MinnesotaEric
Super Member
I thought I'd cross-post something I wrote in the hopes that maybe one dealer or one territory rep would read it, take it to heart and try to raise the level of salesmanship and professionalism. I must have shopped two dozen different dealers in two months trying to find a tractor, but also trying to find a professional who could cross his tees and dot his ayes, and who had the skills and ability to work autonomously without need to go ask for help with every question, or to "ask the boss," if that was okay.
If no other thing is learned, take this to heart: teach your people to return phone calls and when leaving your phone number on voice mail say, who you are, who you're with slowly and then say, "I'll give you my number twice," and say your phone number twice. Why? because the first time you say it, people are scrambling around trying to get a pen to work, and the second time you say it, they got it written down without need to listen to the entire voice mail over again.
Anyway, onto my rant.
Awe, the poor dealer? I comparison shopped and haggled.
As a guy who has at one point been in outside sales and as former a sales manager for outside sales, what astounded me in the entire industry was the lack of professionalism, familiarity and enthusiasm. If a sales cat is going to help people part with tens of thousands of dollars, he or she must understand that in the days of the internet they are a guide, and that their purpose insofar as customers are concerned, is to make everything easy.
Fixed prices remind me of Saturn. Remember them? Great little cars. The marque went under due to lack of sales volume because fixed prices tell me that no matter what, the dealer wants and additional $1500-2000 on top of a normal sales margin, end of quarter spiff, and end of year spiff. And for what? To stare at a computer screen to generate a quote on something you know nothing about and don't have on your lot, so you'll just need to order it anyway?
Reminds me of my last truck purchase. I knew exactly what I wanted but every dealer I visited messed around and wouldn't give me the deal I want (sold cars for a stint too so I understand their business). Eventually, I visited a dealer in a smaller town and I told him I want to order a truck $500 below invoice and the sales guy got it and said, "So all I need to do to get a sale is start saying, 'Yes'?"
Bamb! one of the funner purchases I've done and at the end of the day, the dealer still made $2800.
When I was shopping for a tractor I disclosed up front I wanted to do a cash sale inside of 45 days. The tractor business is so bad at people not returning phone calls, misquoting, producing incorrect or bad information, that I even got on the phone with several different territory reps. And that's when I discovered the source of the problem:
On whole these guys failed to understand that due to the internet, dealers are no longer the gatekeepers of information. The "cloud" is, we are the gatekeepers because we all chatter at each other on the internet and share information.
They failed to understand that sales people are now guides who offer as much or as little information and help and services to customers as needed, but sales people need to determine their "status" immediately in the beginning with the customer.
They failed to understand that due to the flattening of information, sales people need to become familiar with their own product lines and those sales people who cannot do so should be let go. Excuses that everything changes too much don't fly. I sold servers, fiber optic networks, and desktops business to business: do you really think that junk doesn't change every day of every week and then in an industry where 20%, one fifth of everything that gets parked out on your costumers' business will screw up or somehow explode in the first 60 days? That's what being a professional salesperson is all about managing the customers' expectations while making everything as easy as possible.
With the reps I spoke to, on whole, their company culture, or their own biases failed to understand that a sales person who helps people part with tens of dollars at a time will get blown out of the water by a salesperson who helps people part with hundreds of dollars at a time. So too will a sales person who helps people part with thousands of dollars at a time be blown out of the water by the professional who helps people part with tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars at a time. Agg and heavy equipment sales isn't like walking into Radio Shack where the help isn't skilled.
At the same time, I understand that not everybody can be a sales person. To be in sales and be good, sales people must be chatty. By chatty, they must be able to easily drift into conversations, be able to immediately establish empathy with their customer and then guide the customer along the way points of making a sale that satisfies their customers expectations.
When I sold B to B, I knew if I had a guy talking about beer or fishing in the first five minutes, I knew I was going to sell him or her something at some point. It was about establishing relationships, and familiarity with my own product lines where I knew I could provide a solution to my customers needs and meet or exceed their expectations by quickly allowing my customer to frame their expectations for me and identifying with those expectations.
