of sales truth. No longer must you guess your way to success. Sales, like almost every other discipline, can now be guided by science.
There has never been a more exciting time to be in sales because over the past few decades there’s been an explosion of scientific research on how the human brain makes choices and which factors influence what we say, how we act, and what we decide to buy. In the past, these scientific breakthroughs were buried in academic journals and salespeople and business leaders did not have access to them. However, this is no longer the case.
How the brain creates a buying decision is no longer a mystery; there’s a science to it, and when you embrace this science you’ll have a way of looking at and relating to buyers that is accurate, predictable, and reproducible. What’s more, you’ll find that buyers will respond more favorably to you because your way of approaching them will be aligned with how their brains are wired to be influenced and create buying decisions.
That’s why I wrote THE SCIENCE OF SELLING. It connects the dots between this cutting-edge science and the real-world sales situations you face every day to help you consistently succeed. It offers a new way of looking at and relating to buyers that is accurate, predictable, and reproducible. In fact, it’s the only way of selling that is scientifically proven to increase your sales results. And those who have embraced it have a dramatic advantage over their competitors.