Home / Archive by category "Buying Process"

The Sales Version of Chicken or Egg – Sales eXchange 2050

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

For many the age old question continues to be which came first the chicken or the egg, and while some have claimed to have the answer, there is a similar one playing out in B2B sales.

Most agree that you need to develop and maintain relationships with buyers (then clients) to succeed in B2B selling, but there is lot of debate about which comes first the relationship, or the sale?

First thing you have to do is define “relationship”, it is one of those words in sales that people use without often quantifying or defining its meaning. Maybe the assumption is that “everyone knows” the meaning, but that is a false and risky assumption. Some use it to hide their lack of knowledge or understanding of sales, and relationship is one of those sunshine words, if you keep using it, you sound as though you are in the know and good at sales. I see this a lot when I ask sellers I work with to define sales, they’ll talk around the question, and throw in “relationship” at a few critical junctures where their response looks weak.

When you get into more formal definitions, you find two main camps. One basically states that the primary objective is the building of long-term relationships with customers from which repeat business will flow. The other, believes that relationships evolve from good results delivered on sales that were initially made before there was a relationship, based on a positive experience, the interaction continues, relationships build and evolve.

Both agree that relationships are important and make for better and more sustained business, but like the chicken and the egg, they seem to disagree on which comes first, the initial sale or the relationship. For the sake of disclosure, I tend to line up with the “sales comes first, relationships evolve” camp, rather than the camp that feels that sellers need to focus on the relationship first, and then business will flow, a definition borrowed from a popular sales glossary.

Relationship do not ensure sales. I remember having a rep in Ottawa who finally landed a big government department, when asked by her peers how she did it, she told them she established a solid relationship. She failed to mention the 10% discount she negotiated with me to close the deal. A year later, she lost the department, the only one of the many we had as clients, as we were reviewing the deal, I couldn’t help but ask what happened to the relationship?

We have all seen or experienced where buyers, not just new buyers, but established customers, ones sellers thought they had a relationship with, who end up buying from someone else. It usually comes down to either price, the other seller, the one without the relationship, being cheaper. Or even more biting, the other seller was able to convince the buyer that they can move them closer to their objectives than you. In outselling the relationship, they show that attaining objectives will trump relationship for a buyer every time.

We work in a world where companies and reps need sales to thrive, sales in the current month and quarter. This is why companies all pay commissions for sales, not for relationships. This is why it makes more sense to develop a sale, delver to or above expectations and use that as the platform for building a relationship, rather than building relationships with customers from which repeat business will flow. To be clear, I am not saying no relationship, or relationships have no vale, but that there is a sequence that delivers more for both parties, and that sequence is, start building the relationship and the sales as soon as you engage, but get the sale first, it will take time to build a real and worthwhile relationship.

So there, we have solved that one, and if you are interested, and have a sense of humour, the question of which came first the chicken or the egg, has also been answered. Again, if you have a sense of humour, you can learn about it here.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

What Makes You Different?2

by Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

People always want to present themselves as being unique or different, even as they are lined up overnight for the latest iGadget, all adorned in the latest gadget-ware from Fashion Star. So I am rarely surprised when sales people tell they or their products are different.

I recall meeting with a VP of sales from a software company, the latest killer app, and while he agreed to take the appointment knowing what I do, it seemed his objective was to validate how their product and sale were different than anything I had seen to date. If I had $10 for every time he said “Tibor, you have to understand we are different, our product is different, and our sale (process) is different”. While I am not qualified to comment on the nature of the software, I had to ask about the sale of their software.

Me: Am I right in thinking that all your reps are all delivering quota?

VP: No, we have a couple that are, some just below, about half haven’t hit goal for the last couple years.

Me: So let me see if I understand Harvey, your people don’t have to prospect, leads and prospect are abundant, normally potential buyers are lined up around the block; it’s just because you knew I was coming this morning that you cleared the sidewalk for me?

VP: No, no, no, we need to prospect like mad, we are always looking for ways to get enough of the right prospects in the funnel, we get a web leads, but they need to prospect more.

Me: But once they get in front of the right prospect, getting the buyers to buy into your value prop, and getting to proposal is just a formality, right?

VP: No, we have to do a lot of information gathering, understand their needs, and explain what we do just to get them to actually appreciate what we can do for them. It’s a grind and a struggle for some of the AE’s.

