In an economic environment that is like the one we are in heading into 2023, your growth strategy may not be so much about sales growth, but rather more about holding on to what you have! If your clients are deciding to participate in the assumed upcoming recession, then your biggest questions / challenges won’t be:

• Can we be competitive with our pricing?
• Are our salespeople skilled enough to qualify and close business?
• Will we have enough revenue to keep our people?
• Can we meet demand?

No, your biggest challenge will be with your own sales team and their willingness, drive, and commitment to do what needs to be done to reach out each and every day to find new names / logos to add to their pipeline.

Addressing and solving this problem requires great coaching from your sales leadership and sales management people. Your sales managers and people responsible for developing sales talent MUST HAVE a coaching bias. They MUST have an innate desire to help people improve skill, attitude, will to sell, and behaviors. The will to sell alone though, is not enough. There are a set of skills / competencies that will either support the coaching effort, or hinder the coaching effort.  

If you follow Anthony Cole Training Group regularly, you know we are one of the top distributors for Objective Management Group suite of sales talent assessments and evaluations. We are a top distributor because we are absolutely convinced of the truth as spoken by our own sales development expert, Mark Trinkle, “You cannot fix what you cannot see.”

What you see in this graphic is information that we have when we assess an organization's sales management team. When you look at this, what jumps off the page at you? I don’t know about you, but I see three things that would hinder sales coaching effectiveness:

1.     Consistently coaches and debriefs

2.     Beliefs Support Coaching

3.     Doesn’t rescue the Salespeople

And just for good measure let’s add this one:

4.     Effective at getting commitments

Each one of these has a video that you can access for further clarification.  But for the purpose of this article let me attempt to craft the narrative this way.

You have a sales manager that really loves to coach and develop people, but:

• Doesn’t spend enough time coaching to improve skill and change behaviors. The coaching takes place only when the salesperson needs to discuss a strategy for creating the solution or attempting to figure out how to deal with competitive pricing – how much lower can we offer our product?
• In addition to that, this manager believes that only those new people need coaching, and their experienced, tenured salespeople already know what to do and are hitting their numbers.  (The question that needs to be asked is this:  Is hitting their numbers the same as producing to the available opportunity?)
• When this manager does joint calls with prospects, they fail to let them fail.  Rescuing the salesperson once they make a mistake is also tied to beliefs. They believe that it is more important to make the sale, not look bad, make corrections then it is to let a salesperson fail and let them learn from mistakes.
• Finally, when a manager of this make up does meet with their salespeople, they don’t get caught up in the ‘emotions’ of the minute, they won’t sugar coat questions because they are afraid of the salesperson not liking them, but they will struggle with getting a firm commitment to do the right activity, engage in training to improve skills and change behaviors.

As you can read from this narrative, the bias towards coaching is important and yes, even critical, but the skills to execute are just as critical. Here’s an analogy: I loved playing basketball and thought my road to an NCAA scholarship was via basketball. I had a couple of problems that overwhelmed my enthusiasm for the game: I couldn’t jump or shoot. I played basketball like a football player. The good news is that my love for football paid off and I attended UCONN on scholarship!

Find out what our Sales Managed Environment Certification program can do to help you drive sales. https://anthonycoletraining.com/sales-managed-environment-sme/

It has been almost a month ago, but real fans will remember. It was a game for 45 minutes and then it wasn’t. I am talking about the Michigan, Ohio State rivalry football game played November 26, 2022.  Up for grabs was the Big Ten Football Championship Game and a shot at being in the NCAA football playoffs.

As I watched the game, I thought about all those sales opportunities that were close to being won for 45 days and then, they weren't. Up for grabs was a sale that would make hitting goal ‘easier’ and a chance to be identified with the other top salespeople in the organization.

Here are the 10 key lessons to take from this game and apply to your life or the lives of your sales team as you / they pursue wining sales opportunities.

1. Follow the game plan.  Obviously, this requires that you and or your sales team have a milestone-centric sales process in place AND you have processes in place to manage execution of the sales process.
2. Don’t panic. Things will go wrong.  

