Does it all come down to this?

when I saw the thread title the first thing that popped into my mind before entering was "selling" haha

It really does come down to that

With marketing you can create an ideal environment to get people into a buying mood.

Think of casinos where they have no windows or clocks so that you lose track of time which gets the gamblers staying longer. They make a point of making a loud noise when money is won out of a slot machine.

All to create the spending environment.

And so by virtue of being a book author, it creates a halo effect for example.

People become trained and conditioned to be more accepting what
price and conditions of engagement.

Whether we like it or not, it's just buyer behaviour.

And those conditions can be manufactured.

Best,
Ewen

I feel that the key to any business is always having your funnel filling with leads. There will always be customer "churn" in any business. Prospect, prospect, prospect. You always need to be planting the seeds. Building a broad network is also a must for any business. Now of course if you are so bad at the art of selling that you can't even close a window then that is a major stumbling block to your success and all of the hot leads in the world probably won't be helpful. Sales is a people business, and typically with in-person sales, someone will buy from someone that they like. There are always the transactional salespeople that will sell at the lowest price. However, long-term profitable business relationships are built on trust, respect, and at least some level of likability.

I agree with you that if you avoid selling you'll more than likely fail because you're not providing your business with the essential element that it needs to succeed which are people that want to do business with you. However, I don't think that if you give yourself enough opportunities to sell that you'll ultimately be a success unless you can close enough deals to keep you profitable. If this is a weakness and you have a very low close ratio, then you're going to need to be in contact with a lot of leads everyday. Leads can sometimes be the hardest part unless you have a strong method of filling the funnel. Sales skills are somewhat innate, but they can also be learned with a lot of practice and a desire to be a success at selling so all is not lost if sales isn't your thing. As stated by the OP earlier, you could also contract or outsource that part of the business if you can negotiate a profitable partnership with a salesperson.

Just my two cents using my sales career as a guideline. Of course there are always exceptions to any rule. Best of luck in your businesses.

I think that the implications of what being able to sell actually means far outweighs the actual revenue/profit you generate.

Sales in itself is a system: the 1st law of Cybernetics states that "The unit within the system with the most behavioural responses available to it controls the system".

Think of the system as the supplier, the potential customer, and the market-place, including the competitors and all influencing market factors.

Ask yourself, of all the people involved in the customer and supplier organizations, who is best positioned to view and respond to the overall system? Not the CEOs, not the managers, not the technical project managers.

The person best positioned to see and adapt to the whole system is the cold caller. Only that person has the breadth and depth of view back inside their own organization, and also outwardly into the prospective customer organization.

The cold caller is the single pivot - the main connector, interpreter and translator - between supplier, prospective customer and all the other market forces.

Sales is the one profession which can be applied to any other similar system such as networking, management, leadership, et al. No other job on earth prepares you both conceptually and emotionally for success in the real world than being a high achieving salesperson.. so you bet I'm proud to be one!

Good post Daniel. I was in outside sales for over 20 years working with local businesses and it always comes down to making more presentations if you want to make more sales, In my case I found a more consultative approach to sales where I identified needs and offered solutions worked the best.

If people understood that you can sum up any for-profit companies as this, they would be more profitable.

"We are a marketing company selling ____"
- consulting services
- real estate
- locksmithing services
- poodles

As OP mentioned, it doesn't matter what business you're in. You're in the marketing business, you just sell different products or services.