I am constantly being asked the difference between a simple sale and a major sale.
Most of the books out there written on selling just talk about selling skills in general. They tell you how to dress, they tell you how to close, they tell you how to handle objections. All in all they all tend to focus on the same thing. The fact of the matter is, research has shown a very marked difference between selling something simple like a fountain pen refill and actually selling an expensive pen. There are many examples of major sales.
What about a machine to make coffee in a high class restaurant? What about that real high end projector for your media room. Another example may be one million dollars worth of life insurance. In fact we can go on and on. All of these big sales rarely conclude on the first interview. It normally takes many sales calls, sometimes with different people before a decision is made. In many cases proposals must be written, presentations must be made and sometimes to a board of directors etc etc etc.
In the coming months I intend publishing documentation that will assist you when dealing in these kind of circumstances. The skill set required to handle this type of selling does not resemble selling a pencil or a bottle of ink. Yes, there may be one or two similar skills used, but when we are dealing with high powered busy business people we are in a different league. Stay tuned, there will be some really worth while posts coming your way soon.
For further Reading on this subject I suggest the best sales book ever “Making Major Sales” by Neil Rackham Huthwaite Research Group
