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Communication Insights

Human Communication in Sales

Spencer Cooper

CMAT 495: Tom James Sales Communication Internship

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“Rude, sleazy, annoying, pushy, arrogant, lying, condescending…” These random

adjectives were the first few descriptions that came to my mind when thinking about words most

people would use to describe a salesperson. Even though my dad had established a

well-respected career in sales, even I associated salespeople with negative characteristics and

personality traits. I would think of the “sleazy car salesman” who lied about the quality and

performance of a car to persuade people to buy the car and cheat the customer out of their

money. It was not until taking Salisbury’s professional selling course and joining the

Mid-Atlantic Sales and Marketing program my Junior year of college when I finally realized the

beauty of human communication and interaction as it relates to sales. Through my role as an

ambassador for Salisbury’s sales and marketing program, I had developed a passion for sales and

was introduced to Tom James, a custom clothing company who interviewed me for a spot as a

summer sales intern. During my internship at Tom James this summer, I learned to have a greater

appreciation for human communication and interaction through building relationships, solving

problems, daily affirmations, prospecting for clients, and calling prospects over the phone all of

which are skills I developed during my time as a sales intern in order to be successful.

Initially, I was very nervous to begin my internship. I was eager for my internship to go

well because I wanted to come back and work full-time for Tom James. Because of this, I wanted

to make sure people in the office liked me, I wanted clients to like me, I wanted to perform well

on all of my daily tasks, I wanted to hit all of my intern goals and outperform other interns in the

project and presentation. For all of this to happen, I needed guidance and advice from other

mentors and leaders in the D.C. office and other offices. I needed to build relationships.

Typically, building relationships for salespeople means communicating and interacting with

clients, which is important, but it was not the first step in the process for me. I first built and
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developed relationships with my sales leader, my on-site supervisor, my internship coordinators

and many other colleagues in the office. Being honest about where I was in the process and

asking questions helped me learn so much from many of the Tom James sales professionals who

have worked there for years. I was provided with advice that significantly helped me grow in my

personal and professional life. Building relationships with coworkers created a family-oriented

environment where we all felt safe to reach out and ask for help if we needed it as well as

maintain a positive uplifting atmosphere which allowed us to enjoy the day-to-day grind of being

a sales professional.

Similarly, I was able to witness my leader Milo interact with many of his clients during

my internship and watch how genuinely interested and invested he was in their lives. He told me

that developing a genuine relationship with a client is the best way to keep them as a client. Sure,

being a good clothier helps, but taking some time to catch up and talk about life with some of his

clients made them even more appreciative of the service he provides. However, he also told me

other clients of his could care less about rapport and chit-chat but enjoy the service solely

because of the time it saves them. Many of his clients are either too busy, don’t know how to

dress well or simply do not like to spend time shopping. Because we have eliminated the need

for our clients to shop for clothing they appreciate the relationship that is built because there is

mutual respect for each other's time and expertise that is not taken for granted, this includes the

client who typically dislikes small talk and catching up.

Relatively, Solving problems for our clients goes hand in hand with building the

relationship we have with them. The way our service works is “we come to you with fine

clothing.” Once we book an appointment with someone, we come to their home or office, show

them clothing solutions that take care of their needs, advise them in their choices and once we
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have helped them pick out clothing they want to buy, we take their measurements. The clothing

then takes 6-8 weeks to be crafted and delivered by us to the client. More often than not,

adjustments will need to be made to the new client's clothing, especially on a first-time fitting.

However, we deal with this problem before it arises by setting their expectations realistically and

communicating to them the same day they have placed the order that some adjustments will

probably need to be made to their clothing the first time around. Being honest and upfront about

this allows us to solve this recurring problem with clients because they are well-informed before

we deliver their clothing for them to try on for the first time. Other problems that arise may be in

the form of a miscommunication between clients and clothiers about an item that was ordered or

a location that was selected to meet at. However, learning about the 4 different temperaments and

different personality types we see regularly helped me to understand why my leader

communicates differently with his clients depending on who they are. He told me that “everyone

has a certain way they prefer to learn and process information. It’s our job to present our service

and our solutions to our clients the way that they prefer to hear it.” He then went on to tell me

that some of his clients are drivers who always have ideas of exactly what they want to get, they

don’t want to hear too many different suggestions and they prefer to stick with what they are

comfortable wearing. However, other clients of his are very analytical in their approach and need

to have the value and fine details communicated to them for them to feel comfortable spending a

significant amount of money on clothing. Watching Milo’s different approaches in

communicating and interacting with his clients is what fascinated me the most throughout the

course of this internship. The information he gave was always accurate, valuable and important

but was consistently presented and delivered in different ways depending on who he was talking
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to. This was a skill that I was eager to mold so that I too can continue improving my ability to

communicate and interact with different personality types to effectively solve problems for them.

