5 Steps to Attracting More Sales Beyond Your Wildest Dreams

As entrepreneurs and business owners, we all have dreams of closing sales beyond our wildest dreams, signing up lots of clients, and making more money than we ever thought possible. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always happen as quickly as we’d like it to.

Many entrepreneurs and business owners come to me frustrated with their lack of sales, hoping to learn specific sales skills to turn around their businesses. They hope by learning new selling techniques, their sales will quickly grow and their businesses will flourish.

Some of my clients quickly apply the sales skills I teach, reaching extraordinary levels of success, while other clients reach minimal sales success. Why was this happening for some and not for the others? Both groups had the same level of experience, yet the level of success was significantly different.

At first, I was puzzled, frustrated, and saddened I could not make a difference for all my clients. Over time, it became clear I could share all my sales knowledge and show my clients everything I knew about sales; however, it was up to them to make it happen. I realized it took more than just learning the right sales skills; it took shifting the mindset.

A crucial key to unlocking unlimited abundance in business and life starts with shifting our inner mindset. Unfortunately, many people work really hard getting minimal sales results because of their mindset. On one hand, they want to break through their barriers. On the other hand, they allow their emotions to keep them from making the changes necessary to expand their businesses.

You can learn all the skills, techniques, and strategies; however, without a positive inner mindset, your financial success is limited. If you want to create an abundance of sales and clients coming to you, it starts with shifting your mindset.

When you shift your inner mindset, you make the decision to rewrite the way you think. By changing the way you think, you’re changing the direction of your life. You’re now becoming the author of your life. Then you’ll begin to attract everything you want with ease.

As a coach and mentor, I am always learning from my clients. I saw in my own business how I would reach a certain level of success and then stop. I knew deep in my heart I could achieve much more, yet I was afraid of taking the leap. So I started studying with the experts, taking personal growth workshops, and reading more self-growth books than I can keep count.

As I made these internal changes to my thinking, something magical began to happen. I began to appreciate what I have, started “being” in my business rather than “doing,” and let go of the worry. I’m now taking bigger steps in my business and following my purpose.  New opportunities are coming my way and it’s because I’m letting go of the fear.

From the journey I’ve taken and I’m happily still on, I saw there was a process I followed that opened me up to receiving abundance in my business. I’ve taken what I’ve learned and created 5 key steps to follow that will change how you are being in your business and help you easily attract an abundance of everything you want.

1. Shifting the Mindset. You must first believe you can. As soon as you have a doubt, fear, or worry, those feelings take away from believing. Your thoughts, emotions, and actions must be congruent with your belief so that the universe can give you what you want. Your thoughts and feelings create your reality.
2. The Power of Choice. You get to choose the direction you want your life to go. Through the power of choice, you decide how you want to create your life to be. What occurs in your life is not by accident. It’s a result of the choices you’ve made. Are you choosing to live your life powerfully or are you blaming others? Are you choosing to take responsibility for the growth of your business or are you blaming circumstances?
3. 100% Responsible. Responsibility starts with being accountable for every aspect of your life. When you can recognize, acknowledge, and own that you are responsible for your life, you experience a new level of freedom, power and ease in your life. When you’re being responsible, you’re no longer at the affect of any circumstances that come your way. There’s no complaining or blaming others. You know that the buck stops with you.
4. Moving Beyond What’s Stopping You. What have you been putting up with, tolerating, or trying to change? Whatever you put up with drains your energy and keeps you stuck in the same place. Do you make excuses for not going forward in your business? What’s the excuse really covering up? It’s probably an underlying fear that you’re holding onto. When you make the decision to move past where you’re stopped, all tolerations, excuses and fears will lose their power over you.
5. Letting Go of the Past. Are you letting past experiences keep you from moving forward? Some of our past experiences keep us from appreciating what we have in the present because we believe it will happen again. These experiences affect how we communicate, relate to others, grow our business, and even stop us from going after all the things we really want. By letting go of the past, you’re free to attract anything you want in your life and your business. You now have a blank slate from which to create anything and everything!

I believe by applying these steps to your business, you’ll begin to experience a shift in how you sell and interact with clients. You’re now becoming a master of the inner game of sales. I invite you to follow these steps to opening your mind to unlimited sales success. (I’m so certain that this is the pathway to creating your sales success that I’m currently creating a revolutionary new sales program that will change your mindset about selling forever…more details to come!)

