Sales Blog for Sales and Sales Management

I am on LinkedIn.  If you are in sales, you should be too.  It is a great resource for information and a great way to link in with friends, clients and prospects.  In the "sales playbook" group I am in, someone posted the question,  "What is your best question on a sales call?" In other words, "What is your money question?"  This was my answer:  In the comment box, I told them, "I teach people to identify the single most common objection they get from a prospect when it is time for the prospect to make a decision.  Once they identify the most common objection, they must make sure that, during the qualifying step in the sales process, they ask a question about that objection. For most, if not all of our clients, they really aren't buying something that they already don't have or use.  As sales people, we are fact stealing / attempting to take the business from someone else."

Usually the reason for not getting a new piece of business is because the prospect chose to stay with the current relationship - there wasn't a compelling reason to make a change to work with someone new.  And so, to answer the question that was posted, the best question to ask in selling has to be one that deals with competition, especially the incumbent.  The question might sound something like, "How will you go about telling your current relationship that you are going to make a change and you will no longer be doing business with them?"

I promise you this is where the rubber meets the road.

If you think about a sales process being like a baseball diamond, you would ask this question somewhere between 2nd and 3rd instead of finding out when you are sliding headfirst into home hoping to score another run.

I have to give credit to Ron Stewart for this phrase- The Tail of The Fail.  Ron is a senior sales management executive for one of our clients and he talks about two things when he addresses his sales people: the tail of the sale and the tail of the fail.

As I analyze my own personal sales fails from the last 12 months, they each have their own story.  But, if I think about my entire history of sales fails, they boil down to these 3 most common errors:

1. Not getting to 'VITO' (very important top officer).  I was talking to a PEO provider this past year.  I had met with my point of contact and with his management team. I had an agreement that we would move forward starting in March.  March came and went, so did April, May and June.  Finally, I got a return phone call and discovered that the senior partner in the firm said "no" to the project.
2. Not getting budget.  A year ago, I was engaged in a discussion with a benefits group.  I had worked with this group before and had a very good relationship with the influencer/decision maker.  I asked about budget and got a budget to work with.  I failed to double check to make sure he was willing to spend that kind of money; he had said that he was.  But the objection to execution was "I just can't spend that kind of money right now."
3. Anemic Pipeline = being desperate - When your pipeline is low, you will have the tendency to propose solutions to people that don't qualify. These people don't qualify because they really don't have a compelling reason to take action or make a change.  Such was the case with a group in NYC.  The initial meeting was a good one, but I failed to ask the question, "Are these problems you are talking about and the associated cost compelling enough to take action?"  Didn't ask the question, made a proposal, didn't get the business.

I promise you that it is not easy to admit my tails of the fails. But that is one of the keys to becoming more successful. Be gutsy enough to say that you screwed up, find out what you need to do differently, and then learn from your mistakes. 

One more thing, though, make sure you work on the right end of the problem.  If you are failing to execute, you need to do a quick self assessment as to ‘why' the problem is happening.  In my case, it wasn't a need for approval issue, nor a money issue, nor a lack of a selling system issue; it was an issue of not effectively having a pre-call session with one of my other experts in-house.  I was not prepared as well as I needed to be. The result- failure to sell.

A lawyer runs a stop sign and gets pulled over by a sheriff's deputy. The lawyer thinks that he is smarter than the deputy because he is a lawyer from New York and is certain that he has a better education than any cop from Houston, TX . He decides to prove this and have some fun at the Texas deputy's expense.

The deputy says, "License and registration, please."

"What for?" asks the lawyer.

The deputy says, "You didn't come to a complete stop at the stop sign."

Then the lawyer says, "I slowed down, and no one was coming."

"You still didn't come to a complete stop," says the deputy. "License and registration, please."

The lawyer says, 'What's the difference?'

"The difference is you have to come to complete stop, that's the law. License and registration, please!" the deputy repeats.

The lawyer replies, "If you can show me the legal difference between slow down and stop, I'll give you my license and registration and you give me the ticket. If not, you let me go and don't give me the ticket."

"That sounds fair. Please exit your vehicle, sir," the deputy says.
At this point, the deputy takes out his nightstick and starts beating the daylights out of the lawyer and asks, "Do you want me to stop, or just slow down?"

 Any questions about the difference between closing and being liked?

I love what I do.  Sometimes.

I'm writing a book.  For years now, people have been telling me:  write a sales book.  So, here I am writing a book on selling.  I've got to write the outline first and summaries for each chapter.  The chapter summary I just completed is "Gutsy Presentations and Closing."

