Sales Ninja Killer Newsletter

I think a lot of people confuse activity vs achievement. I have a client whose whole sales management philosophy is focus on sales activity. I totally agree that without sales activities, there isn’t going to be any achievement. But there is also another way to look at it, i’ve often asked my clients, why isn’t the pipeline moving? Firstly, we need to fill the pipeline, that’s sales activities, prospecting to be specific. Once they are filled, then why isn’t the pipeline moving?

I’ve found few reasons why pipeline don’t move. One of the main one is this: the pipeline is stucked with many unqualified leads and prospects. If management wants to see activities, sales people will fill the pipeline with activities, but what kind of activities? They will plug in any leads they have. And that is lots of activity and zero achievement.

Key to a healthy pipline is this > if it’s a big deal, quality is more important than quantity because in big deals, we need to spend a lot of time working the deal. 3x the target revenue would be good enough. > If it’s small deals, quantity is then slightly more important. This is where the law of averages play a part.

Conclusion, while sales activities are important, also think of sales achievements. What is being achieved here? Running faster in a wrong direction leads to the land of lost. Lost of deals, lost of sales, losts of motivation and ultimately loss of sales people because they are not performing and thus quits because they are pressured on sales activities but what is really more important is sales achievements.

Hanzo Ng
SalesNinja Grandmaster

During father’s day, i took my dad out for dinner and then to the movies. We watched The Karate Kid. The new one of course. The old one is with Mr Miyagi, the new one is Jacky Chan playing Mr. Han. My father enjoyed it, i was ok with it. Karate Kid is not the only old movie that is now a new movie. Terminator, Indiana Jones or Nightmare on Elm Street are all old movies.

My point is, old stories still work in the new world. So if your sales manager told you an old story of how he/she used to close the sales, the old story is still valid, all you need to do is a remake. The content remains, just the ‘style’ could be different. So don’t just discard some old stories and say, ‘last time is different, the world has changed’. Yes, last time is different and the world has changed but – fundamentals don’t change. Basics of selling is always the same, understand buyer’s need and wants, give a good solution that solves their problems or that improves their situation.

Don’t say, it doesn’t work, ask yourself, how can i make this work. Ask the right question and get the right answer.

Hanzo Ng
SalesNinja Grandmaster

Was having breakfast in one of my favourite Nyonya fried noodle restaurants when this young guy approached me with a polite gesture. The normal reactions of most people would be waving their hands signalling No No No, rejecting anything the approacher would say next.  But I like to hear what they have to say. In this case was solicitation for money. Money for their care homes. 

Just to make sure I don’t get screwed, I did two things. Since the guy asking for money is a student, I asked where was he studying? He said UCSI. I said what course? He said applied science. I then ask a few more questions regarding the subject to test whether he knows what he’s talking about. Ok, verification done, after that I called the number to make sure this care home for disabled kids really exist. It does.

So I said ok, I’ll give you $50. He said thanks and the normal appreciation manners. He gave me a receipt, I didn’t bother to look at it because I was eating still. After my breakfast I took a look at the receipt and I realized (shockingly)…

There was a big lesson for this care home to learn…

While the receipt states my name, there was a missing element for them to be aware of.

I just gave $50 in less than 3 minutes; I can be considered a generous donor. Did they get my contact? Nope. If that Home needs money again, guess what will they do? Get some volunteers and hit the streets again, mistake, mistake.

Lesson here, ask the donors for their contacts, get permission to put them into an email system which they can  get volunteers to help to do, that way they can keep in touch with their donors. They can show the donors what they have done with the $50 I gave them.

Same thing with retailers, or any sort of businesses. DATABASE is the word. Get it, keep it and use it.

Hanzo Ng
Sales Ninja Grandmaster

I got an email recently from one of my newsletter readers commenting on my upcoming public training in July. He said…

better be in hibernate mode now till the recession passes on. There is no money around no matter how hard you work..

I replied…

Well Latiff, there are 3 types of people.
1: those who wait for things to happen.
2: those who make things happen.
3: those who don’t know what happened.

We can wait or we can move. Believe it’s a choice.

We move before we have to and not when we need to.

Hanzo Ng
Sales Ninja Grandmaster

It’s been months since I took the stairs up to my office. Mainly due to the fact that I’m in training most of the time and just isn’t in office. Well today while waiting for the lift I actually had a thought, ‘hey why not take the stairs again?’ and I did.

I’ve been taking the stairs consistently for 2 months I think. But that was sometime last year. Then I went back into normal mode because I was running on auto pilot – a special programming called (HABIT). I’ve been taking the lift for years now vs the stairs for only 2 months. So it’s easy and natural to take the lift.

A lot of people want to improve their selling skills. But if we are always running on shortcuts called habits, then we may try something new for a while and then bounce back to being the same just like the stairs vs lift activity of mine.

The key to this is of course practice. But I think more importantly is awareness. If I wasn’t aware to choose the stairs, I would have taken the lift today. So dear Sales Ninjas, always think of the new habit you want to have replacing the old one and have a iron strong will to consistently practice it. All the best.

Unconventionally,
Hanzo Ng
Sales Ninja Grandmaster