Is cold calling dead? And if laws are being passed to put it to rest once and for all, how do we generate business from now on?

Opinions on the subject vary greatly depending on the background of the individual. For example, most of the old-timers are vigilant in preaching their belief that the only possible way to succeed in the world of selling is to make no less than fifty calls each and every day. On the other hand, younger salespeople tend to become frustrated with this rather quickly and begin looking for more innovative ways to generate business.

I was just reminded of how ingrained this cold calling belief is. I spoke with a friend who left a sales position with a major merchant processing bank only a few weeks after starting. The reason? He was required to make a minimum of 400 cold calls each and every week and to document his activity with business cards. He is highly experienced and knows how to generate business without knocking on 400 doors per week and decided to discuss the strategies that have worked for him in the past with his managers. Their response? This is how we’ve done it for forty years and we’re not about to change.

That response, in my opinion, is the reason we’re seeing record business bankruptcies today. The world and our economy have changed and are breaking into bold, unchartered territory. But the management of most business organizations insists on doing things the old way, even though the old way produces less and less results as time goes on.

The concept of “Permission Marketing” is slowly but surely gaining popularity as the old idea of “Interruption Marketing” becomes less efficient and more wasteful. There are several reasons why cold calling in particular has become less effective as we move further into the Information Age. It destroys your status as a business equal. It forces you to spend time with unqualified prospects while the qualified ones are buying from your competition. It annoys people and is increasingly considered to be rude and disrespectful. Moreover, it may now be illegal (and in several states it’s been illegal for quite some time). But, most importantly, it destroys sales peoples attitudes.

Where is the good news in all of this? Well, the great news is that if you begin using new, innovative, “Information Age” methods for prospecting, you’ll be miles ahead of your competitors who are wasting their time annoying people with cold calls. In this age of the Internet and vast communication networks, why on earth would anyone knock on doors or make cold phone calls to look for business?

Think of the power at your fingertips: there are literally dozens of ways to use the Web and e-mail to let the idea of Permission Marketing do its magic. Allow customers to raise their hands and let you know they’re interested. Begin finding, implementing and reaping the benefits of this bold, new Information Age we are in. Your competitors will be the ones standing in bankruptcy court and explaining their “do-not-call” violations to the government while you are happily taking orders.

Frank Rumbauskas, the New York Times best-selling author who revolutionized selling, is the founder of FJR Advisors, LLC, which teaches people how to get more sales and stop cold calling forever! For 10 free chapters of Frank’s breakthrough book, please visit http://www.nevercoldcall.com.

Don’t Miss Out On My FREE Report – Top Secret Copywriting Techniques To Increase Your Sales By Over 214% In Under 24 Hours!

For An Amazingly Powerful Split Tester That Can Do Thousands Of Tests At Once, Track Every Single Customer And Automatically Improves Your Sales page For You, Check Out The Evolutionary Splittester

Wendy Moyer is a professional writer. Martin World Wide offers a variety of services including mailing lists and other sales data.

Wendy Moyer is a professional writer. Martin World Wide offers a variety of services including mailing lists and other sales data.

Sales managers frequently approach me for advice on how to keep salespeople motivated, especially when sales reps get into a rut – and seem to keep slipping deeper into it. Telling managers what not to do usually solves the problem. Most managers do things to de-motivate salespeople without even knowing it.

Let’s take the idea of funnels and forecasts, for instance. Funnels and forecasts are important aspects of running any sales operation. Both salespeople and managers need to know where they stand in terms of potential opportunities, and funnels serve to track those opportunities. No successful business can operate and properly plan for the future without accurate forecasting. In theory, these are absolutely essential to the success of any operation. In reality, however, few words strike terror in the hearts of salespeople like “funnel” and “forecast.”

For most salespeople, the term “funnel review” equates to micromanagement, probation and performance improvement plans. Just hearing the term is enough to shift a sales rep’s frame of mind from positive to negative. He or she suddenly loses enthusiasm and doesn’t know why. Many managers increase funnel reviews as performance slips, which causes performance to slip further, and in the end nobody wins. Endless funnel reviews, especially if they’re not positive, only serve to reinforce salespeople’s self-doubts and limiting beliefs.

Forecasts are a similar problem, but in different ways. Few salespeople forecast accurately. Nobody wants to fall short on their forecast, so they embellish, exaggerate and make sure the numbers add up to where they should be rather than where they really are. This results in managers who expect those numbers, and salespeople who dodge managers because they know they aren’t going to perform as forecasted. Then there are salespeople like myself who do the exact opposite – since I hated nothing more than having a manager constantly ask me, “When is this one going to close? When is that one going to close?,” I intentionally left good deals off my forecast. While it eliminated the problem of constantly being asked when all those deals would sign, it created another form of stress in having to deal with the consequences of a funnel that fell short of expectations.

Another word that instantly de-motivates salespeople is “activity.” Unfortunately, in the absence of any other viable advice, most managers simply blurt out, “You need to increase your activity” to anyone who isn’t at quota. This accomplishes nothing other than setting up the rep to believe that a series of funnel reviews and performance improvement plans are soon to follow.

Finally, I see entirely too many managers pushing too hard to spend extra time with salespeople who are falling short. While it’s necessary to spend time with these people, it’s not a good idea to keep asking them what they need help with and to insist on riding along with them. This only turns up the heat another notch on an already stressed-out rep. Nobody who is having trouble likes to be singled out, especially when the extra attention easily can be mistaken for micromanagement.

To keep a struggling salesperson motivated:

1. Keep the talk of funnels, forecasts and activity to a minimum.

2. Offer help without being overbearing.

3. Put your trust and confidence in that salesperson.

Stick with these guidelines and you’ll not only do a better job of helping those who are having difficulties, but you’ll see an overall increase in your sales team’s motivation and enthusiasm.