If you would like to use this article on your website, or for your own ezine, not a problem; however, there’s one thing you MUST include: Rochelle Togo-Figa, The Sales Breakthrough Expert, is the creator of the Sales Breakthrough System™, a proven step-by-step sales process that will help you close more sales, sign on more clients and make more money with ease and velocity. To sign up for her free sales articles and teleclasses on closing more sales, visit http://www.salesbreakthroughs.com/.

Are You Tired of Being Out Priced by the Competition?

Are you losing business to the competition because they’re coming in at a lower price? Are your competitors telling the prospect they have the same exact product as you but for less money? This can be very frustrating when you know your product is superior yet the prospect is buying from them and not you.

If you’re nodding your head yes to these questions, then you’re not alone. Being “out priced” is happening more often now as people are being cautious about their spending. Yet, if you go into your local shopping mall or supermarket, you’ll see crowds of people buying. They still need services and are willing to pay for a quality product.

Today’s consumers have become more educated about buying with all the information available to them. They now have more knowledge about products than many of the people selling to them. You can no longer simply communicate information about your product and expect you have the sale.

Although you truly know in your heart your product is the best, there’s a lot more competition out there. You have to be willing to go the extra mile. You have to show them upfront the value they’re getting.

This means meeting face-to-face with the prospect to uncover their pain, identify the solution, show them how you’ll implement the solution, and how you and your product stand out from the competition.

Here are 4 steps to show the value the prospect receives from buying your product:

1. Uncover the pain: At your first meeting with prospects, help them to define a problem they may not fully understand or know they have by asking questions. Questions like “What’s your biggest challenge? What’s not working as well as you’d like it to? If you could wave a magic wand, what would you like to see happen differently in your business?”
2. Identify the solution: Help prospects identify a solution they didn’t know was available to them. Based on what they’ve shared with you, let them know the solution you have that will resolve their problem.
3. Present the solution process: Present and explain how you will implement the solution for them. Walk them through the all the steps, so they understand how the process works. Remind them of all the benefits they will experience after the problem is gone.
4. Differentiate yourself from the competition: Explain what makes you unique in the service you provide. Let them know what you do for them that sets you apart from your competition. This is where how and what you say really matters the most. Be willing to freely and powerfully say what makes you stand out from the others. People want to work with people who are confident and make them feel safe with and they can trust. You will win over the prospect when you speak authentically from your heart!

Yes, in some cases, low pricing will win out no matter what. Do not dwell on those situations…just move on. There are many people out there who want and need your product and are willing to pay for it.

If you liked what you've read and want help in applying these steps to your business, I invite you to take your first step by signing up for a Breakthrough Strategy Session with me. If you're stuck in your business or frustrated you're not bringing in more sales, please stop suffering and call me. There is a solution! I will walk you through a step-by-step process that will give you clarity about the direction of your business, create a 180-degree turn around in your thinking about sales, and move you forward quickly. I will personally give you my one-on-one breakthrough strategies that fit you and your business.
Click here to learn more.

If you would like to use this article on your website, or for your own ezine, not a problem; however, there’s one thing you MUST include: Rochelle Togo-Figa, The Sales Breakthrough Expert, is the creator of the Sales Breakthrough System™, a proven step-by-step sales process that will help you close more sales, sign on more clients and make more money with ease and velocity. To sign up for her free sales articles and teleclasses on closing more sales, visit http://www.salesbreakthroughs.com/.

Break Out of Your Comfort Zone and Break Through in Your Business!

Do you have some great ideas to grow your business, but when it comes time to taking action, you suddenly come up with all the reasons and excuses not to do it? Do you find yourself lit up with a new idea that you can’t wait to implement? But, then your fears come up and you decide you’re not quite ready yet to go forward.

If any of this sounds familiar to you, you’re not alone. I’ve experienced the same thing. Most recently at Ali Brown’s workshop I had some big “aha” moments. I wrote down many new ideas, but when I got back to my office, I began to find excuses to put off taking the plunge and breaking out of my comfort zone. I had thoughts like “what if it doesn’t work, this is too expensive, I don’t have the time.” These are familiar thoughts I’ve had before that have kept me stuck.

