The Sales Manager needs concrete and not generalized information to make his decisions. You must then be very attentive to the deformations of communication, metamessages and the strategies of sellers to make you wrong or get something undeserved from you.
I always say in my manager training that the success of a sales manager is at stake in every response to his salespeople. After several years of experience managing sellers, I have realized that most of us are cyclothymic, (I say we are because I have never stopped being a seller), we are usually euphoric one day, wanting to make each of the visits a sale; and instead other days, eager to change jobs, thinking that we are not good to sell or that the company is not ideal or that the product is no longer the same as before.
In addition there is another very pronounced characteristic in the sellers and it is, also mostly, the lack of will. Perhaps some readers will disagree when reading this, especially if they are a seller, but let me explain why I think most sellers have not yet forged their proactive attitude, their willingness to do things for themselves without the need for an answer. from your manager, from your leader's incentive. It is very simple, if the seller knows how to sell, knows how to convince another person of a product or service, why does he not sell his own product or service? Why is he not independent if he can even convince an investor to invest in his business? and your customers to buy from it? Yes, you will have understood, because you do not have the will to do it on your own,Because he does not like to face that challenge alone and because it is more comfortable, for now, that all that challenge is in the hands of his manager and the company that hires him.
Concluding this introduction to the topic, if we agree that the seller is cyclothymic and that he needs the constant incentive to carry out his management, then he will understand that each response from his manager, supervisor or leader is vital to achieve the expected success. I do not believe in managers who say that the seller "must" do his job, "must" visit, "must" be proactive, "must" have the will to start the day seeing customers and end the day closing sales. Leaving the sales task to the will of the sellers is suicide. Very few sellers are what I call "crazy about sales" and describe in my book of the same name. And those alone can't achieve their overall sales department goal. If you are a manager, if you are a supervisor or a leader in sales,What you need is a method, a system, a strategy and above all, PROVIDE A SMART ANSWER TO EACH QUESTION FROM YOUR SELLERS. In this note we will talk about this last part, which I mark in capital letters, because it is precisely a capital activity in the management of sales management.
The Sales Manager needs concrete and not generalized information to make his decisions
You must then be very attentive to the deformations of communication, metamessages and the strategies of sellers to make you wrong or get something undeserved from you.
Metamessages
What are they?. Most of the sentences have two levels of meaning. The first level is basic information that is communicated with grammatical words and sentences. The second, called a metamessage, includes the attitudes and feelings of the person who communicates. Metamessages are responsible for most of the conflicts between people. At the first level a phrase may be logical and reasonable, but deep within the second level it may indicate aggression, guilt, or liveliness to get something of your own. A very clear example of a metamessage is for example when someone says to him: "don't go worrying about what I'm going to tell you", obviously on the first level you hear that you shouldn't worry, but on the second level you understand that what follows is to worry about.
The most important thing in communicating with an employee is to hear what they are not saying. Peter Drucker
Here are some examples of how your response to vendor metamessages can complicate your leadership:
Manager: "John did not notice that today would be late for a family problem"
Seller: "I never do that"
meta - message: I would or not as you respond
If the manager responds: "That's what I expect from you," the salesperson will never do it.
Instead, he responds: "Sometimes there are understandable problems." The salesperson finds the answer he was looking for so that he could ever use that excuse.
Manager: "I would like to know your opinion about what to do with this problem"
Salesman: "You are going to find a better solution, tell me what you decide to do and I will do it"
Metamessage: I do not want to be responsible for the decision. Take it, so I can criticize it if I don't like it »
If the manager responds, "I still want to hear your opinion, and I want to work it out together," the seller is forced to be part of the decision.
If instead he responds: "Thank you for your trust in me, I will communicate the solution to you later" the seller finds the answer he was looking for in order to be able to act as he sees fit, criticizing the resolution or saying that he would have done better before his colleagues.
These are just a few examples of how managers can carry out good leadership if they learn to understand their salesperson's metamessages and respond based on what they interpret rather than just what they hear. Let's look at other cases, which I call precision language.
The Language of Precision
Korzybsky, an intelligence officer in the Russian army, based in the USA and father of the PNL (1879-1950), has shown that language deviates from experience according to the following three processes: suppression, which we will call omission, generalization and distortion. He could not afford to make wrong decisions based on widespread information from his subordinates in the military, and this led him to a world famous study of general semantics.
In the same way, a manager cannot be guided by what he hears from his salespeople and, at first glance, make a decision or a position in front of his team, without taking into account what I am going to tell you about the language of precision.
| OMISSION | Examples | Manager's Questions | Effect sought |
| Simple omission. | I disagree. | With what?, | Find what
missing the object of the verb. Specify the answer in search of a commitment from the seller. |
| I'm thinking about it. | How much did you already think? What conclusion would you reach if you had to make the decision now? What makes you think the most? What is your biggest question about it and what do you think you can make a decision without thinking? | ||
| Deletion of the index
reference. |
This matters little to me, | Exactly what? |
Looking at these examples, you will have found many in your management that are similar. In my classes I show more than forty similar ones where the managers risk their image and leadership, but the ones that seem most important to me are those that condition a response YES or NO, because at those times, being skilled, you can get no not only valid information to respond, but also an action of the seller in response that leads to more sales.
Do not answer YES, always ask:
Re-questioning allows knowing how to act, how to respond, knowing what the seller's true intention is and, more importantly, provoking action in favor of more sales.
Seller: What discount can we give this customer?
"Usual" answer: 10% do.
Smart answer: At what discount do you close it now? Or what would you do if I don't give you a discount this time to close the sale anyway?
Lets know what the expectation is, invites you to think creatively about another form of solution…
Seller: Buying 3 units, what discount can I give the customer?
“Usual” answer: For that amount we can leave it to X the unit.
Smart Answer: Is he going to give you the down payment check now, do you close it today?
Causes the closing action, gives value to the discount granted to the seller. Later the seller will not ask for a quantity discount again if he is not sure that this will lead him to close the sale because he knows that you will condition it to be so.
Seller: Can I leave earlier today?
“Usual” answer: Yes.
Smart Answer: Can you finish this difficult report this week?
It gives value to the permission, allows to demand something in return.
Several times I have heard that the question is impolite, that it is not correct or due; in fact at a seminar in Bolivia one of the attendees said to me: "Why do you always answer with a question?" And I replied: "Why do you ask?" Let me tell you that several years of sales management, with excellent results, enable me to advise you not to neglect, on the contrary, "take care" of each of your responses because these are your moments of truth, your moments of leadership, moments that will add up to take you to sales success.
