by Art Waskey | Feb 10, 2021 | Art of Sales Weekly, Featured
Were you able to pivot to online meetings when the pandemic closed traditional sales channels? The owner of a high performance car engine manufacturing company told me that he just had his best year, despite the fact that his customers faced completely closed or reduced schedules at race tracks. How did he accomplish this? The company moved fast when the pandemic hit and pivoted to a new sales strategy. To determine how demand for its product might change, engine production was paused and time was spent contacting existing and potential customers via virtual conferencing. The company found that the race community had more discretionary money to spend on engines than they ordinarily would as other business costs (like travel, entertainment, etc.) had been lowered or eliminated.
The benefits of online meetings
While in-person sales calls are still a great way to present your product, the pandemic has proven that online meetings are also a viable way to sell. Here are some of the benefits of virtual conferencing.
- Meet anytime, anywhere – There are significant time savings and productivity gains associated with meeting online. Without travel, the volume of calls can be greatly increased. At the engine shop, the owner reported bringing in more new customers in one day than they previously did in two.
- Put a name to a face – People like to see with whom they are dealing and video conferencing enables this. For the engine manufacturer, clients began requesting online meetings once that format was introduced.
- A quick path to the decision maker — With video conferencing, all the key players involved in a sale, including the owner, can come together at the same time, even if they are in different locations.
- Reach a wider network – Online video enables meetings with potential customers that previously may have been considered outside your territory. The engine maker now has out-of-state clients.
- Better customer follow-up – Virtual online checkups can rapidly measure a customer’s approval of your product or service. The engine manufacturer found that online follow-up improved their customer’s post-sales experience.
A new era
Make sure you are ready to pivot from traditional to online meetings. The pandemic has ushered in an effective new way to market goods and services —online sales communications — which are certain to remain an important part of business going forward.
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by Art Waskey | Jan 25, 2021 | Art of Sales Weekly
Unseating the Competition
Customers get comfortable with their existing suppliers and this makes it difficult to unseat the competition and win new business. I recently visited an account with a rep who saw flagrant safety protocols being breached by the business’ current supplier. As a producer of scientific glassware, this account required a large number of high-pressure hydrogen cylinders and their supplier had lax material handling procedures for this explosive gas. In addition, we identified that the company was not being provided the most efficient mode of supply. When we tried to win this account on the promise of safer and better service, the owner’s response was, “We have been doing it this way for years and have never had an issue.” Unfortunately it took an accident that led to both the competitor and customer being issued safety violations, to change his mind.
Response Modes
The above case illustrates how difficult it can be to overcome a client’s negative response to a sales proposal. In their book, The New Strategic Selling, Robert Miller and Stephen Heilman, address this issue and suggest that each Buying Influencer at an account will have one of four response modes to a proposal. They advise paying careful attention to these factors:
- Overconfident – Many customers have Buying Influencers who are overconfident with their current supplier. The Ultimate Decision-Maker in the above account was too comfortable with his method of supply.
- Growth – The glassmaker was growing and the User Buying Influencer agreed with us that they needed to move from cylinders to bulk supply of hydrogen. He was tired of the time it took his team to stop and exchange the manifolds of cylinders, but his voice fell on deaf ears.
- Trouble – The Technical Buying Influencer, an engineer, recognized the cost savings of going to bulk supply as well as the trouble with existing safety protocols, but he didn’t want to “rock the boat” with the owner.
- Even Keel – We discussed the cost savings of our proposal with the corporate controller, the Economic Buying Influencer, but he couldn’t be convinced. He liked to keep things on an even keel.
Spend More Time with Buying Influencers
You don’t have to let an accident be the factor that changes a customer’s mind. Take time to review your top prospects and key accounts. For each company, examine the response of each influencer to your proposal and make a coordinated effort to get them all on board. These are the people who are critical to supporting your proposal and enabling you to win new business.
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by Art Waskey | Jan 18, 2021 | Art of Sales Weekly
The tactical presentation
Selling involves strategy and the driver of any good tactical plan is a robust sales funnel. For a sales presentation to succeed, you need to be in the right place, with the right person, at the right time.
All this requires good data on your sales prospects. Why? Consider your odds at winning any sales deal. In an article by James Duffy, author of More Than Account, he explains that 8% of sales people capture 80% of the sales, and that 80% of their prospects buy after being asked for the fifth time. In other words to be among the top 8% of individuals who close most accounts, you need persistence, dedication, and a really good sales funnel. Your most precious commodity — selling time — is maximized if you have good data on your prospects.
A sales funnel
What should be in your sales funnel? Start with a list of your top 10 prospects and key account penetration opportunities. For each of these accounts, record the following information:
- Quantity —Quantify the product or service you are selling in either dollars or volumes. Be specific. For example, you are proposing 100 computers per month, or a $200,000 automated system.
- Next step – What needs to be done on the next call to move the decision forward? Do you plan to bring a specialist to demonstrate the product or service to prove the cost savings, for instance?
- Timing – When do you expect to accomplish the next step?
- End date – What is your estimated date for the completion of the sale?
Prioritize and Review
Your sales funnel should be prioritized, reviewed weekly, and discussed with a sales manager monthly. Operate with the adage, “If it isn’t measured and reviewed consistently, it won’t happen.” A good funnel allows you to see each sale in motion and gives you the confidence today that will ensure a closure tomorrow.
