Recognition of Needs

If your salesperson has done a good job in the last phase, she has surfaced one or more previously unrecognized problems that your product/service can help solve. Now, she needs drill into those problems and help the customer understand their severity. The ability to “dollarize” the cost of neglecting the problem and the ability to extend the problem’s implications on all other parts of the business is critical. It is a lot like the old iceberg metaphor. What is visible above the surface looks like something one can easily sail around. However, danger lurks below. A good salesperson helps the customer see the danger that lurks below and helps them steer well clear.

Typical Customer Concerns in this phase:

· Do we have a problem?
· How big is it?
· Does it justify action ?

Signs that this phase is over:

Customer accepts that the problem is severe enough to justify change and therefore decides to take action.

Common Strategic Errors:

· Failure to investigate/develop customer needs
· Making product presentations too early

Coaching Questions and Tips:

· How are we shaping the opportunity?
· All implication end-points mapped? Where else?
· Have we overlooked anything?
· What’s our value hypothesis?


Other Key Coaching Questions:

· What problems are they trying to solve?
· How much pain exists?
· Do you have implied/explicit needs?
· Who owns the problem?
· Who is impacted by the problem?
· Is there a risk if they don’t see the upside?
· Do they have a budget?

Next, we will look at that stage where you have the customer ready to receive your proposal. The customer may issue an RFP or, if you are clear on what stage the customer is in, you can get a jump on your competitors with laser guided unsolicited offer. This stage is called the Evaluation of Options.

Good selling!

Steve

Coaching Around the Buying Cycle

In the seminal book, Major Account Sales Strategy (the follow on to SPIN Selling), Neil Rackham described the stages of the buying cycle as follows:


1). Changes Over Time
2). Recognition of Needs
3). Evaluation of Options
4). Resolution of Concerns
5). Implementation

You can familiarize your self with these stages buy reading the book, or clicking here:

http://www.huthwaite.com/go.cfm?do=Page.View&pid=28

In the next five blogs, I will look at coaching tips you can use to help your salesman move the customer around the buying cycle. Let’s start at the top.

Changes Over Time:

Typical Customer Concerns in this phase:
• Are we satisfied with status quo?
• Do external factors present a threat/problem?

Signs that this phase is over:
• Customer expresses uncertainty and dissatisfaction with current state. May express an implied need.

Common Strategic Errors:
• Assuming your position is secure
• Short cutting the cycle and rushing to solutions
• Failure to leverage front liners for Implied Needs

Coaching Questions and Tips:
• Probing for opportunities?
• Detailed customer knowledge?
• Identified all sources of dissatisfaction and acute pain?
• Deeper account penetration?

Other Key Coaching Questions:
• What else can we help them with?
• What challenges are they experiencing?
• Who else might we talk to?
• Will the client act as a referral?
• Can we document success?

Next, we will look at what most believe is the key stage, Recognition of Needs.

Amateur Salespeople Don’t Take Notes – That’s One Reason Why They’re Amateurs

I was on a sales call with one of my colleagues last June. As we drove away in the taxi, he ridiculed my note taking during the call (it was his customer) and bragged about his good memory. He said “Look, if I am taking notes, I am not focusing 100% on what the customer is saying.” This arrogance can cost you. Rule #1: Take good notes.

My colleague’s misguided confidence in his IQ and memory reminded me of Jeffery Fox’s book: Secrets Of Great Rainmakers. In the book, Fox tells a story about waiters who write down their customer’s orders vs. those who don’t and the differences in the gratuity each receives as a result. The waiter who writes down the order earns significantly more in tips. Why? The waiter, who thought he was impressing the customer with his great memory, was really making the customer anxious and uncomfortable. Deep down, the customer was worried that the waiter might not get it right and if he did blow the order, the customer was especially annoyed because the error was preventable. So it goes with a sales call.

When the customer is talking and you are taking notes, the customer is feeling more valued. The fact that you are writing it down, in detail, makes the customer feel that what he or she is telling you is important.

