Greg’s 44 Sales Truths

For the Ag Sales Professional

The following are ideas and concepts that come from all the years of selling, managing salespeople, leading sales teams, and running a sales training service. As one of the most reluctant salespeople to ever head out into a territory, I found it to be an unbelievably rewarding career.

After ten years of writing a weekly blog and podcast, I’ve assembled these 44 truths. I’m calling them truths because I believe them, or they wouldn’t be on the list. I have lived them, tested them, and can prove with my experience that they are true.

They are not absolute. I’m sure there are a few more truths that will pop into my mind someday. But I hope they help you as much as they have helped me to make your sales career as rewarding as possible.

If you would like to explore more information on how to use these concepts to develop you or your sales team, please reach out. They can be implemented in a variety of ways, customized to what works for you and your sales team.

As always, my focus is working with professional salespeople in agribusiness to develop their selling skills, improve their customer management, and eventually become a trusted advisor in their market.

Sales is a set of skills, applied in art form by a person to a person.
Segmenting your customers is more important than any other skill at the start of your selling career.
Learning how to ask questions is the most important skill for a salesperson to learn. It’s not as easy as you think.
The two biggest salesperson killers are disorganization and calling on the wrong accounts. Far more than actual selling skills.
The first of 4 Why’s: Know the answer to a customer asking, “Why should I buy from you?”
The second of 4 Why’s: Next, know how to answer, “Why should I buy from your company/your products?”
The third of 4 Why’s: Next, with each customer, uncover the answer to the question, “Why should I change from what I am currently doing?”
The fourth of 4 Why’s: Lastly, with each customer, uncover the answer to the question, “Why should I change, now?”
Agribusiness makes it possible for farmers to feed the world. Your job is important. Your products and services are crucial to a farmer’s success.
When selling through a reseller (dealer, distributor, Ag retailer), three sales need to be made: the reseller, the reseller’s customer (crop/livestock producer), and the livestock or crop that will use the product. All three need to be sold to.
Continuously, search for the answer to what you are worth to your customers. Your products will be priced higher and lower than the competition’s. Do you bring more value than the higher cost of your products? Are you a good deal?
Learn the concepts of DISC as early in your sales career as possible. Not just your profile, but how to apply the concepts to other people: customers, coworkers, and personal relationships.
Based on your DISC style, figure out how you like to change. Then continuously change to improve.
Quit presenting on your products and start positioning an individual solution to each customer you sell to. Solve their problem in their words, and closing will come easier.
Start following a sales process and quit trying to be their friend. It’s blatantly obvious that you are selling. Trying to be their friend is patronizing.
Now, adapt your selling process to focus on your customer’s buying process. Every customer has a process they use to buy your products. They may not call it that or realize they have one, but they do. Focus on uncovering that process before applying your selling process. Nobody wants to be sold, but everyone wants to buy.
Use every resource at your disposal to sell. Most salespeople leave their best resources on the shelf when selling.
You don’t have to use technology when selling, but you do have to compete against those who do.
Learn from everyone, everywhere, and always. Don’t stop until you retire, and even then, continue to learn.
Make money on your strengths. To do so, you have to be honest with yourself and have customers willing to pay you more for it.
Mitigate or fix your weaknesses.
Everyone is selling something: products, services, or their resume.
Your company will tell you how great their products are. That’s both great and expected. However, your customers will tell you what they are worth.
Understand the customer’s impact of the problem you solve. Customers don’t buy products. They buy solutions to their problems. What’s the impact of that problem in their words? Understand that impact in dollars, time, or emotion before asking for the sale.
Selling on emotion is the ultimate value to sell on. And the most challenging, as it is hard to put a dollar value on emotions.
Customers need you now, more than ever before. It’s a complicated world of products and services. Our job is often to help our customers navigate that world to buy what’s best for them.
Sales is work. The more you work, the more you sell. Yes, you can be lucky and stumble onto sales. But increasing sales and managing a larger customer base takes more work. Working smarter is always great, but don’t forget to work harder, too.
