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Why Are You In Sales? – Sales eXchange 20020

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

At the end of this post I will ask you a specific question that I would love you to answer, and I thank you here in advance.

Two things happened this past week or 10 days that led to this week’s Sales eXchange being a bit different than the usual, and isn’t that what we always strive to be in sales. First is the fact that this is the 200th Sales eXchange post, and while I had given it much thought, someone asked if I will be marking the fact in any way. The person that asked me was a young person at an event I participated in recently. The event was organized to present young people with different options for their life after school.

One of the questions going into the event was “What do you want to be?” Some had very clear ideas, knowing exactly where they want to go. One young lady was determined to become a speech pathologist due to a friend she had in grade school. She structured her high school curriculum to set her up for a path of success in post-secondary school, and to her dream career. Others stated a number of different career plans, some very specific, marketing, finance, construction, software design, and more. Others were a bit more general, the young man who asked about the 200th post simply stated business. As an aside, it seems he had been spying my blog (and others) to glean ideas for his high school business class, at least someone is getting value at an early age. But in the end no one said they wanted to go into sales, not one.

Consider that according to the United States Department of Labor, there just under 14 million people employed in sales as of May 2012 in the USA. The same department pegs the number of lawyers at under 1 million, and software developers (systems and applications) also under 1 million. Yet fewer than a handful of institutions offer a degree in selling or sales.

There were a number of kids who talked about becoming lawyers, software developers, doctors, even golf pros, but not one said sales. Which begs the question that if no one sets out to become a sales professional, where the hell did we all come from? Are we progressing as a profession, or just a modern day version of post war refugee camps full of people making due while they find their next destination? Are we a repository of other professions outcasts, with the occasional diamond in the rough? After all, almost 50% of sellers do not make quota, this would not be tolerated in any other department.

So here is my ask – take a minute and think about where you are in sales as a career, how you got here, how you’re doing. Then take a minute and in the comment box below, tell me:

Why Are You In Sales?

Tibor Shanto

Did You Get My Voice Mail?7

By Tibor Shanto –tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

Yesterday I got a call about a piece I wrote for Radius titled: Get More Call Backs: How To Increase Returned Voicemails By 50%. Seems it has stirred up a discussion in one the LinkedIn groups, one I did not belong to, (since joined).

Whenever I do a piece on effective voice mail techniques, three things happen:

It get a lot more hits than most other posts – telling me that this continues to be a challenge and hot button for sales people.
In the first 24 hours a slew of feedback telling why the technique won’t work, it is gimmicky, unchristian and a range of other labels. These comments come predominantly from people who do not like to cold call, don’t know how to cold call, never leave voice mail when given the opportunity, and are pissed that they are not getting return calls, when I, and those using my techniques do. These are folks who have not studied the dynamics at play in effective voice mail, generally have a less than sufficient prospects in their pipeline, and BTW, have not tried the technique they are commenting on.
Within about 48 hours, I get a bunch of e-mails from people who tried the technique, got a calls back, got an appointment with someone they have been trying to connect with for sometime without success, and they now have one or more new prospects in their pipeline.

The real difference between the two is the latter is committed to continues improvement, willing to invest time, effort and practice to integrating new techniques to their selling tool kit. They understand it takes work to fill the pipeline, and if the state of their pipeline is going to change, it requires change in their approach and habits.

The first group, the doubters, fail to take into account and understand the dynamics involved in leaving effective voice mails. Let’s look at one specific factor.

Most people these days are jammed, need to pack 16 hours into a ten hour day, they don’t have time to listen to your rambling voice mail, telling them about how great your something is when they already have that something. Since at any given time, about 5% – 10% of your market is actively looking for your something, that’s the total potential of people who may have an interest in calling you back. By leaving a conventional voice mail, chances are less than 5% – 10% may call you back, unless they already have a vendor in mind, in which case no call back.

Let’s face it, the reason most people want you to “leave a detailed message”, is so they can know exactly why not to call you back, and they don’t. So no matter how polished your message is, the more content it has the less your chances of getting a call back. So despite what one of my most recent critics suggested in the LinkedIn discussion, saying I “should spend some time doing research on the buyer so they can leave a message that’s in line with their expectations.” There is an idea, waste time researching to not talk to anyone, hmm? The most effective voice mails are those that are counter intuitive.

The mistake many make is trying to sell or get an appointment via voice mail, WRONG! Good luck if you have never spoken to them in the past.

The only purpose to leaving a voice mail is to get a call back – again to get a call back. When that call comes, you can then proceed to getting the appointment or engagement if you are in inside sales. GET THE CALL BACK! THAT’S IT!

