Undoubtedly, The Beatles were a successful band. But was there more than talent at work to help build their success? Malcolm Gladwell has written some of the best selling non-fiction books of the 21^st century.  They include ‘Blink’, ‘Tipping Point’ and more recently, ‘Outliers’, which examines some of the factors that contribute to personal success.

One of the interesting points which Gladwell highlights is that there are sometimes aspects beyond an individual’s control which play an important part in success. These can be environmental, cultural or historical. And a second point is that there are also actions which an individual can take to increase their chances of success – despite the circumstances they find themselves in.

As salespeople our success is measured openly every month – and if there are things we can do (or not do) to increase our chances of success, we’d be wise to do these things. This short article will see what we can learn from Gladwell’s book – and then provides some actions we can take to apply these insights in our sales world.

Before we look at what we can do – let’s quickly look at one of the examples Gladwell cited regarding external factors which impact success but which are beyond our control (or are they?).

Sales lessons from junior hockey players

Ice hockey is the national sport of Canada – and has strong junior competitions from a young age. Like many junior sports, the better players have an opportunity to play in regional competitions as well as local competitions. By their mid to late teens, players are beginning to emerge who will go on to play professionally. It would be reasonable to assume that a regional representative team of the best 16 year olds would have a spread of birthdays across the 12 months of the year. This was not the case for a recent set of teams examined. In fact – 70% were born in the first half of the year (January to June) – and the remainder in the second 6 months. This seems surprising – given that by sixteen, many boys would be of a similar skill level and physical maturity across their peer group.

Why has this happened? And what does it mean for success?

A Canadian psychologist – Roger Barnsley – first drew attention to this phenomenon of relative age in the mid 1980s. It’s not that boys of age 16 or 18 are particularly different in abilities – the reason is that boys of 9 and 10 are. The cut-off age for being selected for rep teams is January 1. So a boy turning 10 on that date would be competing for selection with other boys who are also turning 10 much later in that calendar year – and there is a physical difference between boys of this age. But – shouldn’t this even out by the later teen years? Theoretically, perhaps, but by then a type of self fulfilling prophesy has set in. The older boys when selected in the first rep sides receive better coaching, play more games, and play with and against better players. In this environment it’s understandable that they will continue to develop their skills – and be selected as 11 year olds, then 12 year olds and so on.

So – in this environment – success is skewed based on age, not talent. The lesson is that – if we want to ensure we get the best talent and give people an even opportunity to succeed – we need to ensure that artificial barriers are not placed in front of people. Often these barriers are hard to see form the inside and can be processes that have been developed over time. Rarely is the intent to skew talent development –after all, the coach of any elite team would want to see all potential stars be given the opportunity to shine.

Some lessons for sales managers:

• Ensure that all team members are given opportunities to display and develop their skills and abilities. Tailor development programs to suit individual experience and skill levels;
• Provide ample opportunity for all to work in environments where they can display their talent. All territories are not created equal – and not all product categories provide the same opportunities. Especially for newer team members – ensure opportunities are fair;
• Don’t judge performance too quickly. Expertise needs time to develop – many managers have unrealistic expectations of what salespeople (especially new salespeople) can achieve in short time frames. And early success can simply be due to blind luck – be wary of quick comparisons between peer groups.

Some lessons for salespeople:

• Sometimes we find ourselves in situations where the odds are against us – despite our best efforts. In the hockey example, some younger kids were doing their best, but their chances against taller, faster and more skilled players were simply not even. So – don’t be too hard on yourself by making unrealistic comparisons to more successful performers. 
• However, don’t become a victim. Instead, look for ways to develop skills to become the equal of better performers. Work on product knowledge, communication skills and market understanding. Get a coach – and find a mentor.
• Be realistic about your products and your organisation. Whilst not making quick or emotional decisions, look to work with the best in the business – it makes a difference.

So – the environment can conspire against. And sometimes we can do things to help overcome these obstacles – and sometimes we can’t. But is there anything else we can do to help us be successful in our endeavours?

According to Gladwell there is.

As a general rule successful people have worked hard to make their job look easy. And it usually takes about 10,000 hours of effort to become a master practitioner. Gladwell looked at what separated peak performers from others – in the fields of music, sport and business – and whilst talent is a factor, a bigger factor for sustained success is doing the hard yards and developing skill.

Sales lessons from The Beatles

Overnight success in highly competitive artistic endeavours is rare. The suddenly ‘new’ actor has often spent many years doing support roles and practicing their skills before being selected for a major role. It’s rare for a chess master to emerge before having 10 years senior experience. Mozart wrote his best music later in his career.

And The Beatles themselves attribute much of their later success to the years they spent playing hours on end in the clubs of Hamburg early in their career. The Beatles began as The Quarrymen, playing skiffle and fronted by John Lennon supported by some school friends. Over the next four years, the group played in and around Liverpool, and eventually morphed into The Beatles. By 1960, Lennon together with Paul McCartney and George Harrison were the core of the group. The band played mainly covers of popular songs – but the song writing partnership of Lennon-McCartney was beginning to develop.  Over the next couple of years, Ringo Starr would become the fourth member of the group, replacing Pete Best behind the drums. The other regular member at this time – Stuart Sutcliffe – left the band in 1961.

By the end of 1960 the band was established in Liverpool, and started to look further afield. They were booked to play the first of what would become a series of residencies at a number of clubs in Hamburg over the next few years. The club area in Hamburg was also the red-light district – peopled with a colourful array of characters. The clubs provided free music – but expensive beer. Patrons expected entertainment – and lots of it.

The Beatles were later to say that this period in Hamburg was their ‘apprenticeship’, where they learned to play – and where they learned to work a crowd. It was common for the band to play 4 to 5 hours a night, seven days a week during their visits. According to Lennon:

“We had to play for hours and hours on end. Every song lasted twenty minutes and had twenty solos in it. That’s what improved the playing. There was nobody to copy from. We played what we liked best and the Germans liked it as long as it was loud.”

And their playing did improve – enough for them to be able to make their first recording. Toward the end of their time in Hamburg, their first hit – ‘Love Me Do’ – was recorded and released. And the rest – as they say – is history as The Beatles went on to become one of the most – if not the most – successful pop bands of the last 50 years. The point of this story is simple – it takes time and practice to become good at whatever we choose to do. Talent alone won’t translate into success.

Your 10,000 hours

As salespeople, sales managers and business people we need to practice and refine our craft. 10,000 hours is a lot of time to invest – so we need to invest wisely. It’s not much use doing the same thing over and over – we need to actively plan and develop our knowledge, skills and ability to perform at our best and achieve the results the we and our organisations are looking for.

Before you look to build a personal development plan, here are some key questions to answer to see if you are on track to become the master of your chosen vocation:

• Do you have short, medium and long term career goals?
• Is your current selling role serving your longer term career goals?
• Does your current employer offer a career path that is attractive to you?
• Do you have the knowledge, skills, abilities, resources and contacts to perform your current role at its peak?
• Do you have the knowledge, skills, abilities, resources and contacts to perform your (anticipated) future roles at their peak?

