Like most organizations, schools in the United States are subject to constant budget stress. Important athletic and scholastic programs are subject to budget cuts as demographics change and taxpayers become increasingly budget aware. As a result, schools include fund raising resources in their planning for programs.

Education should rank high on the list of tax payer funding. With exception of defense, it is hard to imagine a governmental effort that is more important to our country than good education. Education and schools focus on our future leaders and it is in the schools where lessons in character are coupled with the development of skills required for success in a modern society.

Fund Raising and Healthy Products

Schools, both public and private, have turned to fund raising to help fund sporting and educational events. Where large number of people have gathered, schools, through sports teams, booster clubs and scholastic societies have raised funds by selling products for a profit at events or by using team members to sell products to friends and family..

Historically a number of products were sold that generated revenue and these were mainly food products like carbonated soft drinks, cookies, pizza and candy. As a group these products were not considered healthy by many. Recently, for example, an agreement was finalized to discontinue the sale of carbonated soft drinks in schools and this is a landmark effort to help reduce obesity and create a healthy lifestyle for students.

Many schools are now exploring fund raising with healthier products. As a result private label water is becoming increasingly popular as a healthy alternative method to raise funds.

Private Label Drinking Water

Private label drinking water is an effective and healthy way to raise funds for a number of reasons:

• If the water is purified, it represents a wholesome addition to a healthy lifestyle.

• Creation of a private label is an effective form of advertising that adds value to the water and the event. This additional value is reflected in a higher price, greater revenue and more profit.

• Private label water is consumable advertising that is often carried from the event and serves as a reminder to participants and others.

• The label design offers flexibility that allows schedules and scores to be listed and updated.

• Private label water is ideal for outdoor events and is very cost effective. The cost decreases as volume increases.

• Private label water can easily establish a brand identity for the school or team.

• The design of one label can be used for many school events.

Two Avenues of Fund Raising

Private label water is a versatile tool for fund raising. It can be sold directly at school events and players and participants can resell private label water to friends and family to raise revenue. Either avenue is an effective fund raising device.

Both avenues are available to schools most of the calendar year and provide consistent fund raising opportunities.

Student Participation

Students are both the beneficiaries and the key assets of fundraising. They can control the quality of their own athletic and scholastic programs by actively participating in the event and friends and family fund raising activities. Gaining a student “buy in” for programs will guarantee success.

What to Look for in a Private Label Water Supplier

There are a number of private label water suppliers but they vary widely in the quality of their product offerings. There are three areas to investigate when choosing a supplier:

Quality of Water

Events with a large number of participants require proper hydration with water of the highest quality. High quality water in terms of health and taste is also critical for the acceptance of the theme and event message. If the water is low quality or tastes bad then the message will fail. The best quality water on the market today is purified using a distillation/ filtration/ oxygenation process that removes all impurities, including all bacteria, and creates a light, refreshing taste.

Quality of Label Design and Production

The label is the message part of the product and poor-quality labels send a poor-quality message. Production of a poor-quality label is a waste of money and adversely affects the message and theme.

It is very important to know that the vast majority (almost all) of the private label opportunities in this country come from water resellers (not bottlers) with desktop-model “thermal” (or “thermal wax”) printing devices with a quality level that cannot compare well to even consumer-grade inkjet printing devices widely available for less than $200 at your local electronics store. These label printers are very cheap in both quality and cost, typically ranging from $10-20k depending on configuration, and are widely used throughout the private label water industry because of their low cost.

In sharp contrast, a quality label, i.e., one that looks like a top-shelf brand that you might find in your local gourmet grocery store, needs to be produced with professional-quality equipment using professional-grade printing equipment. There are three types of printing equipment that can produce a high-quality label.

1. Rotary offset lithography;

2. Flexography; and

3. High-quality digital presses.

For most smaller runs (under about 10,000 units), digital equipment offered by Heidelberg or HP is the most cost effective solution, but instead of $10-20k, the minimum equipment costs for these professional solutions range from $750k to $1.25M per station.

These facts are very important to understand when choosing a private label bottler because those who sell low-quality labels would have you believe that nothing better is available because of the short runs required by private label customers. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In order to succeed, your label must be professionally designed and produced with high-quality materials using a printing process that renders a high-quality result. Waterproof lamination is also required for long lasting labels. This is easily achieved for an affordable unit cost using the right equipment for the job.

