You Can Always Sell More How to Improve Any Sales Force

Transcription

1 Present You Can Always Sell More How to Improve Any Sales Force How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Questions? You may contact Jim at: Name Copyright 10/2014 Jim Pancero, Inc. Dallas TX

2 ABOUT JIM PANCERO Jim Pancero has the most advanced, leading-edge "business-to-business" sales and sales management training available today. Everything he does is extensively researched and has one bottom line focus...to increase an organization's strategic competitive advantage and market uniqueness. Jim's work focuses on sales organizations with high priced, large and/or competitively complex products and services. His information-intensive keynote speeches, training programs and indepth consulting work detail his innovative selling processes and strategies for the new economy and global marketplace. Even during a sixty-minute keynote, Jim provides the most experienced members of his audience with proven, immediately usable advanced ideas to increase their competitive advantage and enhance their selling processes. His combination of humor and real-world examples evolved from his experience researching and training in over 80 different industries. Jim has been directly involved in "business-to-business" selling for over 40 years. Six of those years were spent successfully selling the largest computer systems for the Data Processing Division of the IBM Corporation. During Jim's prestigious IBM career he earned several awards including the coveted "Golden Circle" designation annually awarded to the top 5% of their international sales force. In 1982, Jim founded his advanced sales training and consulting company. Since then, Jim has conducted over 3,000 presentations or consulting days for 600 companies providing a career average of five events per client. Over 90% of Jim's clients utilize his services more than once. You can learn more about Jim at Pancero.com as well view video clips on YouTube Page 1

3 TABLE OF CONTENTS SECTION I Are You Good enough as a Sales Manager to Get Better? Class #1 What is the Job of a Sales Manager? SECTION II How to Become a Sales Manager, Coach and Leader Class #2 Are You a Sales Leader or Just a Sales Manager? Class #3 The Reality of Sales Leadership Different People Need to Be Managed and Motivated Differently Class #4 How to Master the Values of a Sales Leader Class #5 The Role of a Sales Manager on a Sales Call SECTION III How to Persuasively Coach, Train and Strengthen Your Sales Team Class #6 How to Strengthen Your Coaching Skills Class #7 How to Build a New Sales Team or Improve an Existing One Class #8 How to Train a New Hire/Entry Level Salesperson SECTION IV How to Improve a Salesperson s Selling Skills and Abilities Class #9 How to Improve Attitude and Energy Selling Skills Class #10 How to Improve Operational Selling Skills Class #11 How to Improve Tactical Selling Skills Class #12 How to Maintain and Grow Your Team s Most Important Customers Class #13 How to Improve New Business Selling Skills Class #14 How to Improve Strategic Selling Skills Page 2

4 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section I - Class #1 What is the Job of a Sales Manager? WHAT IS YOUR JOB AS A SALES MANAGER? - The job of a sales manager depends on what your company needs you to do - Company bias of what is really important and needs the most attention - Company bias of short term goals needed from the sales force - Bias of your boss in how they define their expectations from you as a sales manager - What can you do to learn what is expected of you and what your boss and company define as sales management success? - Definition of the job of a sales manager: "The job of a sales manager is to help each and every one of your people achieve more than they would have achieve if just left alone" - Successful sales managers are blended managers - Responding to the bias and expectations of upper management - Backfilling and improving skill gaps and selling weaknesses within their sales team - Leading account planning and selling strategy - Successful sales managers are balanced coaches and leaders - What skill areas are your current team members best at doing and which areas need the most coaching and training to improve their overall selling results and success? People/Persuasive skills Product/Technical Skills Business/Financial Skills Page 3

5 THIS COURSE WILL FOCUS ON THE PEOPLE AND SELLING SKILLS SIDE OF SALES MANAGEMENT - You will learn - How to manage and motivate your people - How to coach and lead your team's selling process - We will not be covering - How to hire and fire - Information controls and "Key Performance Indicators" (the most critical performance numbers to track for a sales team - How to maximize your CRM software (Customer Relationship Management) to track and maintain information on your clients - Are you managing a "Selling SWAT Team" or just a bunch of independent gunfighters? - Independent Gunfighters Each sales rep is fiercely independent, with their own style of selling. Each selects their own independent messages of value and uniqueness to communicate and chooses which of their products or services to sell with little coaching or involvement with their sales manager - "Selling SWAT Team" Sells as a team following consistent selling processes and skills. Communicates a consistent message of value and uniqueness, sells the full line of products and services with active, future focused coaching and leadership from their sales manager. Page 4

