Cold calling still the leading light in new business sales

Real estate agents are not earning enough. Despite the real estate industry having some of the highest income earners in the country only a small number of real estate agents earn over $250,000 per year.With some many offices around the country why are there so few individuals at this level of personal success? Is it really that the way we do business has changed so much that our old ways do not work and we are yet to find our feet in the brave new economy?

A common path to success that has worked for years is cold calling. The question is whether this tried and true approach is still appropriate in today’s web-based sales world. A new study from the Keller Center at Baylor University reaches some interesting conclusions about this important issue.

The details of the study

“134 agents from 10 different geographic areas were divided into two groups. Each group was asked to set aside a different hour each day, for seven days to make cold calls. They used the same script and were asked to record the results of their calls in an on-line form so that the data could be collected in real time. For this study, cold calling was defined as dialing random numbers, from a certain farm area not previously marketed to by the agent. The result was 14 hours of lead generation over 14 days.”

The goal of the study

“The goal was to determine if cold calling as a baseline lead generation activity – cold meaning no experience, no contacts, no database, no marketing, no listings, and no ‘just-solds’ – would generate appointments for agents.”

The Results

71.6 % of all calls failed to reach a live person.
28.4% the agent did connect with a live person with the following results,

  • 14.8 % said they weren’t interested,
  • 2.1 % the agent to call back later.
  • 11.3% agreed to either an appointment or gave a referral
  • It took 208 calls (including all the wrong numbers and no answers)  to get an appointment or referral.

This means for every 60 people the agent actually reached, the agent would either receive a referral or schedule an appointment.

Conclusions from the results

1. If an agent can make 50 calls per hour, speaking with 15 people, it will take them approximately 6 hours to achieve one appointment.

2. Anecdotal evidence of conversion rate suggests a 2-to-1 appointment to closing (listing) ratio. That means for every 12 hours of calls, an agent can expect to achieve 1 listing.

Who can do it?

By the time the sample agents had spent 11 hours cold calling, all 134 had quit calling. Yet the data showed that it takes 12 hours of cold calling to generate a closed deal. In other words, the agents quit one hour short of reaching the 12-hour revenue generating goal.

What does this mean for you and your business?

The conversion ratios from the Baylor study show that 12 hours of cold calling consistently yields one listing. Or if you want to close one listing a week that’s 144 minutes, just on 2 hours, of prospecting a day, 5 days a week.

Is It Worth the Price?

The Baylor study concludes with this important point: “Spending 3 hours a day, cold calling, Monday through Friday can potentially yield $290,063 in total commissions in a year.” This is based on a single listing being worth $4,800 to the agent.

The question it would seem to be; are you willing to work 12 hours a week on the phone to make almost $250,000 personal income.  The answer for most agents is “No.”

But the research from own study of sales ability in Australia is that it is not a question of being willing to cold call but rather; ‘Are you able to Cold Call?’.

The assumption in this study was all sales people are equally able and that they simply  don’t have the inner fortitude. The assumption is if they just showed a bit more backbone or energy or ‘millionaire mindset’ or changed something easy within themselves then they really could do it. They just don’t want to make the extra effort. The assumption is we can change ourselves, or our staff, into effective prospectors with just a little more effort.

So we have focused our attention on hiring staff who want the money in the hope they will want to make the effort. But what if no amount of ‘wanting’ can make the difference when they simple are not suited to it.

As we discussed in a previous article Are your staff to scared to cold call, less than 15 % of people no matter how willing, how well trained or how well managed still CANNOT.

The issue then is not whether cold calling works but whether the individual can cold call. That’s something our Sales IQ Inventory can answer for you and your team.

More on calling:  Are your staff too scared to cold call?

But are your staff too scared to cold call? http://tinyurl.com/cumo6w3

Can Sales Managers change sales results in their staff?

I absolutely disagree that managing people differently will yield significantly different performances. They either have it or they don’t and most people who take on sales roles are earnestly trying their best, so bullying them or bribing them with awards, or tricking them with team activities into more sales results does not work.

If there is a sales person who has it in them, but they are still under-performing, then there are a few very different causes and these need to be addressed differently to allow the person to sell more.

1. Lack of skill – Category 1 i.e. the pure Hunters will eventually work it out without training but while they work it out they will make mistakes which cost them sales and your office it’s reputation. The other selling style staff will always need to be taught how best to sell a particular product before they are able to start selling alone. While selling capacity comes naturally to SIP selected people the process needs to be taught for that capacity to translate into skills and therefore sales.

Sales Management Solution:

a. Training in the specific selling techniques that suit your industry and product

b. Time to practice. This varies between industries. As an example in real estate the average learning time to translate knowledge into effective skills is two years

2. Lack of motivation – even with the very best attributed and trained sales people  they need to WANT THE MONEY. Selling takes energy and if you don’t need the money, even if you could make more, you won’t bother to exert themselves to the level required for sustained success. If they don’t want the money they need their own highly demanding reason to succeed and we (as managers and coaches) cannot give them a reason (i.e. externally set goals). It must be something they really want for themselves.

