International Sales Best Practices
Instead of creating barriers in cross-cultural sales, here is another tip to improve clarity.
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CCCC Tip #7 - Ask questions to clarify even the slightest uncertainty or assumption. |
This month’s series takes last month’s tips to get extreme clarity in cross-cultural communication and brings them into an international sales perspective. Remember to download the free calender for an easy reference to all of the 30 Cross-Cultural Communication Challenge Tips on clarity. Get the complete International Sales Best Practices series here.
Yes, this is an obvious piece of advice. The trouble is that you are probably very good at picking up uncertainty and wrong assumptions when communicating with people from your own culture. And this might make you brush this piece of advice aside.
Before going any further, let’s look at how this ties in with international sales best practices?
Cross-Cultural Communication Skills & Sales Best Practices
Here is a quote that comes to mind from Jeffrey Gitomer’s Little Red Book Of Sales Answers.
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“What is the best way to control a phone conversation? Ask questions.” – Jeffrey Gitomer |
The trouble with cross-cultural sales is that cultural differences make it difficult to pick up on wrong assumptions and areas of uncertainty. One of the best ways to monitor this is to become good at finding the right questions to ask.
I do not think that you can sit down and learn a list of standard questions. This will not work well. Instead of learning a list of questions by heart, I think it is best to focus on learning the cultural skills required. This means practice and acquiring several cultural skills to help you improve your questions:
- Curiosity
- Empathy or understanding the other person’s point of view
- Understanding the business fundamentals involved
- Flexibility
You see, it is not merely a case of firing out questions one after the other. In cross-cultural sales you have to learn:
- How to ask the questions
- What the right questions are
- Which questions add to your credibility and which ones take away your credibility
So this obvious piece of advice is not always easy to master in cross-cultural communications. Even skilled international professionals spend time thinking this through properly.
Good questions clarify uncertainties, avoid wrong assumptions and guide you through the international sales process.
What Is Your Experience Of This In International Sales?
- Do you always know which questions to ask in cross-cultural sales?
- Have you ever had a tiny question at the back of your mind during a cross-cultural sales encounter and let it go by without asking the question?
- Have you asked a question in a cross-cultural sales encounter and felt it came out wrong?
Please share your comments below. I’d love to hear your stories!
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She is who I turn to when I have questions and you should too"
-- Chris Garrett, co-author of the "Problogger" book
