How To Develop Your Communication Skills

Communication skills are vital if you are going to be a top sales person.

But improving those communication skills is easier said then done.

Without doubt the two most important skills are questioning and listening.

Let’s have a look at some questioning techniques you can use.

Open? Closed? Which questions should you use?

I don’t really care as long as they have a purpose!

Questioning With SOAR

Being able to SOAR
An analysis of many thousands of sales has directed us to an acronym that helps us remember the process of questions within the sales call.

The underlying philosophy is for sellers to ‘think buyer’ and help them to understand their needs and potential solutions.

The acronym SOAR stands for SITUATION, OBJECTIVES, ‘ANTI’ and REWARDS

Situation Questions ask about the customer’s operating context and business situation. What is the current business situation that the customer is in? Who else is involved in this decision?

Objective Questions ask about the customer’s goals, visions and ideas that will take them from their current situation towards a solution. What would be the ideal solution for you, Mr Customer? What changes would you like to see in your supplier of services?

‘Anti’ Questions ask what stops you from achieving this, or what is against this happening at the moment. It elicits possible objections without you having to deal with them later.

Reward Questions probe for explicit needs, either directly or by exploring the value or importance to the customer of solving a problem. Would a faster back-up service reduce backlogs? How would a more efficient claims service help? Would x also produce savings with y?

So, asking effective questions is a surefire way of how to develop your communication skills.Keep improving, keep getting better at what you do and the results will come.

The little 1 percenters make a huge difference when added up.

Happy Selling

Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Sales Training

Telephone:
0800 849 6732

Sales Managers Need Good Communication Skills

If you’ve been in management for any length of time you will already know it doesn’t take much to cause animosity, resentment or even real distaste with people that you manage simply by answering a question. I mean just by answering a question, you can cause a host of serious problems. You have to remember the old adage, “It’s not what you say, but how you say it.”

The wrong word or the tone you use to deliver the word can cause misunderstandings, ill feeling and resentment, which create barriers that will cost your organisation lots of money, time, employee retention and eventually unsatisfied customers. It is essential that you approach and communicate effectively with your Front Line People.

First, keep in mind that it is extremely easy to inadvertently make people feel belittled or even stupid, when you speak because of your position and experience. When people you supervise feel that you talk “down” to them, it makes them fear talking to you or asking you questions. Then, small problems you thought you’d resolved suddenly spiral out of control, they fester and grow into major obstacles before you know it. So how do you communicate comfortably with people without sounding like the big cheese? Developing effective communication skills requires serious and practice. However, here’s a few tips to avoid making people feel inferior:

Listen.
When someone comes to you with that question you’ve heard and answered a million times. You know! that one you know what they’re going to say before they say it question; do you have a tendency to “cut them off” with an answer that goes something like this “I know what you’re going to say, It’s a stupid question which I’ve answered a thousand times, go away and stop wasting my time”. BIG MISTAKE. What you need to think about is, ‘OK, YES’, I’ve been asked this question lots of times, along with many other questions which I know the answer to before the question is even asked, You know though, no matter how tempting it is to be abrupt and cut them off because you know you have far more important things to do, you must let them talk. Let them get it out, look them in the eye when they ask the question, yes the question maybe one asked many times before but not by them so LISTEN—HEAR IT!

Wait.
When someone comes to you with a question or situation they feel is important, don’t be too quick to answer or provide a solution straight away, let them SPEAK and you LISTEN. You may well have the answer on the tip off your tongue, but slow down, don’t blurt it out, you can gain a lot of respect and credibility by simply delaying the response, wait a second or two and in-between a “yes, that’s a good question”, gives you time to think about the tone and attitude you use to deliver your response. Your response, if well thought out won’t be patronisng or demeaning, instead it will make them feel valued and important and WOW they will even think they’ve asked the BOSS a question he’s had to stop and think about!

Can I get back to you?
Let’s face it though, sometimes we’re too busy to employ such tactics. However, you don’t have to say, “I don’t have time for you now, go away.” You can still build value and camaraderie if you accept and understand that any question is important! You need to get across that ‘YES’ you appreciate the value of the question but in order to give it the attention it deserves you need more time than you have right now to deal with it. As an example, (you don’t want to cut someone off and make them feel un-important so you might say something like;) “Listen, Steve/Sue, I think I know what you’re getting at, and it’s a really good point; which we do need to talk about, but, I need more time to figure it out. I’ve only got a few minutes now so let’s meet first thing Friday and we can give it the attention it really deserves.”

Can you help me?
You can give commands and orders all day long. However, it is often better to ask for help instead. For instance when you have to delegate tasks, especially tedious or labor intensive ones, people can feel “dumped on” They’re at the bottom of the pecking order, the lowest employee, so you dump the worst jobs on them. No one wants to feel worthless and it’s never your intention to make them feel this way, so why not try a different approach and ask for ‘HELP’ with a ‘PROJECT’ it humanises you, ‘the BOSS needs my help Instead of Graham/Ann, make sure you empty the shredders in the accounting department and dispose of the rubbish correctly…” Why not try something more like this: Graham/Ann, I really need your help… You know the shredders in accounts have been down for a few days, there fixed now but there’s a backlog? It’s really important we handle the sensitive information properly, can you make sure it’s disposed of properly? thank you” People respond when asked to ‘HELP’ instead of being ‘TOLD’

Ineffective communication is like a cancer, if it isn’t detected early, it will grow and spread quickly throughout your organisation; directly and indirectly it will cost your company precious time and a lot of money. Effective Communication is a process, and an ‘Effective communication skills will increase productivity, bring down costs, thereby enhancing your bottom line!

