How to Sell Yourself to the Top; Mastering Your Products: The Salesman Talisman

Introduction

Good sales actually begin with a good knowledge of the product to sell, and with good presentation, everything sells.  A terrific salesman is adept at both knowledge and presentation of his products and services.

By the way, let us establish first that a product is anything that is offered to the market for attention, acquisition, use or consumption that might satisfy a want.  That implies that, even you are a product.  Second, a product is the consumer’s solution.  The market is anywhere the product is presented for sales.  This includes the office where you go to submit your CV for a job opening. 

Third, everyone is a salesperson.  The world we live in is altogether a marketplace.  Your demeanour, vocal-ability, etc. are all part of the presentation process.

Mastering Your Products: To have a magic wand by which you can achieve exceptional sales level, the following keys are essential.

a)      Know Your Product

The first statement in this discourse already gives impetus to this point.  A man cannot give what he does not have; you cannot sell what you don’t know about.  Every salesperson must first take time out to understand the products that he is expected to sell.  Your knowledge must be convincingly deep.  If you are supposed to sell a variety of products, you have to pick the ones that appeal best to you, and study them deeply, knowing all that their functional dimensions.

b)      Be convinced about your product and constantly increase your confidence level:

Your customers can no more be confident about what you sell than you are yourself.  Do not try to talk anyone into buying anything that you are not sure of yourself, except you are ready to make a tool of yourself.  The confidence you have in the product will give you some measure of pride about it, and then influence the way you talk about it.

c)       Be versatile, understand your competition

A major highlight in any salesman’s presentation is when he (she) has to compare what he/she has to sell with the competitors’ products.  You must know about your competitors have to offer and be sincere enough to examine whether they are better than yours.  Whatever information or knowledge you get from this is a major point for you. 

d)      Be enthusiastic about your product

No matter what your competitors think about your product, it still has the potential to succeed in the market.  The onus is on you to love, cherish and be proud to present that product.  Your own enthusiasm will go a long way to help sell that product to the most important customer.  Note:  Your most important customer is the one sitting or standing before you at the moment.

e)      Understand what is unique about your product

To make good sales, to start with, your product must have a unique identifiable feature.  There must be something that distinguishes your product from your competitors’.  One of your sales pitches should be competitive advantage of that product compared to the competitors’ product.  Whenever you sell, emphasize the competitive advantage your product has, however, DO NOT bad-mouth your competition.  De-marketing your competition does not improve your own product or services.  Another sales pitch should be the benefit of that product to the customers, in other words, the solution that product offers for their problems.