The Dying Art Of Sales-Person-Ship!

By Steven P. Burke

Why is it dying as an art or communication and sales practice? This is really very simple. The bottom line is that few people have the guts to do whatever it takes to be the top salesman in their organization. But there is more to it than that.

Mentoring in sales has disappeared within the last generation. Up until WWII and even after it, sales skills were learned mostly through word of mouth, which is the most effective way to learn by far. Since then changes in technology have allowed information to be circulated in 'modern ways'. And, this is partly the cause of the decline of the sales training industry.

Please understand, there are still great trainers, though few of them. And there are still some sales mentors, though even fewer. What there are a lot more people we don't know as sales professionals, marketing their poorly researched information.

In an industry where it takes nearly a whole, career to truly master certain skills to the point where you can even consider calling yourself a trainer, there are people in mid career using a little bits of information gleamed from sources that are not even necessarily sales related trying to influence our profession. These so called experts are espousing general theories on sales that supposedly apply to all selling situations that simply are not all-encompassing and, worse, in most cases totally misleading.

The very thing that benefits us as a society - the information age - has and is in many respects damaging the sales training industry and the sales profession. And, one of the sales practices most affected is prospecting.

I had a conversation with a relatively inexperienced sales author who is a 2nd generation member of a family head hunting business after he wrote an article about sales. During this conversation, this so-called sales expert started referring to the "Google Society" and it has altered sales forever, that the industry would never be the same. After a very brief dialogue, he realized I was challenging his statement. Then he asked after I stated "Not all industries are affected by search engines";

"Okay, name one!" Now, I was not bothered by his cocky attitude, what bothers me is this individual is writing a newsletter on sales, meaning he is one of the people inadvertently involved distributing misleading information about selling.

It was all too easy for me to prove my point. But first you have to realize what those who are promoting "Sales 2.0" as a buzz-phrase really mean. In a nutshell they are saying that people are better informed today, that buyers know more about everything than they used to. And they support these hypotheses with studies like the percentage of Internet users who bought online within the last 60 days and other things that were learned from questioning consumers.

Does this apply to all consumer purchases? More importantly, does it apply to B2B buying? The answer comes from a clergy study. Since the ministers of the world could care less about commercial implications they have a more open minded approach to research. And the ones conducted by and for them show something very different in general and many things specifically;

- People are reading less; meaning they are less knowledgeable in general
- Attention spans are shorter.
- There is no more time in a day; meaning if they know about more how that actually is of interest is, "they know less about more subjects"

In fact, mundane purchases by both consumers and business buyers are not researched, no one has the time. People are expected to get more done than the generation before us and as a result of higher work loads we cannot spend more time researching purchases and, though some may be better researched, only those that excite us, not those hum-drum situations like buying a photocopier or a mailing machine.

Did you go online to check out your shampoo? No. You might have gone online to look at the sports car you have always wanted to buy and finally just about had the money to pull the trigger on but you sure did not research tile cleaners unless you were hypoallergenic.
"Buyers know more and therefore you better change the way you sell." Oh, no!

I guess the above statement means the tactic I have used extremely skillfully and taught with great effect, which is to call a company and explain that new copier technology means today's equipment can now do more for less so we can payout their existing lease, give them more features and reduce the lease payment now, improving profit today, rather than them continuing to use an old machine they do not like for another year and paying more is useless due to Google and other information age unknowns ... because, what? Umm, I dunno, I'm stumped! How does Sales 2.0 indicate this is not one of THE sharpest ways to do more business?
You know the old expression; bullshit baffles brains. Well, there are a great number of baffled sales people in the world today that do not even know they are being mislead.

As technology changes we adapt to these new environments. It is natural. What we do not need to adapt to is people. By this I mean the way people interact with us, as sales professionals, has not changed. And, though no two people are alike, each with unique values, this is the way people have always been. Sales training that indicates technology has changed selling is missing the key fundamental in our profession; People.

Technology is just a tool. It has no control over people's emotions, needs or desires. So that part of selling will always be the same.

Impulse buying has nothing to do with the information age. Nor does emotional buying experiences, they have everything to do with people and are not affected by micro chips or the Internet and World Wide Web.

If you wish to master this profession, you must master understanding people. Use technology, by all means, but spend more time focusing on relationships and what makes people tick.
Good luck, both today and in the future, with whatever it is you decide to do!

NOTE; I decided not to use the word salesmanship. And, though I am rarely politically correct, my feeling is women make better sales people than men, so this word choice is not politically motivated but, rather, sexist in nature.

My name is Steven Burke and I have been a professional sales trainer for 24 years. Together with MySalesDad©, who has been selling for 6 decades and training for 45 years, we have 69 years sales training expereince available as a sample at http://www.mysalestrainer.com
We formed Pro-formance Masters Inc in 1983 and have evolved for the Internet with MySalesTrainer©. Our references, dating from December 2007 when I typed in this BIO, date back 24 years. Prior to that my father trained for sales organizations where he was involved in Sales Management. All the way back to winning a National Sales Contest at APECO for the year in 1963.

I have appeared on the cover of a business magazine as recently as Feb. 2004, as well as featured inside another in April 2001.

Grab a sample of our sales newsletter at the website, http://www.mysalestrainer.com you will be be very glad you did!

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