What I notice about Ali and other successful entrepreneurs is when they have an idea, they don’t sit on it for months or even years, they get into action and quickly implement it. They have no idea if it’s going to be a success or failure but have the courage to try it out anyway. They have their share of failures, yet they don’t let that stop them.

The one thing most successful entrepreneurs have in common is that when they come up with a good idea, they don’t analyze it to death or wait until it’s perfect, they just do it!

I walked away from the workshop with several great ideas, but a couple of the most valuable “a-ha” moments I had was to “stop waiting until it’s perfect, just do it now!” I also know if I’m left to my own thoughts, I’ll come up with lots of reasons not to do things. So I set up a support structure and will be joining a Mastermind Group that will hold me accountable to doing what I said I would do.

Here’s what I learned about breaking out of my comfort zone:

1. When you create something bigger in your business, it’s not unusual to think of all the reasons it won’t work.
2. When those reasons come up not to do it, and those reasons will come up, do it anyway.
3. Successful entrepreneurs quickly implement ideas.
4. Create an accountability support structure to keep you in action.
5. Don't wait for it to be perfect…just do it now!

If you’re ready to break out of your comfort zone and take your business to the next level, here’s 8 easy steps to help you build your best year ever.

1. Write down one BIG idea you know you should be working on now. You know it’s the one if you get excited and nervous at the same time.
2. By fulfilling that idea, write down what will it give you in your life? As you write the details, be as specific and vivid as you can because the more you can see yourself doing it, the more real it becomes for you.
3. Write all the thoughts you’re having that could keep you from implementing your idea. Then take that piece of paper, rip it into tiny pieces and throw it away! You’re now free to pursue that BIG idea!
4. Write down the due date you will implement your idea.
5. Write down the action steps that will help you implement your idea.
6. Find a colleague or a friend to be your buddy and hold you accountable to implementing your idea?
7. Work with a coach, or find a group of like-minded entrepreneurs or colleagues and form your own mastermind group. Together you can guide, support and hold each other accountable to implementing the idea.
8. Now, get your butt into gear and take action, or it's just another good idea!

If you would like to use this article on your website, or for your own ezine, not a problem; however, there’s one thing you MUST include: Rochelle Togo-Figa, The Sales Breakthrough Expert, is the creator of the Sales Breakthrough System™, a proven step-by-step sales process that will help you close more sales, sign on more clients and make more money with ease and velocity. To sign up for her free sales articles and teleclasses on closing more sales, visit http://www.salesbreakthroughs.com/.

When You Open Your Heart, the Clients Will Come

In a teleseries I led one of the topics that made the biggest impact for the group was how to powerfully share their personal story with their audience.

As I thought about this topic, I realized sharing your personal story is not only for when you speak to an audience, it has the same powerful impact when you're meeting with a prospect or a client. When you're willing to open up your heart and reveal who you really are to people, they feel instantly connected to you.

We all have a personal story to tell about our journey through life. Many of us had to deal with challenges at different times in our lives. Your personal story has made you who you are today. The people who inspire me the most are the ones who freely share their personal story of struggle and victory with us.

Oprah Winfrey has openly shared about the struggles and abuse she overcame growing up to become one of the most powerful women in the world. We listen to her story and what she’s accomplished, and we’re inspired to follow our dreams.

Sometimes we cover up our story because we want others to think we have it all handled. But most of us have had to overcome something along the way. In fact, the challenges we’ve had to deal with make us the person we are today.

When you’re willing to share the struggles and challenges you’ve faced, people are quickly drawn to you because you’re being authentic. They can easily relate to you because they see you’ve had similar challenges.

One of the most powerful assets you can use to attract more clients is sharing your personal story. When you share your personal story about how you overcame your challenges, you provide them with inspiration that THEY can do it too!

The easiest and fastest way to draw people to you is when you authentically share yourself. Start your talk by sharing a personal story of how you became who you are today. When you share something personal about yourself, they feel more connected to you. You’re showing them you’re no different than they are. They can relate to you more quickly through your story and that’s going to draw them to you.

