How to Hone Your Soft Selling Skills
At some point, even if you’re not in sales, you’ll likely have to sell something, whether that be an idea or your skills. That’s because almost all aspects of a professional career involve some kind of selling, from internal meetings with colleagues to client calls. But what is the best way to hone your soft sales skills so you can be more effective?
This research suggests that sellers’ core competencies, which include deep and extensive product knowledge, customer knowledge and their ability to connect products and services with stated and unstated needs and demands of customers, are the most important sales performance drivers. As such, companies should focus on these seven verified categories of seller skills when planning sales activities.
Empathy
Having empathy for your customers can help you build meaningful relationships with them, which ultimately leads to more sales opportunities. Being able to put yourself in their shoes can help you understand what they’re looking for, what their pain points are and how your product or service can best meet their needs.
Presentation skills
Whether it’s an internal meeting or a call with a prospect, the way you present your ideas and information is vitally important to how your audience receives them. A good presentation style allows you to engage your audience and keeps them interested throughout the conversation, making it easier for them to connect with you and trust that what you have to say is valuable.
Everyone has a story about that time they bought something from a salesperson who understood their business, asked well-thought-out questions and listened to them (instead of talking), and was able to connect the goods or services they were offering with their expressed and unstated needs. This is the essence of a good salesperson. skills selling