Business & Entrepreneurship – Page 11

Creatively Closing the Sale

"It's important to realize that even when someone is demanding and rude or distracted and hard to read, you can work creatively to close the sale, and still enjoy at least something about meeting that person," emphasizes Jeanne Winkle, a national sales trainer who is enthusiastically launching her new training company, Tough 'n Tender Training and Development.

Jeanne has developed a unique, professional and successful approach to closing a sale that she is presenting across the country. Many people only see the "tough side of a sale," and see "sales" as a scary word. "It conjures up the image of the fast-talking, arm-twisting salesman for some. For others, 'sales' symbolizes a life of cold calls constant rejection, and the fear of not being able to 'make it'," according to Jeanne. Some people think they could never sell for a living—much less enjoy it.

Jeanne has been involved in selling at some level all of her professional life. She recognizes that selling is at the heart of every business—selling ideas, selling one's abilities and selling products or services.

There are five "E's" for Excellence recommended for a successful sales person, Jeanne says.

Enjoy Yourself

Enjoy Your prospect

Educate. Be sensitive

Educate. Really listen

Educate. Close

To successfully close a sale, it is important for you to look beyond the "obvious," look underneath for a prospect's real needs. Get to know your customers and clients in the process of making a sale, and be flexible in your approach.

Every person you work with is different and might require a different approach. Some of your customers want to be in complete control, others just want to have all the information in the most precise way so they can make up their own minds. You always want to emphasize the benefits to prospective customer/client and be sure you know more than they do about your product.

These are just a few of the tips Jeanne shares in her sales presentation, "Sell 'em Tough 'n Tender." She has just released a new 108-minute educational video and audio tape workshop on Closing a Sale using her humorous, soft sell approach.

For more information on training sessions and the video and audio tape materials, call Jeanne at (707) 442-4649.

Completing the Year

As we move into each new year, it's smart to recognize who, what and where we've been. In our personal lives, as well as our careers, taking time to recognize and appreciate our personal foundation lets us continue to create goals in alignment with our vision for the future.

Here are some great questions you can use to:

remind you of what you've accomplished
recognize things that you have completed
create completion on things yet undone
recognize what you'd rather not 'do' anymore!
re-evaluate the vision of what you desire/want

We encourage you to play big here, jump in and have fun doing this…get some real answers and enjoy the process along the way.

Ready to play?

____________Completing This Year______________

Think about what you created this year. Which have given you satisfaction and joy? Which ones didn't turn out the way you wanted? Which would you like to change?
Now think about what have you completed (accomplished) this year. As you identify what you've completed, ask yourself what did you learn as a result? And how has that increased or solidified your foundation?
Is there anything that is incomplete for which you would like completion? What will it take to be complete, finished, over?
Now ask yourself, what are you through learning – that you don't ever have to learn again? And how has that added to your foundational strength?

__________Moving into the New Year___________
Now, think about who and where you are today. What do you want to create in the next year? What do you want to accomplish? What do you want to start?
What do you want to complete (from 1999 – or earlier!!) and what are you finally ready to let go of once and for all?
And finally, as you think about the next year, who do you need to become in order to have your life be exactly the way you want?

The most important step to creating the life you love is clarity – about who you are and what you want. Who you become creates the environment for having what you want. And remember, this as a work in progress, rather than a finished piece (just like life!!).

You can start whenever you'd like.Personally, I like to take stock each year on my birthday, rather than on December 31. It is the beginning of my Personal New Year. Many businesses use April 1 or July 1 as the beginning of their new year.

What matters is that you take stock and chose the path that takes you where you want to go.

Thanks to Business and Personal Coach, Alison Hendren (www.transitioning.com) for suggesting this process and providing some foundational questions that led to this article.

Book Summaries: Unlimited Wealth and God Wants You to be Rich

Traditional economics says that whoever controls the world's natural resources and essential commodities controls the world. This also means that if there are only limited resources, one person's gain must be another person's loss; the richer one person is, the poorer his neighbors must be.

