salespodder: sales blog with musings and tips from inside sales

Lengthen Shorter Days

November 10, 2008 at 3:12 pm · Filed under grapevine

I rib a pal of mine that he’s a painter and decorator. Not that there’s anything wrong with such a noble profession, it’s just that for the money spent on his education he feels he should be looked up to, not upon.

Still, found a useful guide from him about how to - as the press release put it - keep the winter blues away. One or more of these tips could improve the numbers from that sales office you’re in…

Clean the windows and remove clutter from the window areas
Open the blinds whenever possible and rearrange desks so that they do not suffer from glare from the windows when the blinds are open
Add task lighting to each desk
Change the main lighting to ‘day-light’ bulbs
Paint a wall red, to stimulate energy
Install a large natural summer or springtime image
Apply a metallic or reflective wall covering on a wall

Permalink Comments

A 1 in 7 Cross-Sell

October 20, 2008 at 12:13 pm · Filed under grapevine

I found myself in the bedlam that is Hamleys Regent St toy store on a half-term Saturday. Battling my way through to the tills, I plonked my fancy dress party accessories for that evening on the counter with a sense of relief. The bill came to £32.98. Only half concentrating on what was a typical card transaction, I barely registered that the young chap that served me grabbed something from behind him and started talking.

“I’m not sure you guys would be interested in this…”

He was pitching some electronic Hallowe’en gizmo called a Fright Light that produces ghoulish sounds and spooky lights. We could have it for half-price, £7.50. (I discovered later, qualification for this treat was through over thirty quid spent).

Chuckling, I turned down his kind offer. To his credit, even when I’d said no, he kept his smile and gushed with a couple more of the features. Intrigued though, I asked the lad how many he’d sold. He proudly told me “loads”. With further probing, I got him to calculate what the ratio of success was. His considered reply was that once out of every seven times someone had added the toy to their shopping.

The place was packed. I asked this near five o’clock. And judging by how he described what was the huge pile at the start of the day, and now was much smaller, the promotion had proved a winner.

So a cracking promotion for a half-price product, time- and event-specific, with a qualifying spend. What would bring your 1 in 7 success?

Permalink Comments

Crawling For Crumbs

October 18, 2008 at 12:23 pm · Filed under reviews, grapevine

There’s yet another reality show on telly devoted to business. Seeking to emulate success scaled by The Apprentice, Natural Born Sellers you’d have thought, by dint of title alone, would be terrific.

Unfortunately, everything that makes the siralun show win has been jettisoned in this effort. Schedulers have already lost faith, shoving it backwards close to oblivion after only two weeks (a metaphor for our times I’m afraid, as even The Apprentice took a couple of seasons to break through). The two primary mistakes are swapping teamworking for individual endeavour and the lack of any charismatic mentor input. Despite his billion in the bank, this show’s business bigwig plays the role of afterthought, rather than driving force and a cash-only prize just seems misgiuded.

As you’d expect, juicy editing exposes most selling attempts as coming off a training course circa-1987. This makes objective comment tricky. The youngest of the contestants was thrown out thinking he was gifted, yet each time he was shown in action, the words you heard almost to exclusion of anything else were “I” and “me”. It is the lack of rectification of this type of misjudgement that condemns the show to a early telly grave.

For the selling skill observer, the main triumph involved a piece of applied learning. The week’s challenge had two strands; sell £135k worth of limos from an exhibition stand, and add to that by selling tickets for the post-exhibition bash.

All the reps tried to shift tickets before the show started. Despite the presence of bikini-clad assistance, enthusiasm waned and they considered the rewards small beer when set against the limo lure. All but one gave up on the tickets. The logic of this lone wolf was basically “what the last two weeks taught me is that all the little extras count”. In other words, she reckoned if no-one sold any limos, she’d win if she could sell the most tickets. Her masterstroke was to call local strip clubs and ask if she could pop along and flog some tickets. Out till 2am, she racked up sales.

Despite her consequential flaws, this plan did indeed make her safe. When summing up to help the winner decide ‘eviction’ (another mistake by the producers) the referee seized upon this. He told the eventual loser that sales wasn’t just about being blinded by the big deals, and that to win you must “take all the crumbs from the table”. He’d ignored the small sales at his peril. It was also to the show’s loss that he’d gone. As a character he was one of just two that’d ensure viewers engage (the other being our lap-dance queen). And they kissed goodbye to his initiative. His efforts at cold-calling from his hotel room, having pinched a business phone directory, prior to the exhibition should have been a major part of what the competition was about.