Sales Management Solution:

a. Help them identify real highly personal reasons to excel

3. Lack of available energy – people’s attention is distracted or energy can be consumed by other issues in their life (divorce, illness and even hobbies) that simply don’t leave them enough juice in the tank to fuel their selling activities. Selling cannot be done well by anyone as an afterthought or secondary focus. This is why  so called ‘selling rock stars’ lose their mojo. I’ve heard so many stories of sales people who ‘used’ to be good. If they really were any good but are mediocre or poor now then there must be something in their lives now that is consuming their energy.

Sales Management Solution:

a. Wait for the external issue to be resolved (or very significantly reduced)

b. Help them manage the external issue better. This is a very low yield solution even with a professional Coach or Psychologist.

c. Consider managing them out of the business. Your energy as a manager can be better spent

For more information on Sales Training, check out our blog here

What is a Sales Excellence Business?

My passion in business is all about creating sales excellence for organizations and sales professionals. I do this by helping my clients expand the sales functions within their businesses. My coaching philosophy has always been based on the three part formula: Select. Teach. Expand.

Select

Firstly, I help businesses recruit sales staff who really do have the capacity to sell.

‘Oh no! Not recruitment!’

I can already hear your agony because getting this right in the past has been fraught with danger. But not so for my clients. We have a time and cost effective way of attracting the best candidates your market has to offer and then short-listing them for interview based directly on their selling capacity. So you are only interviewing and choosing from appropriate candidates for your role who can do the job. Importantly the attraction and short-listing of candidates all happens in the cloud, leaving you free to get on with running your business.

If you want to hear what some of our other clients have been saying about our revolutionary new way to recruit go to: https://mayasaric.com/testimonials/

Teach

The second way we help businesses achieve sales excellence is to help their sales staff realize their personal sales capacity by teaching selling. Starting with understanding the psychology of buying we continue by coaching them through their own professional road blocks by instilling self organization, territory analysis and sales planning.

You can read about my sales training here.

I have been providing sale coaching as a job since 1992 (when I was a sales trainer) to help sales people through the learning curve of selling to work at a level of their personal best. When I registered my business, Corporate Coach Australia, in 1994 it was the only business in Australia to be consciously providing coaching services of any kind to the business sector.

Expand

Finally we teach sales staff to manage their energy and emotions. I know teaching sales process has gone out of fashion and everyone is focused on the internal game. But consider this: if you don’t know what you are supposed to be doing and you are totally disorganized and behind schedule then you should feel lousy. No amount of positive attitude will help if you have missed doing the first two parts properly. Most sales people don’t understand how buyers make choices or how to build trust during selling.

To combat this, I take people through knowing what to do (training) through creating systems that support their activity to consistently working at their peak level through on-going coaching and occasional nagging.

The Future

If you need sales staff who really can sell or are wanting to improve your or your teams sales performance, let’s talk. Call me, Maya Saric, on 0407 005 290

For more articles: find out Why sales staff who ‘hit the ground running’ are bad for your business 

Sales staff who can ‘Hit The Ground Running’ are bad for your business

staff running

There is a belief in the corporate sales world that to hire sales staff who are capable of “hitting the ground running” is a good idea. I’d like to suggest that it’s bad for your business.  Having staff who, the moment they turn up or really soon thereafter, are out there doing their thing without you and without any clear directions, training or preparation is actually detrimental.  Why is this? Well consider this, staff that are capable of ‘hitting the ground running’, without pre-existing product knowledge are also usually capable of creating or choosing outcome.

es that are not in your company’s best interest, because it ‘seemed like a good idea at the time’ and they have the confidence to act alone.

To have the courage to perform alone in an environment where you don’t have all the facts and you don’t have all the answers and you haven’t rehearsed or seen in action the practicalities and details of various alternatives, means that you’re going to go with what seems like a good idea on the day.  The sales rep who is capable of picking up the phone, ‘having a go’ and has good energy for prospecting and creating new opportunities, needs to be well armed before they start.

If you’ve managed to hire such a person, that person is precious and rare, and there are very few of them in the world as a percentage.  If you have one, you need to prepare them.  They need to have the entire product knowledge ready at their disposal.  So, spend a month or two, or depending upon the technical complexity of your product, 3 to 4 months, training that person, teaching that person, having them sit quietly on the corner of another person’s sales call learning; what sort of answers to give, what sort of questions that they will need to ask, and sorts of answers that other reps who do know the product and who have had correct industry experience in your products, will come up with. Don’t leave your company’s sales success resting on what the new person with enthusiasm and energy, bravery and courage is capable of thinking up on the spot.

