One of the top challenges we discuss with sales managers and leaders is how to get their salespeople to start selling value and stop caving on price.

In this blog, we will discuss the best way to respond to a prospect who tells you that your competition has a lower or better price.

The death of value has come slowly…but you could see it coming for quite some time. Some might blame the economy. Others might blame technology or even hyper-competition from other providers. But do you know who rarely gets blamed? Salespeople.

When we are in front of sales leadership teams the number one challenge we wind up discussing is getting salespeople to start value-based selling and stop caving on price. Let me be clear about something – selling based on price is a sales strategy. It’s just not a very good sales strategy (unless you are Walmart). Seth Godin called selling on price “the race to the bottom” and he went on to say it is a race you can’t win and it is a race you don’t want to win.

John Ruskin wrote these words that will forever be true: “It’s unwise to pay too much, but it’s worse to pay too little. When you pay too much, you lose a little money — that is all. When you pay too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do.”

So, what is the best way to respond to a prospect who tells you that ABC Company has a lower or better price? If you believe in the power of gradual self-discovery then you should ask the prospect one simple question – “why do you think that is?”

Or what about simply responding with “thanks for sharing that with me…what if I tell you I can’t do that…where would that leave you and me?”

I may have been born yesterday but I stayed up all night studying so here is my question for you: is it possible you wind up fighting on price because you offer to fight?”

And if you need to walk away, perhaps you should suggest to your prospect that they add a contingency factor to the lowest priced bid for when they figure out that what they bought is not capable of doing what they need it to do. Of course, if they do that, then they would probably have the money to buy your offering instead.

If you consider the tactics that are generally covered in sales skills training, you can probably think of a handful of happenings that can steal, or make you lose, your prospect.

In this blog, we will discuss the top 4 situations you may encounter that will cause you to wonder; "where are you, prospect?"

From the year it first appeared in 1966 until now, “How The Grinch Stole Christmas” has remained a holiday classic. Narrated by Boris Karloff, it contains so many scenes that quickly rush to my mind. Who can forget the scene of the Grinch talking with Cindy Lou Who…or the scene where the Grinch turns his dog, Max, into a reindeer?

But let’s talk about another grinch – and this one is much meaner. I’m talking about the one that steals your prospect. You know – the prospect you were chasing that you were sure you were going to win right up until the point that you didn’t. If you consider the tactics that are generally covered in sales skills training, you can probably think of a handful of happenings that can steal, or make you lose, your prospect.

I think there are four different types of grinches that steal your prospect:

1. Lack of compelling reasons to make a change. This surfaces when your prospect has no pain/compelling reason to make a change, but you decided to pursue the opportunity anyway.
2. Lack of capacity. This comes to you when you do establish a compelling reason for the prospect to make a change, but you fail to ask them about the timing of such a change. It only appears after the presentation when your calls or emails are not being returned because the prospect isn’t ready to make the change.
3. The incumbent. This shows up when you fail to drill down into two things: 1) the reason why the prospect will leave the incumbent and 2) what they will tell the incumbent when they make the change. Changing providers is a big decision. Probably the toughest decision the prospect will ever have to make.
4. Not receiving a decision (within a mutually agreed-upon timeframe) after you present your solution. Why does this happen? Because you did not get them to agree to make a decision. You simply presented without any kind of upfront agreement.

So, to all of you faithful readers of this blog: could the actual grinch who stole your prospect be you? Think about it…and Happy Holidays to all of you along with wishes of peace in the New Year.

We expect every member of our team to prospect every day as one of their sales activities. But now and then, it helps to put a focus on the effort and bring the team together on a call blitz.  This works for many reasons.

One, we like the company of doing this together. Salespeople are often lone rangers, making calls and sending emails and linking in but it sure is nice to have our team to celebrate or to complain to and more importantly, to share experiences with and learn from.

Secondly, a call blitz puts a scheduled time on everyone’s calendars for just that one activity – sales prospecting outreach and conversations. Everyone gets to decide how they are going to approach this but we do provide a recommended direction and tools.

Third, let’s face it, sometimes life and work get in the way and our sales prospecting time is taken away when we must take care of current clients. Call blitzes put a discipline and structure to this necessary sales activity of sales prospecting.

Fourth, when our team collectively puts a lot of outreaches into the universe, that is also a form of branding – we are getting the word out! 

Fifth, the team gets together after the blitz and can brag or commiserate, but still share best (and maybe not so great) sales prospecting practices. 

Here are some suggestions on how to run a successful sales blitz.