Ultimately, your success will be defined by you – not others.

If you don’t have a clear vision of what you want your career to look like – best to do a little soul searching and find out what’s important to you and what you want to achieve in your short journey through this life. These things can always change –and will often be impacted by circumstances beyond our control. However, if you don’t have a rough idea where you want to go in life and what you want to achieve, it’s very hard to plan your own development.

Assuming that you do have a plan – does your current position serve to reach your goals or not?

If not – back to the drawing board for you too. If your current role isn’t serving to achieve your personal goals – for any reason – reassess your situation. Again, don’t make quick decisions – but do look to find a role – either within your organisation or without – that does serve your longer goals. Do this as soon as practicable – given your own personal situation – but don’t procrastinate.

Assuming your current sales role does support your career goals, then you need to assess the gaps in your knowledge and skill set which you need to fill in order to achieve your goals. If they lie outside your sales role – plan and work to develop the knowledge you need, the contacts you need and the resources necessary to move forward. Then – continue to make small steps to achieve your goals. Be realistic and prepared to adapt.

And in relation to your sales role, begin your development plan by answering these questions:

• Is your product knowledge the best it could be?
• Is your knowledge of your own organisation strong enough to present it in its best light?
• Are you strongly connected with key influencers in your organisation?
• Is your industry and market knowledge the best it could be?
• Are you connected with key influencers in your industry and market?
• Do you have the general business knowledge to deliver value for your clients?
• Do you have the insight to view the world from your customer’s perspective – and from the perspective of their customer?

Answer these questions honestly, rate which are the most important to work on, then build a written development plan to bridge the gaps. Ensure you spend the next 10,000 hours learning things that will help build your success.

Discuss your plan with successful peers and managers you trust – and look for advisors to help you quickly fill the gaps. And get a good coach. It’s worth the investment.

Good luck on your success journey.

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Find out more about Malcolm Gladwell and his books (including ‘Outliers’) here:

www.gladwell.com

And if you’re interested in their early years and what the Beatles were up to during their time in Hamburg (including more quotes from John), you’ll find some good stories here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Quarrymen

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beatles_in_Hamburg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beatles_at_The_Cavern_Club

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.  “Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Sales success lessons from junior hockey players and The Beatles

We’ve all done it – and will no doubt do it again.  Despite our best thinking, we make bad decisions.  And when our job is to make the sale or manage the sales process, bad decisions can have ramifications that everyone else in our organisation can see.

It was always handy for Captain Kirk to have an un-emotional, rational lieutenant in the form of Mr Spock to guide his decisions as they went boldly where no one had gone before. Today, Vulcan side-kicks are hard to come by – and they can have their own peculiar problems.

However, perhaps there’s a way for us to channel our inner Mr Spock and apply a little more intention to our decisions – and get better results in the process.

Recent research presented in the Harvard Business Review by Andrew Campbell, Jo Whitehead and Sydney Finkelstein, has shown that there are reasons why we make poor decisions – and outlines actions we can take to reduce our chances of making bad decisions.  This article will review some aspects of this research and apply the findings to a sales and sales management setting.

The core of the problem with human decision making, say Campbell and his co-authors, lies with two hardwired processes that we all rely on when we make decisions.  Our brains lead us to do two things:

1. recognise patterns, based on our experience; and
2. interpret these patterns in an emotional manner – again based on personal experience.

Both these things have been developed to allow us to operate in a complex world. In a more primitive setting it’s important to be able to quickly recognise whether a person is a friend or a foe; whether the pretty berry we’re about to eat is sweet or poisonous; and whether the charging woolly mammoth is heading our way.

In today’s organisational setting, we also make quick decisions. Is the meeting the boss has called really important – or can I afford to skip it; can I incorporate the data from last month’s report in the new report I’m writing; can we reallocate our warehousing space to defer a move to new premises for another 12 months.

We make thousands of decisions every day. Many are inconsequential in the larger scheme of things; some will have unintended consequences which may be good or bad; and yet others will have major consequences – again good or bad – and often we don’t give some of these the decisions the attention they deserve.

The reason?

Pattern recognition and emotional tagging.

Pattern recognition helps us make quick decisions – which are usually appropriate. It helps us know which foods are safe to eat, and to know which meetings to make sure we attend. Our very survival can depend on these decisions, and we make them without thinking at all about the information we’ve processed, the conclusions we’ve drawn and the actions we’ve taken.

The typical journey from home to office is full of life and death decisions that we don’t think about. We wait for the light at the crossing to turn green before we cross – and even then we take another look in case an impatient driver is late for their arrival. We choose to wait until it is safe before we alight the tram. And again we take care to avoid passing traffic. We take care to avoid the icy pathway, and go another way. And so it goes.

As well as our experience of previous patterns making our life easy – and safe – as we journey to work, we also make some decisions based on previous emotional experiences. We choose not to walk down a particular laneway which would make our journey shorter because it felt unsafe when we used it 12months ago. We avoid sitting in a certain section of the tram carriage because we nearly missed our stop when we sat there on another occasion – even though it may mean standing up.

We are creatures of habit – based on past experience which informs our behaviour today.

Interesting, you may say – but what has this got to do with how I perform my sales role, or my sales management role.

Consider these business examples that Campbell raises.

1. In the early 1980s, the emerging word processing industry was dominated by Wang Laboratories. The company’s founder, An Wang, realised that the sector was changing and would become heavily influenced by the emerging personal computer. Wang had a choice – utilise a proprietary operating system to build a product to rival the emerging competitors, or adapt a platform from a new third party – Microsoft – which would allow him to compete directly with the fledgling PC market. According to Campbell, Wang decided not to use anything associated with IBM, due to a past experience which had led him to dislike IBM. Wang’s decision – based on an emotional tag from his past – proved fateful, with his company disappearing as the environment moved to operating standards.
2. A second example involves the purchase of the Snapple drink brand by Quaker Oats in the 1990s. The chairman at the time, William Smithburg, had great memories of the success he had enjoyed with the acquisition of Gatorade. The similarities between the products were not as substantial as hoped, and Quaker ended up offloading the drink some time later at a loss of in excess of US$1 billion.

Both decisions were coloured by past experience which actually hindered the decision.

And – as professional salespeople and sales managers – I’m sure we can all recall a time when we’ve made a poor sales decision. These decisions can take a wide range of forms, including these:

• approaching markets in a new company the same way as we did at either a competitor or in a different industry;
• assuming industry conditions are the same today as what we experienced in the past;
• preparing to deliver presentations in a way which has worked before – but which doesn’t take into account the specific nuances of individual clients; and
• believing that a strong competitor yesterday will be a strong competitor today.

This is not to say that learning from the past, and applying behaviours which have led to success is wrong. Not at all – when particular things work we’re wise to continue to apply them. However, we can also continue to apply ideas and behaviours which worked 6 years – or 6 months – ago which aren’t as successful as they used to be.

As the world and our sales environments continue to be subject to constant change, we need to constantly question our methods – and the decisions which underlie them.