Interestingly, in order for us to be able to communicate effectively with other people, we

first have to do so with ourselves. Tom James strongly influenced me in the area of positive

self-talk and daily affirmations. We are our own worst critics. My intern goals and vision leader,

Dave Wykle told us that “nobody is meaner to you than you are to yourself.” One of the

activities we had to do early on was to write down 10 individual personality traits good and bad.

Then, we had to write down 10 character traits we hoped to embody by the end of the internship.

Lastly, we wrote down ten habits we can do each day that will get us closer to our goal character

traits. We called these our daily affirmations, which were daily commitments and sayings we

would read that allowed us to develop our character and uplift the image we have of ourselves. I

found this practice to be incredibly useful even though initially I did not think it would be.

Admittedly, I thought it was a little strange at first but the more we discussed daily affirmations

and positive self-talk, the more it made sense to me. We cannot expect ourselves to communicate

effectively with clients and solve their problems if we can’t even solve our own or be

constructive with ourselves. Whether that’s admitting and getting rid of a bad habit or forming a

good one, promoting self-growth and becoming the person we want to be stems from how we

communicate with ourselves. Dave made me reflect on the way I treated myself and the things I

would say to myself whenever I would mess up or do something incorrectly. The truth of it was

that nobody was meaner to me than I was. Because I am a perfectionist with many things, I tend

to beat myself up whenever I don’t excel at something or sometimes even avoid trying something

new altogether if I don’t think I can be good at it. The point is, how we communicate with

ourselves has a tremendous impact not just on our day but our life. If we make a habit of
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developing and reading positive self-affirmations, it will show in our character, our actions and

the words we use to describe ourselves.

Transitionally, most of the communication I have discussed in this paper so far has

exemplified face-to-face, in-person communication. However, most of the communicating I did

with potential clients was behind the scenes. As salespeople, we are expected to “prospect” for

new leads. I would search through Linkedin looking for qualified individuals who may be in

need of our service or could potentially benefit from it. Doing this allowed me to add names into

my sequence on Outreach, which is a prospecting tool Tom James uses to send connections on

Linkedin that have notes attached to them. This was the first form of communication in the

process. From there, we would send all of the names that had accepted our invite a well-worded

email explaining our products and the services we provide for clients, closing with a statement

that provides our information and asks the prospect to reach out and let us know if they have any

interest in setting up an appointment. The process I have just described is typically what drives

most people away from the sales field because it is done over and over again. This is the work

that everyone has to do and is the work that consumes most of your time when first starting out.

However, it is essential in order to build your clientele. This is also the first form of

communication we have with our clients so that when we do speak to them over the phone for

the first time it creates a sense of familiarity when we let them know who we are and what we

do. Admittedly, this step in the communication process was my least favorite part of the

internship. Nevertheless, working hard in this area is what allowed me to be able to book

multiple appointments, meet new people, build new relationships, win the intern capstone project

and become second in sales for my internship. All to say, It takes discipline and persistence to be

successful when building and establishing a career in sales. All of the interns had to read Rory
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Vaden’s Take The Stairs which says “you’ll initially work double-time and part-time in order to

eventually work full-time and have free time.” meaning that starting from nothing will require a

lot of work but the reward, in the end, is well worth the daily grind of starting from scratch.

Going forward, the next step in the process following the email we send to prospects is

calling them on the phone. This part of my internship was stressful at times but also really

rewarding. As salespeople, we constantly hear objections, face rejection, and every now and then

call on very rude people. This is another part of any sales career that may drive people away.