Sales people who are capable of going out and prospecting, winging it and improvising, are great for new business roles.  They are the sort that every company wants and I encourage you to use the Sales Inventory Profile (SIP) recruitment process to locate yourself some of those people.  But I don’t encourage you to set them free without product knowledge and practise because the ramifications of that is that they will make way more mistakes as they will engage in way more opportunities than the other sorts of reps who need more help and haven’t started without the training.  Sales staff that can’t possibly start without preparation will do very little for you in the first 6 months, but they will do it correctly and precisely later on.

The net effect might be marginally better for the new business style person in terms of closed business, but the bloodshed, for both your clients and for them, could be huge.  If these are prospects and not existing clients, you might never know what the ramifications for the prospects were and by the time anybody else thinks to call on them, if you’re lucky, it would be well and truly forgotten.

The greatest damage to your firm is the effect on your new sales person, as they are much scarcer than prospects in most industries.

The consequences for your sales person who is being demoralised and defeated and denied success regularly at the beginning of their career with you, could be huge in terms of their energy to persist and stay in your business. If you lose this person you haven’t just lost 2 or 5 or even 20 sales in the early stages, but have lost 5 years of on-target sales.

Your new person isn’t going to say “Well, I am an awful sales person and therefore, I should stop selling.”  They are going to say “This product is useless” or “My manager is useless.” Or even worse “My company is useless.” They will be saying to this to themselves to make themselves feel better and to everyone who will listen.  Not only might they give up early on and find themselves a new job, and you have lost somebody really good, but they will project that negative energy during their sales calls before they leave you and long after when talking to others about their old job.

There is a period between when they are all enthusiastic, they are willing to do the job, they are happy to go out, make new clients and they have no fear…all before that point of dissolution and defeat.  So, you need to catch them while they are still fresh and enthusiastic and keen, and teach them well. Teach them about your product, teach them about your industry, teach them the subtleties of closing your sale so that they make only a few mistakes, close a lot of business for you, and feel fabulous about themselves.

So if you think you’re up for having new business reps who really can sell, who really can prospect, who really can hustle, I’d like to encourage you to contact me, Maya Saric at Corporate Coach (0407 005 290) and use the Sales Inventory Profile (SIP) system to recruit some of those people for your team.

For more articles on sales staff and training: Why your receptionist may be your next sales star…

Grow your sales results in 2012/13 with an innovation out to change the way we recruit sales staff

It’s mid-way through 2012, but never too late for big sales by the time Santa comes ’round. Or even by the time the fireworks go off for 2013!

If you or your organization are ready to grow your sales results lets talk!

Corporate Coach Australia, after a few years as a successful boutique provider of sales recruitment and sales enhancement technology to Real Estate and IT companies, has some huge plans for the next few months, and I’m inviting you to support our growth by using our world leading technology to enhance your own sales effectiveness and make this your biggest sales year ever.

If you read our testimonials you will see that the SIP technology has achieved some dramatic success since it’s launch in October 2008. Now we’re planning on changing the face of sales staff recruitment and training.

If you are interested in saving some money and growing your sales ability or the capacity of your team please send me an email to maya@salesinventoryprofile.com for a full price list or if you are reading this on Facebook press the Like button and I will contact you.

If you haven’t heard of Corporate Coach or SIP then here’s some background for you. My name is Maya Saric and in the mid 90’s I undertook extensive research into what attributes individuals need to possess to succeed at selling. I was frustrated as both a sales trainer and a sales manager because I was watching very intelligent and genuine people failing. From that research a sales IQ assessment was developed called SIP which stands for Sales Inventory Profile.

In 2008 the stand alone sales IQ assessment was incorporated into a cloud computing sales recruitment website at www.salesinventoryprofile.com

After three full years of selling sales recruitment and having helped our clients hire over 250 people in direct sales and sales support roles I would like your help to grow SIP from a successful small business that supports a few hundred businesses in Australia and New Zealand to a force in recruitment that will change the way we recruit sales staff and bring an end to wasting money and shattering dreams.

Now I’m frustrated again at all that wasted human potential and all the businesses wasting thousands of dollars on hiring staff who will never be able to sell. Worse still are the millions of dollars in unearned revenue and the new staff who start with great hope and energy and dreams of a new career in selling only to end up shattered by the drain of doing a job that just isn’t them. I’m super frustrated now because there is a real alternative that allows businesses to hire the right person at a quarter of the cost of traditional résumé driven recruitment with minimum time to create the shortlist and is about TEN TIMES MORE EFFECTIVE. I had to put that in capitals as I really do feel like ‘shouting it from the roof tops’. There is a way for the individual to find out if they are suited to selling before taking the plunge and if you are; to understand your own sales strengths so you can really focus your training on making a real difference to your sales results.

To spread the word I need your help.

In May 2012 we are moving offices and hiring a full sales team to directly engage more businesses. I want to make the software even more functional so we can support multi-manager recruitment programs. This will allow us to target much larger companies who have several overlapping levels of management involved in recruitment.

How to Buy

Review the price list below (please excuse the formatting) and select the products you wish and note how much that totals.

