Sometimes sales go wrong. When they do, salespeople blame someone or something.

“He wouldn’t return my call.” “He took the lowest bid.” “He bought from the competition.” “He said my price was too high.”

Amazing, isn’t it? No salesperson ever loses a sale and takes responsibility for it.

You know the old adage about “knowing right from wrong”? Well, you can PREVENT sales from going wrong by doing right.

Here are the 11.5 right things to be, have and do:

1. The right prospect. Someone you met at a networking event, someone you connected with on LinkedIn, someone who connected with you, a referral. Not a cold call. Cold calls are wrong.

2. The right strategy. Create questions about the prospects that engage them and also solicit information to help you – questions that differentiate you from your competitors and questions that prove you’ve done your homework. Create a question-based strategy, not a statement-based one.

3. The right preparation. Research the prospect’s company, uncover the prospect’s history and find facts that will help you understand the prospect’s present situation. All of these steps will lead to questions, ideas and a customized presentation, not just a brochure and your pitch.

4. The right approach. Approaches are always awkward UNLESS there’s already some kind of introduction or previous dialogue. Build rapport, find things in common, THEN start your presentation.

5. The right communication. Your presentation skills, your compelling message and your unspoken (but obviously present) attitude and enthusiasm create a buying atmosphere.

6. The right message. Prospects want to know how they can succeed, how they can win and how they can profit from owning what it is that you sell. They don’t care about you unless they’re certain what you sell helps them.

7. The right value. Most salespeople don’t have a value proposition; they have a sales pitch. Value is what a customer perceives, not simply what you offer.

8. The right motive. Unless you uncover your prospect’s motive (prime reason) to buy, you’ll be stuck in “selling” mode. My first rule of sales is people don’t like to be sold, but they love to buy. Once you understand this, you’ll exert your effort trying to uncover buying motives rather than make a bunch of statements that fall on deaf ears.

9. The right urgency. Once you have uncovered your prospect’s motive to buy, you will automatically reveal the need to own and the time frame in which that must take place.

10. The right fit. Fit is defined as the unspoken comfort that prospects feel as they’re thinking about owning what you’re selling.

11. The right relationship. If you’re just trying to make a sale, you may in fact be successful in the short run. But then you have to go out and hunt for another one. The right relationship is value-based, long-term-oriented, and has a possibility of a referral and a reorder as a reward.

11.5. Do the right thing. If you leave out old-world tactics, sales manipulation and aiming for the close, you’ll be on the right track. If you’ve done the right thing, a testimonial can follow, a referral can follow and repeat business can follow.

You need the right belief in your company, your product and yourself; the right attitude; and the right enthusiasm. To transfer your enthusiasm to prospects, your attitude and belief must be firmly in place.

These three elements will determine sales outcome more often than a presentation, a slide show or a closing technique.

Jeffrey Gitomer can be reached by phone at (704) 333-1112 or by email at salesman@gitomer.com. © 2011 Jeffrey H. Gitomer