Professional salesmanship is critical to both growing sales and optimizing gross margin. So salespeople -- especially those new to the sales profession -- that take the time to read sales books, attend sales seminars and listen to sales albums will almost invariably out perform those that take a more casual approach to learning their profession.

A few months ago, I was conducting a sales training session for a Florida client. As we were working on how to open conversation with a prospect, an attendee raised his hand. When I recognized him, he said to me, “That kind of crap won’t work in this market. All my customers and prospects want from me is the lowest price. When I’m successful at beating my competitors’ prices, I get the order. When I fail, I lose the order. It’s that simple.”

Thinking to myself…no wonder this business has gross margin problems, I asked him, “How do you open conversation with a prospect?”

“I walk up to the prospect, introduce myself, shake his hand, and ask him if he will let me quote him on a few key products. Since most all prospects will let me quote them, I selectively quote a few prices that I know are below the market.”

“Do you find that approach to be effective?”

“Not always, but I’ve never found anything that worked any better.”

This kind of sales opening statement may make sense for a not-so-professional salesperson, but it shouldn’t take a salesperson long to realize that such an approach is disastrous to a company trying to optimize its gross margin.

I believe that progressive salespeople -- those that wish to see their incomes consistently grow -- should be learning how to achieve higher levels of sales volume at higher gross margins by adding more value than the competition.

Prospects are not stupid. It takes most prospects about two minutes to figure out when a salesperson is trying to “buy” their business. If salespeople are not trained to open conversation with a good value statement, it’s extremely difficult to solidly dislodge a strong competitor.

Here is a value statement model that sales trainer Art Sobczak (www.businessbyphone.com) recommends:

“Mr. Prospect, my name is Joe Wiggleton with ABC Company. We specialize in working with companies that wish to differentiate their businesses from their competitors so that they can get out of the pricing rat race.”

(FYI - you can either use a positive statement as in the above example or a problem-solving statement like, “We specialize in working with companies that are looking for ways to improve their product’s image and quality while still remaining competitive in the market. May I ask you a few questions to see if our services might be of value to you?”)

Here is a form that you might use to practice this technique: My name is ___________ with ____________. We specialize in ___________ (fill in blank with something your prospect is certain to wish to receive from a vendor or fill in the blank with something that your prospect is certain to want to avoid.)

I recommend spending some time on this technique and come up with a dozen or so unique benefits that you may use in different situations you find yourself in.

Be sure also to keep good notes to make sure that you remember which benefits you mentioned on your last call so you won’t sound like a broken record on your next call.

Here’s how I might use this technique in my business: “Mr. Prospect, my name is Bill Lee with Lee Resources. We work exclusively with owners and managers who are looking for ways to improve their bottom line. We help our clients measure individual performance and design compensation plans for key employees that reward them for increasing productivity. Among your managers and salespeople, how effective are they at optimizing their productivity?”

Or this, “Mr. Prospect, I consult with companies that are looking for ways to help their sales organizations grow sales and improve gross margin. What programs do you have in place now to improve the productivity of your sales team?”

VOICE MAIL MESSAGE: This kind of opening statement works equally well as an impressive message to leave when you make the decision to leave a message in a prospect’s voice mailbox.

Just like my prospects, your prospects are busy. But they all have several common interests: 1. Putting more money on the bottom line; 2. Solving their most pressing business problems; 3. Being more successful.