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Homes that aren’t considered old can benefit from a fresh look that improves your living space, improves your home’s marketability when its time to sell and improves your return on investment. Many houses that have been sitting on the market for weeks without selling could benefit from a house-lift, which doesn’t have to cost a fortune, but can have a big impact on marketing potential. To that end, here are some home improvement ideas that can provide an excellent return on investment.

Read more on Give Your Home a Fresh Look and Improve its Resale Value…



When buying or selling real estate, it is very helpful, even recommended, to have the assistance of a real estate agent to guide you through the home buying or home selling process. With their assistance, you can avoid buying and selling mistakes, learn the selling prices of comparable homes nearby, get an insider’s perspective on the neighborhood and schools and a wide range of other useful information. Like all other professions, not all real estate agents are alike or have the integrity and depth of experience that you need. To help you find the right real estate agent, here are some things to consider:

Read more on How to Choose a Real Estate Agent…

Your call center is the heartbeat of your entire company. If your call center doesn’t clearly represent your company in the best manner, the odds are you will struggle and fail to thrive within your industry.

Read more on Improving Your Call Center’s Communication Skills…

If you have successfully applied Customer-Focused Selling concepts, up to and including the negotiation of terms, getting a buyer’s commitment should come naturally. You have earned your customer’s trust, helped with recognition of needs, and proved that your solution is best.

As mentioned earlier, your goal is to open the relationship, not to close the sale.

In the Customer-Focused Selling process, I refer to the abilities needed to ask for the agreed-on order as “commitment skills,” not “closing skills.” This is a major technique in sales training.

Closing skills attempt to get the buyers to commit.

Commitment skills are different because there is MUTUAL COMMITMENT at the point of sale: the customer commits to you, and you commit to the customer.

In the final two roles you play in the process–Teacher and Farmer–are focused on the commitments you make to the customer.

Use these tools in your sales management. Here are a few non-manipulative ways to ask for commitment:

Ask, “What should be our next step?”

This question is most appropriate for a buyer who has a clear direction of how events should unfold, a lion personality type. This is a simple, honest question that asks your buyer to suggest a commitment to you.

Describe in detail what happens between now and installation, delivery, or commencement of service. If you have an implementation plan, now is the time to share it.

Then, simply ask, “Does that sound acceptable to you?”

Ask, “Would you like to give us a try?”

This commitment question is soft, yet direct, because it asks for a “Yes” or “No” answer.
By now you have come a long way with your prospect. The commitment techniques above are often successful. However, some buyers may still be reluctant. If this is the case, you must deal with the salesperson’s old nemesis–objections.

To learn more about these sales techniques and many others take the time and attend sales training courses.

Recent research has found that the highest producing salespeople are those that work for sales managers with a “hands-on” coaching style. Sales managers that monitor, direct, evaluate and reward their salespeople on a on-going basis; and, these high-performance salespeople were found to have a greater level of commitment to their organizations when they worked for a sales manager with this “hands-on” coaching approach.

Your company can increase sales and reduce sales turnover by installing a culture of coaching within your sales management team.

The role of sales manager just may be the most important job in your company. Sales is the life-blood of every business, and there is a sales manager at the heart of every one of your sales teams.

Has your company provided your sales managers with the skills and tools they need to pump maximum growth and profits out of your sales force?

Read more on Selling Keys For Getting Commitment In The Sales Process…

Most C-Level decision makers are sick of educating sales people about his or her business. This explains why breaking into that level of an organization can be difficult. In order to sell at the C-Level, you have to fully understand the world of the typical CEO, CIO or CFO. Knowing their world involves knowing the business model in which they operate daily. This module will help you understand that model and how that knowledge can help you gain access to the C-Level decision maker.
The business model typically includes the Values, Vision, Strategy, Culture, Challenges and the Competition they face. The business plan takes into account the needs of their Customers.

Each C-Level decision maker operating within the model is evaluated against a series of Critical Success Factors. By understanding what those factors are and directing your efforts to helping the C-Level decision maker achieve them, will go a long way to helping you gain the access you need.