• The prospect won’t always be completely honest with you about pricing, the competition, the budget, decision makers, timeline, commitment to take action or the decision-making process.
• Your backroom may not be able to underwrite / approve / support this type of sale in the fashion to which they are accustomed.
• The competitor may undercut your pricing or make other concessions to keep the business.

3. Make sure you coach or get coaching every step of the way. It DOES NOT matter how many years you’ve been in the business. Great salespeople become great salespeople because they consistently hone their skills (practice) and they understand there are things that they don’t know.
4. Be patient. You are not in control of the timing of the prospect’s process. You can do your best to influence timing by asking questions about the value of acting or the potential cost of waiting but, be patient and stick to your plan.
5. Don’t be afraid, GO FOR IT! Get to decision makers, ask about budget, find out if the prospect will in fact leave their current provider if you solve their problem and /or provide a better solution.
6. Keep track of everything. There isn’t anything that happened in the OSU / Michigan game (any competitive game) that isn’t tracked.  The information / data you get helps you make better decisions within the overall framework of your sales process. Pre and post call planning and weekly huddles are effective tracking strategies.
7. Stay clinically detached. This is easier to do when you have a plan. Remember SW3N.  Some will, some won’t, so what, NEXT!
8. Avoid feeling pressure to ‘score’ or win every sale by having a consistently full pipeline of opportunities.
9. 9. Be discerning as to what you listen to from others. (The announcers were commenting early in in the game on how Michigan couldn’t win if they didn’t establish the ground game.)  Michigan threw an 80-yard touchdown pass to go ahead 17-13).  Lesson, take what the prospect gives you vs trying to force your game plan. Eventually MI did establish the ground game – stuck to game plan – and ou trushed OSU 252 yards to 143 yards.
10. Be better than your competition.

You may not win every sale. But you have to be in the game every time you decide to move forward in your sales process AND it is critical that you have GREAT confidence that you will win BEFORE you present your solution.  In other words, reviewing your game plan score card, you must have a 75% chance of winning before you present your solution. Anything less than that will make you vulnerable to think it overs, second guessing by the prospect, price adjustments by the competitor and loss of momentum by the buyer. 

Has thou been answering the un-asked question? Find out why you should never, ever answer the un-asked question in the final commandment of the 10 Commandments of Sales Success. 

Transcript:

Hi, this is Mark Trinkle, Chief Growth Officer for Anthony Cole Training Group. And believe it or not, we have made it all the way to the final commandment in our series that we've titled "The 10 Commandments for Sales Success."

Commandment number 10 is Thou Shalt Never, Ever Answer the Un-Asked Question. It's fascinating to me that so many salespeople have a tendency to do that sometimes, to the point where they even sell past the yes. Never, ever answer the unasked question. If your prospect isn't asking you about scheduling, don't answer or ask a question about it. If your prospect isn't asking you about the rest of the team, and I'm not saying they're not important, then don't answer or ask a question about it. It's as simple as that. See, we believe at Anthony Cole Training Group that questions well, there's an art part to it, there's an artistic part to it, a little bit of artistic flair, and there's a science part.

By science part we mean that open-ended questions are better than close-ended questions. Think about this. How good are you as a salesperson at getting your prospects to the point where they can't stop thinking about the conversations or the discussions that you're having with them? And the reason that's important, is because people can ignore you, right? They can ignore your email, they can ignore your voicemail, they can ignore you. But the one thing, prospects can't ignore their own thoughts. They cannot escape their own thoughts, hopefully, about the meeting that you've just had with them.

You need to ask the right question, the right way, at the right time. You certainly should be asking questions that you can reasonably predict or know the answers to. And lastly, don't answer questions that your prospect isn't asking. Remember, don't sell past the yes. Thanks for listening. Have a great day.

Are thou always remembering to follow the Rules of Engagement? Learn why it's important by watching our new series with Chief Growth Officer Mark Trinkle. Today, Mark will discuss Commandment #9 of the 10 Commandments of Sales Success. 

Watch all of the Commandments Here

Transcript:

Hello, this is Mark Trinkle, and believe it or not, we have made our way to commandment number nine, the 9th in our 10th installment of our series that we have called The 10 Commandments for Sales Success. Commandment number nine for today is Thou Shalt Always Remember to Follow the Rules of Engagement.

