An interesting article posted over at Entrepreneur.com by Charles H. Green called “Shut Up and Sell” got me thinking about the ways we approach selling education.

In a country like Guatemala, where it is obvious that education is the path out of poverty for so many people, it can sometimes be difficult to balance a sense of social responsibility with the need to make a profit. As a company, we want to help but I also have employees and rent to pay. And I’m sure this is the same for many others in the business of education. So how do we reconcile the two objectives?

We can start by looking at the psychology of selling education.

Why do sales people scare us?

You have probably had this experience before:

You walk into a clothing store to buy a pair of jeans; the sales person approaches you as soon as you enter and immediately asks, “Can I help you?” What is your immediate, instinctual response?

If you are like most people, your response is most likely “No” or “I’m just looking”. Why does the salesperson fail to achieve a positive result? How can you avoid a similar outcome with your customers?

In order to understand how our psychology towards selling our educational services is impacting results, we first need to be aware of two things: our personal attitudes towards sales and the customer’s attitude towards sales.

1. Personal attitudes towards sales: Many sales people working in the education business have unresolved issues about their jobs: they feel that sales is somehow dishonest or unimportant and that we should be giving knowledge away for free for the betterment of humankind. This actually isn’t that surprising, given that many of them have had their own bad experiences with sales people in the past. But it is absolutely untrue: sales can be an important and meaningful job if  we have the right attitude.

What is the right attitude to have about sales? First, stop thinking that it is our job to sell something to everyone; instead realize that it is our job to create relationships with people. The number one reason a sales person fails is because the client doesn’t trust them. When an individual approaches our businesses, we need to see it first as an opportunity to help another person: if we have done our market research then we know we have a product or service that public either wants or needs, something that we believe in, and that is something of which to be proud.

2. The customer’s attitude towards sales: When you walk into a store as a customer, how do you feel? Are you comfortable, or do you feel like a hunted animal? Do you trust the sales people, or do you feel like they are only after your money? When people approach our businesses they are carrying these same preconceptions about us and our sales staff.

Especially today, people are afraid of spending their hard earned money: they’re afraid that they’ll buy a product or service that will fail them, a product or service that doesn’t really meet their needs, a product or service that they’re stuck with once the salesperson has their money. These doubts and fears are multiplied if the person is dependent on our services to help them advance in his or her life and achieve a new level of professional success.  Think of a recently laid-off worker who needs retraining and is relying on you to help him get a new job. Or a worker that has been told by her superiors that she needs to learn English or her job security is gone.

The only way to overcome this obstacle is to establish a relationship with the customer, one that is built on mutual respect and trust.  In his article, Green says, “The best way to sell is to care. People judge caring by how well they feel listened to.” I couldn’t agree more. If we approach the selling of our products and services as caring educators first, and sales people second, we will start finding the success we, and our clients, want.

In the next, I want to explore how we can shape our message to build these relationships. How do you shape your message to achieve positive results for your business and your client? What questions do you ask people interested in your services?

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