Frank Rumbauskas, the New York Times best-selling author who redefined selling, has taught tens of thousands of salespeople and small business owners how to stop cold calling forever! Get 10 free chapters of Frank’s breakthrough home study course at http://www.nevercoldcall.com

Sales pipeline management is one of the most crucial components of a successful sales team. Successful sales professionals are those who know how to effectively manage sales schedules, and identify each stage of the sales process. This type of long term sales cycle management is what pipeline management is all about, and this article will provide helpful tips to keep you at the top of your sales game.

A properly managed sales pipeline means the elimination of peaks and valleys, or in other words, a consistent flow of sales leads. It is also much easier to determine which potential sales require more resources than others, and easier to follow through with potential sales opportunities that you may other wise miss.

So how do you achieve this end. First, be sure to always be clear as to your expectations. You and your sales team both need to know what to expect from each other, and must agree on key issues such as team reviews, sales goals, and sales tracking. You should also take advantage of the technology at your disposal whenever possible. Many programs can help you organize your sales operations, and a few companies even sell software designed exclusively for sales pipeline management.

While you may feel pressured to make weekly, daily, or monthly goals, and, consequently feel pressured into making sure that your sales team meets these goals, it is important to distinguish between long term and short term sales results, and to realize at the same time that it is important not to allow short term goals to eclipse long term ones in importance. Whether you decide to have daily goals or weekly goals is of course up to you, and that is not to say that they are not very important and effective motivational tools, because they are and can be, if handled correctly.

The sales pipeline is also sometimes referred to as the sales funnel, and is designed to be a snapshot of your sales processes, highlighting the leads generated by marketing and other advertising efforts, and a closing rate representing the number of total leads closed. Each step needs to have a clearly defined criterion, so that as leads become more and more qualified, you and everyone else on your sales team will know what each specific level of qualification is. Your sales pipeline is your tracking system, and if it is properly organized, it will be the key to meeting sales goals and closing deals.

For more effective ways to manage your sales pipeline ,the author recommends Cloud 9 Analytics on-demand Business Intelligence solutions.

When you are getting started with your own business, there are many things that you need to keep in mind. You need to think about things like overhead, and material costs and labor; you probably don’t want to think much about the logistics of getting paid!

Though things were perhaps simpler when people only paid with cash, the advent of credit cards has made the prospect of doing business a lot more profitable and good deal quicker. When you are launching a small business, the prospect of taking credit cards is something that you must consider. You must open a merchant account with an institution of some sort, and there are several options to choose from.

If your business is mostly online, you might wish to consider sites like PayPal or cc:bill, both of which offer their services to a variety of online business. The trouble with these sites is that their rates are often higher and there is often a delay in processing the money that is processed using their service.

While this might be a way to start off, as your business gets bigger and handles more money, you might want to look at other options. What sort of terminal for instance, it may be a stand alone or a wireless credit card machine.

To get a merchant’s account, you will usually begin with the bank where you have a savings and checking account. As a previous customer, you may be eligible for deals or discounts. If your bank does not handle merchant accounts, they might outsource you to another company that does.

Some of these institutions do have rather stringent rules about the businesses they will service. Some refuse to handle any businesses that deal with services rather than goods, and all of them will do at least some cursory investigation to make sure that your business is a legitimate one.

You’ll be asked to guess at the average monthly sales you expect to make. Figuring from that amount, there is a chance you will be asked to keep a percentage in an account in order to cover the expense in case of fraud. In light of this, when asked to project your monthly sales, you might wish to be conservative in your estimate.

Do expect to have to deal with set up charges and monthly fees. At this point, you will need to have a business plan and know how much money your business will generate every month. Will you be able to afford the monthly fees? If it will be a bit of a stretch, it might be a little bit too early to take this step with your fledging endeavor.

If you are doing business through the internet and do not have a dedicated server, look for a merchant account that does business through a Secure Socket Layer (also known as SSL), which is a security protocol that is widely used among web-based businesses. Also remember to do good research on the company you are considering. Do they have a good ranking with the Better Business Bureau? What is their customer support like? These are all things to consider as they will be handling your hard-earned money.

A merchant account is an essential part of doing business and if you get yours set up properly in the beginning, your business will have a stable point to grow from! These days it is normal to have a terminal account with matybe the latest wireless credit card machine for portability.

Wireless credit card machines in the UK and worldwide has intriqued Dr S for many years. Remarkably how to accept credit cards for business, can be a minefield, unless you research properly. Instant online business 0 apr credit card services are available for the go getter.

Have you ever wondered how the six figure guys get to be six figure guys? The first thing that any internet professional will tell you is “the money is in the list.” That might be true but to convert members of your list to paying customers you need a powerful sales page that motivates, entices, and convinces them to actually open their wallet and get out their credit cards. How can you build sales page that can do these things? Easy, AB split testing.

In a nutshell AB split testing is the process of testing the conversion capability of one sales page against another. AB split testing is a very powerful way of increasing both the conversion rate of your sales pages as well as the profitability of your business.

In order for a business to be successful in the internet market place it is important that AB split testing be used in an ongoing basis. Successful business people constantly test their sales pages. What may have been a very successful page a few weeks past may not retain its conversion power as time goes on. By continually testing your sales pages you will be able to adapt as needed to a changing market.

Here is a 5 step process that will show you exactly how to AB split test.

1.) Sales Page (A)

Create a complete sales page for your product or service.

2.) Sales Page (B)

Create an identical page that you will use to test against the original page.

