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Delivering a great interview can be the difference between ultimate job success and failure. Interviews can be daunting prospects, but handled in the right way and conducted with confidence and assertive question answering, you can put yourself on the front foot and stand out from your fellow applicants. Whilst there are a lot of top tips out there for when it comes to interview preparation, what are the most important and what areas of the interview should you focus on? Preparation is everythin...

Whatever job position you hold, we are always learning valuable lessons, lessons that we can apply to not only areas of our professional lives but personal lives too. A salesperson is in a unique position. Whilst essentially being on the front line and client facing you have not only has to be a shrewd negotiator but a good listener too. Whilst these are valuable traits, what else can be learned whilst working in sales? 1). It’s essential to be yourself I’m sure you’ve heard i...

No one likes to be criticised. The last thing you want in the workplace after working hard on a project or task is to have your efforts criticised. However, taking on board this criticism and analysing it can help you perform better at a later stage. After all, you sometimes have to fail to move forward. Taking away the negative spin on criticism can be the first step in turning this feedback into something more positive. Often criticism delivered in a constructive way can be invaluable and belo...

2018 has seen an exciting period of growth for Big Motoring World and has seen us able to collect a number of highly recognised industry awards but we don’t intend on taking our foot off the gas just yet and that is where you come in! The opening of our Blue Bell Hill facility and the refurbishment of our existing West Malling centre are the completion of phase one of our ambitious plans for growth over the next few years. The refurbishment and additions of these sites allow us to continu...

Strong negotiating skills can mark the difference between you getting what you set out to achieve or walking away from the meeting table with a compromise. Good negotiating skills are not only restricted to the business world and can be used in day to day life. In this article, we’ll delve into what you can do to negotiate more effectively. Whether it’s walking into a meeting to secure that major contract you’ve been chasing down for several weeks, agreeing on terms over a new...

It may seem like a fundamental, but leaving a great first impression is an absolute essential when it comes to a job interview. A first impression may well make or break your chances of landing that job and if that first impression is poor, it way well dissuade that employer from taking your application further. With people getting a feel for someone on a first impression alone, how do you stand out for the right reasons? Let’s take a look. Give the person you’re meeting your whole ...

You’ve probably heard the phrase, ‘a problem shared, is a problem halved’? Whilst this sounds like a major cliche’ it couldn’t be truer when applied to the professional environment of the workplace. It may sound logical that teamwork is important, but what exactly are the benefits and what can you achieve with stronger team working? Teamwork is absolutely essential in the work environment. It creates a sense of unity, can help galvanise employees and act as a motiv...

Love it or hate it, being able to nail a great presentation that keeps your audience engaged and focused on what you have to say is an invaluable skill to have. Whether you utilise it in the workplace or have to deliver a speech at your best friends wedding, being able to hold your own in front of a large group of people is not only good for furthering your career but providing you with a strong confidence boost. Whether it's the fear of feeling exposed when standing in front of your audience o...

The power of face to face conversation and seeing the whites of someone's eyes cannot be underestimated. It’s an old adage that people buy from people, so by striking up a conversation and immediately becoming more personable you are breaking down an obvious barrier. Whether you love it or hate it, networking is essential to help further your prospects. Some people find it more natural and actively enjoy it whereas some feel they struggle with it and therefore tend to shy away from it. Ma...

The CV. It’s a crucial piece of a job application process. A chance for you, the candidate to put across your skills and experience to an employer when applying for a new job and typically a CV is used to whittle down a shortlist of candidates to be interviewed. But what exactly needs to be in a CV and how should you go about writing one? The considered length for a CV is two pages. A CV needs to be concise, to the point and get across the points that you feel are most relevant to the job...

The opening of our brand new Blue Bell Hill facility marks the end of the first stage of an exciting period of growth for Big Motoring World Group as a whole. Our 1000 car capacity dealership at Blue Bell Hill is state of the art and provides fantastic, modern facilities for both our employees and customers alike. Stocking a range of quality vehicles from some of the world’s premium manufacturers, we have an unrivalled selection of vehicles from the likes of Audi, BMW and Mercedes Benz. T...

As the with other social media platforms, LinkedIn is a powerful networking tool with literally millions of professionals at your fingertips. It’s no surprise then that recruiters and individuals alike turn to this platform for networking and generating professional connections and sales leads. Launched in May 2003 LinkedIn has quickly grown to see over 500 million users in over 200 countries and continues to grow rapidly to this day. So considering the potential connections you could make...

