We often discuss on our courses the value that you offer to your clients. Many salespeople forget how valuable your services can be to your clients, as you’re effectively helping them to create new customers for themselves, simply by being there for them. You have the power to make your customer base very profitable in their markets.

Our discussions often come round to this notion of being a trusted advisor to your clients. Everyone agrees it’s a great label to acquire, but what does it mean in practice?

Here are some thoughts on what it means to be a trusted advisor:

Firstly, it means you have the experience, the training, the knowledge, and the subject matter expertise to be trusted to advise your clients well. This means you have to keep ahead of the game, your acumen has to be developed at all times, and you must concentrate on your personal and business knowledge development.

It means you have to show quality professionalism in all you do. If you miss a call-back to a customer, it makes an impression on their mind. It makes them ask the question ‘if I can’t trust you in the small things, how can I trust you in the big things?’

It means you act as a curious business questioner, probing to find out your client’s problems and challenges, then prescribing the right direction for them.

It means your negotiating skills are finely honed to achieve a win-win outcome, collaborating with them to achieve results that will be great for them and enable you to still offer the quality services that will help them profit in the future.

It mean you have to be honest about the outcomes your client can expect. Exaggerating the benefits they can expect from partnering with you will only result in lack of trust and respect.

How close are you to being a trusted advisor to your clients? It extends your credibility with them and gives many reasons why they should remain loyal in the future by adding value to your overall services

Happy selling!

Sean

Sean McPheat
The UK’s #1 Authority On Modern Day Selling
MTD Sales Training

Have you downloaded my latest report “The Sales Person’s Crisis”? Over 10,000 sales pros have.

Click on the image below to find out why you’re very existence as a sales person is in doubt…

You’ll know how difficult it can be out there to maintain your effective pricing strategy. How often have you been drawn into a price battle with your customer, with the biggest threat going through your mind that you’ll lose the sale if you don’t discount?

Before you do offer a discounted price, bear in mind the following dangers associated with lowering your original figure:

• When you offer discount, you set a precedent. The new price you offer is the reference point from which your customer will start negotiating. When you discount, it’s telling the customer that’s the starting point, and it’s going to be mighty difficult to raise prices again in the future.
• Your pricing point creates an image for your product and your company. By discounting, you effectively reposition your brand message. You are sending the message that your product isn’t as good as you say it is, and you turn it into a commodity, rather than something of value to the customer.
• You tell your competition you are willing to start a price war. When your competition see you discount, they will retaliate by cutting prices, and it’s a downward spiral.
• You are less profitable, and you earn less money. You become more dependent on a price-only strategy, eventually leading to a policy that focuses less on what you can do for the customer and more on cutting costs. This means you have less to invest in R&D and product enhancement, stifling your growth and leading to poorer quality.
• You send the message to your customers that, because your focus is on discounting, you might as well shop around for the cheapest price anywhere, because I have nothing to offer you but a lower price.
• Since the only way your company makes money is through the profits you bring in, you have to start looking inside your company to cut costs. You start asking questions like ‘how can we save a little on quality costs?’ and ‘do we need all these people to support our discounting salespeople?’. You have to cut costs on the inside because you aren’t making the profits on the outside.
• You tell the whole world that your products and services are not as valuable as you suggest they are, making the customer wonder where else you might not be strictly honest.

Do a study on how much your discounts actually cost your company. You may be surprised by how much your short-term thinking affects your long-term prosperity.

Happy selling!

Sean

Sean McPheat
The UK’s #1 Authority On Modern Day Selling
MTD Sales Training

Have you downloaded my latest report “The Sales Person’s Crisis”? Over 10,000 sales pros have.

Click on the image below to find out why you’re very existence as a sales person is in doubt…