Confessions of a Salesman

I am not really sure there are any disadvantages to Internet leads but for sure there are a couple of points you should keep in mind.

Firstly and perhaps most importantly:

‘Today’s CUSTOMERS are better informed and can SMELL BULLSHIT miles off!!’

Search engines and the power of the Net enable your potential customer to research and on many occasions know more about a product than the person doing the selling.

This is neither good nor bad. It is just progress.

The challenge with this for some sales people is that the days of making outrageous claims and being misleading is well and truly over (a good thing too, I say).

Any comment you make for your product or your competitors’ can be checked out in seconds on Google. Hey, some customers will even conduct that search in front of you in their home – so watch out!

The remarkable thing I find is that some sales people are still trying to get away with this – and they are also usually the sales people who say that Internet leads are &%*!

In a recent survey I read that introverts are now out-performing extroverts in the field of selling. Introverts ask more questions, are more consultative in their style of selling and are, above all, better listeners.

Times have changed, but the challenge is that so many sales people go around with their heads in the sand pretending it is still the ‘good old days’ and thinking/hoping that potential customers will believe everything they say.

Customers are now more aware of the product options – the upgrades and additions available with their purchase. Weak sales people who are price-sensitive are often guilty of trying to sell the lowest specification product just because they feel that the lower the price, the more likely the sale.

For example, selling a conservatory or sunroom without the latest hi-tech solar glazing – and even claiming to a customer it is not really necessary, when the overwhelming evidence from an online search is that such glazing is essential if you wish to use your conservatory/sunroom all year round.

Likewise, selling replacement windows with the bare minimum of openings, again because it reduces the cost.

With so many online articles featuring ‘Top Tips’ and advice on just about every subject under the sun it is essential that sales people conduct themselves in an honest and respectful way. (Well, it has always been that way – but let’s say, in times past, less scrupulous sales people may have got away with their lies.

In Marketing speak - Internet leads are passive leads

By that, I mean the buyer has consciously decided to go online and do a search for the product they are considering buying. Indeed, it is my experience that lots of customers, including those who don’t actually make an enquiry online, use the Internet for research with their offline purchases.

This also applies to researching the company they may decide to buy from. For example, entering your company name and adding the word ‘complaints’ as a search term in Google.

Some people may not like it, but there is no question that the Internet has given today’s consumers tools that just a few years ago were unimaginable.

Very Important Point

To avoid any confusion here – I am stating that the marketing method is PASSIVE – i.e. this is not ‘in your face’ marketing such as telemarketing or door-to-door. It is PASSIVE because for want of better words, there is no ‘pressure’ on the potential customer – if they decide to contact you it is very much up to them.

Of course, the important point to appreciate here is that the customer is not passive – in fact, far from it, they are actually very active, motivated buyers and as such need a different approach to that which may be used with leads obtained from a more ‘active’ form of marketing.

Anyway - Back to ‘Passive’ leads

As I said, for the purposes of this marketing explanation, a passive lead is one from a motivated consumer who has actively decided to go out and seek a supplier for a particular product.

A passive lead is quite different from a cold-called lead, a telephone canvassed lead or an in-store promotion lead. It requires a different approach and even, dare I say it, a different calibre of sales person.

Let me relate from personal experience...

Way back when I was a young salesman I was, even if I say so myself, a bit of a superstar. Not only was I a very good closer, but I was also extremely effective at generating my own leads (cold calling).

The company I worked for had a policy that, if you proved yourself with your own leads, they would give you company-generated leads – typically from Yellow Pages.

At that time, the idea of being given a lead was, to me, amazing and so when I was eventually given my first Yellow Pages leads I was very excited.

As you’ve probably guessed, I failed to sell a single one out of the first five Yellow Pages leads I was given. This was shocking for me, as I typically closed one in two leads.

I can remember telling my sales manager quite strongly that I didn’t want any more %&*! Company leads.

Of course the issue was not the leads. The issue was me but fortunately I had an excellent sales manager who was able to put me right. Thinking back on it, I’m pretty sure he knew I was going to fail with the first batch of company leads but he just knew we would have to do it that way, in order for me to learn.

For those of you who would like to know, my sales manager explained the difference between a lead generated by PASSIVE means and a COLD CALL lead rather well.

He said that with a passive lead, the customer already has a reason to contact you. It is your job as a sales person to discover, by asking questions, what that reason is. In addition, it is almost certain that a level of trust in your business has already been established if a prospect decides to contact you.

On the other hand, with a cold call lead it is up to you to give the customer the REASONS to do business with you. After all they did not have a reason to contact you in the first place.

Quite a different approach to selling, I think you will agree.

So for some sales people, leads produced by a passive marketing method are more difficult to convert. But who is the more qualified buyer – a lead generated from passive marketing or a cold-called lead? I would suggest - actually, I know it is the passive lead that is strongest!

Final thought:

Of course what may be a negative to one sales person can, with imagination, be a positive to another. Make it your job to be the sales person who finds the positives.

Winning With Internet leads

The Pros and Cons