How to Sell Anything in 5 Easy Steps

Whether you are evangelizing inbound marketing services in Milwaukee or seeking foot traffic for Baby Jesus clothes in Manhattan, you too can become a sales demigod. Here’s how:

1. Eat Your Own Dog Food: At Kuno, we like to ‘dogfood’ it. Whether it’s using HubSpot software or creating advanced content as part of our own inbound marketing efforts – we do it ourselves AND we recommend it to our current and prospective clients. Similarly, if I visit a GM dealership, I would expect my salesperson to be driving a Buick, Cadillac or Chevy. I want them to ‘dogfood’ it, too. It increases their expertise on GM’s vehicles and GM in general. It also underlines their belief and loyalty in what they are selling.
2. Educate Both Ways: In my world, Inbound Marketing is both service focused and technically robust. I need to educate myself on what techniques prospective clients may or may not be familiar with and conversely, I need to educate them on various marketing approaches – on why they may not just need pay-per-click but also why on-site and off-site SEO and consistent blogging would benefit them. Education must weave itself through anything you are selling. Here’s a real life example. I recently went mattress shopping and the mattress salesperson asked me who the mattress was meant for and how many people would be sleeping on it, among other questions. She took time to educate herself about my needs. In turn, she helped educate me on the different levels of quality I could expect at various mattress price points. 
3. Be a Helpsperson – if you are not approaching a sale from the prospective of helping someone, don’t bother. The first rule of sales is … don’t sell, help. As Kuno’s Director of Sales, I want to understand clients’ goals relative to their online presence and help them achieve those goals. My mattress salesperson wanted to help me get a better night’s sleep. “How can I help you,” is what most of us hear when we walk into a store. Unfortunately, that phrase has become so common and perfunctory it’s lost its meaning.
4. Warm Up – I’ll borrow this tip from The Rainmaker Maker (a.k.a. Rick Roberge). Sales is a full contact sport. Whether you’re calling warm or cold leads, it’s important that you limber up. It’s no different from warming up at the gym. Stretch your sales muscles before you strain them – call a happy customer, call a friend, get those vocal cords moving before you have to make that tougher call.
5. Write – Write to sell. When you write, you are internalizing the process or topic you are writing about. As you write you become more of an expert in your field. When you write, you create (hopefully great) content that Google will then index. Writing engages current and future clients. 

Do you use any of the steps above when you sell? If not, do you think they would help? What biggest sales tip would you share with someone interested in increasing their sales?