Happy Communicating

Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Sales Training
http://www.mtdsalestraining.com

Why say only five words when a thousand will do!

Sounds like any salespeople in your company? It might even be you!

Do you tend to waffle when answering questions from your prospects?

The thing is, we waste far too much time in explaining what we mean.

What we want are precise and concise communications right?

Of course we do!

Well, here is a useful exercise to use to really focus your key messages to really hit home what you want to say to your prospects and clients.

Here’s what to do:

Take one of the key questions you get asked the most like “Who have you worked with?” or “What makes you different?”

Then, write down an answer to the question using 50 words only.

You MUST use all 50 words up.

Then, analyse what has been written.

Next, answer the same question but this time you can only use 30 words and you must use them all up.

Analyse what you have written and explore the challenges and difficulties that you have had in reducing the number of words.

What did you miss out and why?

Did you end up with something completely different?

Did it make more sense than the 50 word explanation?

After you have completed this task do exactly the same process but this time you have got only 15 words to play with.

Go through the results again but this time compare it to the 50 word answer.

I’ll bet that the 15 word answer better explains in a nut-shell what you wanted to say. Obviously you will need to expand on your answer but this will clarify the main points you need to make.

Until the next time, take care of yourself and happy selling!

Sean

Growing up in the 70’s and 80’s I always remember that my Nan always used to love watching a comedy programme called "Mind Your Language".

For those of you who do not remember the show it was about a night school class that taught English to ethnic minorities.

For those of you who do remember the show you are showing your age along with me!

Thinking back about the show I don’t think you would get away with airing the programme now in our very politically correct environment.

The reason why I mentioned that is because I was driving back home from Capital One Bank in Nottingham having just had a successful one on one coaching session and I was
reviewing over in my mind what we had just covered.

We were talking about the language patterns that he was using when communicating to people and how to improve this.

I said to him "You need to mind your language!" and hence I thought of that show!

Now, it’s not language as in swearing or slang or anything like that.

The language I mean is the intensity of the words that you use with your prospects and clients.

Let me give you an example from the session:

My client said to me that he wanted to talk about how good his team were to his boss and what their current workloads were like so that he could ask for an additional member of staff.

"I’m going to show him all of the work we complete and what achievements we have made and then I am going to ask him to attend an issues meeting with me to discuss the additional headcount"

"Issues meeting?" I said "That sounds like trouble to me?"

"Oh no" replied the client "I just want to go over my plan of what additional resource we need and why"

"So why are you calling it an issues meeting?" I said "Issues to me mean problems and BIG PROBLEMS at that"

"I don’t view issues as problems" said the client

"I appreciate that, but I DO and your boss might do as well"

The learning from that example:

You need to be very careful with the terminology that you use when communicating with people.

What do issues mean to you?

Small problems?

Big problems?

A challenge?

Niggly problems?

There are no right or wrong answers here It all depends on the meaning that you give to the word.

You see, if I were asked to an issues meeting I would think that we are going to cover some major issues!!!

If I were asked to attend "A meeting to discuss resourcing" I would know why I was attending and would have some idea of what we would be covering.

Let me give you an additional example of where the use of the wrong word can lead to all sorts of assumptions!

Many years ago, just before I set up MTD, I was project manager for a new company launch. Everything went so smoothly it was too good to be true and to be honest I was the talking point of the company of how well
the team had done under my leadership.

The Chief Exec flew over from Canada and sat me down to review what I had done.

"Yes, well done" he said "You did a reasonable job"

At that point I had to bite my lip!

"REASONABLE?" I thought "Is that all he can say REASONABLE?"

I was so angry it was unreal!!

"What sort of a word is reasonable?" I thought afterwards

Reasonable to me was never good enough, reasonable was not even a good job to me.

Well, to cut a long story short, I went to one of the break out areas for a "calming down coffee" and proceeded to tell one of my fellow Directors what had just happened who replied with..

"Reasonable? Is that what he said Sean?"

"Yes!" I said in a really miffed voice

"You got a reasonable out of MR X? - WOW, you must have done an awesome job! He never gives praise to anyone and when he says reasonable it’s the equivalent of AWESOME to us"

And with that I learned a lesson and I would like you to learn the same lesson as well…..

MIND YOUR LANGUAGE!

Be careful with the words that you personally use and be mindful of the words that others use to you.

What does good mean to you?

What does excellent mean to you?

What about reasonable?!

By saying the right words with the right tonality and inflection in your voice you can literally move mountains or start wars within your company and can AFFECT your sales dramatically in either direction!

Latch on to the kind of words your prospects and clients use and then use the exact same words

And on that note, all that’s left to be said is to have a great day………….if great means anything to you that is?

Live, love and laugh!
 
Sean