7 STRATEGIC FOR SALES SUCCESS

1. Listen to the experts. Granted many will claim they are when they aren't! But, people with solid sales experience and a track record to show you in your area of sales are worth listening to. As an enthusiastic rookie salesman, it's all to easy to start making rational assumptions that may be misleading, based upon intuition and relatively little life experience. A history of sales success is likely to be a far more accurate source of effective strategy.

2. Agree a sales process, who to see, what to say, how many people to see and where, and stick to it rigidly to enable you to establish cause and effect. The foundation for your sales process should lie in number 1. For any thinking person it's all too easier to adapt the approach after each call, making progressively small changes to your approach. Ultimately, this will conceal what is working and what is not. Stick to your sales process until agree review date, then make changes in a uniform way to allow you to clearly monitor the effects of these changes.

3. Don't let individual events change your approach, a call that's gone wrong or an example of a colleagues excellent result. Remember, changes in your approach should be considered over time and based upon a number of rational factors, such as the results of 'many' calls, or someone else's results over sustained period. One off events are likely to be misleading, even though the emotions they can conjure are often very powerful. Stick to your sales plan until your agreed review date, note events and thoughts along the way for collective judgement.

4. Look around you for clues to succeed, in most cases the answers are out there If you are one of many, analyse the most successful people, speak to them, ask for their opinions and examples of their success. There should be strong clues and patterns indicating why there are successful which you can learn from and adapt.

5. Expect setbacks and failures on the route to success. All the most successful people in sales jobs, and indeed life generally will be able to site failure along the way to success. Many site it as necessary stages on route to glory. Stick to your plan through set backs, be resolute, success will come with persistence and determination.

6. Review your progress regularly. Set regular review points where you can assess you progress against you criteria for success. These are the points at which you can consider measured changes to your process based on the collective information from your experience and the others around you.

7. Don't change too much at once. Two or three things at most. Remember, if you are to build success over time you need to be able to monitor cause and effect. Too many changes all at once can prevent the isolation of which are successful and unsuccessful strategies.