5 Sales Hacks That Never, Ever Work
If there’s one lesson that too many people learn far too late in life, it’s that there aren’t many shortcuts out there. Of course, there are lots of ways to be more efficient and productive, but get-rich-quick schemes don’t work for a reason. Doing things correctly and seeing the fruits of your labor takes time, so looking for “sales hacks” doesn’t always lead to the results you want.
These same rules apply in the world of sales. There are plenty of people out there who promise to show you that “one secret” to closing more deals, or offer sales hacks that can make you rich. While some “sales hacks” certainly can help you become a better salesperson, there are plenty of other ones that almost never work. Here are five of them:
(P.S.- if you’re looking for a sales hack that actually does work, try out Spiro’s CRM, which uses artificial intelligence to automate the sales process!)
1. Avoiding price
There are quite a few people out there who preach that avoiding price and instead focusing on value is the only way to close deals. While there is some truth to the idea that building value is essential, it’s absolute nonsense that price is irrelevant if enough value is built up.
For instance, I absolutely love the McLaren P1. I love everything about it, and in my mind it’s one of the most valuable sports cars ever built. But a P1 goes for well over a million dollars and there’s no way I can afford that car payment. Discussing the price and understanding a prospect’s budget are critical parts of the sales process, in addition to building value.
2. Scripts
Sales scripts would probably work well in a theoretical world where conversations always go according to plan and people are willing to sit and listen to you rant in a robotic voice for minutes on end. In reality, conversations are much more fluid than what scripts can allow for.
That being said, scripts can be a great framework for understanding what your company’s unique value proposition and pitch are. Scripts typically help you identify customer’s pain points and present your product in a coherent way. But if you think there’s some piece of paper out there that will tell you the exact thing to say to win someone’s business, you’re mistaken.
3. High pressure
The days of pressuring someone into buying something are (almost) over. Sales has evolved so much over the years that the salespeople who aren’t serving their customer’s needs in this day and age are finding it harder and harder to survive. Of course, there are still high-pressure sales tactics out there, and sometimes they can cause unsuspecting people to give you their credit card number.
But most businesses not only have fairly robust return and cancellation policies which ensure that even if you force someone into a deal they don’t really want, they can unwind it after they’re out of your sight, but they also are hiring salespeople whose energies are spent being a trusted (but persistent) resource, rather than a manipulative and aggressive sociopath.
4. Automated responses
There are not an insignificant number of companies out there whose entire business model is predicated on automating the sales process between companies and their prospects and customers. This can certainly be a good thing, allowing teams to spend their time focused on important activities that move the needle, like Spiro’s AI-powered CRM does.
But it’s when the communication between prospects and salespeople is automated that you can run into trouble. Buyers these days are able to tell when they’re getting generic messages from salespeople, especially given that these messages rarely take into account conversations that have occurred. And there’s nothing that can kill a deal faster than when a prospects gets a message from someone pretending that they actually took the time to reach out.
5. Lying
The “lying” debate in sales is as close to settled as you can possibly get. The overwhelming majority of salespeople don’t think that lying is acceptable under any circumstances. Unfortunately, there is still a small segment of the sales world who wouldn’t think twice about misleading a prospect in order to close a deal.
Putting aside how unethical and potentially even illegal lying in business is, the truth is that you’re unlikely to even get away with it. There is so much transparency and competition with the internet that it’s almost impossible to get away with misleading someone. So if your sales “hack” is to lie to close a deal, then you should do the rest of the sales world a favor and find a different career.