Show your vulnerability by speaking about your struggles, how you overcame your challenges, and the life lessons you learned. We’ve all had to deal with personal and professional challenges in the course of our lives. When we hear true stories of courage and victory, we’re inspired and believe we can go after the things we want too.

They listen to your story and what you’ve overcome, and say to themselves “If she or he did that, so can I!” I’ve had many people come up to me after I’ve shared my personal story of overcoming breast cancer and how it changed my life, and tell me how it’s inspired them.

Tell your story vividly and specifically. As you tell your story, speak in the present tense. Share your story as if it’s happening right now in the present moment. Convey excitement and enthusiasm using gestures, facial expressions, and inflection as you describe your story. What leaves the strongest impression is how you look and sound. People will walk away remembering what they’ve seen and heard.

I saw Suze Orman, the financial guru, speak at a conference. As soon as she walked on stage, she connected with the audience. She was down to earth, funny, and knowledgeable. She shared how she grew up in a poor Chicago neighborhood, worked as a waitress for several years making only $400 a month. She shared her personal story with such authenticity. She had everyone sitting on the edge of the seats listening to every word she said. And, after she spoke, there was a long line of people waiting to buy her products.

I invite you to start writing your personal story now, and start sharing it with others.

Remember it is...Your Story!

If you would like to use this article on your website, or for your own ezine, not a problem; however, there’s one thing you MUST include: Rochelle Togo-Figa, The Sales Breakthrough Expert, is the creator of the Sales Breakthrough System™, a proven step-by-step sales process that will help you close more sales, sign on more clients and make more money with ease and velocity. To sign up for her free sales articles and teleclasses on closing more sales, visit http://www.salesbreakthroughs.com/.

Let’s Beat Out the Competition Once and For All

Have you ever lost the sale because the prospect decided to go with your competitor? In the world of business, there will always be other businesses competing with you for your customers.

Is there a way to decrease losing business to the competitor and increase the chances of them choosing you? Absolutely! It starts with knowing, understanding, researching, and learning from your competitors.

Here are 8 steps to help you learn more about your competitors:

1. Identify who your top competitors are.
2. What services they offer.
3. What services they do not offer.
4. How much they charge.
5. Who they target their marketing to.
6. How they find clients.
7. How they position themselves in the marketplace.
8. What their strengths and weaknesses are.

Invest some time in studying and learning from your top competitors, especially the successful ones. After completing Steps 1-8, you can now identify, create, and offer new ways to present your product that your competitor isn’t doing.

This includes offering services they're not offering, creatively packaging your fees and services, providing benefits they don’t, finding ways to better market your services, and positioning your services against their strengths and weaknesses.

Let me say a little bit more about “strengths and weaknesses.” An effective way to learn about your competition in depth, and position yourself against them, is to do what is called a ‘SWOT” analysis. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.

There are many ways to uncover information about your competition for their SWOT analysis. Here are a just a few:

• Search the company website. You’ll be surprised how much you can learn about them.
• Walk into their place of business, or have a friend walk in, and be a potential customer. Observe how they help you and ask questions.
• Ask them to send you their marketing or media kit.
• Sign up for their newsletter or ezine.
• Use Internet search engines to find out information (google.com).
• Look in local newspapers or trade magazines.
• Interview their past clients.
• Use a business website (hoovers.com) to learn about the financial state of the company.

You’ve now done your research and have enough information about the competitor to create their SWOT analysis.

Every company and person has strengths and weaknesses, including you. It’s just as important to know your strengths and weaknesses as it is to know your competitors. You’re in a better position to sell against the competition if you have a clear picture of how you compare to them.

The next step is to create your S.W.O.T analysis for your business. Now take both S.W.O.T. analyses and compare them, survey the similarities and differences, and think of new ways to market your business. For example, you may have noticed they offer lower prices. Look for creative ways to repackage your pricing. You could offer a payment plan, lower your prices by removing a service, or offer a special discount for a limited time.

With all the knowledge you’ve gathered, you now have all the confidence you need to powerfully differentiate yourself and win over the business.

ASSIGNMENT:

• Create a S.W.O.T. analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) for a competitor and do the same for yourself.
• List 3-5 ways you could market your services that would take full advantage of your competitor’s weaknesses.

