Soft skills for Sales Professionals:

Soft skills for Sales Professionals

Soft skills play a very important role not only in professional life but in personal lives as well. As the time has changes and nature and borders for business changed in earlier times if you ask to any sales professional, which skill sets  required to become a good sales person, they say you only two things one know your product and two go in field and bring business. There are lots of myths are prevailing in market about sales but sales is much more than these two aspects.

In present scenario, businesses, customers and sales profession itself are demanding more from sales professional to increase not only business acumen but also credibility of sales person. Apart from product knowledge and technical skills what else companies are not only looking in sales professionals but these skills are mandatory need in all the professionals in terms of soft skills. Let’s discuss all in detail:

1.       Common Sense:

Common sense is seriously now a day’s become so uncommon. Ironically, people today are getting literate but not knowledgeable, hence the basic common sense ignored by people and they didn’t even realize that by doing this they are going to loss so much. A person with ethics, values, truthfulness, trustworthy who have respect for others & self, commitment, sincere, rational, courageous and honest towards other people in their words and action considered as person with common sense. Analyze yourself on these guidelines and check out are you doing actions and making decisions with common sense or not.

2.       Personality with Commitment & Integrity:

Apart from technical skills (Product, Customer & Company knowledge) sales professional have-to-have a pleasant personality and when I say personality it means two things one is from inside, it is your knowledge, awareness, values & principles etc and second is your external appearance i.e. the way you carry yourself, properly dressed and well-groomed to make a positive impression in front of customers. Personality and your principles define self-confidence. As sales professional you have to dress professionally, don’t eat mouth fresheners and pan masala, never consume cigarettes, alcohol etc while meeting customers. It is strictly prohibited or else you will suffer a huge reputation loss.

3.       Communication skills:

One thing we all need to understand that any sales person needs to have good command over their regional language then Hindi and English. The reason for such a sequence is because the kind of customers you need to deal with are usually communicate in local language and to give them comfort zone we as a professional need to know about local languages.

Always be polite and assertive in your language while doing verbal communication and when it comes to non-verbal communication you need to focus on all these guidelines which you find in this article. Communication doesn’t mean only speaking; you also be very good listener too. Until you listen properly you can’t able to offer the best solution to your clients.

4.       Writing skills:

In corporate you need to do a lot of written communication not only outside the company but within the company too. You need to have good command over written communication as like drafting an email, writing letters and preparing reports etc. Written communication considered as your personality in corporate world it is equal to facing customers. So you can able to understand how much weight-age is given to writing skills in business world. Learn and upgrade your skill sets regularly.

5.       Learning skills:

It is universal fact that if you stop learning means you are not developing and hence it is a mandatory skill set which need of the hour not only now but it is there since the evolution of human race begins. Now, if we talk about importance of learning in sales profession the impact of which is directly propositional to your number of sales calls you close.  As a professional you need to know about technical skills i.e. about your product and services including technicalities of that along with market knowledge. Further, you increase your expertise in MS Excel and other basic activities related to computer it will definitely gives a positive impression in the minds of customers.

6.       Telephone skills:

As sales professional you have to meet new people every day and hence you need to communicate with different people with different mind sets not only in person but most of the times over telephone.  Being the professional you know the etiquette on how to make a call, take an appointment, how to pitch you products and services, negotiate and objections/grievances of customers on phone calls. Click here to know more on telephone etiquette.

7.       Punctuality:     

It’s really hard to understand this fact that today we are discussing punctuality as skill, we need to accept this that Punctuality is not a skill it is habit which everyone in the world has to practice. If you reach 10 minutes earlier to the venue you will be more relaxed, mentally stable, fearless, stress-less, you present well. All this makes a huge impact not only on others but you can explore things within you as well. There is a saying by Lao Tzu - “Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become actions; watch your actions, they become habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it become your destiny.” Respect the time and you will achieve heights of success.