I would argue that the only way to do that is to create a bit of curiosity, one that would create an environment where with little effort, the person you are calling can make a call to resolve their curiosity, THE CALL BACK, once you have them on the line, then you bring your sales or appointment setting skills to play.

The technique in question results in me getting 50% of voice mails returned. That may piss off some people not willing to try, but really what’s the issue, the method is there, you don’t want to use it, don’t knock those who do, just because they have a healthy pipeline, and fat babies.

Read the article
Watch the video

Try it, and then talk!

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

It is bad enough when this expression is used figuratively, but it is sad and dangerous when sales people actually and literally do it.

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

Sales books are no different than other books or forms of literature, especially in one respect. Before we even get to content, quality or other attribute, books generally fall into one of two general categories:

Fiction – Or – Non-Fiction.

You know what I am talking about, you pick up a sales book, an enticing title, a slick smiling face, ready to learn and improve your craft only to discover that the author is not at all practicing seller. Instead of practical real world experience and advices, they are dishing out how he/she wants to be sold, rather than solid usable, executable advice B2B sellers can put into practice and use to improve their game and results.

Good news, that’s not what you get when you pick up Mike Weinberg’s new book New Sales. Simplified.: The Essential Handbook for Prospecting and New Business Development. Weinberg delivers solid framework for selling success; offering up equal doses of the three key components the WHAT, the WHY, and the HOW. Most sales books give you a solid perspective of one, some will a solid WHAT, some of the WHY, and then leave you to figure out the rest, but Weinberg gives you all three, and in good size servings.

I was hooked right from the start where the book takes up the importance of a solid prospecting approach. Warning readers not to be bamboozled by false sales profits promising success without prospecting. Weinberg demonstrates the importance of a blended approach, and then gets in to the specifics, readers are able to get why it needs to be done, and how. He discusses in clear terms the role of attitude, as well as the accountability of the organization’s senior leadership.

If you’re a reader of this blog you know I don’t shy away from hunting analogy when it comes to selling, neither does Weinberg. When it comes to new business acquisition, it is a battle, not against the buyer, but other sellers. I was glad to read about how “the proactive new business hunter requires a strategically selected list of appropriate target accounts in order to launch the attack.”

Not only because it is accurate, but because it recognises that strategy and execution go hand in hand, and the book delivers both.

While it is hard to pick one over the others, my favourite chapter is chapter 9: Your Friend the Phone. Weinberg does not glamorize the “cold call”, admitting it is not his favourite sales activity, but one that needs to be mastered for success. From mindset to attitude and its impact on your tonality and you project over phone. He then delivers an in depth user manual for call, including voice mail; all you have to do is follow it.

Here’s the deal, I enjoy fiction as much as the next guy, give me a Reacher novel any day, but when it comes to sales books, I want practical things I can use to make money. Sales is a nuanced skill, if you are not selling today you can’t capture and communicate that to readers. Weinberg clearly gets and captures it in this book, because he practices it not just writes about sales. Grab this book, and you’ll get it too, in fact grab two, save on shipping, and you’ll ware out the first copy soon enough.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

One of the easiest ways to dismiss Interruptions and to get the most out of Conditioned Responses, is by telling the caller that you are busy.

Prospect: I’m really busy, can you call me back?
Caller: Sure, when is a good time?
Prospect: Call me Tuesday morning!

Chick chack, back to work in less than five seconds.

Let’s look at the replay in slow motion.

First notice how little effort was exerted by the Prospect, making full use of his Conditioned Response. Did you notice the head fake by the Prospect, deking out the Caller by offering false hope in feigning interest by asking the Caller to call back next Tuesday, as if there was a glimmer of hope; of course what he didn’t bother telling the Caller is that he is off on vacation starting Monday.

A key reason it was so easy for the Prospect to deke out the Caller is that like most untrained cold callers they are more focused on getting off the phone than to completing the call successfully, given the opening by the Prospector, the Caller went for it with the most predictable and welcomed line.

Different Prospect: I’m sorry, but I am really busy right now
Caller: I just need a few minutes of your time
Different Prospect: Which part of busy now do I need to break down for you? [click dial tone]

Prospects love the busy objection, the shortest line between ring and back to work. It sucks in the Caller by making them deal with the wrong element of the call, the focus should be on action, in the form of a meeting, not time.

That’s right, the best way to deal with the busy Conditioned Response is to take the off time, and put it on action/outcome.