If you would like to use this article on your website, or for your own ezine, not a problem; however, there’s one thing you MUST include: Rochelle Togo-Figa, The Sales Breakthrough Expert, is the creator of the Sales Breakthrough System™, a proven step-by-step sales process that will help you close more sales, sign on more clients and make more money with ease and velocity. To sign up for her free sales articles and teleclasses on closing more sales, visit http://www.salesbreakthroughs.com/.

Stop Sabotaging Yourself and Get Into Action!

Whenever we step into something new or take on something we’ve never done before, it’s not uncommon to experience fear. It could be the fear of failure, fear of rejection, or fear of success. The fear can manifest itself in different ways that we’re not always aware of. Some signs of hidden fear are: Procrastination, distraction, excuses, feeling stuck, feeling overwhelm, negative beliefs, worried, and anxious.

Let me share a story of a client and how she dealt with her fear. Maybe you’ll see yourself in this story.

Christina came to me because she had started a new business, and was not taking the steps to get it off the ground. She’s extremely talented and had huge success in her corporate position. She had enough of the corporate world and was eager to start her own business. She had no problem creating new ideas for her boss and presenting to vendors, but when it came to promoting herself and her business to others, suddenly she was stuck.

Christina had made a list of people to contact. These were people she knew and could possibly help her. When I asked her why she wasn’t following up with these people, her response was, “Well, they told me they would call me and since they never returned my calls, I assumed they’re not interested.” I asked her, “Did they tell you they’re not interested?” She responded “No, I just assumed they weren’t interested since they didn’t call back.”

In reality, she didn’t know why they weren’t calling her back. She had made up a story and was stopped because she believed her story was true. Christina was transferring her own thoughts, beliefs and perceptions onto these people. And, the more she listened to her own thoughts, the more she believed they were true.

I suggested to Christina there might be others reasons they’re not calling her back. They could be either busy or away.

She realized these excuses and reasons for not calling these people were also covering up her fear of rejection. What if they don’t want to help me? What if they’re not interested? As long as she believed these thoughts to be true, nothing would change and her business would suffer.

Once she distinguished her fear of failing was a self-imposed negative belief and not the truth, she began to feel freed up. The fear no longer had to keep her stopped. She knew she had created these self-limiting thoughts and they were not true. We took the negative thoughts and reframed them into positive thoughts. And every time the fear would come up, Christina would shift her thinking to a powerful, positive thought. This took practice but over time it became a new habit and easy to do. We then created a step-by-step plan and she got into action. What followed was amazing!

Christine was re-energized and ready to go forward. She contacted all the people on her list, completed her website, and started sending out letters introducing her services. The positive responses she received from people she had reached out to helped her to feel more confident and gave her more clarity on the direction of her business. And, the best news is two companies she had contacted have expressed interest in hiring her. These results happened when Christina identified the fear that had been holding her back, realized she had created the negative thoughts and changed her thoughts, created an action plan, and then got into action.

Your Assignment:

• When you feel stopped, step away from your office and spend quiet time with yourself.
• Write down all the thoughts you’re having at this time.
• Then ask yourself, “Did I make up these thoughts?”
• Write down the answer next to each thought. You’ll see that many of these thoughts are made up by you.
• Write down the steps you can take NOW to get you into action.
• Visualize yourself being in action and how it feels.
• Write down the date you will take action and the outcome you want to achieve. (Example: I will call Jim on Monday and he will be happy to hear from me, or he'll have someone to refer me to.)

If you would like to use this article on your website, or for your own ezine, not a problem; however, there’s one thing you MUST include: Rochelle Togo-Figa, The Sales Breakthrough Expert, is the creator of the Sales Breakthrough System™, a proven step-by-step sales process that will help you close more sales, sign on more clients and make more money with ease and velocity. To sign up for her free sales articles and teleclasses on closing more sales, visit http://www.salesbreakthroughs.com/.

The Sales are in the Follow-Up

One of the most effective ways in getting more business is following up with the prospect. Sadly, 80% of sales opportunities are missed because people do not follow up consistently. Studies have shown that most prospects, who do not buy short-term, usually make a purchase within 12 months. When they make the purchase, it's going to be with the person who stays in touch with them on a consistent basis. Prospects do business with people they know, trust, and who understand their needs.

