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Thank You Concept

How Salespeople Can Give Thanks to Customers and Colleagues

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In a few days you’ll hopefully be eating a great meal with family and friends. While Thanksgiving is synonymous with food, I think it’s a great time for salespeople to really give thanks. Here’s what I’m doing:

Look for ways to publicly recognize others.

One way to give thanks is to recognize others for their contributions. I just finished nominating three people for city-wide recognition in a volunteer organization that I’m part of. This organization couldn’t function without the efforts of these three people. They are each volunteers. That means that they aren’t paid for the time they take away from their families while they contribute to the success of this engineering group.

What did my giving thanks involve? I had to write a paragraph about each nominee and their contribution to the group. It was easy to do since I knew how critical they were to the success of the group. I also greatly appreciated what they did so it was heartfelt.

You may think you are too busy to give thanks. I am busy just like every one else, but I enjoy participating in this group and unless these volunteers contribute their time, the group wouldn’t be able to continue. The time it took to write the nomination was little enough and made me feel better doing it.

Write a thank you note.

I am most grateful to my customers this year. Sure, I appreciate what they paid me, but there’s more to my gratitude than the paycheck I received.

My compensation is also being grateful for working on the interesting projects that my customers gave me.  Their projects kept my mind thriving. My spirit soared when they told me that they enjoyed working with me. Each one of my customers could have selected another supplier, yet they chose to work with me.

Now it’s time to send them a thank you note to let them know how much I appreciate them.

Your thank you note doesn’t have to be long. You can simply say that you appreciate what others did for you. Recognize that even though people are paid for their work, they don’t have to do their work with a gracious spirit as many people do. These are the people you want to thank.

You get so much more back when you give thanks. What better time than Thanksgiving to start giving thanks to customers and others who help you sell?

Profile: Maura Schreier-Fleming

Maura Schreier-Fleming is president of Best@Selling, a sales training and sales consulting company. She works with business and sales professionals to increase sales and earn larger profits. She is the author of Real-World Selling for Out-of-this-World Results and Monday Morning Sales Tips. Maura focuses on sales strategies and tactics that lead to better sales results. Maura is a sales expert for WomenSalesPros. She is part of their group of top sales experts who inspire, educate, and develop salespeople and sales teams.She speaks internationally on influence, selling skills, and strategic selling at trade association and sales meetings, demonstrating how her principles can be applied to get results. She successfully worked for over 20 years in the male-dominated oil industry with two major corporations, beginning at Mobil Oil and ending at Chevron Corp. She was Mobil Oil’s first female lubrication engineer in the U.S. and was one of Chevron’s top five salespeople in the U.S. having sold over $9 million annually. Maura writes several columns to share her sales philosophies. She's been quoted in the New York Times, Selling Power, and Entrepreneur.