People buy from people they trust There is a well-known phrase in selling, “People buy from people they know and trust”.  A great quote and certainly true.  Customers prefer to do business with salespeople and businesses they know and trust.  The struggle that most of us face in selling is, “How do I build trust?”.  If you are a new salesperson and don’t have established relationships, this can be difficult.  The most common ways to bolster trust with a customer are actions, such as: Do what you say you will do.  Be honest, sincere, and authentic Care Promptly de ..read more

People buy from people they Trust There is a well-known phrase in selling, “People buy from people they know and trust”.  The struggle that most of us face in selling is, “How do I build trust?”.  If you are a new salesperson and don’t have established relationships, this can be difficult.  Listen in as Greg discusses the actions and Words that build Trust with your prospects and customers ..read more

You Selling You to You Your first customer is you and the first product you sell is YOU!  Might be a tongue twister, but it is true. This is not your standard run of the mill, “Fake it till you make it” message.  I want you to understand that in the beginning and maybe even later in your career, you are going to harbor a lot of self-doubt in sales.  Some of the reasons I feel this happens is due to the nature of the job.  We have to know a lot about our products, our company, our customer’s industry, our competition’s products, the current market forces, and our suppliers ..read more

How to develop your own “Pain Relief” as an Ag Sales Professional Ever thought about your daily selling struggles as pain?  When you decide to go see that difficult customer or collect from that past due account, do you think of it as pain?  If so, then we can jump right into pain relief.  If not, then I really want you to think about your perception of these difficult selling activities.  This may sound negative or counterproductive to being happy as a salesperson.  However, you can’t really fake your way out of feeling the pain.  You might try to ignore it or de ..read more

How to develop your own “Pain Relief” as an Ag Sales Professional Ever thought about your daily selling struggles as pain?  When you decide to go see that difficult customer or collect from that past due account, do you think of it as pain?  If so, then we can jump right into pain relief.  If not, then I really want you to think about your perception of these difficult selling activities.  This may sound negative or counterproductive to being happy as a salesperson Think about going out to fix a customer complaint.  Late delivery or no delivery, product quality issues ..read more

Closing rate # of cold calls to make a sale # appointments Useful or useless?  Make your selling data work for you Sitting in my first official sales training session, one of our company’s top salespeople was giving all of us new salespeople a short training presentation.  One of his opening comments struck me as odd.  Meaning, I didn’t think it was right, but I was too new and inexperienced to say anything. He opened with, “Selling is a numbers game!  If you want to grow your sales, you have to call on more customers”.  He went on to explain, “Let’s say you want to ..read more

Closing rate # of cold calls to make a sale # appointments Useful or useless?  Make your selling data work for you Sitting in my first official sales training session, one of our company’s top salespeople was giving all of us new salespeople a short training presentation.  One of his opening comments struck me as odd.  Meaning, I didn’t think it was right, but I was too new and inexperienced to say anything. He opened with, “Selling is a numbers game!  If you want to grow your sales, you have to call on more customers”.  He went on to explain, “Let’s say you want to ..read more

A Salesperson’s guide to teamwork in a dysfunctional culture Salespeople need to build internal teamwork even when other departments don’t want to. It’s March and most of the agribusiness trade shows are winding down.  You did a great job setting up booths and displaying your latest and greatest products, and you networked.  Oh, how you networked.  You went to the breakfasts, lunches, snack breaks, and evening socials. You met great contacts and agreed to follow up with them soon.  You met prospective customers and promised to follow up. Planting season is at hand for those ..read more

A Salesperson’s guide to teamwork in a dysfunctional culture Salespeople need to build internal teamwork even when other departments don’t want to. It’s March and most of the agribusiness trade shows are winding down. Now, it’s time to get out into the market and follow up.  In other words, deliver on all those promises. Before you do, I want you to accomplish one more networking event.  I want you to do an authentic round of internal networking.  Too many of us that sell in agribusiness feel like we are on an island.   We are remote and seldom see our support teams:  ..read more

See if you or your sales team can answer them When preparing to do a sales training program, I always interview several people on the team. During each of those interviews, I have a short window of time to discover as much as I can about them, their specific strengths/weaknesses, their specific market, and what they want to gain from the training program I’m putting together. In that limited amount of time to interview, I found three questions to be most helpful.  They are indicators of whether or not the salesperson knows what they are doing.  Listen in to learn those three question ..read more