Selling with Integrity
Finally, if you are in this game of phone selling for the long run, you’ll play with integrity. Even if you have many one-time customers or your sales are more short-term, you still need to consider the long-term implications of your actions. You will be able to sleep at night when your company is elevated in your industry and you behave with fairness, securing more business in the long run.
An important topic that seems most relevant these days is selling integrity. This topic comes up repeatedly in all my training sessions—whether the focus is on phone selling, presentations, or customer service. Everyone is searching for answers to the compelling question of: “How do I know when I (or my sales staff) have crossed the line?”
All of us have experienced a salesperson who lied to us in the past. It makes all salespeople look bad. We don’t want the word sales to be viewed as a four-letter word.
Recently, one of my friends told me that they specifically bought their house so that their kids could go to the top elementary school in Atlanta. After moving, they found out that the realtor lied about the school district in which they now lived. So, rather than move again, they are sending their kids to private schools. That was clearly unethical on the part of the realtor.
Professional salespeople—at the top of their game—have everything to gain by operating with integrity. How many referrals do you expect this realtor will get from my friend? And the office that she represents is now tainted, too.
Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but rather we have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.
—ARISTOTLE
These days, your customers are more educated about your products and services than ever before. There is more competition than ever before. In addition, in most businesses, the sales cycle is longer than ever before. What does this mean to you as a professional conducting business over the phone? It means that you must stay on top of your integrity and communicate professionalism.
The following six ideas can help you to sell with integrity:
Always tell your customers the truth—that way, if you’re not smart enough to remember a lie, you don’t have to worry about it later! Over the phone, your customers can’t see you, so they may be worried about your integrity at first anyway.
If you don’t know the answer immediately, tell your customer that you will check into it and get back to him or her by a certain time. That way, you preserve your credibility instead of guessing.
Fact-check before quoting a price. If you give a ballpark figure on your product or service, it could possibly come back to haunt you later. You may have either overquoted, which negatively affects your credibility, or underquoted, which makes you look like a liar!
Make sure you understand what your customer’s real need is. If you don’t understand the customer’s specific problem or goal, you may end up trying to make a square product fit into a round hole.
Remember that your long-term success is dependent on happy and loyal customers. Don’t blow it.
Think before you speak. (Ever heard this before?)