Quality of Customer Service

The design and production of private labeled drinking water is complex and requires intense interaction between the customer and supplier. Communication and a culture of customer service excellence is a prerequisite to the creation of an effective theme message and a successful event. Without a significant commitment to customer service on the part of the supplier, the impact of the theme message will fail.

A supplier with a fully interactive e-commerce site is an ideal way to create a high quality label, modify the label to reflect event changes and to order more water as demand changes.

A supplier that is experienced in fund raising and is willing to commit management resources to support a school fund raising program is a definite asset to individual schools.

Choose a quality supplier to help develop and communicate your message and to create success for the school fundraising event.

Jon Stout is the Chairman of the Board for Element H2O, a bottler in Chantilly, Virginia offering only Ultra Pure bottled water products and private label opportunities for small and large businesses in all 50 states and Canada. Elements H2O’s clients include businesses in the health and fitness and hospitality industries, fitness centers, gyms, large and small hotels, day spas, catering companies, and many others. Visit Element H2O’s web site at http://www.ElementH2O.com You can reach Jon Stout at 1-866-4-PURITY, or by email at jon.stout@ElementH2O.com

Make the Most out of Every Sales Opportunity:

Don’t take “NO” for an answer!

It’s easy to get discouraged when you make your best effort for
a great sale and you’re met with a dead-set “no.” But don’t let
it get you down. In actuality, 97% of all sales are not made
within the first pitch. In fact, it takes an average of five to
ten exposures - also known as follow-ups - to persuade your
prospect to make the first sale.

While your potential customer may not actually say the word
“no,” specifically each time, but every time you follow-up and
the customer doesn’t buy, it should be interpreted as a “no”
situation, and you should be aware of how to handle such
circumstances in order to get the most out of them every time.

As a salesperson, it’s up to you to have the necessary drive and
skill in order to stick with it through the many follow-ups. You
must be willing to use enough effort to get to the point of the
last “no.”

To make sure that you make it past the “no’s” and maximize your
selling potential, here are some tips for success in closing:

*

Know the real reasons your customer would want your product. *

Know the real reasons your customer would not want your
product. *

Know the point at which your customer will become willing to
buy, and work with them in formulating your follow-up plan. *

Present new information relative to the sale each call or
visit. *

Be creative in your style and presentation manner. *

Be sincere about your willingness to be helpful to your
potential customer. *

Be direct in your communication, without becoming patronizing. *

Be friendly. *

Use humor, but don’t be silly or goofy. *

When in doubt, sell the prospect for her reasons, not yours. *

Don’t be afraid to ask for the sale each time.

With these in mind, you’re certain to get the most out of your
potential customers. Just don’t get frustrated and don’t give
up. Perfect your skill and you’ll be on top of the world.

Copyright 2004 Kate Smalley Connecticut Secretary

Administrative Support Needs - Transcription Services -
Virtually!

http://www.connecticutsecretary.com kms@connecticutsecretary.com

Depending upon how much you enjoy writing, writing sales proposals can be a joy, purgatory, or something in between. However, if you sell a complex product or one that involves the delivery of professional services, learning how to write effective sales proposals can be critical to your success.

Some proposals are written in response to an RFP (Request for Proposal) or RFI (Request for Information). Organizations that go to the trouble of writing RFP’s want to receive highly structured proposals, as this makes it easier for them to compare responses from various bidders.

Some proposals are “Boilerplate Bombs”. These proposals tend to be long, boring, and tedious to read. Often these proposals are written under the assumption that “bounce factor” (how high objects on a desk bounce when the proposal is dropped on the desk) is what makes a proposal effective.

The proposal category that is the focus of this article is effective sales proposals. These proposals are lean, highly focused, customer-specific documents that are written to sell anyone that reads them. How can a written document accomplish this feat? Through text that invokes emotion and provides compelling reasons that support a buying decision.

Before we go any further, let’s review the single most common flaw in proposal generation — lack of proper opportunity qualification. Companies waste incredible amounts of time and resources preparing proposals for poorly qualified opportunities. These proposals have little chance of producing sales.

When you are armed with the necessary opportunity qualification information and you have made a conscious decision that the opportunity warrants the investment of time and resources required to generate a quality proposal, you are ready to write an effective sales proposal. To aid you in this undertaking, here are brief descriptions of nine suggested proposal sections:

1. Opening

This is usually a single paragraph where you thank the people that provided the opportunity qualification information and set the stage for the proposal. The last sentence of the paragraph should list the primary value the prospect will receive by making the proposed investment.

