When was the last time you gave something to someone? In terms of SEO, I mean. You have a talent. I don’t know what it is. Maybe you are a great designer. Maybe you are a CSS guru or a PHP pundit. Maybe you are a marketing genius or […]

Original post by DazzlinDonna

In my previous post, I lambasted trick closes like “buy now and I'll give you 15 percent off.” I knew that post would be controversial because I was well aware that some sales pros like and use trick closes on a daily basis. To those sales pros, the notion that a trick close is ineffective seems blasphemous.

But saying something is ineffective isn’t the same thing as saying it doesn’t work. A trick close can definitely generate a sale. Hey, if that weren’t true, sales pros (who are the most practical people on earth) simply wouldn’t use them. The reason trick closes are ineffective is that they’re insulting to the customer and destructive to the long-term customer relationship. Here’s why:

If a customer has already decided to buy, then a trick close (by definition) isn’t necessary. The only reason to use a trick close is if the customer has not yet decided to buy, hence the need to trick the customer into making a decision. With the trick close, you’ve forced the customer to buy something that he doesn’t yet want.

Now, it’s perfectly true that the customer may really need your offering and after delivery be satisfied (even delighted) with what it does for him, but at some level or another he will always know that you tricked him into buying before he was ready. And that’s the best case scenario. If the customer doesn’t really need your offering, and only bought because you tricked him (and he didn’t know how to gracefully get out of the deal), that’s going to create massive resentment.

It seems to me that opinions about trick closes are directly based on how people define selling. If you think of selling in terms of persuading and convincing, you’re probably going to think that trick closes make sense. On the other hand, if you define selling in terms of helping and advising, you’ll probably think (as I do) trick closes are ineffective and even counterproductive

The photo?  An actual snake oil salesman, courtesy of Farl, a photographer in the Philippines. 

Original post by Geoffrey James

In my previous post, I lambasted trick closes like “buy now and I'll give you 15 percent off.” I knew that post would be controversial because I was well aware that some sales pros like and use trick closes on a daily basis. To those sales pros, the notion that a trick close is ineffective seems blasphemous.

But saying something is ineffective isn’t the same thing as saying it doesn’t work. A trick close can definitely generate a sale. Hey, if that weren’t true, sales pros (who are the most practical people on earth) simply wouldn’t use them. The reason trick closes are ineffective is that they’re insulting to the customer and destructive to the long-term customer relationship. Here’s why:

If a customer has already decided to buy, then a trick close (by definition) isn’t necessary. The only reason to use a trick close is if the customer has not yet decided to buy, hence the need to trick the customer into making a decision. With the trick close, you’ve forced the customer to buy something that he doesn’t yet want.

Now, it’s perfectly true that the customer may really need your offering and after delivery be satisfied (even delighted) with what it does for him, but at some level or another he will always know that you tricked him into buying before he was ready. And that’s the best case scenario. If the customer doesn’t really need your offering, and only bought because you tricked him (and he didn’t know how to gracefully get out of the deal), that’s going to create massive resentment.

It seems to me that opinions about trick closes are directly based on how people define selling. If you think of selling in terms of persuading and convincing, you’re probably going to think that trick closes make sense. On the other hand, if you define selling in terms of helping and advising, you’ll probably think (as I do) trick closes are stupid.

Since this blog deals with sales strategies and tactics – and is going to debunk some very popular ones – I think we all need to put our cards on the table. So here’s my question:

HOW DO YOU DEFINE SELLING?

All comments are welcome. 

The photo?  An actual snake oil salesman, courtesy of Farl, a photographer in the Philippines. 

Original post by Geoffrey James

When a sales incentive program fails to achieve the desired results, the reason is often readily apparent. Unrealistically high sales targets and uninspired reward choices are two of the more common causes for a program’s downfall. In other instances, however, a program’s undoing can com…Read More

Original post by Malcolm Fleschner

Wow, that was painful, not because the upgrade went badly (it went great), but because it was excruciating to have to watch the new WordPress files upload ever so slowly to the server. But as far as I can tell, both the MySQL upgrade and the WordPress upgrade were successful. If you find […]

Original post by DazzlinDonna

This is an excellent question. Let’s say I am starting a brand new online venture. I have decided on my company name and it is already confirmed as registered. For example I have named my company Joe’s Trading Inc and I sell cheap widgets. I now need to get my domain name. So what do I choose?

Firstly let’s begin with the actual company name. My company is called Joe’s Trading Ltd so it makes sense that I should register joestradingltd.com or joestrading.com or joestrading.co.uk right?

Nope…this is not the best choice…

When I register a domain name there are some major factors which I need to take onboard. Firstly, what is the purpose of the domain? Is it’s purpose corporate branding or is it to drive traffic to my website?

Well if I am running ‘IBM’ or ‘MacDonalds’, then for sure branding is a clear consideration but ‘Joes Trading Ltd’ simply wants to make sales of blue widgets online and hopefully many, many sales. My real priority is to generate as much targeted website traffic to my site to convert to sales

My business is selling widgets. This is my target market and my unique selling position is that they are really cheap. But what has this got to do with my domain name?

Well…Everything!

The domain name itself is a huge factor which search engines consider when they automatically decide the importance of sites they decide to index in their search results. on search engines. And today, search engines provide 90% of web site traffic. In fact in recent studies, it has been discovered that the domain name counts for 30% of all factors which the search engine decides is important for ranking a website.

The domain really is THAT important!

So what makes a higher ranking domain name? Well, firstly shorter the better. There is a clear correlation between the length of the domain and its ranking is the search results. Secondly, the domain must include the keyword for which you wish to rank high. In this case Joes Trading Ltd sells Widgets so the domain should contain widgets. The widgets are cheap so the domain could be cheapwidgets.com. This domain is going get higher ranking in the search engines for the search term ‘widgets or ‘cheap widgets’ than ‘joestrading.com’ could ever hope to achieve

Higher ranking means more traffic which in turn means more sales & profits. So when it comes to purchasing your domain make search engine ranking your number one priority.

Colin Hartness is the Marketing Director of Web-At-Work Ltd T/A Cheap Domain Names UK offering cheap UK domain registration with full DNS management and low price hosting packages inclusive of cutting-edge online site building software. For more details visit: http://www.cheapdomainnames.uk.com

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