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Sometimes, becoming a better salesperson simply comes down to thinking like a customer. People like to feel they are being heard and improving your active listening skills can help salespeople quickly build rapport that is critical in gaining the customer’s trust, and ultimately making the sale. Practicing active listening techniques can help you serve the customer better while also increasing your chances of earning their business, because being a good listener helps you gather the information necessary to address their needs and overcome any concerns.
There are several active listening techniques you can use to make sure you’re keeping focus where it belongs: on the customer. But first, ask yourself why active listening skills, which seem so fundamental, are so hard for most people to master.
Talking too much: Talking puts us in the driver’s seat, in control, where most of us prefer to be, but listening lets the other person speaking briefly lead the conversation. That can be scary, but not if you think of it the right way.
Get sharp tip: While listening opens the door to the unknown, it also opens the door to opportunity. The customer might share his or her main objection. Bingo! Now you know what you need to overcome their objections and build trust. Changing the way you think about interpersonal communication is an active listening technique you can practice to improve your sales results.
Thinking ahead: While the customer is talking, it’s tempting to start planning your response. After all, what if he or she finishes speaking, and you’re left struggling to come up with a response. The problem, of course, is that while your full attention is focused on writing the perfect, cucumber-cool reply in your head, you’re missing all the invaluable information and nonverbal cues the customer is sharing.
Get sharp tip: While getting out of your own head can be one of the trickiest active listening skills to master, remember that by the time you get to unveil your perfectly composed response, it might already be out of date. The customer may have already shifted his or her interest to other topics. So instead of tuning out while you think up the ideal answer, pay attention and learn to buy yourself time in other ways. Take a deep breath before you speak or compliment the customer on his or her question. Saying something like, “that’s a really interesting point,” is an active listening technique that can give you back those few seconds you need to pull your thoughts together.
Acting like you’re listening: We have trained through social norms that listening is about nodding, smiling, making eye contact, and showing interest in what the other person is saying. The problem is, sometimes we’re so good at the “show” that when the conversation is over, we realize we haven’t really heard most of what the other person has said.
Get Sharp Tip: An easy way to improve your active listening skills is to repeat back all or part of what the customer says. This might feel silly at first, but it will force you to stop acting like you’re listening and really listen.Practicing this active listening technique can help you listen carefully to absorb more of what the customer is saying, providing you with valuable ammo and key points you can use to solve problems to address their concerns and close the sale.
Improving your listening skills isn’t easy. Getting good at active listening involves breaking deeply ingrained habits, but just like body language or facial expressions, listening can be improved by staying focused and practicing. Try some of the active listening techniques above to keep yourself present and tuned in while interacting with customers. Notice how much more information you’re able to gather about the customer. As active listening begins to pay off in the form of more sales, you may find that it will become easier as well. Eventually, you may start to see active listening as yet another essential tool your sales arsenal, a must-have interpersonal skill that can help catapult you toward your career goals!
It’s no secret that effective leadership is critical to any company’s success. While each CEO brings a unique set of abilities to the table, there are some valuable CEO traits that everyone should have. Whether you’re a fledgling leader or a seasoned pro, adopting these 7 CEO traits will help you become more effective in your role.
In today’s challenging business environment, change is inevitable and adaptability is the new competitive advantage. Great leaders recognize that the strong CEO trait of being able to adjust makes you more valuable in an ever-changing environment. It enables you to excel as a leader because you gain experience and learn to modify your responses to handle different situations appropriately.
Communication is key in any company, but it’s an especially important CEO trait. Having good communication skills means knowing how to position matters in the best way possible to help you achieve your desired outcome. Communication isn’t only verbal—it includes non-verbal cues such as facial expressions and body language which can affect the impact of your message. Great leaders are able to be unemotional and manage conflict by giving everyone a voice, but not necessarily a vote.
A high-performing CEO trait is the ability to listen. Great leaders consistently listen to others and seek out the ideas, opinions, and even the advice of others. They recognize the need to be able to read people and adapt their management styles to elicit the kinds of responses and actions needed to produce results. Effective leadership comes from those who are continuously learning and are open to feedback from others.
Strong CEOs are influential, inspirational, and good motivators. They are able to create alignment and get all stakeholders—whether employees, board members, or clients—to buy into the business’s strategy. Having buy in at all levels is critical to effective leadership, executing the business’s strategy, and achieving its goals.
Taking calculated risks means considering all the possibilities and probabilities before taking bold and assertive action that has the potential to produce growth and results. Effective leadership requires driving transformation and innovation by daring to take these calculated risks and learning from the occasional failure along the way. Embracing risk also helps to overcome the fear of failure, as leaders realize that setbacks are the most effective way to learn and grow.
Effective leadership requires a clear vision that team members can buy into. CEOs need to be able to communicate in such a way that they instill confidence in others and elicit the kinds of actions and thinking that result in better performance. Effective leaders have conviction and are able to understand all the working parts of a business, and make quick, far-reaching decisions that benefit the company as a whole.
Many high-performing entrepreneurs will tell you that having resilience is key to success. Despite best efforts, the path to success isn't always a direct journey. Sometimes success is built on failure; as a leader, you need to be able to turn failure around and learn from mistakes. Successful CEOs are resilient because they understand the impact of failure, learn to think differently, and are determined to achieve their goals no matter what.
Having these key CEO traits will help differentiate you, foster effective leadership, and elevate you to become the most exceptional leader you can be.