2. Background

Your prospects know a lot about their own companies. They don’t need you to provide them with a chronological history or a bunch of unnecessary facts. The bulk of this section should focus on selected facts concerning the specific business functions or departments that your solution will impact.

3. Current Situation

This is where you really start selling. In this section you lay out the prospect’s business problems and the impact of the problems…in painful detail. Your goal should be to invoke your prospect’s negative emotions (fear, frustration, pain, etc.).

4. Desired Results

Your goal for this section should be to invoke your prospect’s positive emotions (relief, joy, satisfaction, etc.) by helping your prospect visualize the “desired state” for their business.

5. Business Impact

This is where you justify the acquisition. What impact will your solution have on your prospect’s business? How will their operations and financial results change for the better?

6. Decision Criteria

If you don’t have a comprehensive list of the criteria that your prospect will use to make their decision, you probably shouldn’t be writing a proposal. List all of their decision criteria here.

7. Decision Process, Time Frame, and Budget

The purpose of including this information in the proposal is to make sure you and your prospect share the same expectations.

8. Next Steps

There should be specific next steps (and related time frames) that are expected to take place after you submit your proposal. List them here to make sure you and your prospect are “on the same page”.

9. Closing

Close with a final paragraph that summarizes why your product or service is the best solution for your prospect, plus a positive statement of expectation.

Do you see the power of this type of proposal? Do you see the benefit of eliminating volumes of boilerplate that do not address your prospect’s specific and immediate needs and concerns? Do you see how an effective sales proposal can influence the thinking of decision makers and influencers, even if you have had limited (or no) personal contact with them?

If you construct your proposals in this manner, you will maximize your return on proposal writing time and resource investments.

Copyright 2004, 2005 — Alan Rigg

Sales performance expert Alan Rigg is the author of How to Beat the 80/20 Rule in Selling: Why Most Salespeople Don’t Perform and What to Do About It. His company, 80/20 Sales Performance, helps business owners, executives, and managers DOUBLE sales by implementing The Right Formula for building top-performing sales teams. For more information and more FREE sales and sales management tips, visit http://www.8020salesperformance.com.

I hear it every day…”I can’t seem to get past the gatekeeper. If I could just get through to the decision maker, I know I could make the sale.” It’s a common issue with sales professionals, but I will contend that much of it is self- inflicted. Too many sales people treat the gatekeeper as an adversary, one who must be conquered if indeed we are to get through to that all-important decision-maker.

Let’s get one thing straight immediately. The gatekeeper is only performing his job just as you are performing yours. Why does there need to be a battle…a winner and a loser? Why not create a situation where everyone wins?

Begin by smiling, and showing that you sincerely appreciate their position and their job. Consider yourself in their position. Respect them as people and as professionals. You will stand out from others who treat them as the enemy whose only purpose is to prevent them from getting through to see the decision maker.

Ask for their help. Our natural tendency as human beings is to help when asked. This also shows that you respect him and that you realize that he has something to offer you.

Find out his name and use it! This is one of the most overlooked and simple ways to reach anyone.

Ask them if there is anything you can do for THEM! This is one that will put you ahead of 99.9% of the people who walk through the door or call them on the phone.

Above all, be sincere. It will show and it will earn you respect and a trip in to see the one who makes the purchase decisions.

If you approach the situation knowing that you and your product are relevant and worthy of the decision-maker’s time and when you do get through, every one will be a winner. You, because you will now get through. The decision-maker, because she will now have the opportunity to consider a product or service that will benefit her company. The gatekeeper, because his boss will recognize his discretion in letting only those with beneficial products and services through to her.

Greg Beverly helps sales professionals make more money…and work less. He is a sales coach dedicated to helping create abundance for all who seek it. Find out the secrets to becoming a sales champion and living the life of your dreams by visiting http://www.salessuccess.yougethelp.com

Sales is all about negotiating. You are negotiating from the first word out of your lips on a cold call, to the moment that you touch the contract with your customer’s wet signature on it.

Whenever you are listening to a prospect tell you about something that they want or complain about a problem that they want you to help solve, do not be too quick to agree.

If you do, you risk losing your leverage.

Here’s an example. Let’s say that you are selling photocopy machines. Your prospect tells you that he believes his monthly costs for copying are too high.