So – what can we do to avoid the problems that come from patterns and emotional tags and the human biases that accompany them? Campbell and his friends have a few suggestions for us.

1.  Look for fresh analysis and experience. If the decision relates to a major account sale – look at what successful colleagues are doing in the commercial or channel area. Ask the view of people in service, or customer delivery. Look at colleagues or customers in different situations and apply a different perspective.

2.  Open the decision to debate. Many leaders have strong personalities – and can be prone to enforcing their ideas and decisions on others. There is a place for the learning leader – the leader who genuinely encourages debate from the team. Successful teams tend to be diverse in experience and background. Ensure you team is diverse in terms of gender, ethnicity, experience, age, etc – and then actively tap this diversity. Not only will it deliver insights no one individual can achieve on their own, but – when done with authenticity and consistency – encourage and build engagement with the team when they see that their opinion and views are valued.

3.  Apply rules and governance. I’m not advocating rampant bureaucracy. But a checklist for particular key decisions can ensure that decisions are made more rationally – and not emotively based on poor judgement.

We don’t have a Mr Spock at our right hand to be a vigilant guide for our decisions. But we can learn to accept that we can’t make any decision in life without the experience of the past coming to bear. We tend to leap to conclusions, and are reluctant to revisit these initial assessments.

However – if we want to ensure we get more decisions right, we’d be wise to firstly accept that our decisions are coloured by our past – and then apply some of the simple rules outlined in this article.

“Fascinating, Mr Kirk, simply fascinating.”

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Access the full HBR article here:

http://hbr.org/2009/02/why-good-leaders-make-bad-decisions/ar/1

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.  “Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Why sales leaders make bad decisions

Over 75 people interested in learning the latest ideas, trends and innovation in professional selling and sales management joined me recently at Luna Park in Sydney for the sixth and final Sales Effectiveness breakfast event for 2010.  In a fitting end to the series, we discussed emerging trends in the world of professional selling ending with Michael Schiffner and Robin Gibson encouraging us to celebrate the “death” of sales training and to welcome the emergence of sales development as the new performance paradigm.   We’ll be back in 2011 with another series of events to inform and educate the sales community.  Until then, here are some highlights from November 2010 for you.

Giles Rhodes.  “A taxonomy of sales roles: matching performance & reward mix with different sales roles” 

Are you paying your sales people what they’re worth?

Are you paying too much – or too little?

Giles Rhodes gave us some insights into a recent study by consulting firm Aon-Hewitt which looked at over 25,000 sales roles and the pay structure associated with each role.

We know it’s important to get pay right – but with such a variation in sales roles, how is it possible to compare roles?  The study Giles discussed shed light on this by breaking sales roles into their components, and by so doing, a taxonomy of sales roles begins to emerge.

The Aon-Hewitt analysis identified 12 components that informed sales roles.  These included:

• Sales mode – direct or channel
• Sales focus – new business or account management
• Team selling – sole operator or team member
• Product or service selling
• Sales cycle – long or short
• Product focus – single product or product range
• Plus another 6 parameters

This structured approach to describing sales roles by activities informs the pay structures of roles with specific requirements to ensure that managers match appropriate reward structures with particular sales activities.

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-november-2010/

You’ll find more information about the local work done by HR firm Aon Hewitt here:

http://www.hewittassociates.com/Intl/AP/en-AU/Default.aspx

Michael Schiffner & Robin Gibson.  “Why sales training doesn’t work”

Michael and Robyn began their presentation with a quick activity designed to both engage the audience (it’s an early morning event, after all), and demonstrate how our competitiveness can sometimes get in the way of achieving our goals.

Not only did this get the group up and moving – but it laid the platform for an engaging discussion on what is the function of sales training.  Michael’s key point is simple – but has extensive ramifications for how we approach training and preparing our sales teams.

Many of our current training models are mechanistic and more attuned to a time when our people were viewed as cogs in organisational machines.  Whilst this may have worked in days gone by – it doesn’t work in today’s world with today’s people.  What is needed is an organic approach to training – a developmental mindset.

Key to establishing this mindset is the application of the following three frameworks:

Create a sales development blueprint

Define individual development plans

Cultivate a coaching culture – with a focus on field coaching

Michael then shared his six step process for coaching sales people in the field:

Step 1 – Define the coaching objectives for the day

Step 2 – Pre-call Planning

Step 3 – Document your observations

Step 4 – Post-call Debrief and Feedback

Step 5 – Developmental Actions and SMART Goals

Step 6 – Feedback for you as a coach

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-november-2010/

There’s more information about Michael Schiffner & Collective Intelligence here:

http://www.collectiveintelligence.net.au/

 Special Guest – Michelle Newton (Sales Training Manager Fairfax Media/Rural Press) – “Lessons from 3000 hours of sales coaching” 

Over the past 6 years Michelle Newton has co-ordinated the delivery of over 24 sales development programs to a sales force of over 500.  During this time she has personally delivered over 3000 sales coaching and training sessions in all parts of Australia and New Zealand – from Mt Isa to Launceston; from Perth to Auckland.

Michelle gave a wide ranging presentation, drawing on her extensive sales development experience, and also shared some insights to some emerging research about how the sales function differs due to the influence of gender, geography and generation.  Here are just a few of the many insights she presented:

1. A casual approach to the sales function tends to be used by salespeople in the 40s who have resided in a town for 15 years or more
2. Women salespeople like to know a lot about their clients but prefer a distant rather than a close relationship with clients
3. Men talk more than women (really!)

If you missed the event – you can still see and hear the complete presentation set on DVD.  Order you copy here by registering as a virtual attendee of the breakfast series:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-november-2010/

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Highlights from the November 12 Sales Effectiveness breakfast

Over 70 people interested in learning the latest ideas, trends and innovation in professional selling and sales management joined me recently at Luna Park in Sydney for the fifth Sales Effectiveness breakfast event for 2010. 

As with the previous four, the feedback was fantastic – I hope to see you for the final breakfast in this series on November 15, 2010.  Till then, here are some highlights from October for you.

Yvonne Sum.  “Learning partnerships: practical sales leadership lessons from the home front” 

Dr Sum gave one of the most inspiring presentations in this year’s breakfast series.  Yvonne set the scene for her insights into leadership by talking about change and how we face a world of rapid and often unexpected change. 

One way to be an effective leader in this environment is to engage and build “learning partnerships”.  Put simply – this means that as leaders we need to partner with our team members – and to harness the power of mutual learning and support.   Leaders need to move from being judges – and become partners with their teams to build connection, knowledge and deliver effective action.

Yvonne outlined a simple – yet powerful – 3 part framework (ABC) to help us all do ordinary things well and in the process build extraordinary performance.  Here are the key words in this framework:

• Authenticity
• Be present
• Communicate

If leaders embrace and action these things they will over time build a personal platform to allow learning partnerships to flourish. 