3.) Change an Attribute

On sales page B you must decide which of the attributes that you want to change. You might change the headline, opening paragraph, teaser text, graphics, page layout, your bonus offers, or even the product price. The key is to change only one attribute.

4.) Split Test

Determine the length of your test. I recommend 7 days as a minimum duration. Send equal amounts of traffic to each of the pages that you are testing.

5.) Analysis

Compare the statistics for these pages at the end of the testing duration. The page which converted the most sales is the winner.

You are not done, now you start the process over again using the winning page from this test as the base page for the next. Change a different attribute this time. If the headline was better on the first try changing the lead in paragraph this time. Continual testing will allow you always have the most powerful profit pulling sales pages possible.

AB split testing of your sales pages should always be an ongoing process. You may be quite surprised at how a small change to your sales page and marketing message could have a large impact on your profit margin. AB split testing will give you the sound statistics that are needed to make educated decisions for your business.

Don’t Miss Out On My FREE Report – Top Secret Copywriting Techniques To Increase Your Sales By Over 214% In Under 24 Hours!

For An Amazingly Powerful Split Tester That Can Do Thousands Of Tests At Once, Track Every Single Customer And Automatically Improves Your Sales page For You, Check Out The Evolutionary Splittester

Every seasoned internet professional understands that split testing is a necessity to improve sales page conversion rates. Most of them also know that this can be a long laborious process as well. If you want to free up more of your valuable time then automated testing software might be just what you need.

Automated testing software comes in every price range from free for very simple versions to more than a couple of thousand for the most advanced. With automated testing software, much like any other product, you get what you pay for.

Free and low priced versions may only allow A/B type testing with only one or two variables while the higher end packages which fall into multivariate testing allow as many variables as you would like.

I have conducted thousands of split tests and here are some of the things that I would look for when considering automated testing software

1.) It must be invisible

I do not want my customers to know that I am split testing. The automated testing software must be capable of using cookies to ensure that should a customer decide not to buy at this time and return later, they will be presented with the same page they viewed earlier.

2.) Number of variables tested

The automated testing software that I would choose must allow unlimited testing. This type of software is usually used in multivariate testing and I need to be able to test as many variables as needed. To purchase a software package with limited tests is simply tossing money out the window.

3.) Coding

My pages tend to get a large amount of traffic so I want an automated testing software package that can handle this. Packages that use PHP and mySQL tend to be very fast and would be the ones on the top of my list.

4.) Ease of Use

If I purchase an automated testing software package it is to save time. I do not want to spend a large amount of time learning the software. A package with an easy to use and familiar windows based control panel would make the learning curve much easier to handle.

5.) Installation

While I can install scripts and have done so in the past I prefer that those who are familiar with the setup and operation of the script install it for me. A good automated testing software package should offer either free or low cost installation.

There you have it, the five things that I would look for when determining which automated testing software to purchase.

Automated testing software can save time by performing time intensive tasks giving you more time to work on other aspects of your business.

When considering the purchase of a software package you should consider the visibility to customers, the number of variables that it can test, how it is coded, ease of use, and installation. Use automated testing software to free up your valuable time.

Don’t Miss Out On My FREE Report – Top Secret Copywriting Techniques To Increase Your Sales By Over 214% In Under 24 Hours!

For An Amazingly Powerful Split Tester That Can Do Thousands Of Tests At Once, Track Every Single Customer And Automatically Improves Your Sales page For You, Check Out The Evolutionary Splittester

Mailing lists are an invaluable part of any sales and marketing strategy. Basically, the larger number of prospects you have, the larger number of leads you will obtain, and eventually the larger number of customers you will have.

That is why good, accurate and large mailing lists are essentials. They are the building blocks to the rest of your sales efforts. There are two main types of mailing lists: consumer mailing lists and business mailing lists. Here are some great ways to utilize mailing lists.

Direct mail is still an effective method of reaching your target audience. With the right mailing lists, you can send out information to your targeted prospective customers at any time. Direct mailers such as newsletters can be used with your mailing lists to ensure that your prospects get information about your company periodically. Staying in touch with your target is a great way to give them information about your products or services in an informative way.

Direct mail is also a great method to let your potential clients know about new products and services you are offering as well as any specials you may be running. By using the same mailing list and adding new contacts to it, you can easily keep track of who you have sent information to and track any responses.

If your company utilizes telemarketing or cold calling as a sales strategy, mailing lists are incredibly useful as well. By using your mailing lists with telephone contact information, you can call your prospects to discuss your services or products. Again, by using the mailing list, you can keep track of who has been contacted and what kind of response you are getting.

Compiling a mailing list can take a lot of time away from your sales and marketing team. Because of this, many companies are seeing the value in purchasing consumer mailing list and business mailing lists, as well as other related services.

There is such a demand for these products that the companies providing them have become experts in obtaining information for businesses like yours. More often than not, the cost of these mailing lists is far less than it would cost you to obtain the information on your own.

When purchasing these lists for mailing campaigns, telemarketing leads and other strategies, keep in mind what company you purchase them from. Find a company that has a wide variety of lists available, including different demographics and geographic areas. You’ll save a great deal of time and possibly money by purchasing your list from experts.

Wendy Moyer is a professional writer. Martin World Wide offers a variety of services including mailing lists and other sales data.

Do you know how to quickly increase the conversion rate on your sales page? If I could show you a method that will let you test all of the attributes of your sales page at one time would you be interested? Of course you would. In this article we will discuss multivariate testing and how it can help boost your bottom line.

Split testing has been around for a very long time and all successful internet marketers use it. This method allows you to test one page element at a time to determine what is more successful.