Me: but once they articulate the value prop, and the buyer gets it, it just goes straight to signature and close.

VP: No, there is a lot of haggling, back and forth, we lose too many sales at this point.

Me: So Harvey, I may be slow, but I am not sure I see the difference.

Do you? The one area where Harvey failed to differentiate is in the way they sell. Like other mere mortals, they have to prospect, engage, execute a discovery to find common ground and gain commitment?

The difference is rarely in the product, the difference is in the way you sell. If leading products have an overlap of some 80% or more in features, capabilities and output, the only way left to differentiate is in the way you sell and interact with your buyers. If you are no different in that perspective, than there will be little difference in results moving forward.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Aligning Time Horizons (#video)0

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

Time is pivotal to sales success, on the plus side, it can help you better engage with potential buyers, and on the down side it can create distance and barriers between you and the buyer. One specific is the degree in which you are aligned with the buyer’s horizon. All too often we get ahead of the buyer, or fall way behind, either can slow down or cost you a sale.

Take a look at what I mean, then download our E-Booklet – Sales Happen In Time:

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Small Talk Is For Small People – Sales eXchange 2040

by Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

When I talk to sales people about how they start sales meetings with new potential buyers (first time they meet), most (not all) tell me they “break the ice with some small talk”, then they “get in to it!” We’ll leave the getting into it for another time, what I don’t get is the “small talk” bit, I am not sure that in the current format, as practiced by most sellers is effective, necessary, and at times can be risky to the opportunity.

I am antisocial, (although some have accused me), but spending time talking about the weather, or the useless season the local sports team is having seems counterproductive to the goal of the exercise, helping the buyer move closer to their objectives, and yours. And while the people buy from people crowd may want to pounce on me, wait. You can “break the ice”, and set the mood without having to resort to pointless gibberish.

The buyers are all busy, as I should think you are, you obviously said something that caused them to invest an hour of their time with you, it is up to you to maximize the ROT for both. Getting to the point may not the worst strategy. Some buyers may make you feel that they required “small talk”, but that is more conditioning than anything else, if you deliver value by the end of a successful meeting, they will not complain about not having their time wasted.

I am also not suggesting that you jump right into the deep end, I know that the “void” walking between the reception area and the office or meeting room has to be filled, it is how you fill it that can differentiate you from the others.

As you are doing research ahead of your meeting, look for recent events, announcements, or analyst coverage, not specifically related to your product, but significant for the company and or the person you are meeting. A while back I was meeting with a dairy company that was the first to introduce Omeg3 into a line of product, to accentuate the launch, they introduced a beveled edged carton so it would look different from the other milk cartons on the shelf.

On “the walk” from reception, I asked how the packaging was received, changes they had to make to production, and were they looking to use packaging as a differentiator way with other products. While this had nothing with what we were meeting about, it indicated to the buyer that I came prepared, that I was taking an interest in the entire business, not just the part I can sell to, and I can relate the benefit of my offering to the other responsibilities he had. In return, the information he shared with me about the above, helped me refine and better position my value vis-à-vis his objectives. Small talk, yes, but it beat talking about snow in March or the fact that the Leafs were going to miss the playoffs again.

While we think we are being social with small talk, it can and does often come up being hollow, unimportant, and does not move things forward even one millimetre, in which case, what’s the point. It is also interesting that many people who don’t like the small talk when they are buyers, rely on it when they are sellers.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

How to and Why to Cold Mail – Sales eXchange 2032

by Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

If you are a regular at this blog, you know that I am big proponent and supporter of cold calling. I don’t fall into a camp. I think clod calling is a necessary part of a multipronged approach for engaging with potential buyers you have not have not spoken to before, or have a means of generating a referral to. While social media is a big plus, there are times when still the most direct, cost and time efficient to get “in front” of someone is to pick up the phone and make a cold call.

Unlike some others who will tell you to use only one method over another, I have more respect for your intelligence and time than to tell you to only cold call and ignore referral selling, I believe you need to leverage as many tools and resources as are available to you to get you message to the right person. Furthermore, the reality is that in some markets, with some products, where the audience is not involved in social media, or is unreachable through referral, your choices are limited, especially if your goal is to engage and sell, not just to look cool and modern.