Finances are the only reason a business exists. All too often we aren’t familiar enough with the financial aspects of the C-Level decision maker’s business. This lack of knowledge limits our ability to address the real issues facing his or her business. In this section we will cover how to review an annual report, website and 10K for the information you will need.

Finally this section will bring it all together by implementing a three-step process for developing an account penetration plan. Your plan for selling is absolutely key to your sales training initiatives, and should be reviewed carefully.
Preparing to Sell at the C-Level: Your Customer’s Business Model

Values
What the Company Stands For: Integrity; Hiring and Training the Best People; Customer Focus

Vision
The Company’s goal for the future.

Strategy
How the Company Will Achieve the Vision: Develop Our Infrastructure; Leverage Alliances; Expand the Product Line; Build Organizational Synergy Between Departments

Culture
How the Company: Evaluates Strategies; Makes Decisions; Considers Risk Taking

Challenges
What is Holding the Company Back: Internal Issues; Marketplace Changes; Economic Conditions; Technology Changes

Competition
The Impact of their Competitor’s: Products; Strategies; Alliances; Growth into New Markets

Customer’s
The Impact of their Customer’s: Buying Habits; Marketplace; Customer’s thought process;
Knowing your customers, and how they think, is so important to actively selling, and making sales. Any good sales management training program will teach this point. It is vital your salespeople sell based on how their customers buy. There’s more fear and risk to decision-making today, and your competitors are smarter and tougher. When your company’s sales process corresponds directly with how the buying process unfolds, your salespeople will sell more profitable solutions and increase their win-ratio.

Critical Success Factors
How the C-Level Decision Makers are Evaluated: Profitability; Growth; Shareholder Value; ROI

Finances
How the Company Keeps Score: Revenue; Cost of Goods; Operating Income; Net Income; Overall Profitability

Information Sources
Where to find valuable information: Website; Annual Report; 10 K Report; Interviews With Sub C-Level Decision Makers

Reading the Annual Report
What to look for in the annual report: Chairman’s Letter; Management Discussion of Results

Financial Statements
Important financial statements to review: Income Statement; Balance Sheet; Statement of Changes in Financial Condition

Supporting Information
Other important documents to read: Notes to Financial Statements; Auditor’s Letter; Other Corporate Info

What the Numbers Mean — Pulling It All Together

Developing Your Account Penetration Plan
1) Identify the C-Level Target:
Who has the most at stake?
Who can most benefit from your solution?
Who can influence the most Power Brokers?
Who can best relate to your Critical Case Reference?

2. Define the Circle of Support

3. Select the Delivery Method

4. Create the Message
Critical Success Factors
Current Strategies

Finally, for years, the focus of most sales people has been on the selling process – while ignoring customer buying behavior. But tomorrow’s big winners in sales will be those who learn to join the customer’s buying process. The best salespeople engage in continuing education, including attending sales training courses and reading books on selling and sales.

Read more on Sales Techniques For Selling To The CEO And Other Top-Level Executives…

Keep a written list of your teammembers’ “bad boss” behaviors.

Refer to it often and consider things you may be doing that are similar. Do whatever you can to minimize or eliminate those demotivating behaviors in the future.

As Ken Blanchard, author of “The One Minute Manager says, “Catch people doing something right.” Take time to recognize the contributions of the people who are there every day, doing a great job. Don’t take them for granted by missing opportunities to let them know how important they are to you and your organization.

Involve your best people in hiring decisions.
Ask team members to participate in interviewing new-hire candidates, when appropriate. This gives your producer a say in how the team works – a significant involvement in something that truly matters. Make sure you provide pre-training on effective interviewing. Such preparation not only gives team members a new skill, but also helps them to help you choose the right candidates for the team.

Build a team culture with sales management
Demonstrate respect for your team members – and confidence in their abilities – by having them sit in on your important organizational meetings. You might even consider having them represent you when you’re unable to attend. Besides sending an “I trust you” message, this gives them yet another opportunity to learn and grow.

Increase the job responsibilities for those who have proven their ability to handle more.
Once someone has mastered a job, look for ways to increase their responsibilities and the depth of their tasks. Involve them in that process. If the job is not expanded, or if there is no challenge to stretch, individuals are likely to become bored and less motivated over time. Another great idea is to send them to sales training programs to develop further.

