Linda Richardson interviews best-selling author and international speaker Dr. Tony Alessandra. This is the featured cover article in the March 17, 2015 edition of Top Sales Magazine.
Dr. Tony Alessandra is a best-selling author, international speaker, and entrepreneur in the field of sales and marketing. One of his areas of expertise is DISC, which he began to explore four decades ago. His passion to refine behavioral styles as a way to increase sales performances has never wavered over that time.
DISC is a personal assessment tool designed to help a salesperson understand his or her own behavioral selling style and the style and needs of customers. The initial model dates back to research at Columbia University in the 1920’s. You may think that selling styles, especially with today’s emphasis on research and business insights, may no longer be relevant.
Not according to Tony and he is conducting some exciting research to back that up.
“Certainly I feel that with customers becoming more and more sales independent that the relationship with the salesperson will be one of the main differentiators. Therefore, I was keen to understand how DISC fits into today’s sales world.”
Tony acknowledged that there is really nothing new at the core of DISC but that the research and data he has compiled has allowed him to maintain relevancy through new applications. He reinforced that “to build one-on-one relationships with customers and colleagues, it is essential to develop adaptability.” Adaptability is a salesperson’s capacity to change her approach/style, depending on the situation or person with whom the salesperson is communicating.
For those of you not familiar with DISC, a brief recap. It is an adaptability tool made up of four basic behavioral styles that a salesperson encounters when calling on customers.
Read the entire article, An Eye Opening Sales Tool an interview with Dr. Tony Alessandra in Top Sales Magazine.
Dr. Tony Alessandra is a behavioral and communication expert, and author of 29 books including The Platinum Rule, Collaborative Selling and The Art of Managing People. Today he is a leading business motivational speaker on communication, customer loyalty and sales.
