The value I see in salespeople (from a prospective salesperson)

Salespeople play an incredibly important role in any business. Though that sounds obvious (you have to sell things to make money and you need people to do that), there was a time not too long ago where I really thought that salespersons were a dying breed, soon to be replaced by ultra-smart, speedy AI that could send follow up messages without thinking. I, of course, was wrong. After a bit of research and connecting with current salespeople, I learned this: For low-value items, where the product is not such a huge investment for people, like a mug from amazon, its okay to have a non-human interface. Trust comes from the expectation that Amazon will deliver, and we don’t think twice about single click buys. But for higher value items, where there's skin in the game and trust is everything, it is absolutely necessary to have real-life humans making those deals. To quote CEO Joanne Milner of Debretts, “People buy people, not products.”
To this end, it appears that relationships are at the core of sales. H2H (human-to-human) connections are what make money. The difference between a successful business and one without revenue is how much it (your brand, product, and ideals) resonates with people. How do you get things to resonate? Ideas become research become products become marketing become people who convey products worth to others (i.e. sales). The point is, at the end of the day, no matter how good your product is or how large your marketing campaign, the people talking with other people, who are invested in and can accurately convey the value of your product are the people making you money.
There's no scheme to make people trust you, and the people buying aren't gullible. You have to be real. You have to be invested in your product. And most importantly, you have to be confident in yourself.
I can't wait to experience it.
This post is part of a 4 part series: “The Value I see in…” for this month's Paxis posts. Up next, Customer Success.
