Good morning everyone,
Wow, this October it has been two years since I started blogging. That is 104 blogs to date. It has been fun to do and in doing so I was able to create the book The Sales Process Uncovered. I hope you have found these blogs to be helpful in your success at sales. Today I want to talk about a sales lesson that I learned early on and was recently brought up to my attention that salespeople still don’t understand. I hope you enjoy it!
How many times have you called and not been able to get ahold of the contact you wanted? You were successful however in getting in touch with the assistant. The assistant’s primary focus is keeping the executive’s schedule and weeding out sales calls. I’ve heard stories from assistants to executives where the sales people were not only rude, but threatening. They chuckled as they tossed the message into the recycle bin if they even wrote it down from the rude salesperson.
The assistants asked, do salespeople really think this is a good strategy to be rude to me? Successful business people treat their assistants like part of their family. These assistants know more about the executive than most of their friends and family do. What would happen if someone threatened your family member? What do you think the executive would do if you threatened their assistant?
There is an old saying “you get more bees with honey”. My mother used to tell me that when I was getting upset about dealing with others. She meant that it does not matter what others do to you, the only thing you can do is focus on how you act. People react to anger with anger, but its hard to argue with a whisper. It’s equally hard for someone to argue with someone being polite and nice to them.
If you turn the assistant off and the executive finds out you will likely hear from them, but I am confident that the conversation is not going to go the way that you hope it to go. These executives will protect their assistants. There is never a need to threaten, degrade, or treat the assistant as a roadblock.
Instead focus on being nice and getting to know the assistant. They hold all the knowledge about the executive, so why not focus on building rapport with them before you try to get after the executive. Learn about them and get to know them. Follow the sales process you would with any other prospect to learn about them. They may even tell you how to meet the executive in person on accident? Like when the executive is heading to the gym, or their golf course.
I have watched lawyers use this same process with court representatives instead of going straight to the judge. They use this sales process principal of rapport to gain a relationship with the clerks and everyone else around the judge so they can get cases moved up as well as set up appointments. Judges are just like executives and have a busy schedule. Focusing on building rapport with the clerks will allow the lawyers to get where they need faster.
Remember the assistant can be your best ally, or your worst enemy. Choose to be respectful and nice. It will pay off in the end.
Have a good weekend and happy selling!
P.S. if you do turn the assistant to helping you, you better make sure to drop them a signed card, or even bring them a present when you score your meeting with the executive.
Sincerely,
Kevin Sidebottom