Economist Paul Pilzer argues that today we do not live in a resource-scarce environment – that in fact accelerated technological development has virtually eliminated scarcity. We live in a world today that Pilzer calls an Alchemic world – a world where the opportunities are unlimited, and wealth is not a finite pie to be cut up.

Just as the alchemists of old attempted to create gold from base metals, today we are able to create great value (and ultimately great wealth) from mundane and otherwise "worthless" resources. Today we can even make "computers from dirt". So what's the magic ingredient? Technology.

In 1972, the Club of Rome, a consortium of scientists, industrialists, politicians and world thinkers from 25 countries issued The Limits to Growth, a doom and gloom report warning that among other things, the world's oil resources would only last another 40 years at then current rates of consumption. Fifteen years later the reserves were estimated at nearly twice what the anticipated amount should have been.

As we enter the last years of this century, the effective supply of energy reserves by 2000 is anticipated to be 50% larger than it was in 1980. The same is true of most other commodities. So how did this happen? Technology.

First by improving our abilities to find, obtain, distribute, and store resources, and second by improving the efficiency with which we use the resources. In the case of automobiles, the simple act of replacing $300 carburetors with $25 fuel injectors doubled the fuel efficiency of new cars by 35% in less than a decade.

And, as supplies increase and technology improves, the price of products becomes less. So the relative price of oil has come back down from the huge increases of the 70's. This also shows up as being able to get more car for the price, and cars that last longer with less repairs. When's the last time someone in your office called in late because of a flat tire or a blowout? Even tires are lasting longer now.

Pilzer's optimistic books include several examples of how the principles of Alchemy work, and how to create wealth by closing the gap between the level of technology currently being used and level that is available. He is an economist I can agree with and he writes so that others can understand.

I highly recommend using these books to begin closing your own technology gap and finding ways to work smarter. By his own explanation, Unlimited Wealth is geared more towards the economist, while God Wants You to Be Rich has plenty of specific examples for the businessperson or budding entrepreneur.

Summaries by Katie Darden

God Wants You to be Rich
(Hardback) or (Paperback)

Unlimited Wealth
The Theory and Practice of
Economic Alchemy

Financial Tips on Growing Your Small Business

Companies with 100 or fewer employees dominate the American business landscape. They now employ 60 percent of the work force. Further, entrepreneurs with small businesses continue to generate most of the new jobs.

Strength in numbers, however, doesn't mean running a small business is easy. The lack of economics in scale, particularly in the benefits area, can pose some thorny problems. Here are some ideas for growing a small business in today's competitive environment.

Managing business assets profitably. According to US News & World Report, the three major reasons why small business fail are insufficient profits (22 percent), poor growth (20 percent) and too much debt (15 percent). The challenge for you, as a small business owner, is to manage your business assets as effectively and efficiently as possible.

For starters, you need to know how much your business is worth–really worth. This means you need the perspective of your creditors and lenders. It would be time well spent to meet with a financial advisor who can help you determine typical rates of return in your area of business, average company earnings, current book value and projected rate of growth.

Repositioning cash reserves for higher yields can affect your bottom line. Consider putting funds that you don't need immediately in higher yielding securities which don't increase your risk significantly; such as, intermediate term CDs, money market funds, and bond funds. Also investment in dividend-paying stocks or in tax-exempt municipal funds can slash your business taxes.

Managing employee benefits carefully. The challenge for you as a small business owner is to attract and keep good employees while controlling the cost of fringe benefits. Small companies have choices other than straight health benefits.

Flexible spending accounts allow employees to use pre-tax dollars to pay for day care, medical care premiums and other specified expenses by creating a benefit package that includes a cafeteria plan.

Other benefits that you can offer might include group disability coverage, group life insurance or a SEP-a retirement plan for small businesses that is the lowest in cost and easiest to set up and administer.

By Susan O'Conner, IDS Financials