You can either email me this amount and we will send you a tax invoice with bank transfer details
or
You can pay using the link to Paypal from our website

  • Got to www.salesinventoryprofile.com
  •  Go to the products tab from the Home Page
  •  Press ‘Pay an Invoice’ on the top left of the page
  •  If you are not an existing client put your business name in ‘Username’
  •  For the Invoice number enter ‘February 2012 promotion’ and the amount you wish to pre-purchase.
  •  Press submit and you will be transferred to Paypal to pay by credit card
  •  You will receive a TAX receipt by email within 3 working days and instructions on how to book training or start a recruitment program.

Our 2012 investment in SIP

At the moment SIP is a ‘single manager’ system which works best for small businesses. We built the system so that only one person at a time can have access to the candidate information within their SIP account. In other words if the sales manager, for example, is logged in and the HR manager logs in too the sales manager is automatically logged off.

We then want to redesign the layout and give the website a facelift and provide some simpler client interfaces for both managers and candidates.

We also have plans to ‘white label’ SIP when the website is ready for multi-manager recruitment for large companies to use as their inhouse talent management database.

Finally over the past three years we have assessed nearly 20,000 individuals. Included in that figure are nearly 4,000 people currently employed in client and prospect companies. I would like to use this additional data to further define sales management and service profiles which are different to the sales or sales support roles we have defined so far. Using this raw data in a statistically valid way is a huge undertaking and will require specialist statistical support work. When I first researched sales staff I had access to the statistical expertise of the Psychology Department at Sydney University.

Sales Training Options we provide

Corporate Coach Australia also provides sales training which is totally different to the parrot fashion ‘say this’ style that has come to dominate sales training programs. I am not against scripting, in fact I love it, but only when the sales person understands what they are trying to achieve with the script so that they are able to vary their presentation from the scripts at the correct moment.

I am a qualified Psychologist and have been in selling since leaving University in 1985 and Coaching sales staff since 1993. I have used this combination of knowledge of the human thought processes and experience in commercial selling to develop a course that teaches how to interact with the decision process at a very profound but easy to achieve level. I teach how people make decisions and how to build trust in order for your prospects and clients to make decisions in our favour. You don’t build trust with clever one-liners but by communicating in a way that effectively answers all the clients’ insecurities.

This material has been available in workshop format and1-on-1 coaching and you will see these in the price list.

In 2011 I recorded a cross industry version of my ‘Emotions in Selling’ workshop with the intention of it being a home study system. Some of you received the prospecting portion of this training as a Christmas gift in December of 2011. The full recording will be available as download content with the direct transcript in February 2012. We have a deadline to produce a companion book with exercises by June 2012 to help you learn and implement the ideas in the recording.

This commitment to guide my clients through changing their techniques and achieve better sales results, rather than just giving them a few good ideas is the corner stone of my Corporate Coaching philosophy. Anyone who purchases the DVD pack during the February special will also receive two complimentary coaching sessions to the value of $400.00. I can conduct these by Skype or at our Newtown office in Sydney.

I encourage EVERYONE WORKING WITHIN A SALES ORGANISATION, even if you are not actually in selling to buy these DVD’s so that you can understand the psychology behind how people make decisions.

If you want to discuss your sales recruitment or training needs please contact me this week so we you can take advantage of our February special.

SIP sales recruitment, training and coaching programs pricing

Recruit Sales Staff with SIP. It works!

The number one question in recruiting sales staff is “Who can sell?”

SIP is the best sales staff pre-selection tool in the world and it answers this important question by means of a proven independent psychometric online assessment. The SIP Assessment can determine if a person has the necessary attributes to sell.  What is best of all it does this with no human intervention before your first direct contact with them.

SIP: SALES CAPACITY AUDIT $ 950 + GST

SIP: FULL RECRUITMENT CYCLE $2,950 + GST

SIP: 12 MONTH SMALL BUSINESS RECRUITMENT LICENCE $4,950 + GST

SIP: SINGLE CANDIDATE OR STAFF MEMBER $ 190 + GST

SIP: PRIVATE SELF ASSESSMENT $ 190 + GST

Sales Training Programs by Maya Saric

Group Workshop

EMOTIONS IN SELLING:  Trust based selling to help clients make strong decisions Duration 2 hours $750 + GST

DVD Set

EMOTIONS IN SELLING; Introduction to trust based selling to help clients make strong decisions. $249 + GST includes transcript. Workbook due 1 June 2012

Group Workshop

EMOTIONS IN SELLING FOR  RE: Appraisals to Listing by overcoming the fear barrier 3 hours Duration $950 + GST

Group Workshop

EMOTIONS IN SELLING FOR  RE: Prospecting for Real Estate Duration 3 hours $950 + GST

Group Workshop

EMOTIONS IN SELLING FOR  RE: Full day combined program Duration One day ,$ 1800 + GST