The major drawback to split testing is the amount of time involved. Testing one element then another, and another can be very time consuming. Multivariate testing will allow you to test as many elements as you wish at the same time thus saving valuable time.

Multivariate testing software is set up on your server and you supply the program with a number of variations for each element of your sales page that you want to test. This can be as simple or as intricate as you desire.

The attributes that you might test are headlines, lead in paragraph, font, layout, color, border, and price just to name a few. The list is almost endless.

After you supply the software package with all of your variables it will dynamically generate your sales page and track the corresponding results. For instance you will discover if the white or pale blue background produced more sales etc.

If you are seriously interested in conducting the most testing in the least amount of time then multivariate testing is the answer you have been looking for. Imagine simply testing a headline using the A/B split testing method.

How long would it take? In most cases I usually gave my test at least one week to build statistics. Then I would compare the two pages. If I had been using multivariate testing I could have tested twenty or more attributes in that amount of time and we all know that in our business time is money.

Multivariate testing is convenient in that it allows you to test as many variables as you like at the same time and all on the same sales page. You do not have to construct multiple sales pages to test each element and worry about distributing traffic to each page equally. You do not have to make changes to your advertising in order to facilitate the test, everything continues as normal.

While multivariate testing is the easiest way to test your sales page elements it has one drawback over A/B Split testing and that is cost. Split testing really only cost the internet professional some time whereas multivariate testing will cost them a few bucks. In the Low End (sub $500) price range there is really one one good option: The Evolutionary Splittester. If you want a more robust, more capable program, be prepared to shell out several thousand dollars.

Multivariate testing has distinct advantages when compared with the traditional A/B split testing methods that so many of us are used to. Multivariate testing saves time by allowing you to test multiple variables at one time and is convenient in that there is no need to set up multiple sales pages. Everything is done on one page.

The drawback to this form of testing is its price. Internet professionals who are just starting out may find the price tag somewhat discouraging.

Multivariate testing will help you increase your profit by constantly testing the variables on your sales page. You can then keep the good and toss the bad.

Don’t Miss Out On My FREE Report – Top Secret Copywriting Techniques To Increase Your Sales By Over 214% In Under 24 Hours!

For An Amazingly Powerful Split Tester That Can Do Thousands Of Tests At Once, Track Every Single Customer And Automatically Improves Your Sales page For You, Check Out The Evolutionary Splittester

Setting goals for your sales team is one of the most crucial tasks that you as a sales manager will ever undertake. Without set goals, your team will not feel properly motivated and may also under perform due to a lack of internal work load and expectation structure. This article will help you discover some of the best ways to properly set realistic goals for your sales team.

First, sit down by yourself and draw up a master plan of the goals that you would like your team to achieve and then, write down the steps that you feel are necessary to accomplish these goals. Once you have your goals and objectives, make sure that your sales team is properly trained to achieve them. If you need to have them learn new methods or brush up on skills, remember that although this may take them off of the sales floor temporarily, it will also better prepare them to close more sales in the long run.

Make full use of all of the tools at your disposal, i.e. phones, fax machines, the Internet, and the various sales management tracking software programs available. The Internet is a powerful tool for research and also, for discovering new potential leads and sources of revenue. It goes without saying that the most powerful tool at you at your disposal, however, is your very own sales team, which is why it is so important to recruit effectively. Putting the wrong people in charge of a project or deal can cause you to lose it, and in the end, you will have no one but yourself to blame.

A lot is said at sales conferences and seminars about KPI or key performance indicators. These can be helpful when it comes to problems or potential pitfalls in your sales practices. For example, how often is a sales appointment advanced to the next phase, and what is your average revenue. You should also examine our sales cycle, is it a conventional cycle or do control it. Do some of your team members have shorter sales cycles on average then others do. If so, take the time to examine the reasons behind this.

Answering these questions, following these tips and taking the time to create clear goal plans and objectives will help you and your sales team go a long way towards creating, managing, and achieving your sales goals.

Cloud9 Analytics delivers easy-to-use business intelligence applications directly to sales, marketing, and support organizations as a service over the internet. Visit the website for more information on Sales Pipeline Management

Many areas of selling that I’ve studied and taught to others are rarely, if ever, known and used in the world of professional selling. One of those is the science of social dynamics – before I ever began learning it myself and including it in my training, I’d never before seen it used in sales.

Social dynamics is the science of using nonverbal sub-communication to influence others. What does this include? The primary elements of our nonverbal sub-communication are body language, vocal tone, inflection and volume, eye contact, movement and carriage of the body, and other subtle but important elements.

The consequences of not using proper social dynamics in your sales interactions are severe, and most of us don’t even know we’re doing anything wrong because we haven’tt been taught. The situation is much like cold calling – salespeople who cold call only do so because they don’t know any alternatives. However, by not paying attention to our social dynamics, we unknowingly give our power away to prospects, let them have control of sales appointments, create an impression that we are not successful, give prospects the “gut feeling” that they should not buy from us – all unknowingly.

So, that said, what can we do to make sure we don’t short-circuit all of our efforts by using improper social dynamics? Following is a brief and very basic – but highly effective – checklist of things you need to watch out for while selling:

1. Body language. (This isn’t easy to explain without pictures so bear with me!) Be careful not to lean in to prospects when talking with them. Leaning in sub-communicates weakness and submission. Lean back when you are in front of prospects. This sub-communicates that you are the leader, are in control, and will cause prospects to be more willing to follow your lead and buy. In addition, you should never face a prospect more than they are facing you. In other words, if a prospect is not facing you straight-on while sitting or standing, you should be turned away just a degree more than the prospect is turned away from you. It is okay to face a prospect straight-on only after they have fully turned to face you directly. If you face them directly before they do so to you, you are sub-communicating neediness and submission. However, by allowing the prospect to do so first, they are automatically placed in the submissive role and will be much easier to close.