1. Create a theme and develop a really good email campaign with that theme and send it to the targeted audience you are trying to reach. Our email campaign featured an offer for a free workshop - Roadmap for Success in 2022, that we could deliver for prospects and their teams. We sent the email out several times prior to the calling blitz in the hopes there would be some recognition when we called.
2. Make sure the emails come from the person calling if you can. We have our database segmented by salesperson and sent the same email but it was customized with their name and sig and calendar link and sent just to their prospect list.
3. Make sure your team knows this is a commitment of time and it is on their calendar. They must honor it and plan to provide a recap at the Post Blitz Zoom meeting.
4. Track it – which we do weekly anyways. Here’s an example of our weekly sales activities summary but we press activity reports out daily. The sales prospecting calling blitz is not reported here and will make this week look low. (Names covered to protect the innocent!)

5. Have some fun when you get together for the Post Blitz Zoom. Have each person share their experiences, talk about what to do next, and celebrate the effort. Our calling blitz was for 90 minutes and the Post Blitz Zoom only took about half an hour. We had some great energetic stories and sharing going on – invaluable! We will rinse and repeat in 2022, you can bet on that.

Now it’s your turn to schedule a sales prospecting blitz with your team. Let us know if we can help!

Every salesperson wants to win now and increase sales. But what are the chances that you will actually reach your prospect when they have a problem they want to fix?

In this blog, we will discuss how to best position yourself with your prospect so you are top of mind, even when it means sitting at 2nd place.

As a sales training and coaching company, Anthony Cole Training Group is always hired…no matter the industry…for the same reason which is to increase sales. Every salesperson wants to win. Every salesperson wants to win now and increase sales. No doubt the instant gratification world that we live in has contributed to this reality. Amazon has made it abundantly clear that there is really no need to wait for anything.

But for salespeople, patience is more than just a virtue. It is a requirement. Think about all the sales activities that a salesperson must execute in their sales process. They make outreaches in order to schedule appointments. They go on appointments to find opportunities. They do the work necessary to make those opportunities lead to proposals. They position their value to win their fair share of deals from those proposals.

I don’t know about you, but to me, there are a lot of stars (and a lot of sales activities) that must line up just right in order to win a deal. What are the chances that you will reach out at just the right time, i.e., when the prospect has a problem that they are thinking about fixing?

For that reason, while everybody wants to be #1 it is my belief that is ok to be #2…while you continue to build your relationship with your prospect. I have previously blogged about pull-through rate – which is defined as the percentage of first-time new business appointments that wind up becoming your client. For most of our clients that number runs around 15%. That means it is much more likely than not that you are not going to find the stars aligned on that first appointment. Maybe the prospect does not have a problem. Maybe they do have a problem, but the timing isn’t right.

When you create your pre-call plan, don’t forget to plan what you are going to do if the stars don’t align. How will you leave the appointment with the door open to future relationship-building activities? My suggestion is to ask your prospect to think about who they would call in the future if they did need to make a change. Who has earned first call status? Tell your prospect that you would like the chance to work your way onto that list.

There is nothing wrong with being #2. Think about what sales activities you can be doing until you get to #1.

One of the most frequently asked questions we receive is “how do I/we increase sales” or “how do I become more successful in sales?” It starts with recognizing when your pursuit of a prospect is over.

In this blog, the two fundamental truths of more effective selling.

If you are a consistent reader of this blog (and why wouldn’t you be), you know by now that I have an affinity for music. You also know that my favorite decade of my life was the 80’s. And when those two things intersect, watch out!

Considered by some to be a one-hit-wonder, the Australian band Crowded House got to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 when they released “Don’t Dream It’s Over” in 1986.  

“Hey now, hey now
Don’t dream it’s over.”

So, let’s apply that majestic ballad to salespeople and the one thing above all things that they struggle with the most. That’s right, recognizing that their pursuit of a prospect is over (even when the prospect hasn’t told them in those exact words). Many salespeople can’t even begin to think that it’s over. Most don’t want to entertain the possibility. 

So, the question before us today is simple – why? I mean, it’s not like it has not happened to them before.

One of the most frequently asked questions we receive is “how do I/we increase sales” or we are asked, “how do I become more successful in sales?” And the best answer I have is that you get better when you recognize two fundamental truths:

1. You are going to lose more often than you win.
2. When you are going to lose, you want to lose early.

Have you ever stopped to consider what your “pull-through rate” looks like? We use that term to explain a simple algebra equation:

Number of new clients / Number of initial sales conversations = pull-through rate 

If you have 100 initial sales conversations (or go on 100 prospect calls) in a year, and you wind up with 15 new clients, then your pull-through percentage is 15/100 or 15%. So, if that is your pull-through rate, don’t you think you should go on your calls with a bias for disqualification? Statistically, there is a far greater chance of you not doing business with a prospect than there is a chance that you will do business with them.

Stop dreaming and start asking questions. Ask questions that allow you to confirm that your prospect has a problem they have to fix and that now is the time to fix it. Operate with a bias for disqualification so you are not so surprised when the conclusion is that now is the time for you to move on. No is ok provided you hear it at the right time in your sales process.

Sweet dreams.