So far so good - here’s a prospect that has a pain that you can sell to.

You ask him to tell you why he believes his costs are too high.

Your prospect starts to tell you all of the reasons why he thinks his costs are high, and what he believes the solutions to the problem are. He tells you what sort of new services or equipment and capabilities he needs.

He goes on for 5 minutes or more talking about this.

Being a sales professional, you are most likely what we call a “people person”. Most people in sales have a high need for approval from other people. We thrive on interaction and strokes from others.

During his 5+ minutes of speaking you are naturally inclined to give verbal and physical cues to encourage him to keep talking. You are unable to just sit there like a wooden statue. You feel a normal need to reciprocate the communication in small but noticeable ways.

With a high need for approval, you are likely to encourage your prospect to continue talking by giving positive verbal and physical cues. As he is speaking you nod your head occasionally, you say things like “Yes”, “OK”, or “Right”.

This is where many of us get into trouble.

By using such positive cues, you are subtly telling your prospect that you can solve their problem, or that you can give them what they want.

Why is this bad? In our example here, you don’t want your prospect to know just yet whether you can solve the problem. You want the focus to stay on him, his problem, and the consequences of it.

If you let on that you can solve it too soon, then you give up your leverage. He *wants* to know whether you can solve his problem.

And once he knows that you can solve his problem, he’ll want to know pricing, terms, customer references, etc. The focus will be on you (instead of on him), and you will have lost control of the sales call.

He’ll disassociate from his emotions around his problem. It is at this point that the prospect starts to get intellectual, and tries to figure out how to game you, how to get what he wants out of you at the best possible price.

You want to keep the focus of the sales call on the prospect and his pain so that you can find out more important information. You want to what know his budget is, what his decision approval process is, and you want to see if he’ll make me a reasonable commitment to you if you can solve his problem.

So instead of giving positive cues while he is speaking for 5 minutes about why his copying costs are so high, give neutral cues.

Encourage him to keep speaking by using words and phrases like “continue”, “tell me more”, “interesting”, “wow”, and “I hear what you are saying”.

What you want is to empathize without agreeing. If you agree to soon, then you give something away without getting what you need in return.

Practice this anytime you are negotiating with a prospect.

In other words, practice it all of the time.

© 1999-2004 Shamus Brown, All Rights Reserved.

Shamus Brown is a Professional Sales Coach and former high-tech sales pro who began his career selling for IBM. Shamus has written more than 50 articles on selling and is the creator of the popular Persuasive Selling Skills CD Audio Program. You can read more of Shamus Brown’s sales tips at http://Sales-Tips.industrialEGO.com/ and you can learn more about his persuasive sales skills training at http://www.Persuasive-Sales-Skills.com/

If you live in fear of forgetting prospects’ names, sometimes within mere seconds of being introduced to them, you’re not alone. Surveys show that 83% of the population worries about their inability to recall people’s names. Ironically, while most of us hate having our names forgotten or mispronounced, the majority of us claim we just “aren’t good at remembering names” or putting faces together with names when we meet people again.

If you have difficulty recalling names, you know that the two most common scenarios are forgetting the name instantaneously upon being introduced to someone new, and failing to recall the name of someone you’ve met and interacted with in the past and should know but just can’t pull up from your memory bank.

Forgetting names becomes more than just an embarrassing social faux pas in sales. Straining to recall a name can so preoccupy you that you are unable to fully pay attention to your client or prospect. He or she may perceive you not only as unfocused and easily distracted, but also as not very bright if you’re unable to devote your full attention to him or her. Even worse, if you forget the name of a client with whom you’ve worked in the past, he or she may view your memory lapse as a betrayal of trust, which can cost you a great deal of money if that client severs the relationship.

Integrating Learning Styles to Improve Name Recall

While common, this frustrating phenomenon can be relatively easy to overcome when you commit to taking steps to improve your memory. The most important key to really effective learning of any kind is understanding that there are three learning styles: visual, auditory, and kinesthetic (physically interactive). The more you can apply all three of these styles to a task, the more quickly and solidly you will learn anything.

Practice each of the following steps to improve your name recollection in every sales and social situation.

1. When you’re first introduced to someone, look closely at his or her face and try to find something unique about it. Whether you find a distinctive quality or not is irrelevant; by really looking for a memorable characteristic in a new face, you’re incorporating the visual learning style. And a word of advice: if you do find something that really stands out about someone’s face, don’t say anything! Within minutes of meeting someone new, it’s generally a bad idea to exclaim, “Whoa! That’s a huge nose!”