2. If you cannot hear a prospect, never lean in directly when they repeat themselves. Instead, turn sideways, so that your ear is facing the prospect, but your face is turned away. This allows you to hear the prospect better but without taking a weak stance.

3. Your voice. The single most important thing you can do to be a more effective salesperson is to have a powerful, commanding voice. Like a firm handshake, an impressive vocal presence sub-communicates power and leadership and will cause prospects to be much more willing to buy from you. Practice speaking louder in your everyday communications. You don’t want to yell or strain; instead, focus on speaking from your core, your abdomen, which will result in the commanding voice you need to have to be effective.

Imagine a general who speaks powerfully, but without yelling or straining. This is what you should strive for. I achieved this by simply talking that way all the time. An added benefit is that you will automatically become an excellent public speaker by having this talent, which you can then leverage into more sales by volunteering to speak at networking events, chamber of commerce meetings, and other “target-rich” environments. It will also be a necessary skill should you wish to go into sales training or public speaking later in your career, a choice that is available to all successful salespeople.

4. Your presence. This is closely related to body language, but has more to do with posture than with positioning yourself in front of prospects. For example, weak people are afraid of infringing on others’ personal space, so they keep a small presence. Avoid this by standing with your feet at least a foot apart, leaning back slightly, and having your shoulders back and chin up. This is a powerful stance that sub-communicates leadership and confidence. The same rules hold true while sitting – keep your feet flat on the floor (no crossed legs), with your arms spread wide rather than holding them close together. Unless you are sitting with your arms on the desk, lean back in your chair while speaking. Again, you’re demonstrating command of the situation by doing so.

What about pacing the movements of your prospect? Don’t do it. This is one of those “old, right answers” from the old school of selling that is now wrong. Most prospects can pick up on this because it’s been done to them so many times before, and, what’s worse, why would you want to pace your prospects’ mannerisms when you run the risk of reflecting their own weak body language? In addition, it shows a lack of independence, which is the biggest killer of the powerful, confident persona you want to demonstrate in appointments.

Finally, remember that this is not a competition. These suggestions are not given with the intent to rule your prospects. They simply allow you to present yourself as a powerful leader whose advice should be taken, and the end result is that prospects will feel extremely comfortable with entrusting their business to you. Follow these tips, and your close rates will suddenly explode!

Frank J. Rumbauskas Jr. is the New York Times best-selling author who redefined sales. Frank’s advice has transformed the careers of tens of thousands of salespeople! Click here to download ten free chapters of his award-winning cold calling home study course.

Do you know who created eBay and what year it was? It was created by a man named Pierre Omidyar in 1995 in the month of September. Omidyar who was living in San Jose at the time wanted to create an online market place so he wrote the code in one week end and created AuctionWeb. Now the name he used for his domain was called ebay which was part of his companies name Echo Bay. eBay AuctionWeb was just one part of his Echo Bay website at ebay dotcom. Do you know what the first item ever sold on eBay was? It was Omidyars laser pointer which he sold for $14, and it was broken too!

Ebay became very popular in a very short time. Sellers listed all manner of stuff and buyers readilly bought them. During the start there was a large amount of trust involved and it worked pretty well. There was not a lot of maintenance to the site. Omidyar even from the start collected a small fee on each sale. He took this money and used it for expansion. Soon he was making more money from eBay than he was from his job, so he quit his job to work eBay full time. To let buyers and sellers rate each other and to make it a safer arangement, in 1996 he added the feed back feature to eBay.

In the year 1997, the one millionth item, a big toy version of Big Bird from Sesame Street was sold. It was also the year that he officially changed the name of his site and company from AuctionWeb to eBay. He spent a lot of money on advertising and had the eBay logo created. Omidyar changed the name to eBay officially because it was becoming such a brand name and every body was calling it ebay anyway.

In the year 1998 business was realy booming and eBay became a massively huge. It went public on the stock market and ebay hired alot of senior managers and business strategists who handled the public outing. During this time with eBays encouragment, people started to sell a lot more than just collectibles. You could sell just about anything large or small. Where a lot of other doc com companies folded during this time, eBay survived very nicely, and is thriving to this very day.

In 1999 eBay went Global with a vengence. The UK, Austrailia, and Germany were launched that year. eBay purchased an Amazon type of online retailer called half dotcom. In 2000 they brought in the enormously popular feature Buy It Now to great successs. In 2002 eBay purchased the scandle ridden payment processor PayPal, to the relief of most of the internet. PayPal has became a lot more reputable under eBays ownership. During its pre eBay ownership, PayPal was often accused of freezing peoples accounts taking members money and never giving it back for no particular reason.

Pierre Omidyar still serves as the Chairman of the Board at eBay and has personally earned billiions from eBay. He has tried to keep a smattering of blogs around the net, one of which you can find at pierre.typepad dotcom. This has been a brief historical venture down eBays memory lane. Now a days, there is millions of items bought and sold on eBay every day on just about every corner of the planet. It is estimated that for every $100 spent online, $14 of it was spent on eBay. That is a tremendous amount of money for a business that started out as a small one man operation.

If you are interested in learning more about how you can get into buying and selling on eBay there are tons of courses, books and ebooks available. eBays own site has a tremendous resource catalog of tutorials and videos. So if you have ever wanted to venture in the lucrative world of eBay, now is as good a time as any. Good luck and happy selling and buying on eBay.

Please visit our site eBay Help for more detailed information and videos and also Questions and Answers our main site on other topics.

