Sell the person and then the product. Sell yourself, the relationship, and then the product. Sell yourself to your customer, and the product will follow. Say "yes" to people, and they'll say "yes" to you. The sale is the means to an end.
Marketing and sales is one of the oldest professions in the world. Throughout our lives we all have to be salespeople. From the way I see it, students enrolled at Boston College have the bare essentials to be effective salespeople. BC receives tens of thousands of applications every year. Each year the competition gets more intense. Those of us who made the cut and utilized good judgment are here now. To get here you had to be able to sell yourself via your application and accompanying essays.
I do not know everything about sales, but from my limited experience I have found that several practices can take an amateur and make him or her seem like they've been selling for years. This may seem proverbial, but one of the first requirements to sell anything to anyone is to know yourself. You must know what your talents and weaknesses are. For example, you might be better at communicating your point in person face to face. Some prefer utilizing phones, faxes, and e-mails to reach a higher number of potential clients, hoping that one or two are successful. Working in sales teams is a great way to cover all the bases when it comes to skills. Each person can utilize his or her unique skills in order to close the deal.
In addition to knowing yourself, you must know your customer, his or her business, and his or her budget. For example, when selling advertising in a newspaper such as The Heights, one would approach a small business owner slightly different than a marketing executive from a worldwide company. The last thing anyone being pitched to ever wants to realize is that the person selling something to them does not understand their needs.
Identifying with your client is one of the most important steps along the road to "thinking outside the box." What would you do if you were running your customer's business? What would your goals be? How would you accomplish them? How can you get the maximum "bang for your buck?" Often you will think of a solution to your customer's problem that will astound both of you.
I leave the most important factor for the end. You hear about customer service all the time from major corporations. For example, the Dell Computer Corporation has some of the best technical service I have ever experienced. I enter my computer's serial number and instantly am connected to a technician. Consequently, I will never purchase another computer not made by Dell. Turn on CNBC. You will hear analysts talking about huge retail outlets like Wal-Mart and repeat sales. Repeat business relies on customer service. So, once you make the sale you must work the relationship. Often, not only will you enjoy the fruits of repeat business, but people will refer friends to you because of your work.
All of the above will happen automatically if you make it a routine to put yourself in your customer's shoes and follow through. If you say you are going to do something by a certain date, do it. If you say you are going to call someone at a certain time, do it. It's not hard. It will take some time to get used to, but the fact is you are a salesperson for yourself. The bottom line is that if they say "no," it could be worse. You could be attending a college in the middle of nowhere; say, for instance, South Bend.
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