If you are in business you will know the importance of making a sale whether that is of goods or a service. Lawyers and solicitors can offer legal advice on the legal aspects of your business, so you might not think they would know much about sales, yet they are in business too; the business of giving legal advice, but that is still a business. So they may well have been able to help you out with some tips.

However, here are 10 tips for business sales success that you may not have tried yet.

• During prime business hours decision makers are usually really busy. So make your calls to prospects outside of those hours. Try 8am before the frantic rush starts or 6pm when it has wound down and your decision maker is more relaxed.
• Leave voice messages at night because they will be the first thing your prospect listens to in the morning, maybe even before they get to work.
• Speak in terms of benefits to the sales prospect, not the features of the product. They are more interested in what it will do for them than just what it does.

• Try and keep your sales pipeline full of prospects no matter whether they are almost ready to buy or new. This will save having a slump further down the track.
• Use faxes as part of your sales plan. They tend to be more noticed these days when emails are so common.
• Follow up and follow through. Selling is a bit like gardening. You can plant the seed, but you also have to water, weed and fertilise to get what you want. And it takes time.
• Give your prospect something for nothing. It can be as simple as some information about something you found out they were interested in from a previous chat. They will appreciate you being genuinely interested in them.
• Record yourself sometimes when you do a cold call. Listen to the tape and ask yourself if you would feel like buying from someone who spoke like that. Are your words clear and your tone warm? Did you mention the benefits more than features?
• Pace yourself. It takes time and effort to become a successful sales agent. Set a specific time to start those calls and emails and schedule a certain amount of time to spend on them. Be consistent.
• Keep your sense of humour. People love it when someone makes them laugh. Apart from this, taking a cranky customer so seriously that their words cut you to the quick is a recipe for disaster. You don’t want to become an emotional wreck so if you find this happening too often consider putting someone else in charge of sales while you work in the area of your better skills.