It’s September, also known as back to school time. My neighbors and I escort our children to the bus stop for the first day of the new school year. However, we’re puzzled about the location of the bus stop. It isn’t in the same place that it was in prior years. Instead of the children walking down the street, just a few houses, they now had to cross two, very active streets to get to the bus stop.

Vigilant, we parents made calls to get the stop moved back to where it was before. It seemed to be a fairly easy process. We called the administrator who coordinates the bus stops and he easily acquiesced. The supervisor of the bus drivers visited the bus stop and agreed with us about the safety concern. The administrator told us that the paperwork just needed to get signed by his boss, but to let the driver know the decision was made to move the bus stop back to the old location. Victory was ours. Or was it? We left someone out of the process and what occurred next will sound painfully familiar to any sales person who works in a complex, multi-buyer, sale.

After the conversation with the supervisor and administrator, we went to what we thought was the new, old bus stop. The bus turned down our street, we gave our kids a farewell kiss, and awaited their boarding of the bus. Here comes the bus. There goes the bus. The bus driver drove past us as if we weren’t even there. Needless to say, we were furious and got on the horn. All roads led to Jack (name changed) who is the ultimate decision-maker on bus stops. He had not been consulted on any of these discussions or decisions and was blind-sided by this situation. “I see no reason to change the stop from where I assigned it, he barked.” We immediately knew this was going to be problematic. With the urging of the school and the parents, he agreed to “re-assess” the bus stop.

Following his re-assessment, he called each of the parents to inform them of his decision. “Well, I don’t think the bus stop is unsafe, but I’m going to move it.” Don’t think for one second that he used this opportunity to say that the parents’ solution was better than his. Instead, he didn’t move the stop to the requested location. He moved it across the street from where we asked him to assign it. He even changed the entire bus route to accommodate for his solution, a tremendous amount of work for a small issue. However, assigning bus stops is Jack’s domain. He owns it. He’s responsible for it. He is in control. No one is going to tell Jack how to run his business. He is a thirty-year expert in bus safety. However, this wasn’t a decision on expertise, it was old-fashioned bravado, ego. And, it is not limited to bus stops. It impacts every sales person who needs to engage multiple people in the buying process to get the account awarded to them.

As I hung up the phone with Jack, it dawned on me. I coach sales people on how to work strategically in an account and we failed miserably in this circumstance. One of the perils I share with sales people is leaving the ultimate decision-maker out of the solution development process. Think about a sale that you lost, that you thought you were going to win. And, you thought you were going to win because you had a great relationship with the administrator. You and the administrator had crafted the entire solution in such a way that he could march into his boss’s office for the proverbial rubber stamp.

Many years ago, I learned, painfully, that there is no such thing as a rubber stamp. Many sales people hear “rubber stamp” and feel confident that they are working with the right person. “The sale is mine!” If anything, the rubber stamp is simply the fuse on a stick of dynamite. Better get under your desk, your deal is about to implode!

Here is what happens behind the scenes as your administrator visits with his boss. “Mr Jones, I’ve found a new supplier for our widgets. The sales rep is terrific. We’ve worked together and developed an ideal solution that makes everyone’s life easier and we’ll save 10% on our spending.” “Put it in my inbox,” says, Mr. Jones. Days become weeks as the administrator pings Mr. Jones about his rubber stamp, but no signature is forthcoming.

Finally, Mr. Jones develops an interest in his widget purchasing and surfs the web for potential suppliers. He meets with three of them and finds one to his liking. “This supplier is going to save the company 10.25%”. Guess who got the deal? However, the sales person never knows about this because the administrator is too embarrassed to call him. After all, the administrator said this was just a rubber stamp, you had been awarded the business. Communication with the administrator goes dark; he just stops responding to your emails and voicemails.

What sales people often forget is that as you go up the corporate ladder, business leaders maintain accountability for the lower rungs of their responsibility. Thus, they want to feel as if they are involved in the solution development phase, or at least be offered the opportunity to participate. When administrators fly into their office with what they feel is a great decision, they are rebuffed. And, for one core reason, EGO! While the administrator’s plan may very well be a great one, it is met with resistance for the simple reason that his manager was not invited to participate in the process. When he finally becomes interested enough to look at this issue, his goal becomes proving that there is a better deal to be had. In essence, this approach creates a saboteur of your deal.

If you are the sales person dealing with the administrator, how do you have the conversation where you share the concern of their manager not being involved in the process without offending? It takes a tremendous amount of finesse and strategic planning. However, if you truly have your client’s best interests at heart, it is easy. This is the ultimate key. If you are committed to ensuring that your clients achieve their goals, you can have this conversation. After all, you know that they won’t get what they want if you continue down this path. Need help with a strategy to have this discussion with your clients, send me an email.

Lee B. Salz is the CEO of Business Expert Webinars, President of Sales Architects http://www.SalesArchitecture.com, author of “Soar Despite Your Dodo Sales Manager.” Lee can be reached via at lsalz@SalesArchitecture.com or 763.416.4321.

You can move people to action better with persuasion than with power. Think of those people in your life who have drawn you in and made an impression on you. Maybe they’ve convinced you to take action without seeming pushy or panicky, merely stressing the necessity and benefit of what they wanted you to do. Or maybe they won you over through their empathy, seeming to truly understand your point of view.

Consciously or unconsciously, those who have a powerful effect on us use a set of key influencing behaviors. And you can have the same effect on clients when you learn to tap into effective selling influence.

Influence is more motivation than manipulation. In this inclusive form of communication, you get others to do something or give something while maintaining or improving the relationship and creating a sense of shared commitment with your customers.

