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The Sales Buzz Issue 78 - Positive alignment – Learn from Ambush Marketing
June 23, 2010
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Thank you for subscribing to The Sales Buzz the Free Sales Training Newsletter for all sales people, and small businesses sales managers.


In this week’s Sales Buzz!

Ambush Marketing and Event Sponsorship

What can you take and adapt from sales and marketing techniques used by big event sponsors and ambush marketeers.

Sales individuals and small businesses can use the same techniques on a smaller scale, and with almost no cost, to gain the benefit of positive alignment.

Scroll down the page and see what you can add to your sales and marketing techniques with these fresh ideas on positive alignment Positive Alignment for sales individuals and small businesses...



Also in this edition of The Sales Buzz:

Updates on the Sales Training Sales Tips website

The latest updates, changes, new pages and free offers on the Sales-Training- Sales-Tips website.

Free eBook - A free sales training eBook that will give you techniques you will not find on traditional sales training courses.


Sales 101 - The page for anyone new to sales or selling as only part of their role.


Closing Techniques - 3 Sales tips on how to close more sales.


Retail sales tips – A recently added page that gives valuable tips on how mainstream selling techniques can be adapted for retail sales.

To see more on these uspdates scroll down to Sales-Training-Sales-Tips updates ...






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It's also a really effective self motivation technique for getting into that top selling state between sales appointments.

To download your copy open The Sales Buzz Free Newsletter page and see why Need-to-Close Chains works so well.



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If you know someone that could benefit from this free sales training please feel free to send them the newsletter, or the Need-to-Close Chains sales training tool.






Ambush Marketing and Event Sponsorship - What can we learn for small business sales

What can small businesses and sales individuals learn from corporate Ambush Marketing and Big Event sponsorship that we can do for free.

If you’ve been watching the World Cup you may have seen 36 beautiful blondes, in bright orange mini-skirts, that entered the stands at the game between Netherlands and Denmark.

This was an attempt at Ambush Marketing during the game by the Dutch brewers Bavaria.

Blondes, bright orange mini-skirts, and let’s face it the football hasn’t been the most attention grabbing, so as all the cameras and media focus turned to the Ambush Marketing team.

Prior to the world cup Bavaria brewers made sure everyone associated them with the bright orange skirts by a campaign featuring a top player’s Dutch wife wearing one.

They also gave the skirts away in gift packs.

With big event sponsorship and advertising becoming more expensive we can expect to see a boom in Ambush Marketing.

But what do companies get from Ambush Marketing, sponsoring, or advertising at a big event, and what can us sales individuals and small business owners learn from it.



Recognition and Alignment

One answer is easy - recognition, publicity, getting the brand seen by as many people as possible.

There is not much we can take away from that and use for our sales and marketing campaigns. It’s purely about Pounds and Dollars. The more you pay the more you are seen.

Or in the case of Ambush Marketing, the bigger the organised ambush, the more people involved, and the more audacious the stunt, the more publicity you get.


The other benefit the ambushers and advertisers get is alignment.

Whatever the event the marketing campaign is attached to they get alignment, in the view of the public, with that event.

So a brewer pulling an ambush stunt at a football match is a good alignment. Football and lager beer go together well. The message is that Bavaria beers are associating themselves with football and football fans.

And this idea of alignment is one that we sales people and small business owners can use. In many cases we can use it for free, obviously on a much smaller scale than 36 blondes in orange skirts at an event viewed world-wide.


Align yourself or your business with something beneficial.

The simplest form of alignment is when you name drop a customer you already deal with to a sales prospect you are trying to win over.

During your sales pitch you give an example of a customer you do business with that your prospect will know. The customer will have something about them that the prospect will see as a positive.


Let me give you this example:

A waste and recycling company in the UK won the contract to provide their services to the Environment Agency, a government body involved with legislating for the waste industry.

The waste service provider cannot openly use this in their advertising, but the sales force can bring this into the conversation with potential customers.

The potential customers will see this as a positive. A key legislative body deals with this company. They must be doing everything legally and within the rules.