Going for an interview for a new role can be a daunting process and whatever your motive for applying for that job, the pressures of the situation and the pressure you put on yourself all can have an effect on your performance. Whilst it’s ok to be nervous, nerves sometimes are almost desirable as it can demonstrate a passion and a real care to succeed, however, it’s vital that you don’t let these nerves overcome you and end up negatively affecting your prospects. A lot of the...

A job interview can be a very daunting process. Walking into an unknown situation, with senior business people of which you haven’t met before, the spotlight is turned on you to talk about yourself, your experience and ultimately why that business should employ you for the advertised role. A job interview can take many guises. It may be that your interview is a phone based one. A scenario where a representative from the employing company will call the applicant and ask them some questions...

Big Motoring World, the UK's leading independent, pre-owned prestige car supermarket, continues its rapid expansion by opening a brand new, purpose-built, Retail Centre in Bluebell Hill, Medway.   We are always looking to grow our team and enhance our business.  There are many ways to make our record-breaking team better, and maybe you have the skills to help us do it?   With our new Blue Bell Hill site now open, and our West Malling site being refurbished for a re-launch late...

Have you ever sat next to someone at work who just blows you away with the way that they sell? Or have you ever been the subject of a sales pitch so impressive that you're left wondering how any customer could resist? Here at Big Motoring World we're lucky enough to work with some incredible sales people - and many of these have learned their trade by watching the very best in the business and learning from them. So, here are our thoughts on what some of those lessons are - and how we can all ap...

It's a trick most tourists learn after a while - the realisation that the salesperson you're dealing with will almost inevitably call you back with an improved offer if you show that you're prepared to walk away from negotiations. It's a technique that even President Trump has recently said he might use in his meeting with the North Koreans - but whether that proves to be as effective as it is when you're haggling over a handbag remains to be seen. So, walking away is a negotiating technique th...

Here at Big Motoring World we've always understood that leads are the life blood of sales, and indeed of any business. With hard work and dedication, cold leads turn into warm ones, which turn into customers. Here's our quick guide to how you can hurry that process along a little. Approach every cold lead as an opportunity to help The idea of a cold lead can be intimidating - especially when you think of them as someone who you are approaching out of the blue and whose precious time and attenti...

Over the years, how many great sales people have you been lucky enough to work with? Which team leaders did you find inspiring - and which ones not so? Here at Big Motoring World we're proud to say that we've had - and still have - some fantastic sales professionals working for us and leading our teams. So what do sales people need from these leaders? They need great coaches It's simply the single most important thing that the very best leaders of sales teams do - they train and develop t...

As a sales professional, how far do you take advantage of the opportunities that social networks like LinkedIn can offer you – whether for building your brand, or your network of contacts and prospects? The chances are, it's probably not quite as much as you could be. So, here are Big Motoring World's top tips for making sure you get the most out of LinkedIn. Go Premium You know all those emails LinkedIn keep sending you, offering you free trials of their Premium membership? Click o...

  We've probably all been there before in job interviews - when the interviewer suddenly steps away from the standard script and asks you a question out of left field that really puts you on the spot. It's an uncomfortable - but often liberating - experience. And here at Big Motoring World we'd suggest that it is a feeling that it can be useful to try and replicate in your sales prospects. Be memorable Why? Because by putting them in a situation they might not be expecting, and by asking t...

Thanks to the way that consumers - and businesses - now use technology to buy, sell and search for products and services, there is a huge amount of customer data now available - and plenty of specialist companies offering to help you to analyse it and apply it to your business. But why bother? Well, here at Big Motoring World we'd suggest that it boils down to one simple headline: it's about making better decisions. Here's a quick breakdown of why unlocking the power of data can transform the wa...

Networking is one of those things that some find easy, while others really struggle. But it's an absolutely crucial part of building your business - so here are Big Motoring World's top tips. Don't be afraid to aim for the top Today, thanks to social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, it's easier than ever to directly message people who were previously beyond the reach of most sales people. The key here is not to be generic, or overly-sales focused - keep your message brief, relevant and with a...

First things first - if the content you create to support your products and services isn't compelling, it's not going to help you to sell. Every single word you write - whether it's on marketing materials, emails, blogs or tweets - needs to work for its living. So what are Big Motoring World's tips to make sure your writing is doing just that? Whatever you write needs to make people want to act Your writing needs to be clear and concise, yes, but the most important thing it must do is to ...