When you develop and use your influence, you create a situation where everyone wins. Try these five influence behaviors in your sales work, and watch your sales skyrocket while you enhance the quality of your relationships with your customers.

Behavior #1: Know what you want – then ask for it!

No one likes to feel as if they’re dealing with someone who has ulterior motives. Everyone loves a straight dealer, so be honest and direct about what you are trying to achieve. But in order to state what you want clearly, you have to first know what you want from your customer. What is the purpose of your meeting? What are you hoping to achieve? Are you trying to develop a relationship with your customer, for example, in order to warm him or her up for your next meeting? Or do you want to make an immediate sale?

When you know exactly what you want, you can better state your position and get your point across to your customers. When your customers know exactly what you want, they will feel your influence, experiencing a sense of clarity and purpose. They will appreciate your direct approach, even if you don’t make the sale at that time.

Behavior #2: Create Win/Win suggestions

You can influence your customers to help you obtain what you want by providing them with specific, concrete ideas that will ultimately benefit you both. To make this happen, preparation is essential, so you must know your customers. For example, if you want to make a sale to a young couple who your questions or research has revealed to have a moderate income, show them how they may benefit in the long run from paying in monthly installments rather than paying in full up front. When you know your customers’ needs, you can adjust your approach accordingly. Then ask, “Are you open to some ideas that may help your situation?” or propose “Here’s a suggestion that could help both of us.”

Behavior #3: Build trust by clarifying what you hear

In a sales situation, show your customers that you have listened to what they had to say by clarifying any issues they bring up. For example, when a customer tells you, “I’m interested in the product or service you’re offering, but I am not able to do it financially right now,” make sure that you have clearly understood. Paraphrase and summarize key points. Pause to ask if you’ve understood correctly. When you demonstrate that you have heard and understood the customer’s position, you will find that you create a shared commitment between you. Your customer will feel as if you share common ground, rather than feeling defensive and sold-to.

Behavior #4: Ask big, open-ended questions

Draw your customer out by asking a mix of open-ended questions and focused questions, then actively listening to the answers. Questions will help you to establish rapport with the customer, and lead to openness, understanding, and commitment, so don’t rush this behavior. Taking time now to listen to the customers’ concerns will enable you to go faster later.

Avoid close-ended questions – those that require only a “Yes” or “No” answer – and focus instead on open-ended questions that start with “What,” “How,” and “Where.” These will help you to gather information and find out what your customer is thinking. By seeking a broad answer, you let your customer choose the conversation’s direction: “What would be an ideal outcome for you?” or “How have you approached these issues in your business in the past?”

Focused questions help you to drill down and get disinterested customers to focus on alternatives. When you’ve been actively listening, you should be able to focus in on specific incidents, concerns, or objections the customer has raised. For example, ask, “Can you tell me a little bit more about (that relevant issue you brought up earlier)?” or “Could you tell me more about (your last experience that yielded disappointing results)?”

Behavior #5: Give something – get something!

Your customers want to see clearly why they should give you their business, so motivate them with sound reasoning that relates your solution to those concerns you know they may have. Make it easier or more attractive for your customers to do what you ask by telling them what you will be happy to do for them if they accept your solution. For example, try offering something sought-after that costs you nothing but delivers a powerful benefit to them: “If you can give me answer today, I’ll set up an immediate appointment with our IT group and that will put you first in line.”

Show that you are willing to modify your initial proposal to better suit their needs. This will help you further promote agreement and commitment. Ask, “How can I make this decision easier for you?” or “What would make this offer more attractive for you?” You are inducing the customer to buy, giving them an incentive that makes your product or service more interesting.

You don’t want to offer a discount; in all likelihood, a lower price is probably not a primary need, anyway, and you obviously don’t want to take a discount off your commission. Show added value and make your offer more attractive in some way, maybe by changing the payment schedule, or by proving success with interviews of references. Give them something immediately, and you increase your chances of getting what you want.

Meet their needs and achieve your goals

The ability to influence is a skill anyone can acquire, and it correlates directly to your success in the sales profession. Using influence skills will help you to meet clients’ needs and improve sales. When you follow these five behaviors, you will see breakthrough results in your commissions as you build more meaningful relationships with your customers.

Alan Vengel is a consultant in management training and organizational development and
author of The Influence Edge – How to Persuade Others to Help You Achieve Your Goals. He offers
cutting edge training and skill building workshops on influence and negotiation.
http://www.vengelconsulting.com.

Why is asking questions considered a sales technique? Because, too few sales people actually ask questions.

Most salespeople just start their sales talk without any regard for what their prospects needs and wants are. How can you possible know what your prospect or client needs if you do all the talking? The answer is simply, you can not.

As a salesperson, it is your job to get people to buy what you are selling. Period. To do that, you need to discover what your prospects problem is, this way you have the opportunity to help him solve it. Just spewing your sales talk does not allow you to get any information from a client or prospect.

Let us say for argument sake, you are selling websites to company owners to increase their online presence. When you meet with your prospect, you start discussing the benefits of having an online presence and how much the internet has grown as a source of business.

You explain how many of your other clients have had a tremendous increase in business as soon as they had a web presence. Then you show him all the benefits of having an online presence. But…

This prospect already has a website. He has had a site for years. His problem is the website he has is not generating any traffic and therefore he has not gotten any sales from it. So trying to sell this person a website to increase his business will only result in a lost opportunity.

Had you asked questions first like “what are your online goals, Do you already have a website or What are your thoughts about websites?” you would have discovered that this prospect has a website but is extremely dissatisfied with it.