Taking notes signals to the customer that you are a professional and that you are organized. By the way, invest in a high quality portfolio and spend a few hundred dollars on a good pen. I use a Raika sewn bound leather portfolio with gold-edged ruled pages and a Montblanc rollerball pen. Make an impression.

Taking notes helps sharpen the customer’s mind. When the customer knows you are writing it down, she will subconsciously work harder on getting you more detail and greater accuracy in the information she is transmitting. I have seen customers pick up the phone and call other departments to get me more detail during a call. Wow! They WON’T do that if you are just sipping coffee, nodding attentively, and making eye contact.

Taking notes also gives you a great way to summarize as you close out the call. You really focus the customer when you say “let me review my notes with you and make sure I have this requirement clearly understood.” Then, take the customer through what you have written down ... point by point. Finish with “Did I miss anything? Was there anything else you wanted to cover with me?”

Here is a final excellent reason to take good notes. You can re-play the sales call later, in the solitude of your hotel room, and discover fresh insights that maybe you missed on the first pass. You can triangulate with notes you made from a previous call with another executive in the same company. You can share the notes with your team and see what new ideas the notes stir up in their minds. Here is another one. When I refill my Raika, I make a point of re-reading every page of the old diary. Without fail, I find something I missed, an action or request that I need to follow up on, or a note that at the time, seemed unimportant, but now, in light of new developments in the account, are key to achieving my objective and closing a big sale.

Look, if for no other reason, because a lot of amateur salespeople never take notes, you will immediately stand out from your competitors by doing it.

Good Selling!!

Quick Tips for Better Sales Presentations

Years ago, I coached sales teams and executives on how to make more effective presentations to customers. I developed a Quick Tip Card (see picture and double-click on it) no bigger than a normal business card. This little card served as a client's pocket reminder of the key points covered in our coaching session. Many lives were saved.

Side one is titled BEFORE and side two is titled SHOWTIME. I’ll share it with you and add some detail:

BEFORE

Planning
-Consider Audience Expectations.
The customers listen to one main radio station. WII-FM (What’s in it for me). Make sure you are tuned in.

-Know Your Objectives
I ask myself this question...”I want to say (Blank) so that (Blank) will happen”. Fill in the blanks.

-Focus on Three Main Points
If you want to be remembered, three is magic. Four is forgettable. Five is a disaster. In songs, in poetry - three has rhythm. Up up and away in my beautiful balloon...NOT up up up and away. It doesn’t work. Tony Orlando said “Knock three times on the ceiling”. NOT FOUR. The Three Little Pigs. Goldie Locks and the Three Bears...who would remember the fourth bear? Boil it down to three.

Visuals

-K.I.S.S. (Keep it Simple Sam)

5 X 5
If you have to make a “bullet chart” limit it to five bullets per chart, five words per bullet.

One Idea per Chart
Flash Cards! 10 simple Flash Card charts can be covered as quickly and more memorably then five cluttered charts.

Make it Readable
Stand two meters back from your computer screen and look at the power point chart. If you can’t read it, re-do it. The font is too small. What? Won’t fit? See the two rules above.

Message Headlines
Message headlines vs. Subject headlines – very important. Ask yourself this: What is the point of this chart? Make that the title. Example: “Reliability”. This is a subject title...not good. “Our Components are 78% More Reliable than the Competition”. This is a message title...better.

Pictures Instead of Words
A picture is worth a thousand words. So is a diagram, a graph, or a sketch. Enough said.


SHOWTIME

Energy!
If you want people to be “on fire” for your idea, than you need to generate some heat on stage.
-Maintain Eye Contact
From a physical stand-point, this is the single most important thing you can do to improve your effectiveness.

-Keep Ideas Moving
Get your words, to line up and march out of your mouth in single file. Rehearse.

-Use Vocal Variety
Record your rehearsal. Listen. Do you like it? I have heard voices that could put a cup of coffee to sleep. Bring some song-like energy to your voice. Commercial and Industrial showmanship!