This is one of those moments that I don't love what I do.  Why?  Because after writing the summary, I realized that I've been failing to do what I'm recommending others to do.

I don't know when I stopped, but it is obvious that I've become the Cowardly Lion.  Over the years, I've done a great job of getting decisions from people at time of presentation.  It was expected, they agreed to it and so we got decisions.  Some yes, some no, but decisions are what I wanted and so I got them.

I can't go on; it's too painful.  But here is why I wrote this today:  I want you to ask yourself what it is that you've been failing to do that is costing you sales.  Take a minute or two.  Look hard in the mirror, look at your data, think about why you haven't gotten decisions. Don't make excuses and then decide you are going to change.

I am. 

Duh.

Well, hold on a second.  Don't translate the title of this final post on 5 Really Important Sales Concepts.  Every sales person has been taught to 'Ask For the Business', 'Always Be Closing', 'Get The Sale'.  The problem with these exhortations is that sales people translate them into 'get a yes'.  Which is different than getting a decision.

Sales people struggle in getting decisions because they are afraid to hear 'no' or their sales leadership has not given them permission to get a 'no'.  If you don't get a 'yes', then typically the next alternative is 'think it over' or any one of its relatives:

• Showing it to someone
• Getting additional proposals
• Going to committee
• Have to look at the numbers
• Haven't met with my current provider yet

All of these are rotten alternatives to a no.  You lose sleep.  You make unreturned phone calls.  You get more delays.  You lose confidence.  You lie to your manager telling them that you 'think' you're in good shape, should close now any day, they liked us, they loved the proposal, it just has to...

Makes you sick just thinking about it, doesn't it?

So, here is the 5th of 5- Get a decision.  Prior to making your presentation, you have to make your pitch as to what happens next.  It sounds something like this:

Let me review to make sure I understand what we need to do next.  First, you want me to come back and provide you with a solution to all of these problems we've discussed today that are costing you lots of heartburn and money.  Next, you want me to provide you with a solution within the guidelines we established relative to your investment of time, money and resources.  And the third item is an assumption. I assume you want me to be able to answer all of your questions at that time.  Does that sound about right?  

Good.  I need for you to be in a position to tell me one of two things, either one is ok. Can I share that with you?

Good.  When I come back and fulfill my part, I need for you to tell me 'yes, this makes all the sense in the world, let's do business' or tell me 'no, we aren't doing business'. I would rather hear yes, but no is ok.  What objections do you have to that process?

This WILL NOT eliminate objections.  It will just move them up in your process and give you the chance to deal with them prior to presenting instead of afterward.  You deal with them now and you either eliminate them as a qualified prospect and don't present or you present to a qualified prospect and get an answer.

I promise you it is better than a 'think it over'

The start of any undertaking is obviously the most important step.

"Every journey starts with the first step" 

"If you want to run a marathon, you have to start with the first step"

"Putting yourself in a position to win means you have to start competing"

When it comes to building the confident and trusting relationship associated with a strong seller / buyer relationship,  the start is especially true. I'm not just talking about the immediate "bonding and rapport" part of selling.  That is important, but the "start" isn't a 5-minute segment of chitchat talking about the sailfish on the wall or the soccer pictures on the credenza.  No, the start is the entire first contact process.  It doesn't matter if it is a phone call or a meeting at a chamber meeting or the initial meeting after the phone call.  It's the start that will often, if not always, determine your finish. In today's post, I focus on the initial face-to-face meeting with a suspect.

I want to describe this segment via the "HAVE-TOs"

