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Be Provocative in Demonstrating Results (#video)0

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

Monday I shared a clip from a discussion with Ago Cluytens, for one his Coaching Masters Series. Today’s second clip looks at the need to be provocative in gaining traction with entrenched potential buyers.

The challenge many of in sales face is the entrenched buyer who is reluctant to look at new or alternative means of achieving his/her goals. This is usually due to the fact that they are entrenched in how they are doing things now, feels there are too many resources needed to make a change, and a host of other reasons. In order to get engagement, we need to demonstrate the results we can deliver and the positive and measurable impact we will directly deliver to their business and attaining their goals. In a WIIFM world it is about the What, not how of how they get there.

Here is more:

If you would like to see the entire discussion you can either visit my You Tube channel, or go the Ago’ site by clicking here. Always open to comments and views.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Why Waste Time Waiting for Events – Trigger The Reaction – Sales eXchange 197 (#video)0

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

A few weeks back I had the opportunity to sit down with Ago Cluytens, for one his Coaching Masters Series interviews. All this week, the posts will feature snippets of the interview, below we will also tell you where you can find the whole interview, but now let’s go to the first extract.

Trigger Events are fine, but there is no escaping that you have to wait for the “event”. But here’s the deal, what you are leveraging is not the event, but the buyer’s reaction to the event. So why not take the training wheels off, forget the “event”, and learn to trigger the reaction without having to wait, with the others looking for the same sign.

Take a look at what I mean.

If you would like to see the entire discussion you can either visit my You Tube channel, or go the Ago’ site by clicking here. Always open to comments and views.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Managers: It’s Easier Than You Think1

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

When working with sales teams there are some specific things I look for to understand the makeup of the team and its members. These are things that indicate how open they are to learning, to change and to commit to the effort it takes to change THEIR reality. There generally different indicators based on their industry, tangible vs. none tangible, and the nature of the sale. Interestingly tenure as a rep or with the company is a much smaller factor than one would expect, and of course the big delineator is whether they are and have regularly made their number or not. Let’s look at the latter group, not that those making their number can’t learn or improve, those are not are the drag on the system.

The one tell tale indicator is what they focus their attention on to change. The sub-quota reps will always focus on those things they cannot change. A direct contrast to the consistently deliver, who will habitually focus on those things they can change.

Let’s face it, it is much easier to want to deal with things you cannot change, you can look involved, you can point to this and that, you can blame the elements, and you can completely avoid accountability while pretending and going through the motions of being accountable.

Instead they need to be taking the time, energy and resources and deal with things that they can actually change and impact. To be clear, this is not about the usual reluctance to change, this is about taking accountability for do what needs to be done, and doing it. Not change what they are doing, just do something, anything. In larger companies these are the folks always ready to participate in work groups, make endless points during broader meetings, again looking engaged while doing nothing.

Rather than getting frustrated, which is what they want, because it will validate that things are not working which why they can’t get things done, take the game to them. Agree on the objective, a measurable objective, a revenue number, a pipeline coverage number, a number of meetings per week, or the like. Put it up on a while board, then ask them to list to list all the barriers they face. Eliminate the ones that were already addressed and fixed last year, but are still etched in their psyche; eliminate all the ones beyond their control, you know things day light savings time, the price of gas, the Leafs never winning the cup. What you will be left with are the real thing that impact their performance that they have control over, and then it is time to step up, if they do, great, if they don’t then it is your time to act.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

What’s Improving – Your Sales OR Orders?2

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

As the economy continues to show hints of progress, and business picks up, it is important to understand the nature of the improvements in sales you and your company experience. Taking into account the old adage “all boats rise with the tide”, you need to be able to discern where your growth is coming from. Is it from increased sales, or just an increase in orders due to an improving economic environment; and yes Sunshine, there is a difference, much like the difference between sales professionals and order takers.

More than ever, having a defined sales process, with supporting metrics is a must. Without that, you may easily mistake increased revenues with improved sales or selling, when in reality the improvement may be organic. Increased demand, leading to an uptick in orders or improved selling, the two are very different, but often mistaken.

In fact, this is one of the risks of relying strictly on a single lagging indicator – Revenues, rather than a mix of leading and lagging indicators. In many ways you can look at it the way investors look at interest rates paid on fixed income instruments, where they back out the rate of inflation from the total rate they receive from an instrument to arrive at the real rate. Think of the organic increase in orders as inflation, and the real rate as YOUR ability to sell more or better in a given market. All sellers benefit from a rise in demand, only those who focus on selling will grow sales beyond the herd, and get more than their share of growth. Increased market share is always a good thing.

To avoid being caught, you need understand your intra-sale conversion rates, understanding if in fact you are doing a better job of converting leads to prospects, prospects to proposals and proposals to wins. By measuring these and other critical points you will know if you are just benefiting from an increase in demand – more leads, or ability to convert those leads. If you have a 4:1 lead to prospect rate, then it goes without saying that you’ll have more sales from six leads than 4, 1.5 sales vs. 1. But if your sales and selling skills improve, and you can move to a 3:1 ratio, you’ll sell proportionally more. This is important in down markets too, but people get fooled in up markets when the wind is in their sails.

Once you understand these measures, you can set goals for theses (or other) conversions from stage to stage, and benefit from the compounding effect, and increase both real and organic sales. With goals and metrics in place, it is much easier to develop and Execute a tactical plan, you will be in a position to adjust or change your model to ensure continuous growth and skills improvements.

Not knowing can create more than false comfort, it could lead you to make wrong decisions, and by the time you realize, you may be left too far behind the competition.

What’s In Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Every morning the financial pundits stick their finger in the air, and tell us how things are looking in Europe, and the Greek crisis, then they parade a series of talking heads to support the daily view. Things look good, markets rally; things look bad, markets tank. Many sales people start their day watching these pundits on say CNBC, or on their favourite app, but fail to take away the clear and real lesson that could help them sell better and more. As a result, they end up selling like Greece.

When you boil it down, the “crisis” (real, manufactured, or imagined), boils down to a simple thing, exemplified best, (or worst) by Greece, a country that simply does not have enough money to deliver against their obligations. Yes I know this may terribly over simplify things but after all I am a pundit of sorts, and as such at the very least I have an agenda to promote; Greece just does not produce enough revenue to meet their obligation; add the contagion factor, and you have a snap shot of Europe and their crisis.

Read On…

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

By the time you know if you had made your quarter or year, it is too late. If you made it great, if you didn’t, too bad, it’s too late to do anything about it. So to succeed in sales, forget the revenue, it is a lagging indicator, focus on what really matters, the activities and elements that lead to a sale, the leading indicators.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Be Provocative in Demonstrating Results (#video)0

Why Waste Time Waiting for Events – Trigger The Reaction – Sales eXchange 197 (#video)0

Managers: It’s Easier Than You Think1

What’s Improving – Your Sales OR Orders?2

Selling Like Greece!30

Read On…

Forget The Revenue115