Sales Excellence Coaching Programs by Maya Saric

Individual Coaching Program

NEW LISTING AGENT START UP Duration 9 hours over 3 months $2,500 + GST

FIRES OF HELL: Understanding your personal action triggers. Duration 8 hours over One Month $1,800 + GST
SALES EXCELLENCE: Creating sustainable action, Follow up to the Fires of Hell Program. Duration 9 hours $1600 + GST
What is included:

Sales Management Programs by Maya Saric

SIP SALES CAPACITY AUDIT Understanding Your Current Sales Team 2 hours $950 + GST

WORKSHOP: SALES PLANNING Duration One day $1,800 + GST

________________________________________
TERMS AND CONDITIONS
• Settlement due in full 7 days before program starts, including recruitment.
• * All facilities, refreshments and transport costs are additional and the client’s responsibility to organize.
• Pricing valid until 1/03/2012.

SIP sales recruitment training and coaching programs pricing

Sales Recruitment

Recruit Sales Staff with Sales Inventory Profile (SIP). Why? It answers your number one question in recruiting sales staff is “Who can sell?”

SIP is the best sales staff pre-selection tool in the world and it answers this important question by means of a proven independent psychometric online assessment. The SIP Assessment can determine if a person has the necessary attributes to sell.

SIP: SALES CAPACITY AUDIT $ 950 + GST

Includes:
• Test your existing sales and support team to achieve an independent sales capacity audit.
• Team results debrief with the manager – two hour onsite / phone review with a SIP specialist.
• Includes eight team members. Additional staff $180 + GST per person.

SIP: FULL RECRUITMENT CYCLE $2,950 + GST

Includes:
• Advert copywriting – the creation of the compelling, emotionally engaging, sales message advert.
• Loading and managing your advert on SEEK.
• All candidates tested with SIP.
• We analyze all the SIP reports and résumés within the score range for your job.
• We will recommend questions that you can ask each candidate within the score range for your job.
• Manage and communicate with the candidate pool via our online SIP Candidate Management System.

SIP: 12 MONTH SMALL BUSINESS RECRUITMENT LICENSE $4,950 + GST

Includes:
• Includes a Sales Capacity Audit of your existing team.
• Two full recruitment cycles including everything listed above.
• Direct employment inquiry program includes:
a. Copywriting an employment information pack for individuals who inquire between recruitment campaigns.
b. Copywriting an employment page on your website including a link to the SIP website.
c. Unlimited assessment of individuals (written summaries by SIP staff not included).
• Vocational guidance promotion program to local students includes:
a. Copywriting an invitation to complete a SIP.
b. Unlimited assessment of individuals (written summaries by SIP staff not included).

SIP: 12 MONTH UNLIMITED RECRUITMENT SERVICE $19,950 + GST

Includes:
• SIP becomes your recruitment provider across all job functions for 12 months.
• Write, load and manage all your adverts’ on SEEK.
• All candidates tested with SIP for all your jobs.
• We analyse 10 SIP reports and résumés per job for the first 3 months.
• Manage and communicate with the candidate pool via our online SIP Candidate Management System.

SIP: SINGLE CANDIDATE OR STAFF MEMBER $ 190 + GST

Includes:
• We analyse the SIP report and résumé and provide a written summary.
• We will recommend questions that you can ask this candidate during the interview.
• Manage and communicate with the candidate via our online SIP Candidate Management System.
• For existing staff we include a one hour coaching session directly with the individual or their manager.

SIP: PRIVATE SELF ASSESSMENT $ 190 + GST

Includes:
• Immediate access to your own 14 page SIP report.
• 45 minutes of personal coaching directly with a SIP Sales Excellence Coach.
• SIP Sales Potential Certificate to include in your job applications

Sales Training Programs by Maya Saric

Group Workshop

Emotions in Selling:
Trust based selling to help clients make strong decisions. Duration 2 hours $750 + GST

What is included:

• Understanding the neurological structure of the brain and how the flight/fight mechanism drives all decision making. We will review the progress of data arriving from the senses (hearing, sight etc) to the two levels of thought processing; emotional and logical.

• How to uncover the buyer’s personal perceptions of safety and the decision process they are using in order to guide them to use your service. If you contradict this process and trigger even the smallest feelings of fear they will reject you and your product.

• Learn how fear and anxiety can turn your client’s thoughts from caterpillars into pythons and how to prevent this; so that the caterpillars turn into butterflies instead.

• Learn how selling your own home is the scariest decision a person may ever make and how to guide your client safely through their anxiety to a stable decision to list with you.

• We will look at very specific strategies to maximize your message and the way you present it, so that your clients are able to safely process the message through their emotional filter to make effective decisions. Decisions that will not unravel when they continue to think about the situation after you have left or when they hear new data from your competition.

• Importance of the customer doing at least half of the talking during the sales process in order for the purchase to be stable. Using the magic wand technique that helps a buyer express their needs so you can discuss the real value to them of your offering.