-Make Your Body a Visual Aid
Get your body moving. If you are saying “we need to raise productivity”, then raise your arm when you say it. “Sales are going off a cliff” OK, drive your hand off the cliff. See what I mean?

Delivery/Position

-Face the audience (not the screen!)
Too many speakers stare at their slides. Don’t do that. Face the audience all the time.

-Visuals on Your Left
People read from left to right. They take almost all information in left to right. Keep the visual on your left as you face the audience so the eye always comes back to you.

-Direct Their Eyes to the Visuals
Gesture toward your charts when you want them to focus on the charts.

-Tell Them What’s Coming Next
Many amateur speakers keep talking as they change from one chart to the next. Pros finish the idea (mini summary) and then tell the audience what the next chart is about BEFORE punching the advance button. Use a phase like this – “Now, don’t miss this next chart. It’s on productivity and that is the key to driving profits higher in 2010”. Then, change the chart.

OK, those are the tips. Practice them and you will be miles ahead.

Good Selling!

Salesman’s Checklist Can Lower Your Competitive Death Rate

Teams Using “Cheat Sheets” Always Produce Better Results

There was a recent story in the Washington Post by Ceci Connolly claiming that surgical teams following a basic cockpit-style checklist in the operating room, from confirming the patient's name to discussing expected blood loss, reduced the rate of deaths and complications by more than a third. I claim that your sales “death rate” can also drop dramatically if you take a lesson from pilots and now, surgeons, and use a checklist of your own during sales calls.
Connolly’s theory is that the human brain can't remember everything, so it's best to focus on the complicated challenges and leave the simple reminders to a cheat sheet. A salesman’s checklist is a cheat sheet...a basic form of pre-call planning. The sales call can get intense and dynamic. The professional salesperson must focus 100% on what the customer is saying. Listening skills are a salesperson’s most important attribute. You can’t listen effectively if your brain is working overtime to think of the next question you want to ask, or trying to figure out how to get the sales call back on the road and out of the ditch. Here are some ideas:
-Plan and write down your opening statement. Make it a “killer” question or phrase that grabs attention and focuses the client on the problem.
-Ask why it is important to solve this problem.
-Uncover the decision criteria. Rank them in order of importance.

-What is the decision process? Who is involved? (Get introduced to the people you don’t know that have a role in making it happen).
-Has the budget been approved?
-Which other solution providers are competing?
-Interest rate being used to arrive at NPV and IRR
-Carrying cost of inventory/Cost of capital
-Other financial ground rules?
I think you get the idea. Write them all down. If you are involved in complex sales for expensive things, it’s likely that you make sales calls with a team of subject matter experts. Involve them in the checklist planning and execution. That way the team stays more coordinated during the call.
You will get the most out of your sales call checklist if you build it around the potential problems that the customer may be having. Most problems tend to fall into what I call my “basic dozen categories”. Here they are:

1) Profitability
2) Cost
3) Productivity
4) Competition
5) Quality
6) Ease of Operation
7) Reliability
8) Credibility
9) Safety
10) Morale
11) Customer Satisfaction
12) Reputation/image

Think of the basic dozen as a “checklist for a checklist”. Build your checklist around these categories and your sales call death rate will decrease dramatically.

Good selling!!

How to Run a Constructive and Helpful Sales Account Plan Review – Part 2

In the last post, I promised to cover the broad Account Planning categories one might cover and the type of questions one might ask. A sales coach, like a good salesman, learns more and teaches better by asking well planned, insightful questions and letting the team do most of the talking.

ACCOUNT OVERVIEW
Start here - even if YOU know the state of the account. You want the team to be able to articulate it and challenge their thinking.

• Where are we with this account and where should this planning session focus?
• Describe the customer's business model. What are the customer’s longer term goals (24 to 36 months)? Growth strategies? Productivity Initiatives? New product launches?
• How is their financial health? Drill into the balance sheet and income statement. Spending patterns/trends? Financial Ratios? Cash position?
• Where is the customer’s “pain”? How bad is it? Do we understand it? Can we solve it?
• What does their vendor/service provider portfolio look like? Who are the outside “trusted advisers”?
• What would this customer say about us?

