Bob Beck Talks About How Strategic Selling Controls the Sales Cycle

Did you know that to be effective in controlling the sales cycle you need to incorporate strategic selling techniques?

Sales professionals often scratch their heads when I tell them they must control the sales cycle.  The first place you need to focus on is the rules of engagement between the buyer and seller.

Review these rules of engagement. No one is sure why, but they have become the norm.  That doesn’t make them correct. What they do is put the seller  in a subservient relationship  and they are generally misconceived.

Rules of Engagement

1. The customer/prospect is always right.
2. You can’t sell over the phone.
3. People only buy from people they like
4. You can’t control the sales cycle as a salesperson
5. You can’t say no to a prospect.
6. You can’t take control of the sales cycle.
7. Prospects usually buy from the vendor with the lowest price.
8. Executives are not really interested in your solution.
9. Closing is the most important part of the sales cycle.

Strategic selling is about taking control.

Based on the numerous sales professionals we train every year at Sales Builders in our Quid Pro Quo Sales Training,  we find that the top three most common issues sellers face today are:

• Longer than anticipated sales cycles
• Reps chasing unqualified opportunities
• Lack of consistent performance

Many companies are chalking their lack of sales performance up to the current economic conditions. We have found, from years of experience that these same issues exist in good and bad economic conditions. When times get a little tougher, it is the responsibility of sales management to differentiate their sales approach, maybe even more than their value proposition.

This all comes back to breaking the preconceived rules of engagement for selling and controlling the sales cycle with a strategic selling approach.