• How to manage your clients fear response to help them to continue to listen and have the ability to buy from you.

DVD Set

Emotions in Selling:
Introduction to trust based selling to help clients make strong decisions $249 + GST

What is included:

• Understanding the neurological structure of the brain and how the flight/fight mechanism drives all decision making. We will review the progress of data arriving from the senses (hearing, sight etc) to the two levels of thought processing; emotional and logical.

• How to uncover the buyer’s personal perceptions of safety and the decision process they are using in order to guide them to use your service. If you contradict this process and trigger even the smallest feelings of fear they will reject you and your product.

• Learn how fear and anxiety can turn your client’s thoughts from caterpillars into pythons and how to prevent this so that the caterpillars all turn into butterflies instead.

• Importance of the customer doing at least half of the talking during the sales process in order for the purchase to be stable. Using the magic wand technique that helps a buyer express their needs so you can discuss the real value to them of your offering.

• How to manage your client’s fear response to help them to continue to listen and have the ability to buy from you.

• Managing your own fears and rejection responses.

Group Workshop

Emotions in Selling (RE):
Appraisals to Listing by overcoming the fear barrier. Duration 3 hours $950 + GST

What is included:

• Overview of neurological systems that drive decision making specific to listing and selling Real Estate.
• Brag Sheet: exercise to define why a property owner should hand their greatest financial decision over to you. Having clarity on how vendors choose agents.
• How to manage the vendor’s fear during both appraisal and listing meetings.
• Detailed scripts for appraisal walkthrough. How not to give your opinion on the spot.
• Setting up the parameters for a return meeting to conduct a listing call. Includes how to have all decision makers present.

Group Workshop

Emotions in Selling (RE) –Prospecting for Real Estate. Duration 3 hours $950 + GST

What is included:

• Overview of neurological systems and the role of fear and trust in selling. Learn to manage your own fear response to overcome your fear of cold calling.
• Managing your own fears and rejection responses.
• What is effective prospecting in real estate for residential listings and new property management?
• What is the difference between warm and cold calls? How to be warm calling most of the time.
• The role of scripting and developing your own script.
• Getting started: territory definition, personal organisation of your time and energy.
• Introduction and explanation of six different types of prospecting, each with starter scripts includes a Door Knocking System and Survey Prospecting. This is a specific system, fully scripted with supporting tools.
• Prospect tracking systems: Managing prospects from first touch to formal appraisal, role of follow up contact and marketing material.

Group Workshop

Emotions in Selling – Full day combined program.  Duration One day $ 1800 + GST

What is included:

• Emotions in Selling – Trust based selling to help clients make strong decisions
• Emotions in Selling – Appraisals to listing by overcoming the fear barrier
• Emotions in Selling – Prospecting for Real Estate

Sales Excellence Coaching Programs by Maya Saric

Individual Coaching Program

New Listing Agent Start Up. Duration 9 hours over 3 months $2,500 + GST

What is included:

• Emotions of selling overview.
• Personal motivation exercises targeting addressing cold calling issues.
• Getting started: territory definition, personal organisation and
• Introduction and explanation of six different types of cold calling, each with starter scripts.
• Door knocking system: Survey Prospecting. This is a specific system, fully scripted with supporting tools.
• Prospect tracking systems: Managing prospects from first touch to formal appraisal, role of follow up contact and marketing material.
• Weekly prospecting reporting by email.
• Three end of month coaching sessions on self emotion management.

Individual Coaching Program

Fires of Hell- Understanding your personal action triggers.  Duration 8 hours over One Month $1,800 + GST
What is included:

• Understanding the neurological structure of the brain and how the flight/fight mechanism drives the specific decisions you make.
• Identifying your personal blocks to action.
• Creating a clear plan for overcoming your blocks.
• Identifying goals that are fuelled by your own motivation structure.

Individual Coaching Program
Sales Excellence – Follow up to the Fires of Hell Program. Duration 9 hours $1600 + GST
What is included:

• Defining goals for your immediate sales issues.
• Agreed action plan on daily and weekly levels.
• Joint review of:
1. activities
2. sales situations
3. obstacles to current performance

Structure:

• Minimum program is set up session of two hours then eight weekly sessions.
• Conducted in person or on Skype with video.

Sales Management Programs by Maya Saric

SIP SALES CAPACITY AUDIT

Understanding Your Current Sales Team. Duration 2 hours $950 + GST

What is included:

• Test your existing sales and support team to achieve an independent sales capacity audit.
• Team results debrief with the manager – two hour onsite / phone review with a SIP specialist.
• Includes eight team members. Additional staff $180 + GST per person.

Workshop

Sales Planning. Duration One day $1,800 + GST

What is included:

• Total territory definition.
• Define and agree the business sales mission.
• Set sales goals: Five years and annual.
• Individual territory creation within the total territory by geography, product or industry classification.
• Staff matching to territory (includes results from SIP Sales Capacity Audit).
• Define existing staff development needs to match territory definition.