Finally, perhaps the one thing that surely had to be rammed down the watching public’s throat was left unheralded. The winner was the least pushy of the lot. Who wants truth to interfere with stereotypes? For the purist, it’s all downhill from here I fear.

Permalink Comments

Post Neo-Classical Pitching

October 6, 2008 at 12:24 pm · Filed under grapevine

We appear to have bumbled into credit crunch followed by financial meltdown. The left-of-centre governments of Clinton and Blair over a decade ago, to little Opposition, led the encouragement of lenders to allow people to borrow mountainous sums, with little recourse to whether the interest payments could be maintained, let alone the principal ever repayed.

Unchecked, the banks went bananas. We now see that they lent recklessly, sold on those debts to other banks, fattened their income statements through huge commissions and left their balance sheets one sneeze short of starting an influenza pandemic.

According to engaging economist Robert Sidelsky, it’s Farewell to the Neo-classical Revolution. Unfettered Financiers will be a thing of the past. Here’s a flavour:

“The just-collapsed credit bubble, fueled by so-called special investment vehicles, derivatives, collateralized debt obligations, and phony triple-A ratings, was built on the illusions of mathematical modeling.”

The bonanza is now at an end. The immediate reaction from anyone outside the finance sector was succinct; let them fry. Yet on reflection, schadenfreude shifts to fear. Everyone from housewives to chief execs are keeping their purses shut tight, corporate POs confined to locked cabinets.

The problem now is that no-one wants to spend. Thrift is replacing the excitement of gaining credit. This is undoubtedly going to create problems for us solution sellers. How do you prompt people to spend on your wares?

Well, it’s a toughie. I myself am hearing customers already calling to question next year’s contracts. Here’s two strategies that could benefit us:

CFO Conversation

This must be an opportunity to get on the radar of the chief cheque-signer. Most vendors, when confronted with a demand to reduce prices, will meekly acquiesce. Avoid this trap by asking for a forum with their top bean counter to discuss financial matters. If apt, why not take along one of your finance bods? Ensure first that they are neither eosophobic or phengophobic (just think of a vampire at dawn!). The aim should be to uncover their funding plans. This could be dynamite. Imagine that they’re unaffected. Working capital provides for all their needs, say. Maybe a simple change in payment terms can keep you ‘in’.

Reduce Supply, Not Margin

So there’s no way around it, you’re facing a cull. Again confronted with the unpalletable, when ‘asked’ most vendors will drop their price. If a client states that to keep their business you must cut your price by 10%, you might consider this a small price to pay. But the impact on margin could be horrific. At 40% profit, a 10% price drop reduces your margin by 25%. Work out what each part of your supply costs you, and offer to reduce those costliest bits. A main point is, that whenever you do reduce price, you must get across it’s conditional you’ll reduce supply too. It’s surely preferable to discuss supplying 90% of last period’s product for 90% of the price, as opposed to 100% of previous supply for 90% of cost.

Permalink Comments

Thaw Spend Freeze

September 26, 2008 at 1:03 am · Filed under grapevine

I suspect that virtually all of us are experiencing that the credit crunch is biting. I had a couple of cheekies after stumps with a pal of mine Thursday night who’s responsibilities include managing financial risk and reducing borrowing costs for one of the most well-known global luxury retail brands. We got to talking about what needed to happen to bring back the sunshine.

He gave me a fascinating insight into the decrees being cascaded throughout his organisation concerning purchases.

In general, there is no authority for new expenditure. Hardly news for the typical solution salesrep there.

This though is news. Anything where a process improvement is touted is to be ignored. So, claiming you’ll shave or slash time from a process will get you nowhere. The exceptions are twofold; equate an improvement to the direct and instant cutting of a ‘head’, or provide a tangible (ie: raw hard cash only) payback in less than just a couple of months.

And as a final pointer, if you really want to gain traction, offer an evaluation period as a deal-maker.

These tip-offs have certainly made me rethink about how I can get my own foot inside new doors.

Permalink Comments

Team Bonding Beyond Beers

September 23, 2008 at 11:13 am · Filed under sport & selling

The regular gag of lament among sales trainers is to often mock Sales Management’s widely held view that the best form of ‘team bonding’ is to take the reps out for a slap-up beano.