8.       Relationship building:

We are human beings and you know humans love to communicate in verbal or non verbal ways all the times. As professional of sales, you will be good in relation building professionally and able to manage the situation in a win-win situation for all present in the deal. So now how to do this is question the answer is pretty simple just never speak lie to customers, take rigorous follow ups, meet at least once in month in person with customers. Understand their needs and wants and try to help them by providing solutions to their problems, by doing this you find closing sales become just a byproduct.

So these are the few very important soft skills one has to practice in their professional level. There are lots of other skills too but in my opinion the above skills if you apply in your life you will surely enjoy the benefits in abundant.

If you have something to share or have any suggestion related to the article please you can drop the same in comment section.

#8 Myths about Sales profession:

#8 Myths about Sales profession

Today, we all know that we are living in a global village, where we have tons of opportunities in various fields to earn money, name, fame, esteem. It is one side of the coin the other side is contradicting the above statement because we make our perception depending upon our experiences and that is too sometimes a single time experience. This makes people judgmental, suspicious and confused who confused others too. However, no one in the world can have all the information on all the subjects.

Likewise, it is with sales profession, people usually heard the word sales the stereotype image comes in their minds i.e. “Lair, person who want my money, educated thief, cunning, shrewd, commission agents, and unethical person, below standard person etc” this list may go on and on. It is a mistake done by people who involve in sales “I am not considering them as sales professionals because they created this negative reputation of a sales person in market, this are the people who don’t have ethics, moral values, self-respect and humanity”. In every profession you find a person who driven by ethics and moral values and others who involve in unethical means to meet their goals.

Because of such awful experiences with such type of people builds a common negative perception about sales profession. In this article, I am going to share with you all are the myths people have in their mind not only about sales persons but myths about sales profession.  Reason why people have so much of judgments about sales profession is because “Sales job is depending upon dealing with human beings and human behavior is unpredictable.”

I begin with the ideal statement you may have read this in various books written on sales and business i.e.  “Sales is an art and a science” this is altogether a different area of discussion, this thought based on two school of thoughts in management. We will discuss this in some other article; today we are going to discuss about the myths prevails in the market and society about sales professionals. If you talk to any single person on the planet today about sales everyone have their own interpretations and yes here is the situation of confusions and problems arises. So now, below are some of the very common rather I say basic myths people not only have about on sales person but also on sales profession.

1.       Sales people are liars:

The primary and very basic thought people think about sales guys is they have the in build quality to speak lie just to close the sales. But the truth here is ideally to do sales you don’t need to speak lie. The reason for this myth is sales people who are unable to build trust in the mind of customers pushes customers to think like this. “Selling is one of the proud profession in which you as a professional try to solve business problems of people with your products and services which is best suited for them.” As we all know lie can’t stand long enough in front of truth so is the case with liars too. So just trust the process and follow your gut instinct.

2.       Doing sales is a child’s play:

It is yet another myth people think that sales is just a byproduct if you have a very awesome product. This is not at all true; we are humans hence emotions and logic's flow inside us. It is not easy for any person to build a trust and if someone is building trust on you it’s your responsibility that you keep your words. It is common sense and an act of a dignified professional. A sale is not at all easy yet it’s not impossible too. The reason is again you have to deal with people here and consider them as people only then your sales will happen to start automatically with referrals, positive word of mouth publicity etc.

3.       Sales job is only for men:

It is one of the most popular myths in whole world that sales are the profession for men only. But the fact is that women are equally smart as men works in this profession. Today if we look at the corporate world the main authoritative positions are handled by women very successfully. So not only in sales but in all professions women are working with equal responsibilities along with managing responsibilities of families too.

4.       People who don’t get job anywhere do sales:

Let me be very clear on this fact that sales job is not meant for all first. You must require various skill sets without which you can’t survive in the profession. Ironically, people usually try their hands in education industry, food industry and in sales too because here in entry and exit are pretty easy as compared to any other profession like Engineering, Medical, CA etc. We are living in the era where irrespective of your education and profession everyone has to do sales now and then, directly or indirectly. Due to this every other person do have their opinion on the profession. As I said this is not the profession for everyone so people who can’t survive in the profession flourishes this myth about the profession.

