by Art Waskey | Jun 18, 2024 | Art of Sales Weekly, Featured
A critical phase of a successful sales cycle is validating the decision maker(s). Digitalization has made communication — the centerpiece of any sales negotiation — much faster and broader. Also, this has enabled more people and more data to be involved in the validating the decision makers.
Enterprise Selling
So radical is the change brought on by digitalization that in the last two years the title for the sales process has changed from “Consultative” to “Enterprise Selling.” Consultative selling refers to a process involving mostly personal interactions. However, enterprise selling implies the use of digital tools, such as an integrated Enterprise Resource Program (ERP), eCommerce, content management, and artificial intelligence (AI), in addition to people. This approach involves a broader group of decision makers.
Bringing in a wider group of decision makers
In consultative selling, the salesperson would ask his/her contact, “Besides you and me who will be involved in resolving the issues we discussed?” Today’s digitally embedded customer relationship management (CRM) software broadens the group of decision makers.
AI can generate an organizational chart that provides important details about how a customer makes decisions. Predictive AI can assess the reasoning from the viewpoint of the C-suite executive’s strategic direction. It can uncover the desires of the plant manager, engineering, and quality control for the results of implementation. Additionally, it can highlight the need for operations and purchasing agents to minimize disruptive change during implementation. All of this information helps the sales team confirm the decision makers.
For independent distributors, eCommerce and AI have opened up channels that allow you to differentiate your products and services from other online websites. Moreover, decision-makers can recognize the benefits of personalization, local presence, added-value services, and preferred telephone services offered by independent distributors.
Validating the decision makers
Lastly, the sales team has a broader group of decision makers to validate and support in today’s digital world, but it also has more tools with which to do that. In conclusion, be sure you take your time to make sure this step in the sales cycle is done correctly. It will ensure your success in the all-important investment and proof stages.
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by Art Waskey | Jun 6, 2024 | Art of Sales Weekly, Featured
Once you have built trust and understand your customers’ backgrounds and motivations, you can identify their needs and begin to formulate solutions. If your customer relationship is well-established, your client may even tell you how to fit his/her needs into your product or service offering.
The Customer Needs Trail
Once your customer’s needs have been established, take your time in identifying how best to address their specific issues.
Here is a series of questions I recommend asking your client to establish what I call a Need Trail:
- Tell me more.
- How long have you had this issue?
- What have you tried?
- How did that work for you?
- How much is the issue costing/impacting you?
- What other issues do you have?
- Is it important to make a change?
There are some important things you should note when using the Need Trail. First, when asking, “What have you tried and how did it work?” you are preventing suggesting something that they have already tried with failed results.
Second, the reason you are asking, “What other issues do you have?” is that normally the first issue a client brings up often is not their biggest problem. This question primes the pump. Many times it is the second or third issue they disclose that is the most critical. Your objective is to try to collect the total cost/impact of all the customer’s issues.
Finally, don’t ask, “Is it important to make a change?” until you have exhausted all the issues. If it is not important to make a change, then there is no real need!
When to propose solutions
Having followed the Need Trail you are now in a good position to formulate solutions. Do not share your solution with the customer at this point, however. Wait until you are in investment discussions. Exposing your product or service solution earlier allows the customer to shop the resolution for the lowest price.
Need to be identified
Having developed a customer relationship built on trust and an understanding of your customer’s motivations, you are in a position to identify their needs and propose solutions in the investment phase of the sales cycle. Get tips and tricks like the above in The Art of Sales books. Or subscribe to the FREE monthly articles here.
by Art Waskey | May 22, 2024 | Art of Sales Weekly, Featured
Selling involves the transfer of trust, and a successful sales cycle revolves around establishing trust in customer relationships. The manner in which we develop those strong relationships evolves with the changes in the world around us. In my lifetime, the introduction of new technologies has radically changed how one approaches relationship building to succeed in sales.
Telephones and cars
Consider this. I became a salesman in 1972 at a time when the internet was still a research project. My first job title was Sales Engineer. I lived in North Texas and was tasked with calling on independent welding and gas distributors in Dallas, Fort Worth, Wichita Falls, Abilene, Sherman, Austin, and San Antonio. Also, my means of connecting with clients involved many telephone calls (on land lines) and driving just over 20,000 miles per year in my Ford Custom to meet prospects in person.
