There are a couple of inside secrets that all successful sales people know that the unsuccessful do not and I intend to share these secrets with you, here and now. Secret number one, sales is not about your product, your business opportunity, your compensation plan, none of that. Sales is about you. People don't buy your product, they buy into you. They don't join your MLM or home business opportunity, they join you. You are not selling any of the above. You are selling yourself.

The second secret, just as important as the first, is this. Successful sales people are good listeners. They are able to discern their customers need, want, desire, or the source of their pain and they recognize when the customer is giving them cues to close the sale. Successful sales people listen more and talk less. So what are the skills that make one a good listener? Let's look at a few.

Before you pick up the phone to call a prospect, find a place of inner calm and quiet. Do some breathing exercises. Say a prayer. Sing a line or two of your favorite song. Do whatever it is that helps you to get centered, inwardly calm and allows you to tune out any distractions, even your own misgivings or fears. If you are not in a place of peace, your customer will pick up on it immediately, even over the phone.

Next, have no agenda other than to find out what your prospect needs wants or desires and to discern if your product or home business opportunity is right for them, and they for it. Don't enter into the conversation trying to sell, enter in trying to listen. Remember how you have felt when you pick up the phone and that annoying telemarketer is on the other end cramming a bunch of information down your throat, bludgeoning you with all manner of questions and not letting you get in one word edgewise? Don't put your customer through that same torture.

Start off with some small talk, allow them to open up to you and begin to identify with you. If you pay attention, you will know when this has happened. Then start off with a question or two that can only be answered, yes, like "it would be great to have more money at the end of the month wouldn't It?" Get them agreeing with you, then move on to more open ended questions that encourage them to give you their need, want or desire. At this stage, listen, pay attention. Accept their answer, don't judge, don't rebut, and by all means don't interrupt. You've got them talking, now let them talk. Acceptance does not mean agreement or validation. By accepting their answer you make them feel you are genuinely concerned about them. Of course you had better be. If not, they will pick up on that one as well.

Now, here is the real meat of the subject. Once you get them talking, if you will really listen rather than try to formulate a response or an answer, you will know when they are giving you cues to close. Unsuccessful sales people begin to offer answers, rebuttals and talk themselves right out of the sale! Don't sell past the close. When they give you the opening, offer them the solution to their need want or desire, be brief, and then shut up! In that moment, silence is golden. If you have done a good job, they will feel as if they have solved their own problem, found the answer to their desire. You have successfully sold yourself, and they have bought into you.

In summary, sales is about selling yourself and getting customers to buy into you. It's about making them feel they have solved their own problem, answered their own need. Successful sales people know how to listen more and talk less. They know how to accept their customers answers without necessarily validating them, especially with objections. They have no agenda but to find out what their customer needs, wants or desires and to see if what they have to offer will meet that need. Successful sales people listen for cues to close and then do so, they don't sell past the close. Successful sales people know how to listen. Are you a good listener?