Encourage team members to enhance their own job descriptions.
Make it clear that the descriptions must be in line with the goals of the organization, but give people the freedom to add a personal touch.

Turn failures into teaching lessons.
A failure is a failure only when we don’t learn from it. When people make mistakes, encourage them to share their experiences in order to help others avoid similar problems. This can be a great motivational tool because you focus on learning rather than assigning blame. Just remember that it takes guts to admit mistakes – especially in front of others. So be certain to thank each person for his or her courage.

Leadership is easy when your stock price is high. Be tough during tough times. As Vince Lombardi said: “It’s not whether you get knocked down, it’s whether you get up again.” To keep your team motivated, you need to show resilience, recovery, and “contagious enthusiasm” for the mission of your team – especially when your job challenges are significant.

Help others on your team develop by delegating the lead on certain activities and projects. Most of us like “being in charge” – at least some of the time.

Get in the habit of inviting team members to challenge your ideas.
Encourage them to constructively (and positively) criticize your plans. Make it okay for people to disagree with you. This lets people know you value their input, and ensures that implemented ideas will be well thought out. By giving your people permission to disagree encourages teamwork, which, in turn, helps motivate everyone on the team. Do remember, however, when someone disagrees with you he/she should raise the issue with you in private, instead of blurting it out during a team meeting.

Solicit candid feedback.
Every once in a while, ask people for their feelings about the culture and the motivational climate of your team. Pay attention to team members’ perceptions, act on the feedback you receive, and let the team know what you have done (or will do) in response.

This is the 2nd blog post in our 5 part series focusing on motivating your team through sales management training.

Read more on Sales Management Training: Ideas To Motivate Your Team…

“A problem well stated is a problem half solved.” Charles F. Kettering

With a few variations, 80 percent of the objections sales people hear are:
“It’s too expensive.” (I can’t afford it.)
“It’s not in the budget.”
“I don’t need it.”

These objections point to a problem with a single cause: the customer has little appreciation for the value of your offering.

Essentially, the customer is saying the problem your product solves is not serious enough for the price tag. In the buyer’s mind, the cost of buying is greater than the value that would be gained by ownership.

Value-type objections like this are bad for the sales process because they indicate the customer just isn’t interested. The best sales strategy here is not to “handle” these objections, but to prevent them. Help your customer realize that the “little problems” are really BIG problems. This goes a long way toward preempting value objections altogether. Creating value is a huge key that is taught in sales training courses, and should be used everyday.

In the sales cycle, the customer moves from Change, to Discontent. Change triggers Discontent. During the Discontent phase, the customer:

1. Recognizes a problem (or opportunity.)
2. Asks “just how serious is this problem?”
3. Asks “how much will the solution cost?”
4. Finally determines “I need to buy!”

In your role as Doctor during the Discontent stage, your challenge is to uncover more than problems. Many sales people made the mistake of trying to uncover only problems. Problems are rooted in events which have already happened.

Opportunities look to the future. It is so much more effective to look at both problems and opportunities. Doing so enhances the value of your offering and helps preempt value objections, as mentioned before.

When dealing with problems, customers often don’t recognize how serious the problem is. It is the consulting sales person who helps them realize the full ramifications of “small” problems.

Remember, studying the Key Success factors in your customer’s organization and how they are carried Function-to-Function. This area is ripe for studying the “full ramification” of “small problems.”

Your number 1 priority is to develop your sales team to sell better than you can sell. You must attend a sales seminar to gain these valuable skills! To achieve this priority you must share your talents and skills with your people in such a way that they learn what you already know. What specific improvements in the skill or attitude of your people came about last week as a result of your sales coaching efforts?

If the answer is “not much”. It is time for you to engage in sales management training. Recent research has found that the highest producing salespeople are those that work for sales managers with a “hands-on” coaching style. Sales managers that monitor, direct, evaluate and reward their salespeople on a on-going basis; and, these high-performance salespeople were found to have a greater level of commitment to their organizations when they worked for a sales manager with this “hands-on” coaching approach.

Your company can increase sales and reduce sales turnover by installing a culture of coaching within your sales management team. You cannot install a culture of sales coaching simply by training sales managers how to coach. Instead, your training solution must also solve the obstacles that prevent proactive, hands-on sales coaching from actually happening.