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-october-2010/

You’ll find more information about Yvonne’s work here:

http://www.dryvonnesum.com/

Rob Salisbury.  “Building a successful personal identity and sales career: being CEO of YOU Pty Ltd”

Rob’s lively presentation emphasised the importance of understanding your personal strengths – and building upon them.  He gave some great examples of the characteristics of successful people – and the actions they’ve taken to ensure their success.  As well as mentioning well known business people and sporting stars – Rob also used less conventional examples, including Sarah Marie who had her period of celebrity following her appearance on “Big Brother”.

Rob then outlined a 6 part process to build your identity and sales career:

1. Promote your personal strengths
2. Market your unique skills
3. Present your personal style
4. Sell benefits to clients
5. Deliver unprecedented value
6. Position your expertise

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-october-2010/

There’s more information about Rob Salisbury and his work here:

http://strategicresources.com.au/

Special Guest – Barbara Lichti (legal counsel) – “Legal pitfalls every sales professional needs to avoid” 

Barbara took us on a quick tour of some of the aspects of Australian consumer law which impact salespeople today – including discussions on competition and misleading and deceptive conduct.  We were reminded of the consequences of acting in a collusive manner, and provided with concrete examples of how people had made mistakes – both intentionally and unintentionally – by having discussions with competitors.

She also discussed the implications of how social media can have a negative impact on our work relations – and can also lead to possible legal problems.

Barbara left us on a positive note by giving us three things to remember about handling the myriad of laws which can impact our sales activities:

1. Always act independently and stick to non-business topics when mixing with competitors
2. Ensure that the information you provide to others, and the overall impression you convey is truthful and accurate
3. Don’t say anything on social media you wouldn’t want to see on the front page of the local newspaper

If you missed the event – you can still see and hear the complete presentation set on DVD.  Order you copy here by registering as a virtual attendee of the breakfast series:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-october-2010/

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Highlights from the October 15 Sales Effectiveness breakfast

As salespeople we live in a funny world.

Our job is to help our organisations grow by selling more and more of the stuff our organisations produce.  Growth is at the centre of the expectations of the people in our organisations who set sales targets, budgets and forecasts.  And you can bet that this year’s targets are higher than last year’s – and next year’s will be higher again.

I talk with lots of salespeople and sales managers from all sorts of industries – large and small – here in Australia, and from other parts of the globe.  From these discussions, I’ve noticed a couple of things regarding this relentless push for growth.

Firstly, most sales managers accept the targets they’re given, but know that they’re often unrealistic & unachievable.  They simply move forward as discussion on the subject with others in the organisation is usually fraught with danger, and can sometimes be an act of organisational suicide.

And secondly – at a personal level – many salespeople realise that an insatiable quest to grow – to consume more and more “stuff” at the expense of world resources and personal and social compromise is something that doesn’t fit with their world view.

Here’s an alternative vision from Professor Tim Jackson of how we can prosper as individuals and organisations – and move from the constraints of an economic model built on inexorable growth.

Unrealistic?  Maybe – maybe not.

As more and more people look to balance their lives with competing forces – internal and external – ideas like Tim’s could gain great traction.  And the implications for how and what we sell are enormous.

Professor Tim Jackson is Professor of Sustainable Development and Director of the Research Group on Lifestyles, Values and Environment (RESOLVE) at the University if Surrey in the UK.  For over 20 years Tim has been at the forefront of research and teaching in sustainability.  His latest book – “Prosperity without Growth” – provides an alternative view of how our economic future could look.

You can find out more about Professor Jackson and his work here:

http://www.ces-surrey.org.uk/people/staff/tjackson.shtml

You can read a review of Tim’s latest book – “Prosperity without Growth” here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jan/23/properity-without-growth-tim-jackson

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 Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Can we survive as salespeople in a world without economic growth?

Over 70 people interested in learning the latest ideas, trends and innovation in professional selling and sales management joined me recently at Luna Park in Sydney for the fourth Sales Effectiveness breakfast event for 2010.  As with the first series, the feedback was fantastic – I hope to see you for the fifth breakfast for 2010 on October 15, 2010.  Till then, here are some highlights from September for you.

Sally-Anne Cotton.  “The alchemy of 21st century selling: aligning balance, congruence and intent to deliver golden results” 

Sally-Anne opened her presentation by pointing to a growing body of evidence to demonstrate that organisations with strong adaptive cultures which are based on shared values will outperform companies with a rigid or weak culture by a significant margin.

 Based on these studies, Sally-Anne presents a compelling case for the need for all sales teams to achieve balance, congruence and alignment to allow positive cultures to thrive, and, consequently, for organisations to thrive.  These items can be summarised like this:

Balance – between the needs of customers, salespeople, sales teams and organisations

Alignment – between the values and beliefs of the individual salespeople and the vision and mission of the organisation

This balance and alignment between individuals and organisations then needs to be delivered with intention.  This intention needs to be purposeful and focussed on the common good.  When combined in an authentic manner – the chance of long term individual and organisational success is dramatically increased.

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-september-2010/

Mo Fox.  “What you see is not always what you get: changing how you perceive things to achieve better sales results”

Mo’s presentation was in interactive delight.

Her message for salespeople – in fact for all of us – is that we need to understand that underlying structures and patterns exist everywhere – and that the better we understand these structures and patterns, the better outcomes we will achieve.

Mo took us on a journey to discover our inner artist.  Artists understand structure – and the structure that Mo taught us was the human face.  Despite some protestations and suspicion, we all took up our crayons, and proceeded to draw one of our breakfast companions.  For most of us, our early efforts were somewhat juvenile – and a touch embarrassing. 

However, when we were learnt some basic underlying structures – where eyes sit in faces, the relationship between our ears and our eyes, and a few more – our second efforts overall were much better than our first.

A great lesson for those of us in sales.  Look for underlying structures in our customers and prospects business.  Look for patterns in our clients industries.  Take the time to look and the picture we build will take on greater clarity – and deliver vastly improved outcomes.

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-september-2010/

There’s more information about Mo Fox and her work here:

http://www.mofox.com/

Special Guest – Eddie Paterson (Telstra) – “Getting things right: An introduction to Human Performance Improvement approaches, tools & techniques to maximise sales performance & avoid wasting time, effort and budget” 

Of all organisational functions, the sales function has the greatest focus on outcomes – and outcomes are determined by performance.  In this short presentation, Eddie Paterson introduced the group to a range of little known – but highly effective – performance models and tools.

We were reminded of Tom Gilbert’s base model of performance:

P(erformance) = B(ehaviour) X E(nvironment)

Building on this, Eddie suggested we consider the following questions in terms of sales performance:

• How much of traditional classroom training gets applied in the workplace?
• What proportion of the causes of an employee’s performance gaps can be attributed to a lack of knowledge and skills?
• If training is the answer, what was the question?
• How often do we treat the symptoms of performance issues and NOT the cause?
• How many of the root causes of performance gaps are likely to be successfully closed by a single intervention?

