What are we telling the next generation about ethics in business? Ethics isn’t just for accounting, ethics is about who you are and how you live your life – even if you’re a salesperson…
What Would Momma Think?
By Tim Moore
Published by Carolina Newswire
I was at a networking event this month and a small business owner was telling me about a sales trainer he had seen recently and all the “tricks” the trainer revealed about how to get through to a prospect and close the sale. I asked if he thought these “techniques” were ethical. What he said next surprised me.
He said “I don’t care how my salespeople get the order, as long as they get the order”. I was stunned.
In my opinion, that is a real problem. If the management and business owners of companies in this country don’t care about how they or their employees conduct business, what message does it send to the salespeople on the street? It makes me wonder what is being taught in business schools at Universities and colleges nowadays.
I don’t know about you, but I was raised to believe that being open, transparent, honest, and above all to always seek the truth of the other person, is the basis of any honest human relationship. My momma spent many hours teaching me to always be truthful and that lying was a bad thing. These principals don’t change just because someone is a salesperson.
Over the past 30 years I have spent many an hour in corporate sales trainings where some “sales guru” was paid a lot of money to come in and help us understand, in a very subtle manner, that there’s nothing wrong with using manipulative “techniques” to get the sale.
A Bad Rap
There lots of these “tricks”, including things like pretending to return a message when making a cold call or telling someone their manager told you to call them and they should work with you. These are all designed to confuse the prospect and lower their resistance.
That’s the core reason why traditional selling has gotten such a bad name and why “salesperson” has become such a negative stereotype. What these “technique trainers” are saying to you is that in the selling process, not telling the truth is justified. They think that lying is the only way to overcome sales resistance.
The problem is that these “technique trainers” are doing more damage than they realize. They are promising a short cut, but in reality, they are the ones that are creating the vicious cycle of mistrust. This is why the end never justifies the means. The “technique trainers” don’t understand the damage they have done to the sales profession and continue to do as they teach these unethical practices to young salespeople everyday.
Professional Sales
The truth is that sales can be an honorable profession and true sales professionals never stoop to ticks and untruths in order to get the sale. What the traditional sales trainers don’t understand is that if you stop using these unethical sales techniques, prospects will feel less threatened. When the prospect knows that he/she can trust the salespeople, resistance from prospects will disappear. The result will be a selling process that is no longer a cat-and-mouse game, but an atmosphere of human relationship building.
If you’re not willing to tell the truth, that makes trust impossible. If you will just focus on letting trust grow, you can discover your prospect’s truth and determine if there is a good fit.
The Comparison
Here are some differences between the “anything goes to get the order” and the way Dancing Elephants feels is a better approach for your business.
Old traditional sales techniques still teach that you should:
Ethical selling is a better way – why not quit the games and just:
The Momma Test
In your personal life do you tolerate relationships with people who are comfortable not telling you the truth, and people that what to manipulate you?
If you wouldn’t feel comfortable using your “sales techniques” on your Momma then you shouldn’t use them on your clients and prospects.
The next time you are in a sales training and some “sales guru” wants show a short cut to sales using tricks and techniques, remember that what sounds good and clever for the moment might be the reason your business is suffering once you use the methods later.
Truly professional salespeople build relationships based on integrity, honesty, and truth.
~
Tim Moore is Principle and Owner of the Dancing Elephants Achievement Group of the Carolinas. His mission is to show entrepreneurs and salespeople how to make more money in less time than they ever thought possible. Tim fills his days with teaching classes, private coaching and making presentations around the country. For more information, visit www.saleselephant.com or send an email to Tim@deagsales.com .
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Shook out the cobwebs and made me remember some things that I had stopped doing.