I don't know whether you have seen Top Gun, the original or the sequel that came out, Top Gun Maverick. It captivated the nation. Seemingly, it captivated me. It was a great story. That was actually a movie you could invite your whole family to watch. And if you watched that movie, whether it was the original or the second one, particularly the original, you know the trouble that that Maverick, Lieutenant Mitchell got into when he, when he flew below the hard deck, that altitude level at which it was no longer safe to carry on the competition.

And the problem was he violated Top Gun's Rules of Engagement. Salespeople do the same thing. Actually, they don't violate rules of engagement, quite frankly. Most of the time they don't even have rules of engagement. They just chase prospects. They don't have a standard of what they're looking for. They don't need a prospect to qualify for them. What's interesting is that those salespeople spend a lot of their time trying to argue that they would be a great fit for their prospect. They spend very little, if any time, trying to investigate whether or not that prospect would be a good fit for them. There are three qualifying questions that as a salesperson, you need to ask of yourself when you're deciding whether or not to chase a deal. Number one is, do I wanna win this business? Well, I get to decide. That's one of the great parts about being in sales.

You and I get to decide who we do business with. Do you want to do business with them? The second question you should ask is, can you win the business? If there's a budget, can you meet the budget for the deal? If there is an incumbent provider, can you dislodge that incumbent provider? It's a question of whether or not their current relationship is breakable. Number three, the third question you should ask is, well, how do I win this business? And that's a matter of sales strategy. You know, our coaches and training group receive a lot of calls during the week from salespeople that are frustrated about a variety of things. But the number one thing that prompts them to call in is that they're working on a deal and it's stuck. It's not moving. It's been in the pipeline for a while. Maybe the prospect has gone radio silent.

And here is my concluding thought for you. You know what? Those deals that are stuck in the pipeline, they were always destined to get stuck. They were never qualified. And who's to blame?

The salesperson who worked it, who either didn't follow or didn't have any rules of engagement? Thou shall always remember to follow rules of engagement. Have a great day.

Are you following the Ten Commandments of Sales Success? Find out by watching our new series with Chief Growth Officer Mark Trinkle. Today, Mark will discuss Commandment #8: Thou Shalt Always Remember to Add Value.

Watch all of the Commandments Here

Transcript:

Good day everyone. This is Mark Trinkle, Chief Growth Officer with Anthony Cole Training Group. We’re going to continue to march forward in our series, the 10 Commandments for Sales Success. Commandment #8 is Thou Shalt Always Remember to Add Value. Now, remember this right from the get-go. If you don’t add value at the beginning of your sales process or your sales cycle, it’s going to be really hard to defend that at the end. So let’s get that straight. You’ve gotta add it at the beginning to defend it or sell based upon it at the end. Maybe this screen is summarizing some things that you’ve heard recently about price or about rate?

Maybe you’ve heard, “Hey, your rate or your price is too high.” Maybe you heard a prospect say, “Well, you know what, I’ve got better terms from you.” Fill in the blank. Maybe you’ve heard your prospects say, “Hey, I’m gonna look around at some other options.” Maybe they’ve come back to you. Your prospect has come back to you and they said, “Hey, what would it look like if you took your proposal and you did X, Y, or Z?”

Now, look, there are three immutable truths about a prospect and their mentality and their strategy for asking you for a rate or a price reduction. Number one, the first immutable truth. It doesn’t cost him anything to ask, right? I mean, what’s the worst thing that could happen? They might hear no. Number two, your attitude and how you respond to your prospect when they do make that ask is going to set the tone for all future negotiations. And number three, if you don’t move the conversation with your prospect away from rate and towards value, then you are always going to be negotiating on rate or on price.

Now, if you want to be strong at this, if you want to get it right and you want your response to be as effective as it can be for things, you gotta be assertive. You gotta be able to assert your value. You have to know what that value is. You cannot be scared. Number two, you better be really good at asking questions and listening. That was one of the other commandments in this series, by the way. Number three, I alluded to it at the top of this video. You’ve got to be introducing value all throughout the sales process. There must be something unique. You have to stand out from the competition. You better be teaching your prospect not what to think, but how to think. And number four, you had best be really good at negotiating. That’s it for this commandment, Thou Shalt Always Remember to Add Value. Have a great day.