This leads to a summary of Human Performance Technology (HPT), as expounded by the International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI).  Put simply, HPT is:

• A process to influence behaviour and accomplishment.
• A systematic combination of three fundamental processes:

–        performance analysis

–        cause analysis (pain chain)

–        intervention selection

Find out more about The International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI), here:

www.ispi.org

Find out more about Thomas Gilbert and his performance model here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Gilbert_(engineer)

If you missed the event – you can still see and hear the complete presentation set on DVD.  Order you copy here by registering as a virtual attendee of the breakfast series:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-september-2010/

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Highlights from the September 17 Sales Effectiveness breakfast

Sales Performance International (SPI) is a global leader in helping companies market and sell high-value solutions.

In his role as the director of business development at SPI, Tim Sullivan works with clients to find and capture the best practices of the world’s top performing sales professionals and teams.  He is a co-author of one of the best selling sales books of recent years – “The Solution Selling Fieldbook”.  Tim is based in the SPI offices in Charlotte, North Carolina.

I’ve had a number of conversations with Tim recently when we discussed things sales and selling. During one of these discussions I asked Tim to share his experience working with successful sales managers – and what are the key things managers can do to help their teams excel.

Tim, you regard sales managers – line managers – as critical in effective selling.  Why?

First of all, sales managers today are the lynch pin, the whole keystone if you will in this bridge of sales process and sales as an art form.  They’re the ones that can bring all of this together.  And in fact, when we implement solution selling and sales process for our customers, our first and primary focus is on the first line sales managers.  Because if they can’t take ownership of that process and support and sustain that with their direct sales people or working with customers, then it’s very, very difficult to get the kind of incremental improvement and return on a sustainable basis that we talked about today. 

I understand that you place a high importance on the value of process in the sales function.  Other than this, what factors do you see as being indicative of best practice in sales management?

I think there are three things that managers need to do today that are a little bit different than it was even a few years ago.  First and foremost, sales managers today need to take a hard look at the numbers. To a certain extent, they need to be very rigorous in their analysis of sales pipelines, what’s happening in opportunities and what the skill gaps are in their sales people.  This requires an analytical bent which some mangers are ill equipped for.  Especially if they were high performing sales people before they went into management.  Many of these high flying salespeople – who we refer to as “eagles” – often act intuitively when performing their sales role.  Whilst this approach may assist them in practicing the art of sales – it’s not what they need to be a good manager.

So what can we do about this?  How do you make it possible for an intuitive seller that we promote to manager to have that analytical capability?  Simply – you give them a standard to compare against.  Again, that’s the reason why sales process is so great for managers, because now they can look at those verifiable outcomes and opportunities.  They can look at how it rolls up the entire pipeline and then have some objective criteria for determining how they can analyse the appropriate gaps, either in overall performance or in individual opportunities or in individual sales person.

So first and foremost, provide managers with the tools, the processes and the standards to be able to do that kind of analysis objectively and be able to use that as a basis for improving their sales team. 

And – if I recall correctly – a second important item is coaching?

Absolutely, sales managers today need to really know how to coach.  And I will tell you that coaching in the ‘90s was basically going out with sales reps and helping be a super closer, or showing sales people how they did it, and providing worldly advice.  That doesn’t work well today.  Coaching today means having a standard by which we all agree upon is a level of kind of behavioural excellence that we want to see in sales people and being able to compare the behaviour and performance that’s going on and get sales people to understand where the gaps are and then map out a plan for improvement even for the best performers.  Because not everybody is great at every aspect of selling all the time. It is both an art form and a science.  So knowing how to coach is less about what the manager would do and more about knowing how the sales person compares to that standard of excellence.

Again, a good reason for having a defined sales process.  And again, that’s very difficult for managers that, we tend to promote those eagles that are top performers into those management positions.  And asking those people to objectively measure and then objectively test is very, very difficult.

And where does leadership fit here?

I think the third thing that managers need to have I think is a little bit different than what we’ve seen in the past is that they need to have leadership skills.  And leadership skills are best exemplified by their ability to take these kinds of initiatives, wrap themselves around it, take ownership of it, make it right for their organizations and their people, and give their people the resources that they need to be successful.  And I would say that a lot of times, what we see with managers, especially first line managers, is often they’ll resist these kinds of initiatives because it’s different than the way they’ve done things in the past.  Well, the world is different today.  The economic environment is different today.  It’s different in different parts of the world.  You’re selling different things to more educated customers.  So the patterns of behaviour that made you successful as a sales person are certainly going to be different than they are today.  Not totally different, but there’s going to be enough for a significant difference.

And in summary, Tim?

I think a lot of managers we work with today tend to cling to old behaviours and not take that leadership stance.  So, these three things – an analytical capability, an ability to objectively coach and develop people, and then the leadership ability to be able to understand what’s happening dynamically in the marketplace and with your customers, and bring the right resources to bear.  These are the three aspects of the great sales managers today. 

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Find out more about Tim Sullivan and SPI here:

http://www.spisales.com

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Three things sales managers must do to ensure sustainable team success

How important are you for your clients to stay in touch with?

Why would potential clients want to meet you?

We know that professional selling is undertaking a major revolution in approach, application and execution.  We know that if you don’t bring extra value to the sales encounter – then you should expect to be treated like a commodity, and have buyers simply focus on your price once you’ve ticked the essential shopping list items.

At a recent event I hosted, sales researcher Neil Rackham stated that if salespeople can’t bring additional value to the negotiation table, then they’re wasting their time – and if they don’t change from walking brochures to sources of information, they’ll soon become redundant.

In this article, we’ll assume you know this.  Not only do you know this – but you’ve built a strong store of knowledge, expertise and experience which your clients (and potential clients) value.

Now what?

Write about it – and share your knowledge with the world. 

And you don’t need to be Shakespeare to write a good article, white paper – or even a book or book chapter which resonates with your audience.  Simply follow some simple tips, and you’ll end up with a good piece of work which will introduce you and your expertise to an eager audience.  After all, if you really do have the knowledge and experience to solve other people’s problems – they’ll want to know about it.

Why write?

It’s simple – written articles – especially those formally published – have credibility and add to the authority of the writer.

From our youngest years, we’ve been told that the library is the place to find information, learning and wisdom.  And especially in today’s digital world of way too much information, the published word is rightly assumed to carry more weight than the other 99% of stuff which is just on-line.

We also assume that if you’ve taken the time to write and publish, then you probably know a bit about your subject – and probably more than most.

Published material has been sifted – it points to material that others also think has value.

So – the reasons are simple.  Producing a published piece of work will give you these four things that all experts seek:

• Credibility
• Authority
• A unique voice in a cluttered world
• Wide reach

Plus lots more, including these:

• People looking for speakers at events are more likely to consider you if you’re published
• Journalists, bloggers, and anyone looking for an expert comment will be more likely – and able – to seek you out
• It looks great on a CV or a submission
• Other experts will look to connect with you

And – there’s that nice feeling of knowing you’ve done it!

Who should write?

Anyone who wants to build a credible, authoritative and authentic profile with others.

Do you have knowledge, expertise or experience in a field which could benefit others?

If so – you’re a good candidate to be published.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re an employee of a large corporation, a partner in a small consultancy or an individual consultant, coach or trainer.  All that matters is that you have information of value – and want others to know that you’re an expert in a particular field.

