“Everything starts with a sale” - Thomas J. Watson
In today’s competitive world, the success of a business largely depends on marketing and sales.
However, in many companies, selling is only regarded as the job of the people in marketing and sales department.
Selling should be the job of every employee. Yes, I say everyone. Thomas J. Watson, Sir. still thought himself of a sales man even after he had been IBM’s CEO for forty-two years.
You will get tremendous results if you make every employee aware of the importance of sales to your company. Here are just a few examples. Simply ask your receptionist put on some smile when answering phones. You will see your sales going up. Ask your people in accounting be more careful in recording sales orders or issuing invoices. Let them know delivering wrong products or sending out incorrect invoice loses sales. You should let your people in customer services understand that they depend on customers for bread and butter. Next time, when a customer comes with a problem, they will treat the customer like a millionaire instead of a trouble maker.
Buck Rogers, IBM’s top marketing executive for ten years, once wrote: “At IBM everybody sells! Every employee has been trained to think that customer comes first – everybody from the CEO, to the people in finance, to the receptionists, to those who work in manufacturing”. I guess this tells a lot about the success of IBM.
