If you are one of the many whose sales and marketing results took a giant leap upwards after studying Book Yourself Solid, then you know about Michael Port. While he gears his teaching mainly to owners of service-based business, his ingenious system will work for practically anyone who desires to provide great value to the lives of many customers and clients.

His newest work is somewhat of a re-creation of the original, but with a twist, and a huge one at that. It’s entitled, Book Yourself Solid ILLUSTRATED: The Fastest, Easiest, and Most Reliable System for Getting MORE Clients Than You Can Handle Even if You Hate Marketing and Selling. It has a lot less words to go along with very easy-to-follow pictures. And, the book’s “Visual Strategist” Jocelyn Wallace did an absolutely superb job of visually articulating Michael’s teachings.

In this chat, we’re going to discuss one chapter. And, if you will follow the advice Michael teaches regarding “The Four-Part Sales Formula,” you will most likely become much more effective when you ask for the sale. Simple as that. What he said was so important, we basically summed up our chat by running through it again.

Enjoy this chat with Michael Port:

The four modules Michael takes us through in his book include:

1. Your Foundation: This includes his famous Red Velvet Rope Policy and developing your personal brand.
2. Building Trust & Credibility: In this module he shows how to build credibility and likeability, his sales cycle process and more.
3. Perfect Pricing and Simple Selling: Along with what we discussed today, you’ll learn about “Perfect Pricing.”
4. The 6 Core Self-Promotion Strategies: Includes, Networking, Direct Outreach, Referrals, Websites and more.

NOTE: If you are having trouble playing the interview, please make sure Adobe Flash Player is installed in your web browser. If not, then download Flash Player. Or right-click here and select “Save Link As…” to download the audio file to your computer.

From orphan bounced around from one foster home to another to publisher of a luxury magazine; from beginning salesperson to one of the most successful business consultants on the planet, Richard Weylman knows how to market himself and knows how to help his clients accelerate their production and separate themselves from their competition.

His first book, Opening Closed Doors set the bar for profiting from working with niche markets.

His newest book, The Power of Why shows us that while, yes, it’s important to have a “why” for being in business…it’s even more important to understand the customer’s “why” for doing business with us.

Richard is one of those brilliant people who — when you are fortunate enough to have the opportunity to learn from him — you’re well-advised to jump on that opportunity.

That’s exactly what I did in this interview, and I hope you’ll do the same.

Enjoy our discussion!

What a cool shift — to go from our why, our reason for being in business — which, is still important — to the customer’s why, which is even more important!

How will you follow-through on Richard’s advice?

SPECIAL NOTE: Order a hardcover copy of Richard’s book, The Power Of Why: Breaking Out In A Competitive Marketplace from amazon.com before Midnight, April 22 and, when you check out with your shopping cart use the promo code POWERWHY to receive an additional 20% savings on the book.

TECHNICAL NOTE: If you are having trouble playing the interview, please make sure Adobe Flash Player is installed in your web browser. If not, then download Flash Player. Or right-click here to download and select “Save Link As…” to download the audio file to your computer.

I recently received the following question that, while many in sales will easily relate to, they probably won’t like my answer:

Hi Bob, I work as sales account manager for a large organization focusing mainly on B2B (Business-to-Business).

My question is, I am closing my year end in another 30 days and I know one of my customers is planning to buy my products but his planned purchase is 90 days away. If I can close this order within 30 days, I will be able to meet my target for the year. This is very critical for me in terms of my salary.

Please help me if you have any suggestions.

Thank you for your question and — as a fellow salesperson — I can absolutely “feel your pain.” Basically, though, as critical as the order being placed within 30 days might be to your personal income, it’s even more critical that you understand the following:

Your customer doesn’t care.

He is not at all concerned about your quota or deadline. More importantly, he is not going to change his buying decision (from 90 to 30 days) because it’s better for YOU.

He’s only going to do it if somehow you can make it better for HIM.

So, the question is, what can you do to make it more advantageous for him to buy within 30 days rather than 90 days?

That, right there, is the question. And, it’s the only question that matters.

How would his making the purchase within 30 days improve his busines?…His life?…His situation?

If you can come up with the correct answer and then effectively communicate it to him, then it can happen.

Remember, selling it isn’t about you and your needs; it’s about him and his needs.

Best of success!

On a recent interview I stated that one cannot “make” a sale.

This because — in a market-based economy — you can’t make anyone do anything they don’t want to do. You certainly can’t make them buy from you.

What you can do is create the environment where that person makes the decision (based on their self-interest) to buy. And, when that happens, you are there to receive the sale.

In response, a listener wrote:

“I especially enjoyed your idea that you can’t “make” sales, only receive them.”

Thank you. Remember, though, that this receiving does not occur in a vacuum. We must first provide the value which creates the environment where the person chooses to buy. And, continue to magnify that value through the excellence, education, attention, empathy and other elements involved. This is not passive, but active; very active.

In other words, action is key! (And, it’s why we should be both Go-Givers AND Go-Getters…just not go-takers!)

Yes, in the interview I said the key is to focus on the giving (of value) and allow the receiving.

But, please don’t confuse receptivity with passivity. The receiving is earned; through action; through providing value.

In this case, the correct focus leads to the correct action, and that’s what creates the proper environment.

Have you found this to be true? How do you provide value in the sales process in order to create that environment? Please feel free to share?

Minutes before presenting last Friday morning for my client, WinWholesale, Inc. at their annual convention, I was speaking with COO, Monte Salsman. He shared with me a great piece of advice provided by one of his mentors nearly 20 years ago:

“People buy only two things: solutions to problems and good feelings.”

BINGO!!!!!

Yep, think about it. When it comes right down to it, the very essence of why we buy something is because it solves a problem and makes us feel better than if we did not buy it.

Understanding this is what keeps our focus on the other person. After all, people don’t buy from us because it solves our problem or makes us feel good. Nor should they. Thus, we need to constantly find ways to provide value to others in a way that will serve them and their needs, wants and desires.

So, next time you’re in a selling situation, measure what you are about to say or do by asking yourself, will this solve their problem? Will this make them feel good? If the answers to both of those are “yes” then you are on the right track.

Of course, when you solve their problems and make them feel good, you also solve your problem and make yourself feel good.

Or, as another mentor of many of us (a certain Mr. Ziglar) very famously said, “you can have everything in life you want, if you’ll just help enough other people get what they want.”

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Note: Just put together a special page for The Go-Giver, in the event you’d like to give them out as Holiday gifts this season. And, you’ll have a chance to win some great prizes, as well. If you’re interested, check out www.Burg.com/Holidays.