If you’re a senior salesperson or sales manager with a commitment to your industry – you will certainly have insights of value.  These may be in the form of consolidated data, case studies, industry research or similar which will be of value to a wide audience.

If you’re a consultant, coach, trainer or similar type of industry advisor you should have a wealth of experience and – most probably – specific research or methodologies which can form the basis of a quality article, white paper or book.

Some things before you start.

It’s all about your audience.

We’re talking about reaching an audience in the business and personal development field – so it’s about them, the audience – not you.  They want better results, different outcomes, or whatever it is that’s important in their business and personal lives.  They don’t care about you or your company – only what you can share that will help them get what they want.

If you want to write about yourself, your wonderful company and your fantastic products, great.  Write a brochure, or a product specification.  Writing from your perspective about you is unlikely to help you develop your profile as a credible authority.

What we’re talking about writing here is a piece in the form of a book, book chapter, article, white paper – call it what you like – that shares information, ideas, case studies, experience, research, etc, etc that can translate into actions that others can take to improve their position.  Some blog pieces can qualify – but generally blogs are shorter, and are often topical in nature.

Focus on your audience.  If you can say yes to most of these questions – you’ve probably got what it takes to make a valuable written piece:

• I know a lot about my topic
• My experience is relevant to others
• I’ve developed insights by gaining a wide exposure to my topic
• I’m passionate about my topic
• I want to help others achieve their goals and avoid making “basic” mistakes
• I can support my position with evidence and third party references
• I’m well connected with others who have expertise on my topic
• I can confidently talk about my topic to an audience
• I’ve read widely on my topic and know the underlying theories and practice

If you can – honestly – say yes to most of these items, you’ll produce a good piece with relative ease.  If you think there are some gaps in your experience and knowledge – work to fill them and then re-visit the writing process.  Whilst you don’t need to be THE definitive expert before you enter the published world, you don’t want to be known for simply restating the obvious, or worse, getting it wrong.

When you publish today – the world is potentially your audience.  A bad piece will be out there forever – so don’t produce something which can’t stand up to criticism and scrutiny.  However, don’t delay because you don’t have an encyclopaedic knowledge of your topic.  If your experience and expertise is limited to a specific part of a topic – great – but acknowledge this.

And here’s the good thing.  By writing with authority and expertise on your topic you achieve 2 goals – your audience gets something they need AND your personal credibility increases.  This delivers a genuine win-win situation for all involved.

But – you have to give to receive.  Don’t tease, people quickly see through this.  Even if your first pieces are short – make sure they stand up in value for your reader.  In our connected digital world, your writing will be around for a long time – so make sure you can defend your position.

About style and writing formats

OK, you’ve got the knowledge, expertise and experience which can benefit others – and you want to build a profile as an expert.

You’re ready to write.  What next?

Many people say to me – “Paul, I’m not a writer, I don’t know how to write”.

My answer to them simply is – “can you talk about your subject, and are people interested when you do?”   If you can – and they are – you can write.

Don’t set yourself the task of writing the next best seller – build to this with some blog posts – then some 1,000-1,500 word pieces – and you’ll be pleasantly surprised with your efforts.  Don’t worry that your blog doesn’t have thousands, or even 100s, of hits per week – this doesn’t matter.  Like anything your writing will improve as you do it.  The important thing is to simply start.

Don’t worry about style – let your conversational self shine through to start.  Do get the spelling and grammar fundamentals right, but don’t be concerned about trying to develop a particular “style”, or try to be witty like your favourite columnist.  Remember – people are reading what you write so they can learn from you – and apply what you write to their world.  So a nice, easy style which conveys your insight is what’s important – not your efforts to be the next James Joyce or Joseph Heller.  Leave this to the creatives.

What should you piece look like?  Here’s a summary of some common writing formats which can be used to convey a sense of quality, expertise and value:

• A blog post
• The extended blog-post
• An e-book
• A magazine or newspaper article
• A “white paper”
• A chapter in a published compendium style book
• A published book

Let’s look a little closer at each type and examine their size (word count), content requirements, reader perception, ease of preparation and overall value – from a consumer’s perspective.

The blog post

The blog is today’s way for everyone and anyone to write for the world.  And it’s where most “authorities” start.

This is probably the easiest way to start to get your thoughts out to your audience.  If you already have your own web-site and aren’t putting up regular information – just start doing it.  (There are some tips at the end of this post on how to actually do this.)

The extended blog post.

This site is an example of one built around extended blogs.  Most of the pieces here stand alone – and are about 1000-2000 words in length.  This is the equivalent of about 4-8 pages of a standard paperback and require about 3-6 minutes of reading time.

Pieces of this size can typically be prepared in a few hours – even allowing for some research and some time hunting for photos and related items to make the piece as interesting as possible.

It is also possible to use quality, thoughtful, insightful blog pieces as the foundation of either an e-book, or a published book.

Many blogs, though, are a compilation of thoughts and the pieces tend to be shorter.  So whilst a regularly added to site can become an excellent credibility piece – it takes time and may not be suitable for all industry situations.  It’s also a challenge to use this medium if you’re an employee of a large organisation without access to the main web-site.

In terms of credibility, web posts – in general – rank the lowest of these forms of communication.

The E-Book.

This is now also a relatively easy way to publish – either in specialist formats or a simple PDF.  Whilst e-books can be a good way to distribute information, they have tended to be very mixed in terms of quality – ranging from items which are little more than a check-list, to very high quality, well made products with supporting graphics which rival the best in traditional publishing.

In terms of size – the E-Book can range from a few pages to 100.  It’s probably the most diverse of the methods described here.

It’s this range of quality and size which leads to a mixed view in terms of reader perceptions which diminishes this method of distribution.  The other drawback is that it is expected that an e-book will be free.  Whilst not a problem in itself, if you have high quality information, you may be better off building toward a full publication and then issue a chapter as an e-book, or promotional item.

Magazine or newspaper article.

Being featured in well-respected, high profile magazines, newspapers and web-sites is of great value.  The key value is that you get an independent seal of approval by being quoted or featured in quality publications.

And this can be easier than you may think.

Whilst you’ll need to work hard to get an article in The Financial Revue or BRW, it can be done.  On the other hand, trade publications and specialist magazines are always on the look -out for content.  Do your homework, contact the editor, and start to build your case.  Often, you may be called upon when a feature article covers your field.  And – it’s not unknown for some magazines to look favourably at advertisers when selecting articles for publication.

Generally you’ll need to submit about 800-100 words, occasionally more.  The drawback is that you may not be in total control of the topic, as the editor may require material which supports themes and other requirements of the magazine.

“White papers” (or other “thought” pieces).

The term “white paper” has taken on a much broader – and to some degree devalued – meaning over recent years.  The term originated in the political world, with a famous reference being Winston Churchill’s white paper of 1922, that addressed issues in the Middle East.  More recently the term was used widely in the IT sector, where issues of a technical nature were examined, assessed and outlined.

The essential quality of a white paper (which is being more and more ignored) is that it provides an objective view of an industry issue or issues.  It is not meant to be a vehicle for marketing.