Nobody likes calling on 60 plus random people a day just to hear the word “no” over and over

again. This is where persistence was key for me. Finally getting a “yes” and setting up an

appointment was an extremely rewarding feeling for me and made me want to keep dialing and

book as many appointments as I possibly could. Knowing that calling prospects leads to booking

appointments and appointments leads to sales kept me going even after countless “no’s” and

answering machines. I was chasing the high I had previously felt from getting a sale; a feeling

that made me realize selling is the career for me. Furthermore, the dialogue we used for calling

clients on the phone was given to us by Tom James and utilized a script that has been used by

every sales professional since the creation of the company. The phone script uses psychology to

hook the customers into the conversation and make them think about where they might know us

from. We then use tonality and brief pauses when communicating to promote a response that

insists the prospect participates in communicating. From there, we casually tell them what we do

and ask for an appointment in a laid-back manner. If they object, we overcome the objection with

an objections sheet that Tom James also provides and ask again politely for an appointment. At

this point, the prospect either objects again and hangs up or says yes to an appointment. Once the

appointment is booked, we move to our sheet of qualifying questions Tom James provided us
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with which serves to set the buying atmosphere once we are at the appointment and also makes

sure we ask a series of questions to figure out what their clothing needs are so we better take care

of them when we come prepared with ideas they would like to see. The whole point of Tom

James’ phone dialogue is to make it sound like we are the exact opposite of a telemarketer. With

that said, some people still hang up immediately, but when they do talk to us they more often

than not are appreciative of our call because we are respectful. I was very intrigued when I first

learned the dialogue because it was neat to see how different forms of delivery, tonality and

diction would change the response of the person I was calling on. This made me realize

communication is everything in sales. Making sure we communicate the value of our product

and the benefits of our service in a way that’s convenient, beneficial and preferable to the client

has the power to determine whether or not that random person on the other line will turn into a

lifelong client or just another uninterested prospect.

As a result of my internship with Tom James, there were many things about

communication and my career field that I learned starting with asking questions. I did not realize

how valuable asking questions to clients was. More importantly, though, was figuring out how to

ask the right questions. To solve a problem and figure out how we can provide the solution for

clients, we first need to figure out what their needs are. We did this by asking a LOT of questions

that dove into the clients' values, needs and desires. What was also surprising about this

internship was the amount of valuable knowledge and advice I received from my leader, my

supervisor, my internship coordinator, and everyone in the office. So many people took the time

to invest in me and guide me throughout the process of my internship which is something I did

not expect but am very grateful for. For example, one of the first appointments I booked was

very disappointing because I did not fully qualify the prospect when talking on the phone.
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Because of that, he did not even consider buying from us and was more interested in partnering

with our company. In my dissatisfaction with myself, my leader sat down with me and listened to

every phone call I made to give me tips and advice that made sure I was better equipped to

handle objections and qualify prospects on the phone. From then on, I felt more confident and

comfortable calling on potential clients and am proud to say that I was second in sales this

summer out of all the interns throughout the country. However, I am most proud of coming in

first place by getting a 100% on my intern Capstone project and presentation and winning a free

custom suit. Throughout our internship, all of the interns completed questions, writing prompts

and gave an end-of-the-summer presentation on client retention and customer service. My

project and presentation were recognized by the company as the number one project/presentation

and I was awarded a free custom suit because of it. This was announced on the last day of my

internship and felt incredibly rewarding after the many hours of hard work I had put into my

project.

All in all, working as a sales intern for Tom James this summer has solidified my

decision to go into a career in sales. I am blessed to say I have officially accepted a job offer to

come back as a full-time clothier for Tom James upon graduating in the spring of next year and I

am thrilled to begin! This internship has been eye-opening in many ways. Realizing the

importance of communication and interaction with clients and coworkers through building

relationships, solving problems, doing daily affirmations, prospecting for clients, and calling on

clients over the phone helped provide structure throughout the course of my internship. The

principles of discipline, accountability, character development, coachability, ambition, and work

ethic are skills Tom James instilled in me throughout my time as an intern that have translated

over to my professional, academic and personal life. My favorite actor Denzel Washington once
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said “in order to achieve your goals, you must apply discipline and consistency.” Through my

experience as an intern, I have learned the value of setting goals and staying persistent and

disciplined in my pursuit of them. The harder you work for something, the greater you’ll feel

when you achieve it.

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