Prospect: Jim, I am really busy right now
Jim: I understand, in fact I thought you would be, (Acknowledge)
Jim: in fact I only work by appointment myself, which is the only reason for my call (Credibility, Involvement through curiosity); and the opportunity to differentiation yourself by the approach you bring.
Jim: can we do that Friday at 10:00? (Call to Action)

No fuss, no muss, just an effective way to deal with the prospect’s Conditioned Response.

As with the other Conditioned Responses, be they Status Quo or Lack Of Interest, this paves the way for them responding to your Call to Action in the form of a time to meet, which in fact will be another objection, but this time no conditioned, but a direct response to you, and a start to a, rough, but nonetheless, a conversation. An opportunity for you to engage based factors relevant to the buyer.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Prospectors’ Guide To Objection Handling – Part I – Sales eXchange 16350

Last month I posted a piece call “The Reality Of Prospecting Rejection“, in it I argued that rather than trying to avoid rejections, sales organizations and sales people need to adopt and adhere to a specific prospecting process, and leverage it for consistent results. The goal is to adopt a method for dealing with rejection, rather than trying to avoid them. With a proper method, executed consistently, you will be in a position to address and manage objections, and convert more of them to conversation and engagement with potential buyers. As an added bonus, with a process you have a means of measuring the outcome, reviewing and adjusting according to a plan.

A couple of folks enquired about the methodology, more specifically, how to deal with rejection; in reality what they are looking for is how to manage the objections and leverage them to engage with more prospects. As a result, over the next few posts I will do exactly that, put rejection and objections in context, and then provide ways to manage and use them for success. A combination of a tried and proven best practices used by many leading sales organizations to engage with more of the right prospects. These methods have been gleaned over the years and continue to be refined daily in the field, not only by me, but our clients day in day out, and in the current socially charged recession.

In order to deal with and manage objections, you first need to understand them and put them in context. This is a key point in not only managing objections but overcoming the fear and related call reluctance. The context IS NOT YOU! Let me repeat, the rejection, which will come if you make prospecting calls, is not of you. The context is TIME and VALUE. The demands on the buyer’s time, generally greater than the time they have to do all the things they need to. Most people already are trying to pack 16 hours into a 10 hour day, so the last thing they need is a distraction or interruption, no matter how cool your thing might be.

Interruptive Marketing

Let’s face it, we are professional interrupters, and that is not a negative it is just a fact. Unless you are on the agenda of the person you are calling, you are interrupting their ability to get through the 16 hours of work they have to finish before they have to get their kids to little league. Given the choice to finish their work, or talk to an unknown interruption, guess which wins, leaving us to be rejected.

Now this can be tempered with a structured approach, taking a number of dynamics into account that will help smooth the bumps inherent in an unsolicited prospecting call; and by the introduction of real value into that approach, giving you an opening to change the perception that you are a completely useless interruption, to one of potentially a worthy interruption.

Remember that interruption and disruption are part of the creative process, it causes change, which is what you want, but you need to prepare for the response and deal with it, not surrender and abandon a potential opportunity. As well, injecting a heavy dose of value will only take you from life threatening to critical, meaning you still need to deal with the rejection.

Let’s start by understanding that YOU ARE NOT BEING REJECTED! When you have a proper process and understanding that they are rejecting the interruption, and the collective memory of all the bad interruptions they have lived through in the past, you can act with confidence and gain room to manage and engage. If you can accept that it is not you but the circumstance, it changes the context. Circumstanced can be controlled and altered with some forethought and an action plan. Which is what you will find in the next few posts.

Next we’ll look at the context VALUE brings, and how to leverage it throughout the prospecting call to achieve the right rejection, yes, the right rejection.
What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

Wednesday I posted the first in a series of 3 Things you Should Not Say on a Cold Call!, looking at avoiding the phrase “Just need…”. By the way, the word just should also be avoided when following through with a prospect, rather than saying “I am just following up”. Be proactive and leave out the JUST, get to the point, the thing that will move the sale forward.

Today we look at avoiding either of the expressions “Wondering if” or “I was hoping that we could…”, or any variations of these expressions. At the risk of coming on a bit strong, I think that these expressions can and do make you come across weak, tentative, unsure, unworthy of being followed, especially when you are asking the prospect to change. Often it comes across as frankly mealy-mouthed.

When you picked up the phone, you were not hoping, you were not wondering, you picked it up because you WANTED to SET an APPOINTMENT. So say that. As mentioned Wednesday, I know you want to be polite, you don’t want to perceived as pushy or aggressive. But clearly articulating your goal is not aggressive or pushy, it is what makes for good sales people.

