The Skill Of Selling - Part 1

In this multi-part series, I am going to be discussing the technical skill called selling.  Selling is the direct interaction of a company representative with the customer in order to create the sale of a product or service.  I consider it a technical skill as opposed to a business skill because it is generally a process that is created by marketing and executed by a sales professional.  Sales people are craftsman, hands on individuals who develop their craft over time by studying great sales people and by practicing their art.  Creativity and practice are what makes selling an art, but there are straight-forward skills that can be learned.

I had the opportunity to work with many customers in our dietary supplement business and found that selling is generally the execution of a good marketing plan, but also the flexibility to be able to solve customer problems whatever they may be.  We were helping people lose weight, but we would also have customer objections to price and concern as to whether the product would work for them.  We had answers ready to go for both objections, but we really could not be so robotic in our technique, so we would make sure to listen to the customer's concerns and provide them real answers rather than scripted ones.  Chris and I both got better at this as time went on but the marketing preparation really helped as we were early in our business.

Here are some resources to look at on selling.  I will write more on selling and the sales process next time.

• Sales Wikipedia 
• How Sales Techniques Work 
• The Relationship Between Marketing and Sales