 |
My
friend who studied marketing always tells me there is a huge disconnect between
marketing and sales. I am not a guru in either field but a rookie who intends
to gain hands on experience from the field of selling. At the end of the
process I'll be as anonymous as I am now. What some salespeople out to make
quick bucks do is beat about the bush in order to sell and protect their job. A marketer on the other hand in my
friends view considers the plight of a customer first. If you go to a customer
and realize that he does not understand something, you need to enlighten him or
her and if you are not able to qualify the customer for a product, you let him
know that there will be an appropriate time in future. Some salespeople on the
other hand look at their pockets first. The converse of a marketer is true for
such people.
Very
few clients ever call to say hi, and when you call, if you are that person who
will continually remind the client of the product, trust you me, the call will
go answered. And deep down, I also know that I am also that way. If you
perpetually prod me with products, trust you me, I know the worse I can do is
only to brush you off, or unwillingly buy the product.
“In
order to make a sale, you need to walk, knock and talk.” That’s the mantra of
my current boss. Well, to some extent he may be right. But the only lesson you
learn in sales is that there is no formula for doing it. However, there can be
a way of cracking it by lining yourself with experienced gurus in the industry.
I hate to say this but the very people who push us to sell these abstract and
elusive products are the very people who sometimes do not realize that times
have changed and though the monkeys remain the same, the approach of doing it
should also change.
While
selling, you have to fight the smile that may give away greed, when the client
is willing to listen. You will see it in their eyes. There are those who you will
see their eyes unsettled as if they want something, then there are those who
will give you an ear and a promise. And it is up to you to follow back. Then
there are others who you will find playing FIFA on their phones and they will
not mind leaving it alone to listen to you.
Sales
is a dynamic job. You have to have a smooth tongue and words better than silk
because you are selling nothing apart from requiring the client to sign some
documents then he will get the result after sometime. Sometimes the job can be
too easy, you close a sale because the client wanted the product like yesterday
its only that he was not aware of where to find it.
The
single best experience you can ever receive in your career is the art of
selling, in the event you want to venture out sometime in life to start your
own firm. By then you will have realized that human beings are the most
slippery beings you can ever deal with. At one time, they are upbeat and
cheerful, the next they call to say they are unwilling to take up what you had
offered. It’s worse when a client tells you that you should not continue with
the processing of a loan or a credit card because they have consulted and realized
that they no longer need it or it will realign the status quo.
Practice
makes perfect they say. If you speak to ten clients in a day, you will be able
to hone your skills in articulating your ideas so that people can buy them. This
means that you are on the forefront of closing a deal. When you walk, and knock
at different doors, you will also learn how to inspire people. To some buggers,
this is innate, to others, it has to be a struggle. If you close a deal, you
become more confident and happy. Whether it is an insurance policy you are
selling or it is a big loan worth millions of shillings or opening an account
that will be funded with millions.
The
bottom line of sales is to help those who are in need. I love the way my
current sales mentor goes about the business. While I still have that fear of
speaking too much because of sudden ambush by coughs, this dude has been in the
industry for five years and hence knows how to engage a client. He can really
talk. Even when we are not selling, he still tells us stories that we heartily
laugh to because he tries to source for such nonsensical sometimes fallacious
gen from whatever location he might find. Being ‘glorified hawkers’ he has been
able to guide us on who to sell to and who not to engage even though sometimes
he can be full off braggadocio. Like selling a loan to a city marshal is
illegal because you need to have a license to hawk and in the event you are
nabbed by this mullah thirsty buggers, you will be on your own.
Perhaps
what is encouraging is that in less than three months he will be able to make more
than a million in the event his loans are processed. That process of a loan
being ratified as apt is called ‘drawing’.
As
a seasoned individual, he has been able to get it right for this long because I
realized he knows how to engage a prospective client. He ensures that he speaks
gently and comes up with real solutions to existential problems. ‘Mi najua sai huwezi kuwa na project kwa
akili lakini pia najua ungetaka kuwa na ploti yenye utajenga masiku za usoni.
Unajua tunaweza kukusaidia kupata title
deed kama umerelax hapa kwa ofisi ikue tu wewe ni kusign forms baada ya kuonyeshwa mahali ploti iko.
Na kupata hio ploti ni loan tunakupatia at 14%.’
As
for ladies (those who cannot qualify for loans), after breaking the ice, he
will ask whether they have a child. These are individuals he knows are
gullible. He will go ahead and tell of stories of successful people who have
benefited from education and in the end, he sells an education policy. Anyway,
all in all, education still remains the only gem that you can bestow to your
child. But I like this chap, Deno, since his tongue cannot fail to utter words
that give hope.
I
know the ‘sales’ tag conjures up thoughts of pushy people, which in essence has
a stigma and hence a bad part of the career. This job needs one to continually
develop skills, be highly focused and determined to make it at the end of the day.
There is need to invest a good amount of time into continual knowledge growth
and development, psychology study, and ongoing self-awareness and improvement.
Sometimes
it is the experience you might get from working with a company that might give
you the wrong impression of the entire industry. The truth is that there is
lots of pressure in sales. You are monitored like a small child if you are not
delivering. Believe it or not, an outside sales career can be a lonely
job. With freedom and flexibility from being away from the office, you
are out there on your own. As such, you need a strong sense of
accountability and self-motivation to set your own work schedule, since nobody
is there looking over your shoulders, you are basically managing yourself.
Your
exposure to management is also limited, so career advancement is also a
challenge since there are only a few upward career advancement opportunities
for field sales people. Even the sentry who man’s the banking hall knows that
this is a challenging job and will remind you about it. Your friends who know
you are not making good commissions look at the job as if you are struggling
with life. But the freedom that comes with doing sales is what makes it very
intriguing. You determine your own pay cheque and meet lots of new people.
As
at now, I personally don't understand how anyone can be stuck in a cubicle all
day or report into an office all the time without feeling the monotony of
sedentary life. I love it when I visit people in their office to find out
which are serene, those that do not have air conditioning you wet your forehead
so much so that a client may think that you are struggling. There are those you
have to gain entry by dialing some numbers and there are those which you would
never fancy at all, given that the pay slip of the individual you are meeting
is also thin.
Then
there are offices that don’t ooze panache and the employees sit in what looks
like emaciated desks but when you look at their pay, you regret why you are not
among those who are withdrawing salaries from this company.
What
I know is that no experience is bad experience. We go through it to ensure we
make the best out of it. If only I was fainthearted, I would not have made it
past the sixth month. Given that to some extent, I on average find myself
mulling over this job deeply and questioning what purpose do I really have
here. But the question that begs is, will I make it to earn those six figure
commissions?
Hasta
La Vista Baby
[Picture
Source: Google Images]
