Selling your services is an important part in your entrepreneurial journey and yet a majority of women entrepreneurs are simply uncomfortable with it, or they are uncomfortable with the idea that a successful sales pitch has to be glib, sleazy and focused on their self-interest only. They hate being dubbed as pushy and being turned down. Not everyone has a background in sales and not everyone is naturally outgoing and convincing. Yet you have to sell your business if you want it to survive and thrive. So if you too have been sucking at sales, you would find Dr. Lizette’s psychological sales hack helpful. Dr. Lizette is one of the guests I invited on my Wealthy Wednesday Show. Dr. Lizette is a psychology professor, a celebrated behavioral scientist, licensed psychologist and consultant who teaches women entrepreneurs proven psychological method so that they can achieve sales confidence, can tune into their inner genius, gain insight into their ideal clients’ minds, and sell more, with ease and grace. Dr. Lizette thinks that selling is a science and an art which can be learned. She has shared her top 5 psychological hacks for successful selling with us:
People First; Profits later
Conventional sales training is about making sales and profits first and that doesn’t seem to work for heart-centered, spiritually inclined women and creates inner conflict and turmoil. What we need to learn is that what works for other sales people may not work for us and that we need a sales strategy that is radically different from the conventional sales wisdom but is in tuned to our innate nature and style. That’s why Dr. Lizette tells us that we don’t have to be icky, pushy and sleazy, but human and natural. We need to focus on people first because conversion comes later. We need to put connection before conversion; relationship before revenue. She tells us that being in business doesn’t mean that we should just see people as a numbers not as real persons.
Capture the Attention and Retain It
In a complex and competitive world, nothing is harder than capturing the attention of your ideal clients, because as audience and consumers, we are bombarded with sales pitches and messages every day and we are likely to ignore most. We would only engage with those messages or people with whom we feel an emotional connection, and as a consequence, we are more likely to buy from them. That’s why Dr. Lizette iterates the need to connect with your clients and connect with their hearts. She equates a sales pitch to a marriage proposal. You won’t propose a person you are just getting to know; likewise, you won’t start selling to a complete stranger and expect him or her to look upon you favorably and buy from you instantly. That’s why you need to focus upon rapport building first.
Sell to People’s Heart, Not to Their Purses
Attention is retained by a unique, warm and personalized message and once it is gained, it has to be retained. Dr. Lizette adds that one needs to take one’s ideal clients to the next level of attraction in order to retain them. One way to do so is to sell to their hearts and emotions. It works like this: People have a natural urge to seek solutions to their problems. But if they are under stress for a long time, they end up accepting stress as a part of their life and getting used to it at the cost of their health, relationships, and sanity. So if someone comes up with a solution to our problem, puts the “spotlight” on it, puts in front of us what we are likely to lose when continuing with a bad situation (like continuing with a bad job, or working haphazardly in our business), only then we take notice of our situation and are motivated to seek a solution and take action. And if you are able to promise and deliver a solution to people’s most critical problems, you would be able to retain their attention and sell to their heart eventually.
Create Urgency the Right Way
We often come across indecisive clients, ones who hold on to their cards too close to their hearts, don’t want to commit, and are sitting on the fence. We often don’t know how to deal with them, i.e., whether to push them harder or to give them the time and space to decide. According to Dr. Lizette, the urgency hack is often an open secret for sales people but is often misused, underused, abused by sales people. Many of the conscious entrepreneurs might mistake this strategy as being manipulative, a strategy to manipulate clients into buying from you. Dr. Lizette says that this is a misconception. When you tie your offer with an urgent action like a limited amount of time for buying your offer, a special rate, a privileged access, limited spots in a program, you are giving them a chance to get in on something unique and exclusive. You are telling them that their time is precious as well as your and that your offer has a value. We miss out clients when we are mellow or too aggressive and too eager.
Gain Empathy and Trust
One way to seek connection with your ideal client is to come across as an empathetic person as opposed to a crafty, calculating, and salesy person. If you manipulate your clients’ pain points and give them a misconstrued picture of what you can do and what you can help them achieve, then that’s manipulation and a breach of trust. However, when you are able to create an accurate picture of what you can do for a client and what you can’t then you are being honest in your sales approach. After honesty comes empathy: You should also show potential clients that you ‘get them’, understand their situation, and that you care about their plight. One way to do is to embrace your own vulnerability and show that you have been through a situation that was equally bad or worse, which can build mutual understanding and empathy. This way they will be able to relate to you. They can see your progress and that of other clients of yours and can believe that they too can make the same progress. The third thing Dr Lizette tells is that we need to earn the trust of our clients and preserve it. She says that trust is hard to earn but harder to keep. It works this way: They try, they buy and then they rave about you based on their positive experience because they begin to trust you. This means they will refer you to people; tell them why you are the expert and go-to person in your niche, and why they should trust you. If you appear too perfect, too glossed over, you would appear unreal. If they cannot relate to you, they won’t be able to trust you. Keeping things real is what can help you close the deal ultimately.
Dr Lizette’s final message to women entrepreneurs is that no matter what, they should keep shining. In continuum, my parting thoughts are that we should keep on going forward despite our fears because the darkest moments we have are often our breakthrough moments in disguise. If you are struggling with debt, financial issues, unpaid bills and are feeling overwhelmed, then my book my book Magical Money Manifestations can help you makeover your mindset, scale down your limitations, change your money vibe, breakdown your income barriers and create money generating businesses that you can be proud of. Order it from here today.