Have you ever known a salesperson who sold mediocre products and services and yet they gushed sales like a fire hose?

Or the opposite: A salesperson who sold superior products and services and yet their sales spigot was nothing more than a slow drip?

A critical success factor I discovered from selling and helping other people sell for the past 25 years is that the salespeople who are most successful do not behave like salespeople.

If that sounds counter-intuitive, listen to what happened to one of my customers:

This is a small company that makes snowshoes and sells them to retail stores, distributors and catalog companies in the U.S.

Most orders for snowshoes are placed in spring for delivery before the busy fall season.

The snowshoe company’s factory runs at or near its full capacity through the busy season and then sits empty for several months…or at least it did.

The company had capacity to take on more customers. The problem was how to do this without overburdening the factory during the high season.

Two years ago the company launched a marketing campaign targeted at potential new customers in Australia and New Zealand.

Seasons in the southern and northern hemispheres of course are opposite, so orders from these new customers are now arriving when the snowshoe company’s factory would normally go unused. Problem solved.

Here’s the kicker: The idea came from a salesperson who sells manufacturing equipment to the snowshoe company.

This is a sales professional who is not as much a salesman as he is a business partner.

Some of the benefits the snowshoe company reaped from implementing this innovative idea are:

• Revenue almost doubled

• Peaks and valleys of demand were flattened

• Profit margins trippled because they didn’t need to invest in new factory equipment to meet the increased demand

• They eliminated the need to cut staff during slow season

The sales pro benefits because the manufacturing equipment is now being more heavily used and will need replacement sooner.

The point is: In order to make bigger sales at higher prices, you have to behave more like a business partner and less like a salesperson.

A sales professional who behaves like a business partner:

• Acts like they are part-owner in their customer’s business

• Thinks about and understands their customer’s business

• Takes personal interest in the growth and success of their customer’s business

• Looks for ways to help their customer increase revenue, expand markets and operate more efficiently

• Spots trends in the customer’s business

• Builds real value for their customers

If you want to know if you behave like a business partner to your customers, here are a few questions to consider:

• What percentage of your time with customers is spent discussing product or service features, benefits and pricing? (If this is more than 15%, it’s too much)

• What percentage of your time with customers is devoted to conversations about the customer’s critical business issues? (If this is less than 70%, it’s not enough)

• How many strong business relationships do you have with key people at different levels of your customer’s organization?

• How often does your customer ask for your opinion or ideas about ways to improve their business?

• In what specific ways are you helping your customer accelerate their business results?

When you behave like a business partner, you create happier customers, you sell more products and services at higher prices and you generate more repeat business.

(This article may not be reprinted or copied without written permission from Howard Wallin.)