6 KEY GOALS OF COACHING AND LEADING A SALES TEAM - The goals of sales management are to shift behaviors: Intuitive Painter Structural Printer Reactive Proactive Only One Move Ahead Focused Selling Planned Multi-Stepped Selling Strategies Control of Customer Information Memories of Customers - Follow the four steps of all quality improvement programs to improve your sales team 1st Start measuring and tracking what your people are doing now 2nd Define your "Best Practices" you wish they were doing 3rd Improve your people's "Best Practices" skills through ongoing training and coaching 4th Raise your standards once your people get close to your "Best Practices" so you have continuous quality improvement Page 5

7 TODAY S MOST CRITICAL SHIFT IN SALES LEADERSHIP Managing a Bunch of Gunfighters - Only hires experienced sales professionals so no sales skills training (or coaching) is needed and assumes experienced = trained - Reactive Transaction Driven Management ( Call me when you need me ) Leading a SWAT Team - Hires experienced sales professionals but understands they can always sell more and improve their abilities to plan and lead a territory - Proactive Sales Leadership - ( Let s talk about your plans for the Johnson account ) - Operational Activity Driven Focus ( What are you doing to sell next at this account? ) - Tactical and Strategic direction and planning focus. ( What are your plans over the next several months or so to grow this account? ) - Leads a sales team as the Head Doer assuming the reason they were promoted was due to their selling abilities. - Leads a sales team as a Managing Manager Understanding the reason they were promoted was due to their ability to successfully lead, and grow, experienced sales professionals. Page 6

8 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section II Class #2 Are You a Sales Leader or Just a Sales Manager? YOU CAN DEFINE YOUR STYLE OF SALES MANAGEMENT BASED ON HOW AND WHERE YOU SPEND YOUR TIME Are You Investing Your Sales Leadership Time as a Manager or a Leader? % of time % of time needed in spent now? the future REACTIVE/SUPPORT EFFORTS Paperwork, administrative, performance analysis Acting as a sales rep to your own accounts Solving problems fighting fires Product ordering Inventory management Talking to customers as a manager to solve problems - A "History" and "Today" focus - "How can we make you happy about this?" Other non-sales focused responsibilities or assignments PROACTIVE/GROWTH EFFORTS Coaching and training to improve selling "Best practices" Leading sales reps through account planning Riding with sales reps to observe and coach Talking to customers as a manager to improve service - A "Future" focus - "How can we make working with us even easier and better?" - Sales managers spend their time reactively supporting their sales team - Sales leaders spend their time proactively leading and coaching their sales team Page 7

9 WHERE DO YOU FOCUS YOUR COMMUNICATIONS? Future So what can you do so we don t have this problem again? - Forecasts and quotas - Message of uniqueness development - How to gain a competitive advantage meetings Today So what do you plan to do to fix it? - Status reports - Call planning meetings - Customer sales calls - Problem resolution activities History So what happened? - Call reports - Expense reports - "What happened?" meetings Page 8

10 ARE YOU A SALES LEADER OR JUST A SALES MANAGER? "Sales Process" Sales Coach and Leader - Asks "how" and "why" questions that focuses on improving the selling process - "How are you planning your next selling steps with this buyer?" - "Why aren't you also talking with their financial buyer?" Proactive Leadership Focused Training - Industry and competitive analysis - Defining and improving Selling Best Practices - Special pricing - Help close sales - Problem/crisis management - Equipment acquisition and expediting management Future Focused History & Today Focused - Coaching and - Call report analysis Reactive Support Focused Transactional Sales Manager - Asks what and who questions that focus on winning the transaction - What s it going to take to close that proposal? - Who else do you think will close this month? Page 9

11 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section II - Class #3 The Reality of Sales Leadership Different People Need to Be Managed and Motivated Differently THE REALITY OF SELLING AND SALES MANAGEMENT - What does it take to be a great salesperson? - Strong ego (To help defend and protect them from all of the rejection of selling) - Positive attitude - Strong level of confidence - Independent - Tends to talk more than listen - The attributes that make them successful are also the source of the hassles you will experience managing and leading a group of sales people - The invalid assumptions of experienced sales professionals and their managers - Experienced = trained - Majority of experienced sales professionals already know how to sell - A company does not need strong sales management if they have strong independent sales reps on their team Page 10

