SPECIAL BONUS:
12 Ways To Improve Your Listening Skills & Improve Your Sales Results
(Editor's Note: I was given these the other day. Their origin and authorship is unknown, but the tips are timeless and important, and I hope you find them as useful as I do. JPM)
1. Think Before You Speak
Many salespeople are in such a hurry to make sales points that they pitch the product before they hear the prospect finish his/her thought before blutrting out what's on your mind. Only after your prospect has completely finished speaking and you have allowed afew seconds for a possible afterthought cab you feel sure that you have heard the prospect's point of view.
2. Silence is a Sales Ally
Use silence as a tool to control the flow of conversation and to draw out the prospect. Most salespeople feel uncomfortable during moments of silence. They may feel embarassed or awkward and they have been trained to talk. Instead of talking nod your head, and count to five before you respond.
3. Interruptions Discourage Listening
If you interrupt your prospect while he or she is talking, what incentive do you give for listening when its your turn to speak? If you think of something while they are talking, jot it down for future reference when the whole story has unfolded. Before you make judgements, rebuttals, or comparison, be sure you have heard the point your prospect is trying to make.
4. Concentrate on the Topic Under Discussions
Since your mind is capable of jumping from one thought to another, it is imperative that you maintain your concentration while listening to the prospect. Listening speed is faster than speaking speed. Therefore, place all your conscious energy on the prospect - on his words as well as the non-verbal message he is sending while he speaks.
5. Don't Be Distracted
When you are making a presentation to more than one person, it can be difficult to listen to everything that is happening. Talking among others in the room can distract from the process of listening. To ensure that you hear what is important, physically turn to the person who has the floor at the moment, show taht you are listening to them by usinf his/her name and then turn to the next person. This will let everyone in the room know that each will get your full attention.
6. Ask For Details
active listening implies responding to what you hear - even if it is not something you automatically understand. If your prospects message seems to technical or unfamiliar, listen until he or she is finished, then ask for definitions and explanations of anything you don't understand. Repeat it all back to be sure you are both in agreement before proceeding.
7. Listen For Subtleties
Do you jump to conclusions before the whole story is told? The arrogant negotiator may fell that he has heard it before or say that it is sometrhing else that he has heard which was false, a party line, or the like, and thus leap to a conclusion. Listening means tuning yourself in for fine differences in the other side's story.
8. Take Notes
Do you try to remember too much and get lost? Your prospect may be giving you a complicated and lengthy story. Take notes. If you're lost, call for a halt, ask him or her to repeat, and then restate back what you understand has been said, ask for confirmation, then urge your prospect to go on. Don't leap blindly across barriers of understanding.
9. Listen and Feel What the Prospect is Telling You
Sometimes your ow feelings are a good barometer for what you are hearing. A prospect may not want to tell you everything that's on his/her mind. Your listening skills, as well as your innate sense of what's going on, amy prove invaluable. Focus on delivery, tone of voice, breathing patterns, and speed of speech, as well as the content of the words being used. The message is important but sometimes the way its conveyed is the message itself.
10. Concentrate on Listening to One Topic at a Time
Some salespeople simply can't concentrate on a single topic for vey long. Cultivate the ability to stick with a topic. Don't let your involvement in the sale break your listening concentration. Jumping all over the map confuses you and the prospect.
11. Listen to Everything - Even That Which You Don't Want to Hear
Skilled listeners don't discard information they don't like, they respond to waht they hear no matter how unpleasant it may be. Irate customers are not ever calmed by being ignored. Listen to the problem and then restate the issue in your own words to be sure that you and the prospects are communicating, then deal with the issue.
12. Be Patient
Pencil-tapping and finger-drumming are clues that you are not listening to what the prospect is saying. If you are nervous, calm yourself with deep breathing or positive self-talk before you enter the prospect's office or home. A nervous mind can't listen.