It happens to us all - yes, even sometimes here at Big Motoring World. Occasionally, people just say 'no' - prospects who we were pinning our hopes of a sale on, dash those hopes with a single word. It can be disheartening and tough to take - especially if you've been working on converting them for a long time. But is there a better way to handle this kind of rejection, and to try to turn a negative into a positive? Here at Big Motoring World we think there is. Work out what you did wrong, ...

What do you think of when you hear the word 'courage'? Physical bravery in the face of danger? The lion from the Wizard of Oz? The venerable British brewery? Whatever associations you might have with it, it's a word that here at Big Motoring World we feel is sometimes overlooked in the world of sales. But we believe that courage is absolutely crucial to being a successful salesperson. A quick definition first though - what do we mean by ‘courage’ in this context? Well, in this sense...

We'll come right out and say it: in this day and age, there really is no excuse for prospective customers to not know every thing they need to know about you and whatever it is you're selling. Why? Because the digital revolution has dramatically transformed the number of channels available for you to use in order to get your message across, allowing you to reach prospective customers in new ways, and at a relatively low cost. Think back to the expense of taking out a television commercial or a ...

What do your customers actually need? It's a really basic question, but it's one that is worth re-visiting from time to time, especially when you're developing new products and services. It's all to easy to fall into the trap of creating something you passionately want to sell, rather than creating something that people passionately need and want to buy. Here's Big Motoring World's thoughts on how to avoid these mistakes. Never start with the product Creating an incredible product and then tryin...

What objectives will you set yourself in the coming 12 months? We're not talking sales targets here - but rather the kind of personal challenges that many of us give ourselves every new year. Here at Big Motoring World we know how hard it can be to stick to resolutions sometimes - but it's always a useful exercise to try, and these particular ones could have a fundamentally positive effect on your sales performance. So, just as many people detox every January, we're recommending a sales detox p...

We've all been there. You've wandered into a shop, or a market stall, and idly picked something up to have a look. Ten minutes later you're walking away with a bag full of things you had no idea you wanted, let alone knew you needed in your life. It's the same with gadgets - who knew that we needed the latest piece of kit until someone showed us just how it can make your life easier, more efficient or just more fun. The common thread in all of these experiences is often people - it's one of the ...

It's a question that gets right to the heart of the whole sales process - what is the real value of your product? It might seem like an incredibly obvious question too – the answer is that it does x, y and z, and it's better than anything else on the market at doing it. But thinking carefully about what that actually means is a really useful process to go through - not least because it helps to put you inside the heads of your prospective customers and on the path towards better understan...

Sometimes in sales, as in life, things just don't get off to a good start. For whatever reason, there will some situations where you begin to realise that things just aren't going well. It could be a personal relationship issue - where you and your prospect have just failed to hit it off, or it could be any one of a number of complicated business reasons that mean that they feel now just isn't a good time for them to be talking to a sales person. Whatever the reason, here at Big Motoring World w...

We've talked before here about whether salespeople are born or made, and to what extent the essential skills you need to be an effective seller are innate. And while it seems clear that there are some people who are just born to sell (we've got more than a few of them here at Big Motoring World!), we also know that there are plenty of people out there who find themselves having to sell, when frankly they don't really feel comfortable doing it. We're thinking here of people who maybe run their o...

There's no place in business for emotion, right? Well, here at Big Motoring World we couldn't disagree more - managing and understanding how emotions work is absolutely central to being an effective business person. This is particularly true in sales, where so much of the success of what we do is founded on our relationships with other people - how we connect with them, listen to them, empathise with their problems, and build mutual trust. We are emotional creatures, and so are the people we de...

Here at Big Motoring World, it's a question we've debated many times - is it really possible to train absolutely anyone to become a great sales person? To what extent are the skills you require to sell learned, and how much are they simply innate - essentially, talents that you're born with? This is an industry where personality is so crucial - and your ability to make people like you enough to want to buy from you so fundamentally important - that it's critical to understand the extent to which...

What’s your story? How do you explain how your product or service will improve your customers’ lives? One of the most powerful ways to do this is with a powerful sales narrative - a story that goes beyond your usual pitch and engages your prospects with a compelling argument. Explain why people need to change If you’re a parent, you may know how difficult changing the status quo can be sometimes. Encouraging a child to move from one state (for example sitting and playing) to an...