THE PROLOGUE
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And so it began, the search for the best “sales process” that solved all the world's challenges and brought prosperity to humankind.
In the early 20s, 30s, 40s, and 50s selling went through a number of evolutions from Snake Oil salespeople to pyramid selling to mood selling, barrier selling, and the great work done by Dale Carnegie on Relationship Selling.
While a lot happened in those early days the 60s is where it made a huge shift with work done by Xerox. Their methodology was so successful that they packaged and sold it to other companies under the name of Professional Selling Skills. That form of thinking prevailed for quite a while, and I studied that process in my early days as well. Then the flood gates opened and the search for selling Nirvana went full speed ahead. Thru the 60s and 70s things took a few turns and every few years we had a brand new magic answer to how to “sell” better. Some of the more notable selling methodologies are below.
- 1967 Sandler Selling System
- 1978 Miller-Heiman, Strategic Selling
- 1988 Solution Selling (SPI)
- 1988 SPIN Selling
- 1991 Value Selling (as ValueVision Associates)
- 1993 Customer Centric Selling
- 2002 RAIN Selling
- 2005 Baseline Selling
- 2011 The Challenger Sale
It can be said that many of these had success. A few became almost cult-like in nature. All of these are related to the world of the complex sell. Not a simple transaction sale of simple nature. This would be B2B selling as we know it today. Most with a many-month cycle time.
As we sit here today we find ourselves in a brand new world and again, in search of the magic selling wand that does everything. And, just as in the early days, there is no easy answer. It is not magic. But this time we do have THE WAY…. What is true now, has always been true. There is an answer that is at our fingertips, that WILL create the outcomes that you desire. The greatest sales methodology ever, or sales process ever, or whatever label you need to apply to it is THIS….
STOP SELLING!!! NOW!!!
START SERVING!!! NOW!!!
Ok, what? Crazy right? Nope. Sane as heck with a proven way of doing the job, for the benefit of ALL. And outcomes that every client, corporate stakeholder, and salesperson anywhere would give their all to have! The data will prove it.
Over the next many weeks we are going to spell out the Why, How, and What to the CUSP way of serving our clients. CUSP, in case you did not catch this in the few hundred other articles on CUSP, means…
CARE greatly,
UNDERSTAND deeply,
SERVE endlessly, with
PURPOSE
We will dig into each of the 4 quadrants, explain what is meant, why we do it, and how it actually gets done, what it looks like in action.
And so it starts…..
CHAPTER ONE:
So you think you CARE! How do you know? Who have you asked? What did they say? What were your follow on thoughts and questions?
Why should you care…. That and more in the CARE world….next week….
OK, LET’s ROLL!
And dig into your sense of caring.
Mitch