Clumsily staring into a computer screen while attempting to quote a tractor using software you're not familiar with is no way to sell to anybody, let alone assert that the price is the price.
</rant>
If no other thing is learned, take this to heart: teach your people to return phone calls and when leaving your phone number on voice mail say, who you are, who you're with slowly and then say, "I'll give you my number twice," and say your phone number twice. Why? because the first time you say it, people are scrambling around trying to get a pen to work, and the second time you say it, they got it written down without need to listen to the entire voice mail over again.
Anyway, onto my rant.
Awe, the poor dealer? I comparison shopped and haggled.
As a guy who has at one point been in outside sales and as former a sales manager for outside sales, what astounded me in the entire industry was the lack of professionalism, familiarity and enthusiasm. If a sales cat is going to help people part with tens of thousands of dollars, he or she must understand that in the days of the internet they are a guide, and that their purpose insofar as customers are concerned, is to make everything easy.
Fixed prices remind me of Saturn. Remember them? Great little cars. The marque went under due to lack of sales volume because fixed prices tell me that no matter what, the dealer wants and additional $1500-2000 on top of a normal sales margin, end of quarter spiff, and end of year spiff. And for what? To stare at a computer screen to generate a quote on something you know nothing about and don't have on your lot, so you'll just need to order it anyway?
Reminds me of my last truck purchase. I knew exactly what I wanted but every dealer I visited messed around and wouldn't give me the deal I want (sold cars for a stint too so I understand their business). Eventually, I visited a dealer in a smaller town and I told him I want to order a truck $500 below invoice and the sales guy got it and said, "So all I need to do to get a sale is start saying, 'Yes'?"
Bamb! one of the funner purchases I've done and at the end of the day, the dealer still made $2800.
When I was shopping for a tractor I disclosed up front I wanted to do a cash sale inside of 45 days. The tractor business is so bad at people not returning phone calls, misquoting, producing incorrect or bad information, that I even got on the phone with several different territory reps. And that's when I discovered the source of the problem:
On whole these guys failed to understand that due to the internet, dealers are no longer the gatekeepers of information. The "cloud" is, we are the gatekeepers because we all chatter at each other on the internet and share information.
They failed to understand that sales people are now guides who offer as much or as little information and help and services to customers as needed, but sales people need to determine their "status" immediately in the beginning with the customer.
They failed to understand that due to the flattening of information, sales people need to become familiar with their own product lines and those sales people who cannot do so should be let go. Excuses that everything changes too much don't fly. I sold servers, fiber optic networks, and desktops business to business: do you really think that junk doesn't change every day of every week and then in an industry where 20%, one fifth of everything that gets parked out on your costumers' business will screw up or somehow explode in the first 60 days? That's what being a professional salesperson is all about managing the customers' expectations while making everything as easy as possible.
With the reps I spoke to, on whole, their company culture, or their own biases failed to understand that a sales person who helps people part with tens of dollars at a time will get blown out of the water by a salesperson who helps people part with hundreds of dollars at a time. So too will a sales person who helps people part with thousands of dollars at a time be blown out of the water by the professional who helps people part with tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars at a time. Agg and heavy equipment sales isn't like walking into Radio Shack where the help isn't skilled.
At the same time, I understand that not everybody can be a sales person. To be in sales and be good, sales people must be chatty. By chatty, they must be able to easily drift into conversations, be able to immediately establish empathy with their customer and then guide the customer along the way points of making a sale that satisfies their customers expectations.
When I sold B to B, I knew if I had a guy talking about beer or fishing in the first five minutes, I knew I was going to sell him or her something at some point. It was about establishing relationships, and familiarity with my own product lines where I knew I could provide a solution to my customers needs and meet or exceed their expectations by quickly allowing my customer to frame their expectations for me and identifying with those expectations.
Clumsily staring into a computer screen while attempting to quote a tractor using software you're not familiar with is no way to sell to anybody, let alone assert that the price is the price.
</rant>
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