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by Art Waskey | Jan 12, 2021 | Art of Sales Weekly
Finding Talent
I remember a young man I met 30 years ago. This man had aspirations that I could have easily dismissed, given his background. However, I always tended to look at the dreams of others in a positive way. With an eye toward finding talent within and helping individuals use them to attain success.
Moreover, a book I recently read, Multipliers by Liz Wiseman, reinforced my belief in how important it is to concentrate on each person’s aspirations to maximize their potential. Wiseman discusses how to “release the impossible” in each of us by looking for capabilities and encouraging their development.
Be a talent magnet
Wiseman suggests “Four Practices of the Talent Magnet.” Here are some examples of how I applied them to the young man I met 30 years ago.
- Looking for talent – “Tap into someone’s native genius and unlock the hidden reserves of discretionary effort.” The young man above made some big mistakes and was in federal prison when I met him. I saw someone who was determined to learn from their mistakes. By getting an education, and helping others, they wouldn’t end up in a similar situation to his.
- Find native genius – “What people do easily, they do without conscious effort.” As I spent time with this individual. I found he had tremendous enthusiasm and an unlimited natural flow of energy. I gave him books to read and he devoured them!
- Utilize potential – “Connect people with opportunities.” After finishing his time in prison, I hired this man in a customer service position. He excelled and was promoted. I encouraged him to attend college and served as his reference and advisor.
- Remove blockers – “Provide both the space and resources to yield growth. Get out of their way.” My friend explored career options with more significant challenges and earning potential. He excelled in both his education (he earned a graduate degree), and in his new career.
A successful leader
Lastly, thirty years ago I would not have called myself a “talent magnet,” but today I recognize how I have always acted as one. It has been my privilege to hear the dreams and aspirations of many young people and guide them as they “release the impossible.” A successful leader recognizes the importance of each individual’s aspirations. And the need to find the talents within that enables them to be realized.
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by Sean Newman | Jan 5, 2021 | Art of Sales Weekly
Selling Involves Strategy
Like a good game of chess, selling involves strategy and paying careful attention to all the moving pieces. I worked with a welding and gases distributor’s rep who was promoted from inside to outside sales and then was part of a company reorganization that put him in newly assigned territories, which included 10 well-established accounts. While these events were all positive, they were game changers. He sought my guidance on how to develop a sound sales strategy to deal with his new circumstances.
Maintaining Existing Customers
Here is my recommended 4-step strategy for maintaining and growing established accounts:
- Assess – Talk to the previous account manager to analyze your current position. Find out what his specific sales objectives were. Was he in a purely maintenance mode or aggressively selling? How often did he touch base with the plant supervisor and engineering team? In each account, identify the decision makers who approve deals, the purchasing agents who clear requests, and anyone else who influences buying decisions.
- Plan – Carefully consider the tactical sales plan that is in place when you take over an account. A transition to a new rep is a good time to consider alternative positions. Find out what may have changed in the account. For example, the rep in this scenario learned that one of his major accounts had brought in a manufacturer’s rep and an in-house company specialist to look for improvements in the production processes. These people would influence future purchases and needed to become part of his tactical plan to keep the account viable.
- Devise – Once you have determined what alternative position(s) would best secure your objective, you need to devise an action plan. In the example above, after examining the client’s current fabrication assumptions with the company’s team through a series of intense questions, a few significant efficiencies were discovered that led to a new sales plan.
- Implement – The cost savings of the new plan were dollarized by the rep and presented to the customer’s decision-making team. After completing their internal engineering analysis, the company approved the rep’s action plan and it was implemented.
Knowledge Is Power
The newly minted outside sales account manager in the above scenario successfully used these 4-steps to continually reassess and refine his sales tactics. Knowledge is power and the basis of any good sales strategy. Today, you only win in sales if you know what you and your customers are looking for.
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by Art Waskey | Dec 29, 2020 | Art of Sales Weekly
A client came to me for advice on a sales dilemma. One of his customers was expanding his business and needed to purchase a couple of hundred thousand dollars’ worth of welding and fabricating equipment. In the past, however, this company had been slow to pay and at one time was even on the verge of bankruptcy. My client had already spent many hours resolving financial issues with their CEO. The dilemma — the sales manager’s company needed the sale. Would he be able to make the customer keep to the agreement this time?
Have you found yourself in a similar position? Your intuition tells you that trouble is ahead, but you reason that this time you can make it work.
Intuition comes first
In his book, The Righteous Mind, author and psychologist Jonathan Haidt gives us helpful advice on this type of dilemma. His first principle of moral psychology is that intuition comes first, and strategic reasoning second. Intuition is defined as a thing that one knows or considers likely from instinctive feeling from past experience, rather than from conscious reasoning. To illustrate his first principle, Haidt uses the analogy of a small rider on a big elephant. The elephant is your intuition, and the rider is a “rationalist delusion.” The large intuitive elephant should cause you to slow down and patiently work with others, despite your desire to move at a faster pace.
Keep your reasoning in check
To keep your “reasoning” in check and your intuition at the forefront, be thorough in your project analysis. My advice to the sales manager with the dilemma outlined above was to spend time with his fellow employees who had also dealt with this customer in question. When he did, he was able to get “the rider”, his reasoning, back in line with his intuition. To solve the question of timely payments, the sales manager introduced a third party financial lender to his client, which enabled him to pay in advance. The equipment was installed with one-time training, and the customer paid COD for all future supply requirements.
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