One key reason you want to use as many tools as possible, is that it could take many touch points to get someone to engage, not to buy, but just to engage, depends who you read it could take anywhere between 5 – 9 touch points for the nickel to drop with a potential buyer. Consider:

48% Of Sales People Never Follow Up with a Prospect
25% Of Sales People Make a Second Contact and Stop
12% Of Sales People Make a Second Contact and Stop
Only 10% Of Sales People Make More Than Three Contacts
10% Of Sales Are Made On the Fourth Contact
80% Of Sales Are Made On the Fifth to Twelfth Contact

To make the most of the touch points, you need to mix up the modes of approach. As with most tools, it is important you use the right one for a desired outcome. What follows assumes:

• You need to have a direct conversation with the prospect to sell successfully, either face to face or by telephone. • The e-mail in question is your very first attempt to reach the prospect.

Given the above, especially the second point, you need to determine what your objective is. If you have never spoken to the buyer, the objective is clear, to schedule a firm time for the first conversation. It is not to sell, deliver your value prop, start a relationship, or anything other than getting their commitment to speak at a specified time. You want a call back to confirm the call, or as you will see in a moment, to actually schedule a meeting. If your goal is different than that, what follows may not be for you. On the other hand if you have never spoken to them before, and you need to direct, then what other outcome could you hope for?

The Format

Keep it short, two or three lines – in a 140 character world, you need to focus. Chances are your e-mail will be read on a mobile device, if you don’t capture them in that first screen, you won’t. You may get one flick of the thumb, the second will be to delete.

The Subject Line – think of how you do things, first question do I know this person? If not, you look at the subject line, if it doesn’t grab you, delete. If it does, you may open it, as a result the subject line is crucial, as the reader will not know you. This is why your subject line should be your call to action with a question mark.

Example (from a few years back):

Subject: Meeting June 30, 9:30 am?

Dear Mr. Prospect,

I am Tibor Shanto Principal with Renbor Sales Solutions, over the last three years we have helped The Business Development Bank of Canada set more appointments with Canada’s small business owners. I read about The Scotia Bank RV, and am writing to set up a meeting to discuss how we may help you and Scotiabank reach your objective.

How is Monday June 30th at 9:30 am?

Thank you in advance, Tibor Shanto

Result, within 90 minutes, I had response saying the date did not work, but they suggested an alternative time for us to meet.

Doesn’t work every time, about 10% – 20% of the time it does, but it is just one of many tools. Combined with voice mail, a presence in social media, and you have an effective means of engaging, or at the least, an effective touch point.

An interesting observation, while the perfect result is 10 – 20 percent, I do see a number of people visiting my site after getting the e-mail, and while many may not call back, when I follow up with my next touch point, they are more aware of who and why. When they visit the site, check out the blog, see what I am up to on social media, I am willing to bet, that some of the appointments I get through other channels with these same people was helped by the initial short and direct e-mail.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

3 More Tips For Effective Telephone Prospecting1

by Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

On Monday I wrote about the need to counterbalance for some of the realities of telephone prospecting, and some things sellers can do to compensate. Today I offer up some other basic things you can do, to improve your success in some simple ways.

Some of these things may seem mundane and basic, but that doesn’t lessen their importance in consistent results from telephone prospecting. As in sports, music or other crafts, focusing on the most basic aspects is as important as mastering the big things, your messaging, value props, etc. The balance and combination of the two, augmented by your style and personality are what make for your success.

We spoke about intonation on Monday, we the most basic thing you can do is smile when you are on the phone. Smile even when you feel like reaching through the line and strangling the person at the other end. The tone and tenor of your voice is different when you smile, but it does carry over the phone and impacts your listener. We all remember the old song “When you’re smiling – the whole world smiles with you”, is true! Smiling is something you can practice, sounds odd, but in the heat of the moment, when your emotions kick in, you will forget unless you practice it as part of your routine.

