The craft of selling has been totally devalued. It is fundamental to everything we do, yet we never give salespeople the credit they deserve. We don’t give them the respect that we give the professionals – the engineers, from mechanical to chemical, aeronautical, civil and IT; the accountants and the lawyers – but we expect our CEOs to be chief sales officers of the companies they run.
There is a reason for both of these mutually antagonistic positions: in the first instance the barrier to entry for sales people is much lower than it is for the professions. In the second instance, when things are shrinking it is very easy to cut, but to be able to grow your company you have to sell what it is that you’re making – particularly when no one really wants it or knows that they need it.
The deep art of selling has been lost, for all intents and purposes, and we are all a lot poorer for it. We see this dearth, and vulgarisation, of the craft at all levels of life, from the tyranny of cold calling to the rough persuasiveness of identity politics.
When times are tough, we need to get shrewd, not shrill, we need to raise our argument, not our voices – and yet here we are, mired in a very noisy world of the lowest common denominator, besieged by inane cold calls from call centre sweatshops to soggy advertising flyers stuck under our windscreen wipers.
Breaking the cycle
It shouldn’t be like that; in truth we can’t afford for it to be like that. We must break the cycle of hustling at the hustings and/or trying to appease the bottom line and get beyond that.
Selling is about listening, understanding, it’s about solving problems. It’s not about just selling a product at the right price – it’s about selling a product that meets the customer’s needs and gives value. We can only understand what the customer needs by getting to know the customer’s world.
If that seems trite, it is because it is – and yet with all the tools we have in front of us to help us understand and to make communication (and staying in touch) easier than ever before, we’ve abdicated our responsibilities to apps, algorithms and the occasional video call.
In an ostensibly multidimensional world, we have managed to be so beguiled by technology that reduces our clients to 2-D on our screens that we have lost sight of the fundamental truth that it is the third dimension of human mutuality that creates the sale.
There is no substitute for the basics, making an appointment and sitting down face-to-face and, here’s the thing, actively listening. We must stop behaving like missionaries on methamphetamine once we get past the door and into the office, and start behaving more like people who care. When we listen, we will hear what the real problem is that needs resolving and we will be able to tailor-make our solutions to that.
Just like the mining companies of yore used to send geologists out into the hinterland with picks and pans to prospect, we must do the same, especially when we are selling solutions that go behind the basics of selling a loaf of bread and a litre of milk.
It is not enough for companies to innovate their products – we must sell in a way that produces value, and we do this by creating relationships. We need to be clear about what we are doing, and that means understanding who we are going to meet and talk to, not just blindly writing an email, polishing it up in AI, and then spraying and praying, sending it to our database and hoping someone opens the email and doesn’t delete it – or block it – on receipt.
It means reading up, becoming experts in the field that we are in. Selling is a craft, and like all other crafts it needs to be practised and polished to be perfected. It also requires us to be inventive.
We can’t just blindly knock on doors with the same tired old story, hoping to be let in, because on the off chance that those doors open and we are invited in, we must be able to provide more value to the other person than they are providing to us. Our pitch is useless if it doesn’t bring about a change in that person’s opinion or behaviour.
Building understanding
If we concentrate on the concept of building understanding, we stop hustling to make targets at any cost and instead lay the foundations for repeat business because we are in the business of meeting others’ expectations, understanding their problems and solving them. It shouldn’t be about securing an order from them, but rather sparking an epiphany, a series of epiphanies in fact, about how you can both help each other fundamentally and organically. It’s from providing this value that true relationships of trust emerge, not from flattery and faux friendships.
Selling permeates every facet of life, not just in business. What is happening right now is all salesmanship in a way, from the general elections to the establishment of a government of national unity, with micro-epiphanies radiating out from every decision between those who made their crosses in voting stations to the WhatsApps to the Union Buildings.
Selling solutions is far more complex than selling products. They are abstract for a start, but they are based on the same principle of understanding what the other needs to fulfil your own needs. If it’s a zero-sum game, a win/lose game, it’s a quick win with a high risk of scorched earth afterwards and buyer remorse. If it’s done well, with an understanding that it’s a repeat relationship in what is known as “the shadow of the future” in game theory, then that risk is minimised.
There has never been a greater showcase for the importance of sales – and for CEOs, political leaders and presidents being able to sell well – than there is right now.
The challenge for those of us in education, and particularly business education, is to get the understanding of selling for mutual value on to the curriculum at every level that we teach – we might even halve the divorce rate at the same time. DM
Daily Maverick’s journalism is funded by the contributions of our Maverick Insider members. If you appreciate our work, then join our membership community. Defending Democracy is an everyday effort. Be part of it. Become a Maverick Insider.