We hope this informative article helps you and your team sell more and sell faster!

Read more on Sales Tips For Finding Little Problems And Uncovering Bigger Needs…

Selling ebooks and other information base products is the top business you can ever have in the online arena. Creating these products will only take your time and specialized knowledge.

Yes, you will not need to shell out money for your initial investment yet, you can be assured that you’ll be able to generate great sales leads and revenue as these products are selling like hotcakes these days.

Here’s how you can increase your information product sales:

1. Sell your products on Amazon. Amazon is one of the most visited affiliate programs in the internet today.

If you sell your products through this site, you can take advantage of the huge traffic that it attracts so you can be nearer to your potential clients.

As long as you have great products to offer or those products that are being sought by online users, you can be assured that this site will help you boost your sales and revenue due to its proven ecommerce experience that online users trust.

You will need to pay less than $40 for your monthly subscription fee and a portion of your profit each time you make a sale.

2. Sell your products on your website or on your blog. Post your own ad on your website or on your blog.

You may also talk about your offerings on your content as long as they are very related to your site’s and blog’s topic. The good thing about going this route is that you can keep 100% of your revenue as you don’t have to share it with other affiliates.

3. Market your products on your newsletters. Are you currently publishing your own ezine?

Then, take advantage of it and promote your products through your newsletters. Talk about the topics that are highly relevant to your offering so you can easily pitch in your information products at the end of your content.

Don’t forget to include the URL of your site or your product page to make it easier for your recipients to give you a visit should they decide to make a purchase.

4. Promote your products on your presentations. Are you offering high-ticket information products like bootcamps and seminars?

Then, you can talk about your other information products that you are selling so you can persuade your audience to make a purchase. Ensure that you highlight the features and benefits of your information products to boost your sales leads.

Jeff Schuman helps people make money online with network marketing, paid survey training, and JV With Jeff free internet marketing training. He is on page one of Google for over 4100 unqiue keyword phrases andf has over 13,000 backlinks to his site through various free traffic methods. See if he can help you too!

Read more on 4 Methods To Improve Your Information Product Sales…

Did You Know: Your business could be more profitable in France with your french website than in the UK, USA or any other English speaking country?

Why and how does this happen?

So far when you launch your business in English, the task is bigger than you could expect because too many websites are in the same market.

For instance, let’s say you run a golf business in the UK and you want to promote your business online trying to sell Golf Equipment(your main keyword).

You log into Google and these are the results you get (30/01/2009):

A – What do your UK customers want? Number of searches done for the Keyword Golf Equipment in the UK.

368,000 – Highest volume of search in October 2008.

B – How is the UK competition like? Number if English websites competing under the Keyword Golf Equipment.

. Worldwide: Results 1 – 10 of about 5,380,000 for golf equipment

. Page from the UK: Results 1 – 10 of about 684,000 for golf equipment

C – How much does an effective online marketing campaign cost?

As you sell Golf Equipment and decide to increaseyour sales using a Pay Per Click Campaign for instance. You intend to create your Google Adwords campaign and start watching the bids in order to place yours.
In this particular case you target the UK using Google adwords tools.

And this is what Google UK will propose you (30/01/2009)

. Keyword Golf Equipment

. Average CPC: £0.76 (at a maximum CPC of £1.70)

. Estimated clicks per day: 128 – 162 (at a daily budget of £150.00)

Now Catalyst Entrepreneur does the same research for you business targeting the French Golf users on the Internet. You will agree with me that my Google page will be Google.FR doing exactly the same process in order to compare the same features.

A – What do your French customers want? Number of searches done for the Keyword Equipement de Golf (Golf Equipment) in France:
5 400 – Highest volume of search in October 2008.

B – How is the France competition like? Number of French websites competing under the Keyword Equipement de Golf.

IMPORTANT:

When you log into Google.Fr, you shall see 3 radio buttons under the search box category displaying:

. Radio button 1 – Rechercher dans Le Web = Search in the World Wide Web

. Radio button 2 – Pages Francophones: meaning Pages displayed within the French Wide Web including France and other French speaking countries worldwide. We could name it F.W.W. for French Wide Web

. Radio button 3 – Pages France: France only

So let see how many French websites are actually competing under the Keyword Equipement de Golf.