By aligning themselves and their business with the Environment Agency the service provider is gains some of the prestige and correctness that the agency are seen as having.


When sports companies sponsor the Olympics or the Super Bowl, they are trying to align themselves with a great sporting event. They want people to think, consciously or sub-consciously, that the sportsmen and women wear their products, and that these top level sporting organisations are in some way endorsing the advertisers.


Who can you align yourself or your small business with

Once you start to think about it there are many opportunities.

Your customers are an obvious source of alignment. Who do you do business with that will give the right impression to your sales prospects.

Depending upon your type of sales role you might want to get written referrals to use in your sales pitch.

Or how about pictures of your products being used somewhere that will give sales prospects a feeling of confidence because of what you are aligned with in the picture.

Think about the people and organisations above you, like the Environment Agency in the example above. And the ones below you such as customers, end users, or charities you donate to or work with.

Having something in common with your sales prospect is a good rapport and relationship builder. But it can also be a great alignment tool. A sports or social organisation can be good if there is something beneficial that you want to align you or your business with.


Consider this: If you were a customer who would you want to buy from, a gambler that spent time at the track or in a casino, or a sports referee.

Knowing this one piece of information tells you nothing about the person, but it gives you a picture, an image, of the sales person.


As a sales professional choose the image of your business. Select who and what you want you or your business to be aligned with. To see more on creating an image look at
Professional Selling skills on creating an image...





Updates on the Sales Training Sales Tips website

The latest updates, changes, new pages and free offers on the website.


3 Sales Tips on Closing Techniques

Use these 3 sales tips and add them to your existing sales pitch.

A nice easy way to close more sales withour completely changing your sales process. You'll see:

A way to start closing from the very strt of your sale.

How to gain agreement in the middle of the sales stages

Closing techniques that stop you making one of the most common mistakes that stops you getting the order.

Open Closing techniques - 3 Sales tips to close more deals.


Free eBook on closing more sales

A free sales training eBook that will give you techniques you will not find on traditional sales training courses. Where traditional sales training focuses on the stages of a sale, this free eBook looks at how you connect the sale stages.

It focuses on how you motivate your sales prospect to move with you through the sales stages towards closing the sale.

Get your free copy. It’s brief, easy to put into action, and will make a great addition to your existing sales skills. For more information and to download your free eBook open Free online sales training.



Sales 101 – Basic sales skills

Basic sales training for people new to sales or selling as only a part of their role.

I was asked to present some quick and basic sales training to people who were to start selling as an addition to their current roles. It became known as Sales 101.

If you want a quick and basic sales process covering all the major stages of a sale, open Sales 101 – Basic sales training.



Retail sales tips

A great new page for anyone in retail sales – Shops – Showrooms – Forecourts - Anywhere that you approach customers and need a good line to introduce yourself.

Retail sales tips – A recently added page that gives valuable tips on how mainstream selling techniques can be adapted for retail sales.

Go into any shopping mall, any showroom, and you will get approached by retail sales people still using opening lines from up to two decades ago.

On this page we look at how you can get more potential buyers talking to you. Learn more at Retail sales tips.






Short and to the point - Effective - and Practical

That's my aim with The Sales Buzz Free Newsletter and with all the selling and career techniques on the sales training website. You can learn sales skills without spending huge amounts of money or ploughing through long boring books.

Pick up sales techniques and sales skills from wherever you can. You do not have to spend huge amounts of money to get the learn sales skills that are right for you. I present sales techniques that are:

  • Easy to learn sales skills
  • Short and to the point
  • Simple to put into action

To make sure you don't miss out on all the right updates for you get the sales training Blog and you're in control of when you read the latest additions to the site.



The Sales Buzz

The Sales Buzz is the free newsletter for all sales people in all sales roles. If there is a topic you would like to see covered here use the contact form on the website and I'll get the best information, from working sales professionals, to learn sales skills and pass them on to you on this newsletter.

Wishing you the very best with your sales career.

Stephen Craine
Sales-Training-Sales-Tips

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