Speaking of practice, yes, you should practice – out loud, and more than once. Sales people often look at me funny when I suggest they lock themselves in a boardroom or meeting room and practice their approach, be that a prospecting call, an actual sales meeting, anything important. By practicing, you become not only more confident, but master the salient points much better. In fact in addition to practicing, I recommend you write down the key points you want to cover, when you write things down you retain them better, just like in collage. By the way, this does not imply that you are memorizing the “presentation”, I don’t like presentations, but you can apply this to questions you want to ask around key points you need to explore to get the client engaged and in a buying mode. By practicing and mastering what you want to cover you minimize the need to think (or worry) about what you are going to say, when and how you’ll say it, freeing up valuable bandwidth to focus on what the buyer is say, and processing power to deal with that properly.

For prospecting calls, it is important to practice how you will respond to and manage objections potential buyers have. It is one thing to download our Objection Handling Handbook, it is another to spend some quality time with it in a room alone and practicing the methods and concepts, much like practicing a playbook in sports. It may unfold differently on the field, but the practice allows you to react from a base of knowledge. If the meeting is large, important, or to a committee, spend time visualising the meeting, exploring potential paths it may take, questions, comments or objections participants may pose. You’ll find that you’ll be much more prepared for the expected and the unexpected. The same works for a prospecting call.

Finally, and it may seem small, stand up when you make calls, get a headset so you can use your hands to express yourself the way you would in a direct conversation. With Bluetooth headsets, you now have the freedom to walk around, feel and be relaxed, and that too carries over the phone and adds to your intonation. Add a mirror to the equation and you can really affect the way you speak, and how they hear you at the other end. Some say this sounds bizarre, but to bring it full circle, I remember taking a telephone skills program from Bell back in the 80’s, and when we finished the course, we were given an 8 x 6 mirror, and in Bell blue at the bottom it said “Smile”. Worked then, and still works now, as long as you commit and execute.

Don’t Forget To Enter The Big Contest!!
See Biz Stone, Seth Godin and others

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Effective Telephone Prospecting Tips – Sales eXchange 2023

by Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

If you are a sales person who does not use the phone to proactively prospect for potential clients, you may not find this post of interest, on the other hand you may find something to spark you to take up the habit.

As with many things in sales, to successfully engage and move through the process, you need to do some things that are counter intuitive, don’t conform to how you may act or behave in regular circumstances. But if you’re in sales, you know that selling is not a normal circumstance.

While the numbers vary, there seems to be consensus that communication is:

60% Body language
30% Intonation
10% The words you use

The challenge for those using the phone is that there is no room for body language, (well almost), and with that 60% of their ability to be fully effective is negated. Unless you compensate for that in some way, you are relying more on luck than anything else.

Most sales people do not take this into account, and in fact approach their prospecting calls as though they were in a face to face meeting, a fatal mistake.

All good selling involves a bit of drama or theater, the telephone as a medium, also lends itself to a bit of theater, when prospecting by phone you need to combine both. You need to accentuate certain things to make up for the lack of visual. The logical thing is to put greater focus on the second element, intonation. Rather than speaking in your normal tone, using words you would use sitting across the desk from someone, you have to make things bigger, be more assertive, descriptive and direct.

Think of the old radio programs, and how they ballooned things for effect, and so must you, especially given that your buyer is getting calls from dozens of other sellers, and that if you are an unscheduled call, their focus and attention is elsewhere, unlike when they have committed the time to at least listen to you in the context of an appointment. Introduce a bit of drama and effect, use more descriptive words, and accentuate them. Rather than simply saying we do this or that, say “we have a proven track record of success in delivering double digit growth.” Get rid of socially expected norms of being polite, rather than saying “I was wondering if we could meet” or “I was hoping…”; say it direct and with conviction.

People have a tendency to rush the prospecting call, which makes it easy for a prospect to go with the flow and the call faster. Leave greater pauses between words, let the meaning land before moving on, slow down, make you voice deeper. Ask questions, make them engage, rather than just listen and object. This is why having a script helps. Not so much because you will recite the words by heart, but it allows you set the momentum and rhythm that will engage the listener on the other end (assuming the right content and message).

Remember that the lack of body language cuts both ways, while they can’t see you, you can’t see their reaction either, so you have to sharpen you other senses. My first sales job was telesales, the first things I was taught was that I had to listen for things other than words. Focus on the breathing, the space between words and sentences, and all the other things that make up for the lack of body language. In the end, there is more than one element that will help you “give good call”, but if you do not make up for some of the big things, the small things will matter less.