On a contrary, yes I do agree that anyone can sale but again first they need to fulfill basic criteria which sales profession requires.

5.       Below standard job profile:

It is again people have this myth in their minds that sales people are below average people with below average IQ with no growth potential and hopeless creatures on the planet. But the fact is because of sales professionals companies sale their products and services to earn their desired profits. It is companies who build kinds of culture and philosophies which as a sales profession one need to adopt and deliver results. Sales profession has potential to earn huge amount of money. Yes we are having very big shortage of good sales professional in the industry today. The more you train the new entrants the more likely you can expand the business.

6.       Digital Marketing replace Sales people:

It is one of the very fresh myths which are prevailing in the market today. Human beings create new innovations and inventions do that means this innovations replace human beings. Digital Marketing is just an emerging branch of sales so fundamentally the classic forms of sales never replace or omits from the industry.

7.       Sales people never have a stable career :

This is again a myth prevails from such a long time and still lots of people have confusion on the fact. But the thing is that if a person is performing as per standards set by the organization and deliver desired results then no one want such a performer to loss. As we discussed above there is a shortage in skillful sales professional today that is the reason people switch very often. To keep sales people companies need to give them training and other necessary support to make sales happen. Doing sales is not a magic it is a planned process which need to perform and you will deliver the results.

8.       To do sales you need to smoke and drink:

It is one of my very personal experiences the myth I faced in my sales career.  There are professionals, business entrepreneurs who think like that sales professional has to do smoke and take drinks to close the deal. And it is very specifically prevails in Real Estate and Construction business. It is totally a misconception and immaturity about the way a person sees a profession. Again drinking and smoking is altogether a very personal choice of a person and if someone is relating it and generalize it with any profession, they are doing injustice with not only with the profession but with the person who is working with full dedication and devotion.

Hope I can able to cover up some very crucial myths which people have about sales profession which need to answer. One point I want to make to all sales professionals that it is very important that we as a sales professional need to understand the seriousness of the issues we discussed above and try to remove these myths by the way we act in our profession. Sales is all about trust, once you lost it you loss it forever.

If you have something to add along with these points or you want to share your own experience so please you can share in comment section.

#7 Different types of Sales a person can opt as profession:

#7 Different types of Sales a person can opt as profession

In professional arena the most talked or discussed term if you search, you find the term “Sales” because in any sort of business sales is the only department which generates revenue for the business by making a fragile relationship with all the support departments without which merely sales can’t happen.  You will find n numbers of articles on how to do sales, what type of strategies one need to opt to do sales etc but still today people don’t know the different types of sales which a person who want to opt sales as a career have verity of options and ability he/she can work upon.

Coming to point, if someone wants to join sales as profession in how many different types of sales domain he/she may opt as career .

One important point, I want to clear here is yes in sales profession travelling is a must activity and carrying your sales-kit all the times. To live life we need oxygen, similarly to do sales we need to reach out clients and in below all domains travelling involve sometimes with high frequency and sometimes with low. We discuss this in detail further in this article.  Below is the list and let’s discuss them in detail one by one.

1.       Direct Sales:

It is the domain we all are aware about in common because in direct sales a sales person need to reach out to door steps of the prospects to convert them into customers. The reason for this is the nature of product they are selling involves door-to-door selling. Best example for this is Eureka Forbes products, Dictionary or books selling, NGO donation funding etc. In all this types of business target customer is the mass audience.  Prerequisite to join this sales are you need to have guts, self-confidence , communication skills (specifically, good command over local language), convincing skills, aggressive in pitching and most importantly handling rejections. Probability of getting rejected is highest in this domain out of all. In direct sales, sales professionals called as “Son of Soil” the reason is they work on field 90% of their time. Direct sales is the toughest one in all the below sales domains.