• You have to be prepared (pre-call strategy).  Aside from your internet research, you have to prepare for the sales process.  In other words, you have to know what questions you are going to ask that are going to move the sale forward, not just questions about the technical aspects of their current position or status.  You have to anticipate the suspect's answer to those questions and then be prepared with your follow up dialog.  Too many sales people take this step for granted because "they've been in the business for ... years."  You have to be prepared for their questions and how you will respond to them.  And finally, you have to be prepared for curve balls.  Suspects / prospects always throw them, and when you are unprepared, you will always miss them or certainly never get a clean hit.
• You have to identify clearly what your preferred outcome is.  In the book, Getting to Yes, the authors do a great job of explaining how defining your preferred outcome helps guide you through any meeting that you have.  In selling, and specifically for the initial call, most sales people define the objective of the first call as "to get a second call".  I will change that and suggest that your objective be to make this the only call.  Try to disqualify your suspects instead of trying to qualify them.  I guarantee you will end up with more qualified opportunities.
• You have to demonstrate your credibility, not by what you say, but by how you conduct yourself.  Make yourself different (see first blog in this series). You will do this by the questions you ask, by your focus on the prospect and what is important to them, and by your reluctance to get into a sales pitch and do a data dump in their lap.  You demonstrate your knowledge of the industry by the stories, analogies and metaphors you use about their business.  You demonstrate your professionalism by the way you ask professional penetrating questions and by how you don't look, act or sound like every other sales person that has met with this executive.
• You have to have the courage to ask the tough questions and have fierce / honest discussions.  Everyone reading this probably knows the questions that you are supposed to ask and how you are supposed to ask them and when you are supposed to ask them. Yet, every one of you most likely leaves initial calls having failed to ask the tough questions like, "How will you make this decision?  When do I meet the decision maker?  If you don't have a budget, then how will you pay for this?  If you are shopping for low price, then what happens if I show up and I'm not the low price?  Who wins a tie?  When you told your current provider that you were unhappy with the current situation and you were shopping to replace them, what did they say?"  And finally,  "When I show up to make my presentation, I need for you to be in a position to tell me 'yes' or 'no', what objections do you have to that process?"  You all know that you should ask those questions, but time and time again, you fail to.  How come? 
• You have to leave your need for approval at the door when you leave the house in the morning.  You have to re-write your record collection about how people buy in your industry. (Let your sales manager stew over that one.) You have to leave your personal buy cycle at the car lot where you debated for the last three weeks on which make and model to buy and where you negotiated with the manager for 2 hours.
• You have to qualify suspects / prospects to do business with you rather than you attempting to qualify to do business with them. Too many sales people still go to a meeting feeling like they have to qualify to do business with someone.  No, you don't.  You have to make sure that the person you are meeting with qualifies to do business with you.  Not just from a profile perspective or from an underwriting or credit perspective.  Also, qualifying is more than, "Did you do a needs analysis, discuss the features and benefits, get a budget and agree to a decision making process?"  In our world, in our effective selling system, it means the following:
• Do they have a compelling reason to take action quickly?
• Will they invest the time, money and resources to solve a problem they have or the problem they see coming?  Will they invest that time, that money or those resources in a timely fashion or are they in the "seeking" mode of buying?
• Will they tell you "yes" or "no" when you present?  In order to do this, you MUST have eliminated the current provider.  You MUST have heard them say they want to "fix it", whatever "it" is. And you MUST have a solution that is appropriate for their problem.  You cannot make the mistake that, even though your solution isn't exactly right, you are good enough to sell them on buying something that doesn't fit their exact specs.
• You have to close.  Not close the sale, but close this step and get a clear next step.  There is always a next step even if you are in a "one appointment close" business.  It doesn't matter if your business requires multiple meetings, or one and done.  Always close what you came there to do and then move on.  I promise you that, if you get masterful at this step, you will have fewer meetings and your close ratio will improve.  Ask for closure, ask for a clear next step, ask for the business.

I will not pretend to imply that these are the only "HAVE-TOs" in the start of building your relationship.  I will suggest to you that, if you get these 7 "HAVE-TOs" right, you will close more business, more quickly at higher margins.

Let's make this simple.  When it comes to closing and selling there is no sure thing or to use a basketball term "lay up".  Nope.  Especially in today's economy.  Now for those of you that know me from our sales training and sales management work, you know that I'm the last guy in the world to make excuses for you or for myself.  When you screw up, admit it.  When I screw up, I'll tell you.  So, here are my 5 lessons so far this year when it comes to opening, qualifying and closing deals in today's market environment.

1. You have to work harder at creating opportunities.  The market shrunk but you didn't own 100% of it so your market only shrunk a fraction. Get on the phone, see people, and good things will happen
2. Develop channels.  Distribution has changed.  If you have any plans to be scalable or to leverage yourself, you must use technology and develop relationships with those that occupy your same space but with different products and services.
3. When you get to see someone, make sure that your expectations are realistic.  No matter how much pain you think you hear.  No matter what the compelling reasons that the prospect gives you to take action - slow down.  Make sure you address anything (qualify urgency) that could "go wrong" or keep the deal from moving forward.
4. Discuss money and be prepared to sell smaller deals. If you've always been good at getting budget up front, realize that now it is more important than ever.  Don't worry about discounting; just work on providing different packages of solutions that are in different price points.  Capture market share today.
5. Don't assume.  When you get a call from a current or previous client and they want to talk business, make sure you put them back into the prospect box and treat them the same way. Qualify them.  Take them through all of the steps of your sales process without taking short cuts.

If you do these five things, you will be in a position to sell more business, more quickly at good, if not higher, margins.  And today, that is a really good thing.