Here are the results (30/01/2009).

. Radio button 1 Le Web: Résultats 1 – 10 sur un total d’environ 1,610,000 pour equipement de golf

. Radio button 2 Pages Francophones: Résultats 1 – 10 sur un total d’environ 1,450,000 pages en français pour equipement de golf.

. Radio button 3 Pages France: 10 sur un total d’environ 1,160,000 pour equipement de golf

C – How much does an effective internet marketing campaign cost?

This is what Google France will propose you (30/01/2009)

. Keyword Equipement de Golf

. Average CPC: £0.42 (at a maximum CPC of £0.85)

. Estimated clicks per day: 2 – 3 (at a daily budget of £2.00)

If you are in the business and intend to sell online, you may consider seriously implementing European Union countries in you business strategy. Not only you will improve your internet sales but you will reduce your online marketing costs as well.

6 reasons to increase your online sales in France now:

1 – Catalyst Entrepreneur translate your existing website in French and we do French copywriting to comply with SEO requirements and generate sales online.

2 – Your French website could benefit from a Pay Per click (PPC) campaign cheaper than in English and managed by our Internet marketing expert.

3 – There is room for expansion online for small medium enterprises (SME) – your company could be one of them.

4 – Extra online sales means you can earn more whilst you are asleep

5 – Finally… your company can be as big as the ones online at advertising products and boosting sales.

6 – We offer your keyword study for Free PLUS your free domain name as well.

Read more on Boost Your Health Beauty Sales In France With Your French Website And Get Free Domain Name In French….

1. The “No Need” Marketing Secret

The “there is never a need to do a particular (negative task) by yourself…” marketing ploy tells your prospects that your product will eliminate the negative task in their life. Your prospects won’t have to be alone, they will have your must have product by their side and your product will never leave them high and dry.

2. The “never enough Time” Marketing Secret

The “don’t have enough time? Nobody ever does! I don’t…” strategy tells your prospects that almost no one, not even yourself, has enough time to gain all their desired benefits. Tell them it takes less than (number of.) seconds, minutes, hours, days, etc., of their time to reach their goal with your product.

3. The “Cost Of No” Marketing Secret

The “think it costs too much? What is the cost of not having this little modern marvel by your side…” strategy tells your prospects that your price may be high but the cost of not gaining their desired benefit could cost them a whole lot more. Mention that not buying your product could cost them more money, time, embarrassment, etc.

4. The “If Yes” Marketing Secret

The “if you answered yes to any of these questions, then (you need my product)…” strategy gives your prospects a list of questions and queries that will help convince them that they need to purchase your product. You just need to make sure that a majority of your prospects will mentally answer yes to them as they are reading your add.

5. The “If No” Marketing Secret

The “if you answered no to any of these questions, then (you need my product)…” strategy gives your prospects a list of questions that could convince them to buy your product. You just need to make sure that a majority of your prospects will mentally answer no to them as they are reading your add.

6. The “Still There?” Marketing Secret

The “are you still reading? Good! Then you already know that (you need my product)…” strategy tells your prospects that it sounds like you are actually right there checking on them, like in a real store. You are also reminding them about a benefit you mentioned earlier and are reinforcing it once again.

7. The “You Are Special” Marketing Secret

The “we’ll be launching in a week. But because you’re a (special group) we’ll let you buy now for (discount price)…” strategy tells your prospects you’ll allow them to acquire your product during the pre-launch and give them a discount on top of that. The special group of people could be your visitors, current customers, a membership site you belong to, etc.

8. The “Group Bonuses” Marketing Secret

The “for every (number) people that buy I’ll add (number)(of extra products)…” strategy tells your prospects the more people that order your product the more money you will make and you’ll be able to give them a bigger product package. They may also want to join your affiliate program to help you get more orders so they get more stuff. For example, for every 100 people that buy, I’ll add an extra bonus e-book. It shows you are always reinvesting in your business for your customers benefit.

Read more on Eight Ultra Cool Free Marketing Strategies That Really Work!…