2.       Retail Sales:

It is another type of sales; it emerges because of the mall culture. The qualities required here are sales persons technical knowledge about the products specifications, excellent command over 3-4 products who are substitutes to each other, knowledge about shelf management, merchandising, bar codes segregation & floor management. The best examples here are any mall, an exclusive factory outlet, More Mega Mart, Reliance Fresh or any FMCG shops, Superstore etc.

3.       Channel Sales:

A channel sale is also known as Dealer channel management, Here as a professional your customer here are not the end-user but the dealer. So the skill sets requires here is, be good at numbers. Because end of the day dealers and traders are working for commissions and you need to show them what they want. The trickiness here is many times you need to make sure the sales target must be achieved by dealer or else as a sales professional you need to help them to meet the target. You need to focus on Pricing, Commissions, Products gifts and samples and if you are managing key accounts then you need to help the end users as well. The best examples here are the consumer durable sector, FMCG sector, Retail sector all this sectors requires a professional who is good at dealer channel management. As the name sales channel management so from company to end user who all are comes in between you need to manage them all.

4.       Industrial Sales:

This is my personal favorite sales domain because here it involves some part of all types of sales here. Skill sets requires here are open for hectic travelling part not only in city but for out station tours as well. Sometimes you were handling a state or country as a territory, hope you can able to imagine the opportunity you have to explore world and to meet with new people, good at personal relations and act as a solution provider. Other benefits in this domain are you get an opportunity to deal with top management personals and the decision makers of the companies.  You need very good at presentation skills, technical skills and analytical skills to do sales-effectively . This type of sales type mostly used in manufacturing sectors and capital item product sales or participating in tenders etc.

5.       Corporate Sales:

It is a type of sales you find in the service industry where you are not selling any physical products but you are selling services like IT sales, financial products selling etc. Here written communication is the pre requisite, along with verbal communication, excellent command over benefits of your services, interpersonal skills and negotiation skills. It is a fact that “a person with more relevant information is always a very good negotiator” and as a corporate sales professional you update yourself with full of information like product knowledge, competitors knowledge, offers and policies prevailing in the market, knows your target customers.

6.       Indoor Sales/ Tele- Sales:

This is the type of sales which done over telephones; it not at all involves travelling, that’s why is it also named as in-house sales. Pre-requisites required here to do tele sales is you work as excellent communicator (Especially verbal), knows etiquette related to tele-sales. Further, you expected as very good listener abilities and keep things simple and precise, it all helps you to close the sales. Here you need to do pre-sales, closing and post sales over phone itself. Industries where tele-sales reps need are in KPOs, BPOs etc.

7.       Sales Support:

It is one of the most important divisions if sales because of the Sales support team sales team equipped with all the necessary back up required to complete the sales cycle. Sales support people are generally not directly associated with sale but definitely play a vital role to get repeat business from the existing customers. Sometimes a sales person need to play a role of support function as well. The key requisites needs here are patience, listening skills, excellent knowledge about company's policies and compliance's etc. You find sales support department in almost all the companies irrespective of the kind of product they manufacturing or services they are providing.

In last, here are some of the common skills set required while facing customers and become an effective & successful sales professional:

1.       Communication skills

2.       Presentation skills

3.       Technical skills

4.       Negotiation skills

5.       Convincing skills

6.       Analytical skills

7.       Leadership skills

8.       Self-motivational skills

9.       People skills

10.   Learning attitude

Keep applying the skills and make a note doing sales is not a cup of tea for all. You can share in comments any skill sets which you think is an important part of sales, this enable many people to decide on if they think of opting sales as a career.

Positive effects of speaking truth in life:

Positive effects of speaking truth in life

Speaking Truth is not just a word it is way of living life. Since ancient times, all mythologies irrespective of religion diversities holds the same view that it is important and ideal condition that everyone has to speak  truth in any situation. People manipulate the truth depending on our needs and benefits.

