Success Principles from Ron Willingham

Ron Willingham, in Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), gives 10 "success principles," one at the end of each chapter.

Here are they are:

1. "People are more apt to listen to you when they veel good about you--when they feel they can trust you!" (p. 11)

2. "People are more apt to buy from you when they perceive you view the world as they view the world."

3. "People are more apt to buy when they're talking than when you're talking." (p. 35)

4. "People are more apt to respond to information you ask for than to information you freely give them." (p. 46)

5. People are more apt to buy when you communicate end-results benefits than when you communicate only the product or service features." (p. 60)

6. People are more apt to understand your offering when they experience it, than when they just hear about it." (p. 73)

7. "People are more apt to believe what others say about you than what you say about yourself." (p. 85)

8. "People are more apt to believe you when they see a congruence between wheat you say and who you are." (p. 99)

9. "People are more apt to negotiate when you ask their opinions than when you press your opinions." (p. 111)

10. "People are more apt to see your side of the argument when you first see their side." (p. 124)

"But I'm starting a business, what's this got to do with sales?" you ask. I have to reiterate, it's all sales. In order to generate revenue through sales, you have to sell products. You may not be selling specific products, but you're selling the public on your business, and that's sales.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Approaching Different Kinds of Buyers

Willingham, in Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987, pp. 41-43, does not recommend categorizing prospects immediately. Rather, engage them in conversation, not relating to what you're selling, and learn about them. the first meeting will be a meet and greet. Then, when you're done, think about what kind of buyer they are.

This is good advice, as you shouldn't try to close before it's time to do so, and you don't know your prospect well enough to understand what he or she needs, much less wants. But you've listened to them talking, and you have some preliminary ideas about what group each buyer may fall into.

Remember, everybody is a mix. You need to acquire a different kind of persona depending on the person to whom you are talking so that you can match his style.

Here are a few questions to ask each type. Remember these are just sample questions. You need to evolve your own, but these should get you going:

For Talkers:

"Who will be involved in using the product or service?"
"What do other people like or don't like about what they've been using."
"How will morale be influence?"
"Who else will be involved in the final decision?"
"How do you feel about my product?"

For Doers:

"What do you want to accomplish?"
"What do you want to happen that isn't happening now?"
"What can I do to save you time?"
"How important is it to them to get more done?"
"What problems have they had that you can help them solve?"

For Controllers:

"What return on investment are you looking for?"
"What would help their organization run more efficiently?"
"What are the questions that call for facts and specific answers?"
"What do you do to manage your job most efficiently?"

For Plodders:

"What would help you do their job better?"
"What risks can you help them avoid?"
"What details do you need explained?"
"What's worked for you in the past?"
"Can you help me out?"

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #10: The closing is a Victory for Both

Willingham's final point, on p. xv of Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), "Closing isn't just a victory for the salesperson. It's a victory for bothh the salesperson and the customer."

Actually I don't see the closing as a victory for the salesperson. It's his job. The closing is a win for the buyer. In real estate, it's a win for both the buyer and the seller. The agent's win comes later when he or she has a friend for life, when the buyer says, "Thank you so much, you changed our lives."

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #9: Negotiation is Never Manipulation

As Willingham says on p. xv of Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), "Negotiation is never manipulation. It's always a strategy to work out problems....when prospects want to work out problems."

The best way to avoid the urge to manipulation is to understand what your customers are looking for and to answer or her questions ahead of time so that you don't get any problems. If you do your job right, your customers won't ever object because you know what they want and have shown them the way before you ever try to close the sale. That way you can structure a deal with which everyone can live with.
eels comfortable.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #8: Selling Pressure

Willingham says that "selling pressure is never exerted by the salesperson. It's exerted only by prospects when they perceive they want ot need the item being sold." See Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv.

Truth: No one ever sells anything to anybody else. That's why sales has such a bad reputation. Too many people tried to take shortcuts and intimidate people into buying something. Down deep, this kind of person hates himself or herself and thinks the only way he or she can make money if they manipulate the buyer.

Actually, people buy things, salesmen don't sell things. A good salesperson understands what he or she is selling, understands the client's needs and wants, and positions his or her product or service in such a way that the buyer wants to buy it.

You need to keep this in mind as you develop products for sale.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #7: Ethics and Values Contribute More Than Do Techniques or Strategies

Willingham's 7th point: "A salesperson's ethics and values contribute more to sales success than do techniques and strategy." See Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv.

A story: a commercial and a residential realtor shared a client. This particular client, the residential realtor had referred to the commercial realtor.