White papers are now common – and in areas well beyond the realms of politics and information technology.  It should be well prepared, with a solid outline and, preferably, based on research or, at least, a case study.  Its purpose is to inform and educate – not pitch.  It will range in size from 1,000 words to, typically, 3-4,000 words.  It will commonly include charts, tables and graphs – even on a more general topic – as such devices demonstrate that a degree of research, comparison and evaluation has been applied to the issues.

The white paper is still a powerful tool when used appropriately – however, the term has been devalued as it is now sometimes used to describe writing which is poorly researched (if researched at all), and often simply the presentation of unsupported opinion.

Published books and book chapters.

The published book – preferably by a well recognised publishing house is the goal.  But it will require a lot of time – and a bit of luck.

Self publishing is now common, and available to us all.  But, you’ll need a lot of time – and some cash – and you’ll then be faced with the challenge of distribution, marketing and promotion.  But it’s a doable thing, and can be highly effective (as a credibility builder at least) – if you have a good story to tell.  Book preparation and publication is a large topic – and well beyond the scope of this article, so we’ll leave the evaluation of the “how” for a separate article.

However, it is within everyone to write a book – if you have the experience and expertise to be of interest to your audience.

A good way to begin your journey of authorship is to contribute to an anthology style of publication.  These are growing in popularity as they offer readers an opportunity to have access to a range of views and opinions on particular topics and areas of interest.

What’s stopping you?

Assuming you want to build your profile as subject matter expert – start now.

Here’s how you can start today and build a 1 month plan to make you a writer:

1. Re-read this article and take notes on what gaps are missing in your knowledge – then fill the gaps.
2. Look for some blogs which already exist on your topic of choice.  Spend at least 30 minutes every third day of the month looking and reading more about your topic.
3. Start a blog – or start a diary – now.
4. Commit to adding a piece to your blog or diary every 3 days for a month.  Make the pieces short (200-500 words), and make them about a theme.
5. After a month you’ll have 10 pieces.  Review them – edit and adjust as necessary.
6. Build a plan to continue your growth as a writer.

Good luck on your journey.

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia. 

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Why all leading salespeople must become authors – and how you can start today

What if the key to sales success was NOT greed, self-focus and a relentless push for decisions which are often not in the buyer’s best interest?

What if uncompromising competition was NOT the way to build quality and add value?

What if salespeople could do what many feel an innate desire to do – create genuine connections with other humans – and build a new business frame for our society?

A dream?  Perhaps not.

Jeremy Rifkin is president of the Foundation on Economic Trends and the author of seventeen bestselling books on the impact of scientific and technological changes on the economy, the workforce, society, and the environment.  His books have been translated into more than thirty languages and are used in thousands of universities, corporations and government agencies around the world. His most recent books include The Hydrogen Economy, The European Dream, The End of Work, The Age of Access, The Biotech Century, and his most recent – The Empathic Civilization.

In this short animated presentation, Rifkin runs through a few thousand years of human history, highlighting how recent research in the fields of neurology and genetics reveals surprising connections between all of us.

Have a look and then think about how this changes they way you sell and connect with your clients and prospects.

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Find out more about Rifkin and The Foundation on Economic Trends here:

http://www.foet.org/JeremyRifkin.htm

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 Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Why understanding empathy is the key to your future sales success

Neil Rackham has built a strong international reputation in the global business community as a speaker, writer, and seminal thinker on sales force effectiveness.

Three of his books have appeared on the New York Times best-seller list, and his works are translated into over 50 languages.  Recently he has been named by the Speaker’s Bureau as one of 2009’s ‘9 Business Speakers you need to know’, and was included in The Speakers Group list of ‘8 High-impact Speakers’.He is Visiting Professor of Sales and Marketing at Portsmouth University and a Visiting Professor at Cranfield University.

I’ve had a number of conversations with Neil recently, and one of the topics which I know many have asked to hear about is “lessons from past recessions”.  In this discussion, Neil outlines 3 things that salespeople and sales managers should focus on – in good times as well as bad.

Neil, could you please give us some background about recessions of the past – and things we should focus on in more difficult times?

Let me start by just talking about the specifics of the selling in the economy we’re in, because that’s a good starting point.  It so happens if you look at people selling today, less than 20% of them had ever before sold in a real recession.  It’s a sign of how long that prosperous boom went on.

And now, we’ve got to the point where, frankly, people are making a lot of mistakes.  And I’ve gone into my research files.  In the ‘70s, ‘80s, ‘90s even, I did a lot of foundation research into what makes people successful in selling.  As it turns out, a big piece of that was done in a fairly bad recession, particularly the recession of the 1980s.  And I’ve gone back into those research files and looked at the mistakes people made.  And I’m just going to raise those as an opener here.  Because I think exactly those same mistakes are being made by sales people, sales managers, and by sales forces all across the world today.  And I’d like to in particular raise three of them and talk about why they’re such problems and what to do about it.

So let me being with number one.  In hard times, sales people try harder.  Now, that doesn’t sound as though that’s a particular sin.  That sounds like it’s a sensible thing to do.  They try to be more active, to make more calls, to knock on a few more doors, to try to open up more opportunities, because that seems the best way of dealing with hard times.  We haven’t got enough business going in, so let’s go out and beat the streets for a bit more. 

Well, the issue is – what’s wrong with that?  Because you might think that’s actually the smartest strategy you could adopt.  In fact, in certain cases, it is.  We did studies in the recession of the ‘80s, where, for example, we had one company in New York that was selling office supplies. They had a new Vice President of Sales who said – I want you to make twice as many calls a day.  And in fact, sales went up by 40%.  So, in that case, the strategy of let’s go out and make more calls, let’s work that bit harder, turned out to be very, very successful.

But, now let’s look at some other cases.  What we found is that if you’re in a very large sale – the kind of sale which usually can’t be completed in one call, and in fact may make two, three, or five calls to complete – things are different.  When you make more calls, you actually reduce your sales.  We did studies of this in Motorola and found that happening there.  We looked at it in a dozen other companies.  The same thing happened. 

And there’s a fundamental rule here, which is, when you’re in fairly large significant sales, it costs a lot to go after any piece of business.  And to go after a piece of business that you’re going to lose is actually very bad strategy.  So one of the things that you find happens is, looking at the companies that were most successful in the 1980’s recessions, they actually reduced the number of opportunities they chased after.  They didn’t try to increase them.  But to each opportunity they chased after, they put in more resources, and they over resourced the best opportunities.  And that’s what kept them out of trouble.  The less successful companies were the ones that tried to chase more business.  Because what that meant was they could give less effort to each piece of business.  And in sales, there’s no prize at all for coming in second.

So one of the things that came out very, very clearly from that research was, an unsuccessful strategy in the larger business-to-business sale is to half chase twice as much business.  And yet I will guarantee you, whether we’re in Sydney, whether we’re in Singapore, whether we’re in Auckland, wherever you happen to be right now, right now there are people trying to go out and knock on more doors as a way out of the recession.  It doesn’t work.  There’s one absolute rule that people should always follow, and that rule is this:  if you wouldn’t chase a piece of business in good times, never, never chase it in bad times.