To achieve success in sales, it’s important to follow a 5-step sales cycle developed by IBM:
- Begin the call with small talk
- Investigate the customer’s needs
- Present the benefits of your product
- Address any objections
- Close the call using a variety of techniques.
Small talk
Being able to converse with your customers on their terms builds trust. The distributors I called on in the ‘70s were patient with my formulaic approach. Additionally, I quickly learned that “small talk” should involve the Dallas Cowboys, Houston Oilers, Texas Rangers, or Houston Astros. I enjoyed making connections with my clientele and I was able to develop a deep sense of trust with those Texas distributors. I still remember each of their names, their likes, and dislikes. Their work ethic and customer relationship experiences have been guiding principles in my career.
More avenues of communication
In conclusion, digitalization has changed how relationships are formed today. Smart phones and computers have opened up avenues of communication not even imaginable in 1972. Lastly, you can build relationships via mobile phones, text, email, and video chat. Digitalization can be effectively used to establishing trust in customer relationships, which are at the center of the successful sales cycle.
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by Art Waskey | May 1, 2024 | Art of Sales Weekly, Featured
Having a consistent digital filing system that supports your business’s objectives is critical to success in the digital era. Here are 3 key actions to consider when building your permanent filing system:
- Save files by year. It is important to create new file storage each year. Annual filing prevents data clutter that can slow the search process. Referencing the year it was created, makes data easier to find. If you need to reference a file from a previous year multiple times. Simply copy and paste it into the current year for easier access.
- Create 5 to 10 main folders. Each year create new main folders that represent your focus areas. Moreover, my primary folders include Personal, ISD (business), Ministry (I’m an associate pastor), Art of Sales (for my books), Sales Articles (for regular publications), Seminars (I offer public speaking and training), Rockies (relating to season tickets for the Colorado Rockies), WeeklyReviews, and Planning Management.
Identify your core interests and obligations and create your folders accordingly. For example, as Senior Vice President of Sales for a distribution company, your folders might include Personal, Business, Competitors, Sales, Vendors, and Sales Managers/Reps.
Lastly, creating folders by key responsibilities annually enables you to find specific documents in less than 15 seconds.
- Use Archive folders. How many times have you updated a document only to find that you didn’t hit “save,” or deleted it by accident? The Archive folder is used to keep a historic record of files so you can recreate records if they are lost. Archiving saves endless hours of work and maybe even a client or a job!
The consistent filing system
In conclusion, by saving files by year, creating folders by key responsibilities, and archiving important documents, you can build a permanent filing system and a more efficient business.
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by Art Waskey | Apr 24, 2024 | Art of Sales Weekly, Featured
A full mailbox is a time sink. Many people assert that checking emails is the biggest time-waster among all management tools. This makes it difficult to find important ones that are waiting for a response. To better manage your email and keep clutter at bay, keep your mailboxes empty.
A radical idea
To those of us who check our email every time the phone pings an alert or the computer signals you’ve got mail, this will sound like a radical idea. To manage your time better and achieve an empty Inbox and Sent Box, I suggest that you open your email no more than twice per day. Review it once in the morning and once in the afternoon. Use one of these two times to clear your emails.
File, route, discard
To become more efficient and save considerable time, all new emails should be read with the aim of filing, routing, or discarding them.
- Filing an email signifies that after reading it, you would like to keep it, as the message might be valuable to access in the future.
- Routing is applied to an email that requires follow-up, or one that you need to read at a future time.
- Discard is used for emails that are irrelevant or require no future action.
The Sent Box too!
I consider an email processed only when the Inbox and Sent Box are empty since a copy of the sent emails appears in the Sent Box. Additionally, I recommend going directly to the Sent Box as soon as you send an email. File, route, or discard that email right away.
Careful Management
The careful management of emails can prove invaluable to making your business more efficient. In conclusion, a well-organized email system allows you to access information as you need it and eliminates the clutter that can slow that process down.
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