The client wanted to get money from his property. He could find a renter for it or sell it, but first he had to evict a squatter, a person living in there without paying rent. The client finally got the squatter out of there finally and changed the locks and sent them to the commercial realtor.

The residential realtor called the commercial realtor and asked if he could get copies to him. The commercial office was pretty far across town and the property was equally distant between the two offices.

The commercial guy said they keys would be at his office for the residential realtor to pick up. The residential realtor asked the commercial guy, could he have his people make copies of the keys and have them ready for the residential realtor.

The commercial guy called the residential realtor lazy and a prima donna for expecting the commercial realtor's staff to "drop everything" and do for the residential realtor. The residential realtor had to go over to the commercial office, pick up the keys, have them copied, check them to make sure they work, then take the keys back.

The moral: Don't e like this. Pay it forward. If I had been the commercial guy, I would have said, "I'll have the keys copied and dropped off at your office within 24 hours.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #6: Integrity and High Ethics

Willingham's point: "Integrity and high ethics are accepted as the basis for long-term selling success." See Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv.

Here's an example of the opposite. I have had a web designer managing my website for about a year now. He's done a good job, given freely of his expertise and done what I needed in a timely fashion for a reasonable price. I've always paid him on time, too.

Yesterday, after a couple of days of discussion over some things I wanted him to do for me, I got an email from him. He said,

I think it's time you found someone else to work on your website and blogs. You and I seem to have some fundamental differences on how things should be done and I can't keep you on as a client if we continue down this path. As it is right now I can't even include you in my business portfolio and I've seen no benefits in keeping you on as a 'local' contact. This is where we part ways, I wish you good luck in the future.

Point, Set, Match. Not even, let's talk about how we can work together better. Integrity and high ethics would demand such discussions.

I feel like asking him for my money back, but I won't. I won't spread any rumors about him, but he's not likely to get any recommendations from this desk unless we have a talk.

Looked at from his side, the relationship was not working for him. If you have that in your life, talk to your client or customer. Maybe you'll figure out something or if it's not going to work, you'll leave your client with a good feeling about you. But this is not that.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #5: Selling Techniques and Selling Principles

The fifth point Willingham develops is "Selling Techniques Give Way to Selling Principles." See Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv.

For Willingham, selling is based on a system founded on values and integrity. [p. xii] Values can be personal, cultural, religious, or other kinds. Integrity, or credibility, are based on values. You can't sell if your efforts aren't values based. This is too often ignored by untrustworthy people

I've been in a number of situations in which people tried to sell me stuff before they found out anything about me. One was a video phone salesman with whom I though I was just having lunch. It turns out he brought his sales materials and tried to recruit me to his team. Another time I met with a financial consultant who, without telling me brought her manager along who tried to recruit me into the business. The third time was a seller of home security systems who brought his manager, without checking with me first, who tried to push his stuff on me.

Each of these products are good and useful, and the people who transgressed meant no harm. Because none of these people laid a groundwork of trust, they weren't successful, and their misguided efforts closed off any meaningful discussion we might have had about stuff that might have made a difference.

Lesson: if you're scheduled to have lunch with somebody, and you haven't made sure it's okay with them that you try to sell them something, don't try to sell them something.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #4: Develop trust and rapport

Ron Willingham's fourth point is, "Develop trust and rapport before any selling activity begins." See Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv.

This is too often ignored, and ignoring it causes you to beg (See Todd Duncan's sales mistake #8). You have to develop trust first. And how do you get people to trust you? Act in a trustworthy manner. If you wonder what this is, see my early postings earlier in this blog.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #3: Understanding People's Wants or Needs

Ron Willingham says: "Understanding people's wants or needs must always precede any attempt to sell." See Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv.

Not understanding this risks making Todd Duncan's sales mistake #6: Arguing, not understanding the customer before trying to sell him or something., is that sales is something you do with someone not to someone. You always have to base your selling efforts on knowing what your customer needs and wants.

But I think Willingham glides over this point a little too easily. Wants and needs are separate. A need is something that a person requires as determined by a third party. A want is a perceived need and is determined by the person.

Example: My teenage son comes to me and says, "Dad, I need a car." I ask him why he needs a car. He says, "I need to get to school, and all the guys have cars." Never mind that we live across the street from the school and only two kids, each of whom lives several miles away from school and have after-school jobs not near a bus line and have gotten special permission to drive rather than take the bus. He doesn't "need" a car, he "wants" a car. Result: I buy him no car.