Add to that the environment demands that you be assertive to compensate for the realities of a cold call. Consider that the experts tell us that communication is 60% body language; 30% intonation; 10% the words we use. Which means on a cold call you are missing the biggest component, the body language, yours and the prospect’s. You have to make for that somehow, and I would argue that beyond the words you use, and your intonation, it has to come down to how you deliver you message.

One way to overcome the environment is to be clear, to the point, which means the buyers’ points, not your brochure talking points. Which means when it comes to asking for the appointment, do ease off the gas, gear down, and tell them what your objective is, which is you want to meet. Not hoping, not wandering if, may be, could be, perhaps we could meet. What are you, Oliver asking for more soup, or a potential business partner of critical supplier that will help your prospect meet their objectives. I know who I would make time for, it is the same for most prospects.

Lets get past the cotillion approach to prospecting, and get to what’s in it for the buyer, why, and when you want to meet.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

A reminder that there is a class this afternoon, 4:00 pm Eastern

GAP Selling – Leveraging Process and Execution

GAP Selling – Looks at how to deliver value to buyers across the entire sales cycle.
Almost every sales conversation starts or ends with the concept of value; at the same time there are as many different understandings and definitions of value as there are sellers and buyers.

This course delivers clear and actionable definition of value. Starting with that definition of value, participants will learn the five step platform to leveraging that value right through the sale, from the initial engagement to winning the client. The overarching goal of the platform is to focus on the buyer’s objectives, and delivering specific means of helping them achieve those objectives.

These include:

Identifying and validating buyer’s objectives
Understanding why buyers really buy
Why Buyers buy and don’t buy from you and your company
Converting the above to impact questions and quality conversation
A structured follow-through approach to maximize impact and progress Participants will learn how to use the above to create alignment with the buyer, their objectives and buying process

Join us at 4:00 pm Eastern today

Prerequisite – An open mind to learning and selling better

Test – Your weekly Pipeline Review

The most valuable, complete sales training of the summer!

Featuring me and 18 other well-respected sales innovators, authors and trainers from across North America, Sales Summer School delivers ideas and actions that you can take immediately to improve your sales results.

You can select from over 30 courses with a wide variety of topics ranging from tips and techniques for interviewing for your next sales position to obtaining strategic referrals and partners, through to coaching your sales teams as an effective leader.

My course is GAP Selling – Leveraging Process and Execution, is coming up next Thursday, August 2, at 4:00 pm Eastern. GAP Selling – Looks at hoe to deliver value. Almost every sales conversation starts or ends with the concept of value; at the same time there are as many different understandings and definitions of value as there are sellers and buyers. Without a clear and actionable definition of value, many conversations between buyers and sellers are less than effective, and do not help create a buy. Starting with that definition of value, participants will then learn the five step process to leveraging that value right through the sale, from the initial engagement to winning the client. The overarching goal of the process is to focus on the buyer’s objectives, and delivering specific means of helping the achieve those objectives. Steps include: 1) Identifying and validating buyer’s objectives 2) Understanding why buyers really buy 3) Why Buyers buy and don’t buy from you and your company 4) Converting the above to impact questions and quality conversation 5) A structured follow-through approach to maximize impact and progress Participants will learn how to use the above to create alignment with the buyer, their objectives and buying process.

You can see the other courses, schedules, and register by clicking here.

Each course is scheduled for 60 minutes and there is always time available for live Q&A with the audience.

You would have to pay thousands of dollars to hear these speakers live. Your investment of $47.00 per event will prove to be the most valuable career investment you will make this year.

Look down the list of Presentations and Speakers, select those that you would like to attend, and the rest will be taken care of behind the scenes.

As an attendee, you will receive access to a recording of the event for your review later on, and will also be given exclusive access to a private LinkedIn Group reserved only for attendees of Sales Summer School. Each of the instructors is an active member, and are available to answer your questions on sales and sales management. Private access to this group of experts is worth more than the price of the ticket itself.

What’s in Your Pipeline?
Tibor Shanto

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Why Are You In Sales? – Sales eXchange 20020

Why Are You In Sales?

Did You Get My Voice Mail?7

Just Mailing It In (#video)37

By Tibor Shanto – tibor.shanto@sellbetter.ca

Selling Like Greece!30

Read On…

New Sales Simplified – The Real Deal!71

Prospectors’ Guide To Objection Handling – Part IV – “No Time” – Sales eXchange 16464

Prospectors’ Guide To Objection Handling – Part I – Sales eXchange 16350

3 Things you Should Not Say on a Cold Call! – Part II139

School Is In53

Sales Summer School34

The most valuable, complete sales training of the summer!