LISTENING to your prospect.

NOT doing the "Show Up and Throw Up" presentation dump the amateur salesperson delivers.

Asking questions. Asking some more. Asking uncomfortable questions. Instead of trying to bypass, ignore or sweep under the rug a key issue you might find makes working with this prospect "Not A Fit", ask the question and find out for sure.

Looking for "Fit", not "Trying to sell everyone". Everyone is NOT a great prospective client. Some people would be The Client From Hell. Sometimes, the best sale is the one you never made.

Stop being desperate.

Stop being overenthusiastic. Fake enthusiasm of the oil slick of the lousy salesperson. You need it to get the sales job, but out in the real world with prospects it's a real turn-off. ("Why is the salesperson smiling so much? They must be ripping me off big time and making a huge commission.")

Now I have to point something out. Everything I've said so far is actually a Sales TACTIC. Not a strategy.

A Sales STRATEGY involves:

* determining your target market

* deciding on path(s) to market -- eg. direct mail offers, retail, channel

* formalizing prospecting methods -- how are you going to start the communication with individual prospects in your target market? By knowing the key typical problems you solve for your customers, you can use these issues as a conversation starter and qualifier

* applying a consistent qualifying process -- making sure you work with people who are a "Fit" for you (who you can help, will treat you well, value what you offer)

If you've done the strategy steps to this point well, and the prospect qualifies "In", selling should be pretty straightforward.

Selling is not about persuading, cajoling, fooling, forcing, deceiving, pitching or any of the other awful things we see in (fictional) movies like Glengarry Glen Ross or Boiler Room or Wolf of Wall Street. Not ethical, effective selling, anyway. It's too bad the public gets its information about salespeople from bad experiences in poorly run retail operations like appliance stores and low end car dealerships...and from movies like those. High level business sales works very differently.