Rainmaking for Salespeople

%1s5+QtpTUSzeu8OtIW2ug
If the way to expedite business development or rainmaking results is by integrating networking, marketing, and sales, how can professionals who are trained salespeople reconcile that?
The good news is that if you are trained in sales, you have a distinct advantage in this integration process.You already know that sales is a numbers game. You already know how to articulate the value proposition. You already know the importance of tracking your hit rates and you already know that sales is a systematic, repeatable, predictable process. You know how to handle gatekeepers and objections. You know how to close. What if you could do it all faster? What if you could expedite the entire process? What if you could save time and produce increased results? What would that be worth to you?
Well, here’s how you can intentionally cause a quantum leap in how quickly you generate results. Integrate, integrate, integrate. Sales alone is good, sales with networking is better, sales with networking and marketing is best! You must find a way that is aligned with your (and your organization’s) core values to have consistent actions in all three domains.
In responding to the question from Techslog last week, I spent a little bit of time distinguishing between the “critical trinity” of Networking, Marketing and Sales.  If you are active in all three domains, you will find the sweet spot where networking, marketing and sales intersect. When you are hitting your stride in terms of your networking, when your marketing materials and message are clear, and when you understand how to leverage your strengths in sales, you will reach that tipping point where it all comes together to yield results in terms of clients, dollars, contracts, business. That sweet spot is the place where you most effortlessly Seal the Deal.
So, what does that mean for you, as a salesperson? It means that you already have the one domain handled…sales. So, by focusing a bit more on generating activity in the other domains of networking and marketing, and finding ways to incorporate those actions into the sales activities you are already masterfully engaged in, you will find that your sales numbers start to pop more quickly, and that you create an action-circuit that hums along in strategic concert.
If sales is the musical staff, networking and marketing add the notes and the chords. Now, with you as the maestro, let the music begin!

Leave a comment