You’ve heard it from medical sales recruiters. You’ve heard it from your manager. You’ve heard it from your medical sales colleagues. “Be a professional!” It sounds like good advice…in fact, it is! But what exactly does it mean? In this weeks podcast, Mace Horoff describes the attributes of professional behavior as it relates to medical sales. Listen and assess yourself to see if you measure up to the standards of professional behavior for the medical sales profession.
Every medical sales rep knows to ask probing questions. Make sure you are not asking probing questions that a medical professional might find insulting! One of the worst ones is, “Doctor, tell me about the biggest challenges you have when you are …..?” Mace Horoff, medical sales speaker, trainer, and consultant offers some thoughts on why a question like this can be perceived as insulting to a medical professional and then suggests a more subtle, non-insulting approach to uncover the information you need before trying to offer a solution.
Many medical sales people are good at delivering the details about their products, and without question, the ability to do that is important. But this alone does not make you a “sales person.” In fact, if this is all you do in your medical sales presentations, you are really more of a “detail person.” Yes, you can earn a good living as a detail person (many people in the pharmaceutical industry do this), but you will miss out on the higher incomes that are paid to truly effective medical sales professionals. In this Medical Sales Guru podcast, Mace Horoff explains the difference between sales people and detail people, and what you need to do to make sure you are “selling” and not just “dumping” product data.
Ask a medical sales professional the best place to sell, and he or she will probably tell you, “anywhere the prospect or customer will listen.” Sure, you can sell anywhere, but anywhere is not always the best place! Nothing beats a scheduled (or unscheduled) sit-down appointment in the healthcare provider’s office or other location where you can have a focused conversation with a minimum of distractions. Mace describes why you need to make this kind of meeting with your prospects and customers a priority and how to get the healthcare professional to give you the time you need for a proper, complete sales presentation.
When you give a medical sales presentation to a prospect or customer, who is the presentation about? The question is not WHAT, but WHO is it about. Too many sales reps make the presentation about themselves, their companies, and their products and truthfully…your prospect can care less. In this edition of the Medical Sales Guru Podcast, Mace Horoff describes WHO the presentation needs to be about and why.
Want to rise to the top of the medical sales profession? Then stop playing it safe by avoiding anything that might cause a customer to criticize you as being “too pushy.” Sure, there’s a fine line, but if you’re not dancing close to the line and stepping out of your comfort zone when selling to your customers, you’re leaving sales opportunities and money on the table. Listen as Mace Horoff discusses the need to be more assertive with your medical customers to keep your sales career moving forward and to help them care for their patients.
Medical sales is like playing a competitive sport — you need to develop and maintain specific skills if you expect to stay in the game, let alone win. The highly competitive world of medical sales is not for the faint of heart or the unprepared sales rep. Listen as Mace Horoff explains “What’s in it for YOU” when you spend 15 minutes with this free Podcast every week.
