Listen Up For More Sales

Posted on | November 30, 2009 | No Comments

Kari Sliva

I recently attended an event where we were given five minutes to “pitch” a product. It was a boot camp for selling under the gun. The room was split in two. Half of us pitched while the other half pretended we were corporate buyers. We got five minutes -not one second more. When the bell rang, we were done with our pitch.

As the fake corporate buyer, I listened to ten spiels from some very passionate people.

One man sat down and I felt like an imaginary switch flicked. For five minutes, he spoke without taking a break. In fact, I’m not sure if he even took a breath. When the buzzer rang it literally cut him off in mid word.  Forget closing the sale. He had not left one minute for my questions, and he asked me nothing. He had no idea after five minutes if I would be interested in buying what he was selling. Not to mention it was the longest five minutes of my life.

Another man sat down and had completely memorized his pitch as if he were a presenter on QVC. Even his questions dripped with redundancy, like, “You’re probably wondering where I’m going with this, right?”  I nodded, but felt like saying, “You have no idea.” I kept wondering if good old fashioned conversation was becoming extinct.

Most of us, especially in this economic climate, find ourselves in a selling situation at some point or another, even if it isn’t in our job title. And, while we usually have more than five minutes to talk with a potential customer in a meeting, many of the same tenets apply.

I went into this expecting to get some practice presenting. But I left with a reminder of perhaps the most valuable selling tool in our toolbox-active listening. 

Most of us think of ourselves as great listeners, but are we, really? Most of us have never been formally trained in active listening.  I learned of a couple areas where I could improve my active listening skills by taking a little quiz in this great article by Keith Rosen, a well-known national sales coach.

If you take a few minutes to listen to a customer or potential buyer, you’ll be amazed at how much better they listen to you and how much more impactful your follow up will be.

Kari Sliva is VP of Communications & Special Events at the Tempe Chamber of Commerce

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