A few years back I ran an article in our monthly newsletter – also call The Pipeline – talking about the perils of allowing your pipeline to take a holiday this time of year, called Make it a Happy New Year Now.  Rather than rerunning it as I have in some subsequent years, I thought we would take a fresh approach and highlight specific things you can do to make sure you enjoy the holiday season and still start next year in a successful way.

If your product or service allows you the chance to up sell your customer at the point of sale (and seriously, what product or service doesn't??), then you instantly double and even triple your income if you know how to properly suggest and get your prospects and customers to buy more.

First, let's talk about what NOT to do:

1) First of all, you absolutely have to ask for the up sell in order to get it. I know that sounds like a "duh!" comment, but take it from me — out of the thousands of sales reps I listen to each year, a very small percentage actually do.

2) Ask for the up sell as an afterthought. As you'll see, timing is everything with the up sell. Don't wait until the very end of the sale to suggest one. You have to make it part of your original product offering as you'll see.