A prospect funnel needs to be active, vibrant, and flowing. Most are stagnant or loaded with poor-quality prospects.
There are three levels of salespeople. Level one is a salesperson. You achieve that when hired, and you have a business card that says so. The next is a skilled salesperson. That means you know how to sell and manage a territory. For many, that’s good enough. They have long and rewarding sales careers by being competent at selling their products. However, the third level is called the “trusted advisor”. In short, it means you have a seat at your customer’s board of directors (figuratively).
Trust has three main components: credibility, reliability, and the customer’s interest over self-interest.
Test the waters with small steps. Changing to you and your products has risks. Make the first steps of the switch smaller and less risky. Get a toe hold and then earn the right to get a larger share of their business.
Your price is always too high until you do your job of differentiating yourself, your products, or your company. If you can’t, then you really are competing on price.
There are four major seasons in your sales career: Spring (years 0-3), Summer (years 3-10), Fall (years 10-25), Winter (years 25+). The years are a general guideline as to when most salespeople go through those four seasons.
Remember, when it all seems to be so difficult, when customers are complaining, when operations and admin seem to be making your sales life miserable, when your prices always seem to be higher than your competition, THAT’s the job. That’s why we have jobs as salespeople. Not that you have to tolerate incompetence or abuse, but if it were as simple as taking orders, we wouldn’t need sales professionals.
Earn more than you cost. Roughly, you cost 1.4 X your pay. This accounts for expenses and benefits. Make sure you know how many units or dollars it takes to break even for you.
Measure and interpret. There needs to be some form of numbers and statistics that measure your role as a salesperson. I know they don’t tell the whole story, but they do tell an important part of your story.
Challenge the status quo appropriately. Too often, we get into a rut and waste time and energy on tasks that are no longer needed. OR we hold beliefs that are no longer valid. For example…those customers don’t pay their bill…or….that customer hates us and will never buy from us….
Learn the art of Story Telling Selling. There are key components or steps to learn. Then, learn to apply those steps to develop stories about your successful customers to be more effective in your sales approach.
Do your own customer surveys. Industry or company surveys are great. But you can quickly do your own informal customer survey to determine key concepts. Don’t keep your survey info to yourself. It is critical for managers, marketing, and product development people to receive that information.
Look for the open lane or blue ocean in your market. Every industry has the large volume customers and products. The sales road to those customers is crowded. Customers often screen out the salesperson onslaught by using price as an elimination tool. Look around to find the underserved market. The customers on that road are usually a little more open to sales calls.
Go see it for yourself. Whenever possible, go see successes and failures with your own eyes, ears, nose, and hands. When a customer calls you with a product complaint, go to their operation and see it firsthand. Too many fines in your feed….sick animals not responding to your medication…. crops in one field not performing on your biological…..delivery driver damaged the side of a barn. Go see it. Maybe not every time or when it’s a small complaint. But when it is a significant situation, go see it. Not only will you see it and make your own judgment as to how bad it is, but you will show the customer you care enough to take the time. This same concept applies to internal situations. Any time you are having repetitive problems within your operations or admin departments, I encourage you to go see them firsthand.
Think of your sales territory like a franchise. Your company provides the structure, the customer segment for you to sell, and the overhead of marketing and administering for your territory. They provide a vehicle, travel expenses, and any needed training or equipment for you to be successful. They rely on you to manage your territory like it’s your own business. Very similar to a franchise.
Reaching success in sales does not necessarily make you a great sales manager. Those are very different skills. Look at sports as an example. The greatest players in sports are rarely the greatest coaches. Most coaches played, but weren’t high performers.
Becoming a successful salesperson with an established customer base can provide the ultimate in value: financial, time, and emotional rewards. Successful salespeople often make more than sales managers, have more personal time, and feel more accomplished than sales managers. Before taking that leap, test the waters with a ride-along. Meet with a few sales managers in your company to discuss the value of becoming a sales manager: time, dollars, and emotional value.