Some of the reasons salespeople don't follow up are:

• There is no organized system in place.
• They're afraid they'll appear too pushy.
• They're afraid they'll be rejected.
• They don't know what to say.
• They call once or twice, and move on to the next thing.

Here's the good news—although for some of you it may seem like bad news! It takes 7-10 follow-ups to close the sale. Yes, that's the truth. So if you're routinely giving up after 2-3 tries, you're giving up way too soon. They may not be ready to buy from you now, but if you remain fresh in their minds you'll be the one they'll buy from when they are ready.

Here are 6 easy and simple ways for turning follow-up into sales:

1. Create Follow-Up Systems
   Select a follow-up system for tracking your accounts that works for you. There are several systems that help you track your accounts efficiently and effectively.

• A personal computer. There are contact management programs designed for organizing and tracking your accounts. ACT, Goldmine and Outlook have contact management programs.
• A notebook. Use a single sheet in your notebook for each client and enter the dates of your calls along with notes. Keep your top 10-20 hot prospects in the front of your notebook, alphabetized by client name.
• The old-fashion tickler system. Set up your folders numerically by dates starting with 1-31. Use a single sheet for each new prospect, and write down the name, phone numbers, address, email address, and any pertinent notes about the account. Then file it in your tickler file system by date of your next contact with them.
• A business card file. Although the space is limited, you can write tiny notes on the card. The card file can be used before information is entered on computer.

2. Follow-Up Sales Tools
   It's pretty standard to use the telephone and e-mail for those 7-10 follow-ups with a prospect. Begin to embrace other ways of staying visible to the prospect over a period of time.
   
   Some other tools that work are sending letters, faxes, brochures and literature. Be creative and use testimonial letters from satisfied clients, invite them to a seminar or to lunch, send them a small item with your company name printed on it, or if appropriate, give tickets to a sports event, the theater or a seminar.
3. Touch Base Email
   It may take 7-10 touches to close the business, so don’t give up. Writing a “soft” touch base email is a non-pressure way of letting prospects know you’re thinking of them.
   
   Email the prospect you are thinking of them. Remind them they did express interest in your product or service. Let them now you’d be happy to meet and specify a time you’re available to talk. Let them know if they’re not ready that it’s perfectly fine with you, and you’re there for them when they are.
4. Personalize Your Follow Up
   There are numerous ways to personalize your follow-up contact with the prospect. You can write a hand-written note thanking them for the meeting, or inviting them to meet for coffee or lunch. A hand-written note is a personal touch the prospect will appreciate in a world that’s becoming more and more electronic.
5. Develop the Habit of Persistence
   The key ingredient to effective follow-up is persistence. Persistence with the right attitude leads to more business. With persistence, obstacles and problems can't stop you and most importantly, other people can't stop you.
   
   Your ability to follow up will determine your success in sales.
6. Don't Get Stopped by NO
   You have to be willing to do what it takes to move past the seventh "no" or "I'm not ready yet" to get the sale. A "no" is nothing personal. The prospect is saying "no" to the product, not to you. Think about the fact that when you really want something important to you, nothing stands in the way. Why not bring those same qualities to your business? How many "No's" are you willing to take before you give up the sale?

ASSIGNMENT:

• Make a list of prospects you’ve met with, who expressed interest but did not buy from you. They may have told you they weren’t ready or maybe didn’t even tell you why.
• Select one of the follow-up systems to track your prospects. Then set up a schedule of dates when you'll be following up with them and enter those dates in your system.
• Select any of the sales tools listed and decide when you'll use these tools.
• Send “soft touch base” emails to these prospects. Make sure the email you write is friendly, brief and non-pressuring.
• Write a personal hand-written note to several prospects letting them know you enjoyed meeting them and invite them to meet for coffee or tea.
• Be organized, creative, and persistent and don't get stopped by "No." Remember it takes 7-10 follow-ups to close the sale!

If you would like to use this article on your website, or for your own ezine, not a problem; however, there’s one thing you MUST include: Rochelle Togo-Figa, The Sales Breakthrough Expert, is the creator of the Sales Breakthrough System™, a proven step-by-step sales process that will help you close more sales, sign on more clients and make more money with ease and velocity. To sign up for her free sales articles and teleclasses on closing more sales, visit http://www.salesbreakthroughs.com/.