Once you know what your prospects problem is, you know how to address it. When you ask questions early in your sales call, you will discover the needs and wants of your prospect so you can help him get what he wants. You will close more sales and make more money by asking questions.

Zig Ziglar is famous for his quote “You can have everything in life that you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want.” The trick to doing this is to ask people questions so you know what it is they actually want.

Asking questions is a powerful sales technique and you should use it whenever you can. Don’t make the mistake so many other salespeople make.

To learn more download my FREE report-How To Read Your Prospects Mind
Marc Savage is the owner of http://www.Dynamic-Selling.com

It is very vital that anyone who intends to sell and get profit on eBay be aware of some crucial tips to sell. This is mostly important for the fact that eBay attracts in the region of 2.5 million visitors per day. This is huge business. You should take it seriously and not as a hobby.

Perhaps the most crucial thing to always keep in mind is that eBay times are in Pacific Time zone, which means in whatever part of the world you live in, you will be maximizing your time auction, if you start your auctions based on that. The auction will close as per the pacific time zone, regardless of you just waking up when its midnight in the pacific.

And the timing alone is not enough. The nature of the product plays a supplementary role as well. For example, if you plan to auction something to the average school going teenagers, keep in mind that most likely the chances they will get to go through eBay thoroughly is when they are free, and that will most likely be on the weekends.

So, it makes more sense that you post on Friday evening. And besides those timings and days, the best times to go and begin is the festive seasons, and also at the end of the month, when people have just earned their salaries and are more willing to make purchases.
Many buyers will be happy with a product and want to purchase, but then the cost of shipping itself should not make them hesitate to buy.

It is very wise to check out the latest offers that packaging companies may have, as you may even save money in this process by offering to send the item you’re auctioning free of any postage fee. A happy buyer is more than likely to buy from you again. So, stay away from putting outrageous shipping prices on your items.

How you advertise your item will help your sale. If you are taking photos of the item, make sure the picture sells. Don’t use poor quality light. Make sure you display your item not with too many other items in the background to make the original item unseen. Most buyers also search for an item seeing the keyword, so this makes it very important that you carefully choose precise words that will stand out to show the type of item you wish to sell. Looking at the words most people use to buy will help you a lot.

Finally, take caution about carelessness. One slip can prove very costly as much as your profits are concerned. Before you bid for anything, make sure that the price that you have tagged for the item is the correct one that you have settled upon. Once you post the item on auction, you cannot reverse the selling price.

Don’t put money for a bid in a hurry and if you don’t bother to confirm, you may easily lose lot of money. Remember: God helps those who help themselves.

That’s it for this article and thank you for reading this article.

Kristine is the great enthusiast of Article writing and the owner of the Article Blog
Get the Benefits of Adult Stem Cells in Your Own Body
Watch the Movie here

Read Testimonials here –>>

Predicting shifts in demand can help you surf the profit waves generated by demand fluctuations. Whether you correctly forecast the increase or decrease in demand for a particular product, you can profit from both scenarios.

The Starting Point

Unless you have access to expensive market forecast data, you can use less expensive historical data to generate your own forecast model. There are various options to obtain historical data, one example is the eSources Market Research Wizard at http://research.esources.co.uk. Other methods include conducting your own targeted questionnaires and observing demand trends in your area, by asking family, and friends.

Whichever method you choose, if you can correctly predict the demand trend for a product, you stand to gain from your correct prediction, whether the trend is upward or downward sloping.

How To Gain From A Future Increase In Demand

Basic economics explains that an increase in demand for product A will result in an increase in its price. The more people want product A, the higher product A’s price will be.

Let’s say you are predicting product A demand will increase next month. If your prediction is correct, by purchasing and stocking product A today you stand to gain by reselling it next month at the higher price (theoratically, even if you purchased product A today at retail price, you can gain by reselling it at next month’s higher retail price). A good example of demand led price increases is game consoles at Christmas, which experience a huge demand surge during this period, and a correlated increase in price.

NOTE: another factor that can lead to an increase in the price of a product is shortage of supply. The lower the quantity available for resale, the higher the price of the product. Supply is inversely related to demand.

In summary, if you can correctly predict a future increase in demand for product A, by purchasing product A today and reselling it once demand has increased, you stand to gain from product A’s future price increase.

How To Gain From A Future Decrease In Demand

Just like a product’s increase in demand leads to an increase in its price, a decrease in demand leads to a decrease in its price. The advantage of a slump in demand is that you don’t have to predict it (unless you are already holding stock of the product). What you will have to predict is: i) how long the low demand will last; ii) when will it reach the bottom; iii) whether and when will its demand increase again.

A good recent example is luxury goods: in some parts of the world buyers are delaying purchases of luxury goods to more certain economic times. Due to this lower demand, prices for certain luxury goods have decreased. By buying lower priced luxury goods now (or as soon as you start noticing that their prices are increasing again) and reselling them once demand picks up again, you stand to earn the difference between today’s lower price and tomorrow’s higher price due to a resurgence in demand for those goods (Christmas will certainly see an increase in demand for quite a few luxury lines).

In summary, you can profit from a product whose demand has slumped, just as you can with products that are about to experience a surge in demand. Your experience, access to the right information, ability to hold stock for variable periods of time, and market research will all play a part in increasing the likelihood that your prodictions are correct.

Conclusion

In conclusion, when you experience a decrease in overall demand, it is always a good idea to evaluate where new opportunities have arisen. With Christmas approaching, there are certain products which will undoubtedly increase in demand, independently of market conditions. Now is the time to evaluate your options and act on these new opportunities.

eSources is the Internet’s largest database of verified wholesalers and dropshippers. Find suppliers, dropshippers, distributors, wholesalers instantly, or start your eBay market research.