Here’s some more information on what SIP can do for you.

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TERMS AND CONDITIONS • Settlement due in full 7 days before program starts, including recruitment. • * All facilities, refreshments and transport costs are additional and the client’s responsibility to organize. • Pricing valid until 1/03/2012.

“When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.”

“When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.” – Tuli Kupferberg

Love this quote! It’s the most elegant way of saying if you
change yourself the world changes with you. Unfortunately change is the hardest of all things and rarely occurs elegantly. Indeed most of us have it hoisted upon us  through some catastrophe.

To proactively create changes takes great clarity about the workings of
your internal belief system as well as acting in new and unfamiliar ways. It’s
rare that any of us have the energy or courage to walk a new path alone.

If there is anything you want to change in your working life, let’s
talk. I’m a qualified psychologist with over 30 years experience in Sales and
Business Management who has been coaching people to create new realities for
themselves in business since 1993.

Email me for a personalized coaching plan maya@salesinventoryprofile.com or call now on 0407 005 290

Want more inspiration?

The Will to Win

In my life I have been a couch potato then an amateur Australian title holder in a team rowing sport.

Yes the same person within just a few years of each other.

I have also trained a team of coach potatoes to a level of local sporting success in just a few weeks. The team I coached was a corporate Dragon Boat crew made up of staff from a large Sydney law firm. They varied in age, shape and level of fitness.

They were all very startled to find themselves with a coach who expected them to win. A coach who was a winner and assumed that they would be too. I didn’t ask why I had been chosen to coach. I was honored to have the job and was determined to do it to my very best abilities. Plus I was a driven and competent athlete. They were a group of novices with only 4 weeks before the race.

I assumed they had asked for someone good to give them some chance at winning. Other wise they could have been given a coach who wasn’t as good nor as driven as I was. So I drove them. I did notice some surprise from them on the first night that I was being so thorough in my style and so demanding in the tasks. They didn’t complain and I chose to ignore it.

Over the 4 weeks I implemented a very detailed training program. I never said anything discouraging to any individual or singled out anyone for non performance, though I had plenty of examples of both. It isn’t my style to focus on the negative. But I did continue to expect improvements and I never slackened on the pace. We spent our weeks ‘doing’.

Race day came and I was ready for victory!! They were still a bit amused. I lined them up before the race into their positions. They had been lining themselves up at practice and choosing their own positions. I hadn’t interfered with that as I had felt it was more important to learn the technique fully first. But today we needed to be at our very best. Everything we could do to win was important. Luckily that day I was really angry with the world and so I was taking no crap. Someone complained that they wanted to be further up the rank. I told them without flinching that heavy strong people get to be the middle. I wanted small skinny agile people in front tall skinny people at the back. They had all been weighed at the last training session. End of discussion. What discussion?

I myself was also competing this day in the open sports division. After lining every one up and having a brief chat about why they were in these particular positions and that I had every confidence in them and all would be good I left them to compete with my own team. My sports team came second. Right well now I was really angry! I told my corporate crew what they had ‘a chance’ of winning, because:

1. They had completed a professional training program designed by an expert
2. They had been training well for 4 weeks
3. They were seated in the prime position for the group dynamic
4. If they gave it 100% and expected to win, they would

Someone laughed, the rest were deathly quiet. I said if there was anyone who isn’t going to give it 100% and expect to win, it is best they stayed out of the boat. Yes I’m serious. We will do better racing with less crew than racing below our personal best. Was there anyone here that didn’t want to give it their personal best? No comments. They very quietly got in the boat. I sat in coach position at the drum. While we were moving into position I was repeating what our strengths were and that I expected them to win.

We were waiting for the gun. Silence. Everyone in start position eyes on the water. The gun went and I was yelling:

We can do it!
Push yourself!
Pull harder!
Work together!
You are good at this.
Pick it up! (What do you mean pick it up we are dying out here)
Faster!
Come on you’ve got plenty of stamina I know you can do it.
We are winning (What! Who is?)
Yes we are in the lead.
Push it now we can win.
Come on we are doing it
Death or glory there is no second time
Now is it
Pick it up

On and on I yelled.

To everyone’s absolute amazement, we won!! Indeed we won by an obvious margin.

They were so busy laughing and hugging that we nearly capsized. We rowed back to the pontoon without a glimmer of fatigue. When we got out of the boat one of the blokes gave me such a big hug it picked me up of the ground and told me I was awesome and that was the greatest thing he’d ever been a part of. I said:

“The team is awesome. You’re a winner!!!”

Later I discovered the bloke who hugged me was the MD. The bloke who had complained about the seating was a senior manager. The two women who were in lead position where both juniors (skinny and agile).

This race was a heat. It qualified us for the finals.