If you’re in a team where this logic prevails, then perhaps you can take a leaf out of the legend that is Arsene Wenger’s book. Although his Arsenal are not my footie side, they’ve been the one outfit I’ve always tried to watch since he took over. Everybody I know, including several useful players I’ve had the privilege to line up alongside, feels the same. And the amazement is usually how he manages to get such brilliant performance out of significantly younger and cheaper resource than the other big clubs.

One reason is his focus on the team ethic. Today’s press all carry reports of a single sheet of paper that summarised a recent team meeting. It somehow fell into a random hack’s grubby paws. It is fascinating. Here’s the most detailed report.

There are two summary points, followed by the 14 bullets below. The selling question is twofold; which of these when applied could benefit your team, and how can you apply them?

Our team becomes stronger by:

* Displaying a positive attitude on and off the pitch

* Everyone making the right decisions for the team

* Have an unshakeable belief that we can achieve our target

* Believe in the strength of the team

* Always want more - always give more

* Focus on our communication

* Be demanding with yourself

* Be fresh and well prepared to win

* Focus on being mentally stronger and always keep going until the end

* When we play away from home, believe in our identity and play the football we love to play at home

* Stick together

* Stay grounded and humble as a player and a person

* Show the desire to win in all that you do

* Enjoy and contribute to all that is special about being in a team - don’t take it for granted

Permalink Comments

Implementation Hand-Holding

September 15, 2008 at 12:20 pm · Filed under academy, grapevine

I was reminded recently of an all-too-often overlooked part of the sales cycle; implementation. How often do we cringe when hearing of ’salesrep-sold-and-ran’ tales? Ink barely dry, commission already spent, and the customer left in the lurch as a new set of faces takes over part-petrified, part-clueless?

The ’spin’ exponents, Huthwaite, advocate as part of their Major Account Selling Skills courses to think carefully about this. Clients are often nervous. They may have staked a lot on what you’ve sold them. Reputations and cash could be on the line. So understand this, and thoroughly hand-hold them through the immediate post-sale moments.

This doesn’t just mean be there at delivery time, or a few phone calls asking about the weather.

What might that mental agony be based on? What is it they’re apprehensive about? Where do they need to see promises delivered? Find out, and make a plan to document how you provide answers to all such areas. Better still, share this timeline with them beforehand and personally deliver it.

Permalink Comments

Another Forecast Spreadsheet

September 3, 2008 at 10:32 am · Filed under grapevine, crm

One of my customers shared with me the parallel reporting that has since resoundingly taken the place of their ditched Goldmine crm. It’s a single worksheet they call the Schiffman Board. It seems that with usage of Goldmine having tailed off to practically no use at all, a new Manager (an American emigré) introduced this spreadsheet.

Web surfing doesn’t shed much light on its origins, although a New Yorker with decades of sales support appears the front runner.

The good news for those exasperated with crm, and bad news for those who promote its use, is that this team appear to fill-in their ‘Board’ and email updates to the Boss on a weekly basis with little grudge. One fella even boasts how it’s improved his forecasting accuracy to such an extent that he’s only a couple of hundred quid out each month.

The spreadsheet has five areas to input:

1st Appointments
10% close chance
50%
90%
Closed

A cheeky macro then populates a trio of forecast figures multiplying the percentage by the deal values; Realistic, Midrange & Longshot.

Whether the probablities chosen are from Mr Schiffman’s recommendation or the team’s boss is unknown. What I feel is critical to its usage though, is the clarity that is given to the thresholds that must be crossed to progress from first appointment through to close.

In this case, after your initial meeting you must have an agreed Needs Analysis to earn a 10% chance. Then a Trial with an agreed feedback meeting ensures a 50% chance. And for 90% certainty, you must have been given the verbal nod.

These can quite readily be adpated to most solution selling situations I’m sure.

Permalink Comments

Are You A True Choice Architect?

August 28, 2008 at 12:54 pm · Filed under grapevine

I gained recent exposure to the current big-buzz right-wing think tank concept of Nudge. Rather than telling people to do things, it advocates instead that you let them make their own journey to where you suggest they go. Key to the concept is the use of influence as a Choice Architect.

Each time we provide options, there’s a chance to increase desired take-up by judicious presentation of said alternatives. When doing so, it is crucial to understand that “there is no such thing as a “neutral” design“.