INDUSTRY OVERVIEW
• Describe the macro sector trends and economic factors most impacting the customer.
• What significant events have taken place on the customer's competitive landscape (recent loss of market share to a new competitor or disruptive emergent technology)?
• How is the customer doing in the eyes of its end customers and its suppliers?

RELATIONSHIP OVERVIEW
• Who are the key contacts in the relationship?
• Who are our main executive sponsors? What are our goals with each?
• What key relationships have not yet been established? What actions are being taken to close those gaps?
• How are you leveraging alliances/partners to introduce us to new decision makers and influencers in the account?
• Who are the competition’s champions in the account and how do we convert or neutralize them?
• Are we considered a trusted advisor/partner? If yes, how are we leveraging this? What must be done?

COMPETITIVE STRATEGY
• Who are our chief competitors?
• What are the competitor’s goals in the account? What are their key messages?
• What is our competitive strategy? What are our key competitive messages? How are you going to fight them off?

OPPORTUNITY ANALYSIS
• (For the top three opportunities) who is the customer executive sponsor? Rate your relationship with him/her. What should it be?
• What other long term opportunities may exist that have not been identified?
• Is this customer aware of our complete portfolio of products and services?
• Describe your strategy to create new opportunities.

PAST PERFORMANCE
• For each key current project, how would the customer assess our performance? What actions are needed?
• Describe what value we have created for the customer in the last 6 months. Can we “dollarize” it? Is the customer aware of it?

TEAM ALIGNMENT
• How often does the sales team get together and work the account issues? Is our whole company supporting you (shipping, pricing, customer support, call center, billing, etc)? What alignment issues need to be resolved with other parts of our company?
• What can I do (as a sales leader) to support you?
• What investments and resources are required for the priority opportunities? Any special needs? Exceptions? How can I help?

FINANCIAL/REVENUE PLAN
• What are the expected revenues for the next month 12 months?
• What has changed with respect to the Financial Plan since our last review?
• What is the financial risk and exposure in this account?

NEXT STEPS
• What are the team’s top actions resulting from this review (let them tell you and write them down)?

To be effective, these reviews should take place every six to nine months for a top account. Getting Account Planning to stick as a sales discipline is hard work but the pay-offs are potentially huge.

Good Selling!

How to Run a Constructive and Helpful Sales Account Plan Review – Part 1

I like to think of an account plan review this way: Imagine you are giving your customer a chest X-ray. Imagine you are in there diagnosing what's working, not working, and where you can help.

Last week, I promised to layout the steps and the methods for running an effective Sales Account Plan Review. So, here we go by the numbers:

1) Purpose:
Be clear on your purpose with the sales team - are you reviewing the strategy, reviewing execution, or trying to help the sales team solve a particular problem? Could be all three. Be clear at the outset about the difference between an opportunity review (near term focus) and an account plan review (long team focus).

2) Preparation:
Consider sending some questions to the sales team in advance. That sends a powerful signal about your sincerity and your commitment to the discipline of account planning. The goal is collaboration. The output is creation and evolution of a better plan. You don’t want to simply poke holes in the plan of a team that is unprepared. That is a culture killer.

3) Elevate:
Keep the team focused on the long term view of the account. Poor account plan reviews focus on the near term sales opportunities. This is wrong. Don’t get the team drawn into deals in the pipeline and tactics. It may be appropriate to cover some major deals but only to determine if you need to schedule a deeper opportunity review later. Account strategy is more than a string of individual opportunity strategies.

4) Meeting Length:
For a key account, one should typically schedule 90 minutes. Give it the time it deserves. Give the sales team YOUR time.

5) Time Allocation/Approach
Allocate time to different parts of the plan depending on the planning needs of the account. For example, if we are weak on our relationship strategy, spend a lot of time on that. Account strategy also changes depending on if we are penetrating, growing share, or fighting off a competitor.

Next week, I will cover the broad account planning categories and the type of questions you might ask.

Good selling!