There were almost 30 corporate crews there that day. Most like us had joined just weeks or even days before. Not one had a serious coach. There were also well organized corporate crews who had trained for months and used the sport as a regular fitness exercise. They too had amateur coaches. In the final we came second. The crew that beat us had been training together for many years and were using the sport as a fitness process and a company social bonding (drinking) thing. We did plenty of drinking (I mean bonding) too.

This is a true story and has some great lessons for anyone in a leadership role whether in sport or business. This was neither the perfect team dynamic nor the ideal coach/leadership model. Reality has a tendency to imperfection. The story is still important however, as it does illustrate some of the key issues required to achieve a successful outcome.

7 Keys to Victory

1. A clear and highly specific goal.

I mean clear! Not ‘give it a go’ or ‘try our best’ but WIN! It is usually better to have the goal clearly articulated and known to all team members. In this case, I had assumed their goal was to win. It later turned out that some of them had very specific individual goals, all of which were surpassed by their results. While getting buy-in from all members at the start of a project is preferred, it is not mandatory.

What is mandatory is that there is:
a. A specific goal that is clearly defined and,
b. Known to the leader who will be creating the plan and then,
c. The members provide all the required actions to complete the plan.

2. A lot of thinking and planning done by someone qualified

In this case this was me, the Coach. I used my great depth of knowledge in this sport to assess in detail the available resources and developed a plan for each training session in 10 minute intervals. The individuals didn’t need to know any of these details so long as there was a good plan to follow.

3. Lots of Action

By them – the Coach never rows. They came to the training sessions and did their time on the water. They had worked much harder on the water than any of them had expected to and all said later that the training was as good as the racing. On a long journey (which this was not) the daily work must also be rewarding as the glory of the outcome can be too brief to provide any on-going motivation.

4. Having a qualified and specialist Coach or Leader responsible for implementing the action process and ensuring the team keeps to the plan.

It can be the drawback of many teams that one of the participants is also the Coach. In the years we had won we always had a separate person who did not row as our Coach. In fact, in this type of rowing, the Coach is an extra weight in the boat to be carried by the workers. However, it still works better that way to have someone dedicated to coaching and, that they are an expert.

5. Absolute drive

Initially that was just me but it became infectious. Lots of members of the crew increased their dedication during training when they could see the rate of improvement. No-one had dared say that they were serious about it, until after we won the first race. But I had already seen they were serious by their demeanor and improvement in the boat at training.

6. Group Dynamic

There is something special about working in a group. For some it is the companionship that gives them extra strength. Some people do not want to embarrass themselves in front of others. So if the Coach says we are rowing at full capacity for 5 minutes, who wants to stop before the end? For some, it is the inspiration provided by others. Either by someone who does this so well they are delights to have around or by watching someone struggling heroically against the odds. For example, in that crew watching some of the smaller people put in so much energy make you feel like doing it too. I have often trained on land alone using the same strength program we use as a group. I know that when I am on my own then 15 repetitions can seem plenty. When I train together and the Coach decides it will be 30, I’ll do it. Groups are not always easier. Just as a group dynamic can be good it can also create problems which are beyond this article to consider.

7. Positive feedback

Firstly, they received lots of positive feedback from me at each training session. They could also see for themselves, at each training session, that they were moving faster and further than the time before. The absolute feedback came with winning the first race. Instantly, they all thought they could do it, not just the optimists amongst them and that driven Coach of theirs.

What about their drive, passion and vision?

Often in corporate projects you will be working toward a given task and be expected to make the project work, despite your personal beliefs.

Is that realistic?

It isn’t necessary, though it does make it easier, if everyone is personally passionate about the vision. In this case someone obviously was. That was me. A few other people were secretly almost as passionate.

What is mandatory is that there is a viable plan and that everyone is genuinely committed to executing their actions effectively. While I did use visualization techniques to teach them about stroke style and timing, our results came from ‘the doing’.

What will sabotage the result is if an individual reduces their ‘doing’ for any reason.

If someone is holding back on the amount of effort they are contributing it maybe because they don’t share the vision. It is very hard for people to work against their own values and beliefs. If this is the case, effort must be made to align the individual’s beliefs and values with those of the project. This process need not be difficult or complicated but cannot be ignored if a person is dragging their feet and you want them to stay with the project.

I was lucky with this group as they had all volunteered to participate. As it had not been a formal company requirement so they were all equally willing to do the work. It is the nature of volunteer organizations that people are unlikely to join a group that contradicts their personal needs. There was one bloke who complained about the plan (remember the seating issue) but his commitment to the team was sufficient for him to complete his actions well.

As a leader, or coach, you must expect people to challenge your plan.

Some people need a thorough knowledge of what is required of them, and why, in order to do their part properly. It does not mean they disagree with the plan. There may be people who are questioning the plan because they do disagree. If you cannot gain their co-operation they will become useless in the team.

This event is a good example of how great results can be achieved by having a qualified coach experienced in planning, individual performance enhancement and team dynamics.

Want to achieve your deepest desires?