Practicing sales without being in sales

[Olimac21]

I was having this discussion with a friend on how to practice sales/influence skills without necesarily working for the area. We got to the conclusion that this can work in seduction, when negotiating stuff in real life and learning how to act better in some situations (i.e role playing) but I believe big part of the puzzle is missing in our analysis.

What are for you 2-3 unconventional ways to practice sales skills?

 

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[Charnell]

A good way to practice sales is to try to sell.

No amount of reading or roleplaying is going to be worth actually getting stumped by an objection on the phone and figuring out the correct way to answer the next time it comes up. Because it will come up again.

It's usually something obscure and a total curveball that you couldn't have known was a roadblock without talking to your audience.

Example (because I went through it):

Say you're offering a 30-day guarantee on something. You're talking with a decision maker and they ask "so what happens if on day 35 something goes wrong?"

The first time that happened, I didn't know how to answer and killed that potential deal.

The second time it happened, I knew how to answer ("we're not some fly-by-night operation. If something happens after the guarantee, we'll work together to come up with a solution.").

"But I don't want to mess up my market"

Then call another industry or location and practice your script. If you're trying to offer services to construction companies in Texas, cold call through Oklahoma with the same service and get comfortable with it.

You're trying to be like every other social media guy and target dentists? Cold call optometrists or chiropractors.

You'll either get comfortable enough with your script you can confidently call your market or land a few clients.