Don’t Forget To Enter The Big Contest!!
See Biz Stone, Seth Godin and others

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

The Pipeline Guest Post – Megan Totka

Customers are the lifeblood of any business, and attracting new customers while strengthening your relationships with existing ones is a constant challenge. The best way to do so, however, is a matter that often leaves your sales and marketing staff at odds. Your sales force is focused primarily on closing the deal and landing new customers, while your marketing department wants to nurture customer relationships before and after the sale. No matter what your role at your company, however, it’s to your benefit to continue to nurture customer relationships long after they’ve paid their invoices.

Why Long-Term Customer Relationships Matter

We’ve all heard the adage that it’s cheaper to retain a customer than it is to acquire a new one. After all, you’ve already done the wooing. They already love your brand. If you maintain the relationship, they’ll come back to buy other products or services from you, increasing their customer lifetime value.

A customer with whom you already have a relationship is more likely to refer more business to you. They’re happy to tell others about how much they enjoy your brand when communicating through social media, review sites like Yelp, and face to face with friends. A single customer can help attract business from friends and family if they’re happy. And the best way to keep your customers happy is by paying attention to their needs and staying connected.

Managing Your Customer Relationships

Customer relationship management tools like Insightly and Salesforce make it easy to create profiles for each of your customers. You can track critical data like purchases, each customer’s birthday, and communication preferences. Companies use this data to better engage with customers. If you have your customer’s birthday, you can send her a email with a special birthday offer. If you know she has looked repeatedly at a certain item on your website, you can offer her a discount for it. Building a profile is a great first step; if you are in regular contact with a client, take notes each time you speak with them.

Social media is another fantastic tool for staying on top of customer relationships. Since Hootsuite lets you set up custom streams based on your preferences, it’s a snap to set up a stream containing the social media content generated by all your customers. From there, it’s up to you how far you drill down. You could create streams for different types of customers, such as those buying women’s clothes in one stream, children’s clothing in another, and men’s clothes in the last stream. You could set up a search for a keyword that relates to your industry to see who’s talking about it, and connect with them. The possibilities are endless, but what matters is using the info you gather to enhance your customer relationships.

Once you’ve set up customer profiles, it’s simply a matter of paying careful attention to what’s being said, especially if it relates to your product or brand. If a customer’s unhappy with your company, they might not bother to tell you, but reach out on their social network instead. If you’re monitoring your customer Tweets using your new setup, it’s much easier to discover customer concerns—and address them—before the situation escalates.

From a more positive angle, if you notice a customer tweeting about her search for product or service you provide (that they may not realize you offer), your sales team has a fantastic opportunity to respond and develop that interest into a lead.

Email is another great way to stay on connected to your customer. Don’t bombard your customers with emails, but do make your emails frequent and relevant enough to remind them of why they chose to give you their business. Sending one newsletter and one promotional email at specific times each week or month is a good start, but with a little creativity and careful data management, you can create targeted email campaigns for special occasions or broken out by demographic. Using the data gleaned through your customer relationship management software, you can deliver even more sophisticated and targeted messages, such as discounts for a customer’s birthday for example. The better targeted the offers, the better your connection with your customers.

The aim is to keep growing the connection. With intelligent application of the information you gather, you can build real and lasting relationships with your customers that won’t end with the sale.

About Megan Totka

Megan Totka is the Chief Editor for ChamberofCommerce.com. She specializes on the topic of small business tips and resources. ChamberofCommerce.com helps small businesses grow their business on the web and facilitates connectivity between local businesses and more than 7,000 Chambers of Commerce worldwide.

Stop making sales predictions and start executing0

by Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

As some of you may be aware, I have a monthly column on the Globe and Mail’s, usually the third Tuesday of each month. These pieces are unique from what I usually post here on The Pipeline. I will post links to these posts as I think they will be of interest to regular readers of this blog. As always, I invite you to share and comment on the articles on the Globe and Mail site, here, or both.

Enjoy: Stop making sales predictions and start executing

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Conditions Are Not Objections (#video)0

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

In the heat of a sale, it is sometimes easy to confuse a condition to the sale with an objection. The key is to understand what you are really dealing with, and respond accordingly. Done right, it could solidify the sale and the resulting relationship with the buyer.

Take a look, then download the Objection Handling Handbook, and let me know your thought.