As sales people, we constantly offer choices to potential buyers. The most common format is likely the “PLOF”. Such a ‘Price List Order Form’ is, as the name suggests, acts as both a price list and order form combined. The idea is that buyers can simply tick off what they want. The columns are straight-forward; product code, product description, price, tick the box or fill in the quantity.

In the wholesale-distribution trade they’re omnipresent. Yet whoever creates them should be shot. Better still, asked to re-design them. It’s not difficult to see a process could be relatively easily set-up that creates bespoke PLOFs for each client based on their buying behaviour, both actual or hoped-for in the light of identified gaps.

Then there are Proposals. How often do even the biggest of tickets sellers need to put forward different options? Pretty much every time a Prop is provided. If for no other reason, it’s a way of trying to upsell a touch. Usually, it’s because the precise nature of the eventual order remains unknown. How are the alternatives listed? There’s a great example from the Economist magazine’s subscription efforts, subsequently related to music CD and mp3 experiences, that suggests an intelligent approach to your job as a Choice Architect can bring richer rewards (an incredible 43% bigger in fact for this case).

Permalink Comments

Olympian Goals

August 26, 2008 at 4:51 pm · Filed under sport & selling

So much has been written about how Team GB made Britain Great again at the Beijing Games, the past few days have enabled glorious reflection whenever I fancied a break here in London. After recounting the manifold (and largely unexpected) successes, broadsheets have wondered how it was all so miraculously done.

Two strands stand out for me. And they are two things that we’ve never had before. Sure, Olympic competitors have had the drive to awake at 5am each day to swim for hours alone, like double-Gold winner Rebecca Adlington. I’m old enough to remember how middle-distance titans Coe and Ovett, hardly on speaking terms at the time, were spurred on by the thought of what the other was doing to such an extent that Christmas Day was simply nothing other than a normal training day. Gold medallists have always displayed a winning mentality, whether it be Linford Christie’s knowledge of having to run 101 metres to win, or Daley Thompson’s desire to “crush” his opponents. But two strands build on mere individual dedication. And they are a pair that sales people can similarly tap into.

Attention To Detail

The stories of the cyclists’ regimen are rapidly becoming the stuff of legend. No wonder that many other sports are gravitating towards spending time at their Manchester base. They famously re-created their Chinese Village quarters and climatic conditions. Then there’s the Kayak ‘Paddle Project’, where they assessed all sorts of material and shape combinations within the rules to arrive at the best form of propulsion. Consequently, next time I kick-off a solution-selling cycle, I’m minded to mention Team GB’s success, and suggest we follow an Olympian process to uncover all the needs and remedies. How could a prospect turn that plan down?

Around The Edges

The other strand that appeals to my selling focus, is how all the things seemingly only remotely connected to competing are examined. Sir Clive Woodward (now involved with the 2012 delivery) talks of improving 100 things by 1% each. ‘Distraction Control’ is a new phrase I’ve picked up to allow all energy to go into winning, rather than allow some to get diverted onto ultimately fruitless paths. Also, a key reason for the cycling dominance is their team-bond. Rebecaa Romero didn’t feel part of the team until she’d won her Gold. A touch extreme perhaps, but what a fantastic culture to develop if each of your sales team members didn’t feel they belonged until surpassing 100%. And there was also the fact that Team GB riders and support staff couldn’t work out why they were the only country who all stayed en masse to cheer on every single athlete in each race. Again, what an amazing culture to foster.

In short, current cycling supremo Dave Brailsford considers winning a process, rather than an end in itself, and this is something we sellers can readily adopt. We all have the bsaic I guess, ie: a quota, and may well have targets within this, eg: profit split, account growth, new acquisitions. Yet how many of us break this down further? Here’s just a few off-the-wall ideas for starters:

getting 10 prospects to talk to my ‘best’ client
arranging a dozen meetings with people only affected by my solution indirectly or downstream
asking my five largest client’s Head of Sales what their biggest issue is right now and relating that to our solution
working out how to increase my funnel by 10% each quarter
creating forums with 3 of my prospect’s suppliers/customers that would see an impact from my solution

Permalink Comments

salespodder: sales blog with musings and tips from inside sales

Archive for grapevine

Lengthen Shorter Days

A 1 in 7 Cross-Sell

Crawling For Crumbs

Post Neo-Classical Pitching

Thaw Spend Freeze

Team Bonding Beyond Beers

Implementation Hand-Holding

Another Forecast Spreadsheet

Are You A True Choice Architect?

Olympian Goals

Ask Salespodder

Archives

Categories

Search

Pages