Now consider this: My son comes to me and says "I need a suit," even though he's never won anything by jeans and t-shirts in his life. I ask him why he needs a suit, he says "I have a job interview." Okay, he needs a suit. Hence I buy him a suit.

But, this difference aside, always understand the person before you try to sell him anything.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #2: Something You Do With Someone

Ron Willingham second point, in Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv, is that sales is something you do with someone not to someone.

The traditional idea that a good salesperson could sell refrigerators to Eskimos, forget it. You work with customers to find out what they need, gain their trust, then help them make the decisions that allow them to buy the things they need to realize their dreams. With the coming days of mass customization, you'll be able to design a separate project for each customer.

Think of yourself as a consultant. Customers will even help you design your products if you will let them.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling Point #1: Exchange of Value

Ron Willingham, in Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987), p. xv, says the first point of integrity selling is that "selling is an exchange of value." You're giving something to somebody else and getting something in exchange.

It may not be money. You may have sold a colleague on the fact that you an expert in your field. You've sold him on your reputation and maybe he's sold you on his. What you've exchanged is the potential for mutual referrals.

If it's a product, you're giving him a shoe in exchange for money. If the shoe costs $50, you're getting $50, and he's getting comfort, or style, or convenience, or status, or something.

If it's a service, you're getting money and the pride of having helped that person achieve his or her goals. As a real estate agent, the greatest payment is to hear someone say, "You changed our lives, we can never pay you enough."

The value you're getting is not just the money, but the pride and satisfaction from having given something to somebody that that somebody values.

The thing you have to figure out is what you're customer is buying.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.

Integrity Selling

If Todd Duncan pointed out things you should avoid, Ron Willingham in Integrity Selling; How to Succeed in Selling in the Competitive Years Ahead (New York: Doubleday, 1987) gives you 10 elements of things to base your selling practice on.

To reiterate, an entrepreneur is a salesperson, so everything about sales applies to him or her.

You will notice the publication date on this book, 1987, is over 20 years ago. It shows that sound sales principles do not change with the times. They're just as valid today as they were then.

Willingham doesn't define "integrity," so how about this one from Wikipedia, the free, on-line encyclopedia:

In general, integrity refers to wholeness, in the sense of unity, consistency, purity, unspoiledness and uncorruptedness.

The etymology of the word integrity stems from the Latin adjective integer (whole, complete). In this context, integrity may comprise the personal inner sense of wholeness deriving from (say) honesty and consistency of character. As such, one can judge that others "have integrity" to the extent that one judges whether they behave according to the values, beliefs and principles they claim to hold.

Integrity comprises perceived consistency of actions, values, methods, measures and principles. As a holistic concept, it judges the quality of a system in terms of its ability to achieve its own goals. A value system's abstraction depth and range of applicable interaction may also function as significant factors in identifying integrity due to their congruence or lack of congruence with empirical observation. A value system may evolve over time while retaining integrity if those who espouse the values account for and resolve inconsistencies.

Integrity may be seen as the quality of having a sense of honesty and truthfulness in regard to the motivations for one's actions. The term "hypocrisy" is used in contrast to integrity for asserting that one part of a value system demonstrably conflicts with another, and to demand that the parties holding apparently conflicting values account for the discrepancy or change their beliefs to improve internal consistency.

I think Willingham would agree with this.

Here are the 10 ingredients in selling, as laid out in Willingham's "Statement of Integrity Values and Ethics:

1. Selling is an exchange of value.

2. Selling isn't something you do to someone, it's something you do for and with someone.

3. Understanding people's wants or needs must always precede any attempt to sell.

4. Develop trust and rapport before any selling activity begins.

5. Selling techniques give way to selling principles.

6. Integrity and high ethics are accepted as the basis for long-term selling success.

7. A salesperson's ethics and values contribute more to sales success than do techniques or strategies.

8. Selling pressure is never exerted by the salesperson. It's exerted only by prospects when they perceive they want or need the item being sold.

9. Negotiation is never manipulation. It's always a strategy to work out problems...when prospects want to work out the problems.

10. Closing isn't just a victory for the salesperson. It's a victory for both the salesperson and the customer.

I don't see anything on this list either with which Todd Duncan would disagree. As we go forward, we're going to unpack this list. Come to think of it, I don't think there's anything in Willingham's statement that Duncan would disagree with. In fact, I think they would get along quite well.

What do you think about this? Post a comment to this blog.

This is some of the stuff that will go into my entrepreneurship course. The ideas in it supply the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.