There’s a huge body of research findings that shows that’s a bad strategy.  But it makes common sense.  To most sales people, they feel they’re doing something.  They feel, if I could just start a few more business cycles, if I could just open a few more doors, I could get out of this.  Well, no no no no.  The evidence says the people who succeeded best in the last recession actually consolidated their opportunities. They put more effort into the ones they were the most likely to win, and they outsold their competitors.  That’s how you win in hard times.

So the first rule of our take, of my three rules for how to sell in hard times would be, chase fewer, deeper opportunities, not try and chase more.  Unless you’re in the very low end sale.

And what do you mean by understanding the difference between selling and negotiating?

There’s selling, and there’s negotiating.  And we need both to get business.  We sell and we negotiate with our customers.  Now, what’s the difference between selling and negotiating?  And we use these words all the time.  But I don’t think we’re always crystal clear about what the difference is. 

The difference, put at its simplest, is that when you sell, you’re trying to get an agreement without changing the terms.  But the moment you start to vary the terms, you make a price concession, or you alter the specification, or you change delivery in order to induce the customer to buy, then you’re negotiating.  So negotiating basically is about altering the terms.  It’s about giving things away as an inducement to get the business.  And keep that in mind as the difference between negotiation and selling. 

Now, what research has always shown in good times or in bad times is that the most effective sales people who do the best job of maintaining margins negotiate little and they negotiate late.  The less successful people can’t wait to start bargaining with the customer.

Now this has been established over 30 or 40 years of research, not just by my research teams, but by research teams all over the world.  That if you start negotiating very quickly in the sales cycle, what you do is you give the customer an appetite for more concessions.  Because the customer thinks, if you go in the door and you say, we can really do a deal here.  We can offer you a discount.  If you say that early on, the customer thinks, I can get an even bigger one if I hang on here.  So what you do is you create an appetite for more concession.  You come across as being anxious, and you come across as being pushy.  And these are the kinds of things which create a negative climate within the customer and a more demanding climate.  And in hard times, it really hurts you. 

But I can guarantee you this, that most sales people when times are hard will start negotiating more quickly than they would when times were tough.  Now that’s hard to resist.  If you’re out there and you’re under pressure and you know that your competitors are prepared to cut their prices, and the buyer says to you, look.  I’m not prepared to pay the sort of prices I would have paid a year ago, I’m under pressure to.  The temptation is immediately to go into negotiating, changing price, changing specification, changing delivery, and so forth.  But what that does is it actually weakens your position without strengthening it.  It doesn’t increase your chances of getting the business.  But what it does do is it increases the customer’s appetite for yet more concessions from you.

So that again is something where people should advise their sales teams, don’t get into early negotiation, even though times are hard.  The temptation is to do it.  It’s a bad, bad strategy.  So that would be my second point.  Don’t negotiate.

And what about price, Neil – how important is this in the sale?

I suppose that’s what sales people have come to believe because it’s what the customer says.  But if you look at the hard research coming out of the 1980’s recession, actually price was much less important than safety.  In hard times, customers will buy what’s safe rather than what’s cheap. 

In fact, here, everyone is listening to me now.  Think in your own mind, if I had to make a decision to buy something expensive, some big item, and I had the choice between buying something which was a safe decision and buying something that was a cheap decision, what would you do?  Well something like 80% of people say, I choose the safe decision. And your customers are no different.

And I could argue this on all sorts of good psychological reasons.  But maybe the best example is a purely practical one.  The 1980’s recession was fairly bad.  Not as bad or as sudden as the recession now, but really a very significant one.  One company above all others prospered.  And that company was IBM.  IBM not only didn’t cut its prices during the 1980’s recession.  IBM actually increased prices several times on its most popular lines.  In contrast, its competitors like Digital, and Fujitsu cut their prices quite ruthlessly, averaging something like a 30% price cut.  They were the ones who went out of business.  None of them are around now.  IBM increased its profits, increased its sales volume. 

And how could they in a recession increase prices and at the same time, make more sales and increase market share? And the answer is fairly simple.  Anyone who was around in those days will know that IBM had a brilliant value proposition.  Their slogan was, “nobody got fired for choosing IBM”.  Now, when you think about it, that’s one of the most brilliant, brilliant pieces of marketing of all time.  Because what happened was, IBM positioned itself as being safe. 

Now, IBM was overpriced and under featured.  In terms of advanced technology, Digital was way ahead of IBM.  And Digital was reducing its prices fast.  But by the very fact of that price reduction, Digital was trying to sell technology at a low price.  They were making the price sale.  IBM was making the safety sale.  And history says, it was IBM that won, not Digital.  And I could quote more cases.  But I think the fundamental point is there.  And the fundamental point is that customers may talk about price as their primary decision criteria.  If you happen to be selling a commodity, like metals, or basic chemicals, then it is a price decision.  Because commodities fluctuate by price, and that price is determined by factors on the exchange.  But if you’re selling what most of us sell, proprietary products and services and solutions, then price is secondary.  Safety is primary.

And one of the things that worries me as I look around is that very, very few people are good at selling safety.  If you lead a sales team, or if you’re training sales people, or if you’re responsible for sales management, just ask yourself, how good a job do our people do of making the customer feel safe about coming to us?  Well, the chances are that we’re not doing a very good job at all.  And one of the examples we’ve already mentioned.  If sales people start negotiating too soon, that makes customers distinctly nervous.  They think, uh oh.  They may be in trouble.

So, how do we sell safety?  Most sales people are not good at doing this.  One of the things that we would advise sales people to do is just think about this.  People spend an awful lot of time thinking about how do we overcome price issues and price objections, but very few people think, how do we make customers feel that we’re the safe pair of hands to be with?  There are lots of little things, of course.  It’s the way you use your proof sources, the way you have case studies of success, the way you introduce customers to successful, satisfied customers where you’ve done it before.  You do it by the assuredness and self confidence in your sales people.  There’s a lot of ways in which we transmit safety.  But we need to think about doing that and doing that more. 

And so, Paul, if I could just summarize this is what I’d say:

1. Number one, in hard times, sell more deeply to fewer opportunities.  Don’t just try to generate more opportunities.  Remember that lesson, if you wouldn’t chase an opportunity in good times, never, never chase it in bad.
2. Point two, don’t start negotiating earlier in the cycle.  It will only hurt you.
3. And point three, sell safety rather than sell price.

And those would be the three pieces of immediate advice I’d give your readers about handling these hard times. And I believe the hard times aren’t going to just stop, even though the optimists are saying the recession is over.  I think we’re going to have a fairly difficult time for the foreseeable future, and sales people need to take these lessons on.

But you know, they’re not bad lessons for good times either, because they’re fundamentally lessons about good selling.

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Thanks Neil – great points for anybody selling in today’s world.

Neil’s been researching the world of professional selling for many years, and always has insights worth hearing.  Find out more about Neil and his views on selling at his website:

www.neilrackham.com

Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Post from: Sales Effectiveness Australasia

Lessons for selling in good – and bad – times