2. The next step utilizes both auditory and kinesthetic learning styles. When you meet someone, slow down for five seconds, and concentrate on listening to him or her. Focus on the prospect and repeat his or her name back in a conversational manner, such as “Susan. Nice to meet you, Susan.” Also make sure to give a good firm handshake, which establishes a physical connection with the prospect.

3. Creating a mental picture of someone’s name incorporates the visual sense again. Many people have names that already are pictures: consider Robin, Jay, Matt, or Dawn to name just a few. Some names will require you to play with them a bit to create a picture. Ken, for example, may not bring an immediate image to your mind, but a “can” is very close. Or you might envision a Ken doll. The point is not to create the best, most creative mental image ever, so don’t get caught up in your head during this step of the process, thinking, “Oh, that’s not a very good picture. What’s a better one?” The worst thing you can do when learning is to stress yourself out and overthink the process. If an image doesn’t come to you right away, skip it and do it later. You’ll undo all of your good efforts if you’re staring dumbly at your prospect, insisting, “Hey. Hold still for a minute while I try to turn your name into a picture!”

4. Once you’ve identified a mental image that you associate with a person’s name, the next step is to “glue” that image to the person’s face or upper body. This bridges that gap many people experience between being able to recall faces but not the names that belong to those faces. If you met a new prospect named Rosalind, for example, you might have broken her name down into the memorable image of “rose on land.” Now you must create a mental picture that will stick with you as long as you need it and pop into your head every time you meet her; this should be something fun, even a little odd, that will bring “rose on land” to mind when you see her face. You might imagine her buried up to her neck in earth, with roses scattered around her, for example. Because you created the image, it will come up next time you see her and enable you to recall her name.

5. At the end of the conversation, integrate auditory learning by repeating the prospect’s name one more time, but don’t ever overuse someone’s name in an effort to place it more firmly in your mind. Use the prospect’s name only right at the beginning of the conversation, and then again at the end; if you feel like you can do so naturally, you might insert someone’s name once or twice in a natural fashion during the course of the conversation, too. But if you’ve ever had a stereotypically pushy salesperson use your name a dozen times in a five minute conversation, you know how annoying, even weird, this can be, so don’t overdo it.

6. Writing is a form of kinesthetic learning - you’re getting a part of your body involved in the learning process - so if you’re really serious about wanting to remember people’s names for the long term, keep a name journal or a log of important people you meet, and review it periodically.

Forget Me Not: It’s the Effort That Matters Most

The most important thing to know about this memory process is that even when it doesn’t work, it still works! For example, if you get stuck trying to make a picture out of someone’s name, skip it for now. The next day, when you have a chance, give the matter a few minutes of concentrated thought. If you still can’t get a picture, stop and take up the matter a week later. Even if you’re still unsuccessful at creating a mental image, you’ve thought about the prospect’s name so much, there’s now no way you’ll ever forget it! So you’ve actually accomplished what you set to do in the first place.

People can’t remember names for one main reason: they’re just not paying attention. This process forces you to think. If, for example, you struggle with the step of creating a mental picture, the other steps - looking at the prospect closely, shaking his or her hand confidently and repeating the name a few times - are easy to do, will solidify the name in your memory, and will ultimately convey a positive image of you to clients and prospects. That positive image will certainly make you memorable to prospects, enabling you to close more deals and increase your bottom line.

It is important for teach each and every sales trainer and sales training manager of any company with a large sales force to make sure that each and every salesperson that is on the team so they can recognize when a prospect is interested in what it is they are selling or offering. When a prospect is interested and begins asking specific questions about the product or service that the salesman is selling or offering the salesperson must draw in to answer any potential objections, which would kill the sale.

The salesperson must also ask questions of his own in order to make sure that he is on the same page with the prospect and can continue the sales process. Sales managers should also make sure that the salesman working for their company does not push prospects or potential customers into items, products and more services that are not right for their situation.

The most important thing during the sales process is to make sure that the products and services being offered are indeed a good fit. If not the salesperson will find towards the end of the sales process a number of huge objections and excuses as to why the prospect will not buy. Sales managers need to make sure that the salesperson understands what is happening and does not blame the prospect for balking at the last-minute. I sincerely hope you will consider all of this in 2006.

“Lance Winslow” - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/