Ideally speaking in every human being while making any decision two voices from within starts talking and one says what is ideally and rationally correct and the other one speaks for comfort. Most times people with less self belief go for the second option and in long run they will pay the unwanted prices for their lies.

Here I am not going to talk about bad effects of lie, but I am here to give you the reasons why you always speak truth not only with people around you but also with yourself as well. End of the day every living being in the earth want two things one is “HAPPINESS” and second is “PEACE OF MIND”.

So below are the points which help you to achieve both in life. I assure you once you start speaking truth you will feel all the below points relevant and this will improve your standard of thoughts and changes your life style.

1.       Self-respect

2.       Boost Self-Confidence

3.       Remove Stress

4.       No Fear disturbs you at all

5.       Give Peace of Mind

6.       Feels satisfied

7.       Develops Faith

8.       Start seeing new version of life

9.       Improves your standard of life

10.   Build trust

11.   Don’t need to remember anything

12.   Feel happy inside and outside

13.   Feel courage within you

14.   Feel Relaxed

15.   Improves your credibility and integrity

16.   Makes you humble

17.   Short term pain but in long run you gain

18.   Start feeling real in life

19.   Improves your mental health

20.   Your mind, body and soul aligned positively

21.   You will associate with good people in life

22.   You feel powerful

23.   Feel enlightened

24.   Makes you passionate

25.   Makes you full of Hope

26.   Truth destroys all lies

27.   Your thoughts become rational and logical

  

This list may go on but to summarize,  listed few of the benefits from the pool of benefits, people stands with truth is seeing as new sophisticated simple human beings whose lives are setting example for others to live life full of freedom, wisdom, enlighten, happiness, peace, positivity and enthusiasm. Because of all this your creativity gets an opportunity to explore the unexplored and live life by setting your own standards.

Important skill sets new graduates lacks:

Important skill sets new graduates lacks

Corporate world is still the place where large number of students feels like entering into it need some rocket science. But the fact is very common, things which student ignores, sometimes take them for granted are the things which matter most to flourish your skills and knowledge and become successful in corporate world.  Here are some of the points which enable you to understand how corporate think and expect from the upcoming future professional own this skill sets and make win-win situation for all and applying these suggestions will definitely give tremendous positive results not only in professional but also in personal lives.

1.       Missing Common Sense:

This is one of the most crucial things which today’s youth is lagging behind that the basic common sense on how to deal with recurring and non recurring problems of their day-to-day life. Family plays a very important role to shape their child mindset. With basic common acts along with this little sense of humor is an added advantage. Let me tell you the fact “If you have common sense then by default you have good sense of humor, only thing you have to work upon is your timing”. If I have to define common sense in general “Ability to act and think rationally in every situation with practical approach with responsibility”. We all know common sense is very uncommon today, so work on it and you will see wonders.

2.      Lack of Learning Attitude:

India is soon going to become youngest nation in the world, but what is matter of concern is youth today lacking in learning attitude. Specifically in urban youth most of them have superiority complex and in rural or tier-2 & tier-3 cities people have careless attitude and not at all focusing on up gradation of their skills and knowledge. Here, family plays an important role to develop learning attitude in their kids, which enable them to meet their dreams and goals. Study life of any successful person in the world they always carry learning attitude irrespective of their age and experiences. Try to become quick learner but before that also you need to be a learner first. Give it a try!

3.       Lacking  Self-Vision:

Self-vision is very simple word to hear, but if think over it sincerely one will find huge difficulty to deal with it. Today most of the population which includes students, professionals, experienced professionals etc very few of them are working with clear self vision. To develop vision one need to upgrade their knowledge by knowing current affairs, politics, self core competencies and weaknesses. Also needs to refresh it from time to time on regular basis to develop a life with self-vision.

4.       Handling Rejections:

Today, the time has gone when kids are much more involve in real world, where they learn rejection handling, team playing, affection, friendships, decision-making, leadership skills, communication skills which gives self-confidence, motivation to them to explore new avenues of life. It is drawback of technology that we started living in virtual world where all the above mentioned characteristics are lacking and hence the basic common sense and moral values in today’s kids are lagging like anything.

We need to understand “Any kind of rejection is not the end of the world” focus on what you want to meet in life, why you want to do it and how you will do it! Such types of questions need to answer with logic's and rationality. Accept rejections and always try to upgrade your knowledge, skills and keep on learning new things.

5.       Lack of Maturity:

Maturity is nothing but the common sense, when you start thinking and acting rationally in all situations. Maturity comes with experience yet we have seen exceptions that are not at all mature irrespective of their age. The easiest way to learn maturity is to spend time with old age people learn from their experience. Maturity includes mental synergy, harmony, practical, social, assertive, decision-making, leadership, creative, calculated risk taker and self-confident. Learn the skill of handling of situation and never take things personally while dealing. Mature person knows how much he/she need to play role of being angry, harsh, logical, practical, emotional, ethical, perceptional which you can learn by practicing maturity in your daily decisions.

6.       Lack of Motivation:

The problem with youth today is they get demotivated very often the reason for this is confusion, indecision, fear, self-doubts, negative self talk and the biggest problem is they don’t have patients to learn things and demand money much more than their knowledge. It is an advise that trust the process have time bound targets once you work on these parameters the biggest motivation i.e. inflow of money begins. The real character of a person reveals when he have nothing, to stay motivated you need to do things with dedication, devotion, determination and with passion.

7.      Lacking Punctuality:

Punctuality is not a habit it is the way you show to world that how much you care for your time. It is really embracing that people take time for granted, they waste it like anything. Once the time gone then just start blaming and crying about people & situations. As you started valuing not only your time but also about other person’s time you called as mature person. The positive side of your personality highlighted. We all know importance of being punctual but our casual attitude diminishes our overall persona.

8.       Lack of Patience:

As we have discussed how much important it is to keep patient. As technological innovations taking place our patience level is getting reduced, this is impacting our behavior, attitude, perception and makes us impatience, angry, frustrated, increases mental panics, fearful, depressed and feels like stuck in life. So trust the work you are doing and focus on the deliverance which you have to deliver and keep your cool all the times.

9.      Casual Approach :

Again, casual attitude ruins most of the time. Being casual is not a big deal but what’s important here is the sincerity you holds while being casual as well. We need to understand here that being casual is ok sometimes but not all the times. Professionally or personally in both the cases you need to be sincere with your commitments, promises. Once you start focusing and working with full dedication and devotion there is nothing in the world which you can’t achieve.

10.   Lack of Professionalism:

Youth today defined professionalism according to their comforts. Sometimes you need to see the need of the hour and act accordingly. In corporate world how your professionalism is measured, below are some of the parameters:

a.       How much organized you are in your day-to-day activities.

b.      How you behave with your superiors, colleagues and subordinates.

c.       How you deal with small things.

d.      How you carry yourself (attire, well-groomed, follow etiquette).

e.      Your ethics and values being judged while working.

f.        Your dedication, consistency, maturity, moral values also being judge.

g.       How you pass time in leisure time is being observed.

h.      How prompt you are in delivering results and so on.

i.         How much sincere you are about your job example if you are in sales do you carry your sales-kit all the time or not.

So these are some of the very important parameters which usually people notice about you and your working style. You feel like you are aware of all this points what I am talking about but understand one thing when I started research about this topic what I found is lacking of all the above points which we has discussed here. So people who are at the verge to enter into corporate world you all need to focus on this basic qualities apart from your domain knowledge and technical skill sets like email drafting, working on ms-excel etc.

If you have any further suggestions to add-on in the above list you can comment in the section or if you have something to share you are most welcome. Meanwhile read good articles, stay healthy, wealthy and acquire knowledge.