12 TODAY THERE IS A CHANGING OF THE GUARD AS BABY BOOMERS LEAVE THE WORKFORCE - Baby Boomers, those born between 1946 and 1964, tend to be loners - Technology (and its increased communications) arrived after they were adults and their education complete - Personal computers arrived in the late 1970 s - The IBM PC was introduced in August, Hand-held cell phones arrived in the mid-1980 s - s became popular in the early 1990 s - Boomers grew up making decisions alone, - Because I m unique and know what I want - Most baby boomer business decisions are made by individuals alone - I m in charge of buying our supplies so it s my decision which vendor I select and use - The next generations have grown up with technology and are more interconnected with both their personal and professional contacts Page 11

13 THE CHALLENGE FACING MOST BUSINESSES TODAY - What percent of your current sales team will you lose within the next 5 to 7 years due to age or health? Sales team = Counter + Outside sales + Drivers + Inside support - Why do we need to change? Baby Boomer Business Model Next Generation Business Model Sales rep is your competitive advantage Sales team is your competitive advantage Sales manager reactively supports sales reps - "My door is always open" Sales manager proactively coaches and leads - Get in here and tell me what s happening with that customer Sales rep over-services most important accounts to keep the business Sales team over-services most important accounts to keep the business Low competitive pressures due to sales rep/customer relationship Aggressive competitive pressures due to Internet and active prospecting by competitors Only new sales reps prospect for new customers All sales team members are always looking for new customers and selling opportunities Management assumes low turnover in sales team - Long term loyal employees Management plans on ongoing turnover within sales team - "Next Generation" is more mobile with easier access to job openings (due to the Internet) - Which management model do you have in place now? - Larger businesses with younger sales teams have already made this shift - How long before you will have no choice but to shift your management structure to this "Next Generation" business model? Page 12

14 HOW TO MOTIVATE OTHERS - The Four Rules of Motivation Rule #1 You cannot motivate anyone to do anything Rule #2 Everyone is already highly motivated Rule #3 People are motivated for their reasons, not for yours - They are motivated because of their bias, not yours - Their background, not yours - Their culture and generation, not yours Rule #4 All you can do is build an environment so each person motivates themselves - Bill McGrane Jr. - Your job (as sales manager) is to build a motivational environment for each member of your team to motivate themselves - Some need more guidance while some need more independence - You can be different in how you deal with your people as long as you are fair and consistent - As their manager you cannot be their best friend - You only complain up (Saving Private Ryan Movie) - You need to provide support, but still maintain a distance (and responsibility) - Follow the Platinum Rule instead of the Golden Rule - Golden Rule Treat others as you would want to be treated - Platinum Rule Treat others as they want to be treated Page 13

15 WHAT KIND OF MOTIVATIONAL ENVIRONMENT HAVE YOU CREATED? - The two universal motivators feeling loved and feeling important - How are you making your people feel loved and important? - What is your balance of positive to negative comments to members of your team? - How much telling and edicting do you do compared to asking? - When was the last time you asked them for their suggestions of how to fix a problem? - Do you focus on the past (history) or on the future when coaching members of your team? - Successful coaching only occurs when the person being coached believes in your leadership and trusts you want them to be successful - Successful coaching (and persuasion) is based on a two-step process: 1st Lower Resistance 2nd Deliver Your Message - How are you lowering your team s resistance to your help and coaching? Page 14

16 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section II - Class #4 How to Master the Values of a Sales Leader DO YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO COACH AND LEAD A SALES TEAM? - Have you sold before? - Selling is a unique culture and set of challenges. It is very difficult to understand a sales person's environment if you have never worked a sales territory - If you have never sold before and now find yourself as a manager of salespeople then become a student of selling - How many books, personal coaching or online learning can you find to better understand the structures and "Best Practices" of selling? - You can only successfully coach someone if you see more than they do - More awareness - More "Best Practices" - More structure and/or process - More moves ahead Page 15

17 THE FIVE CENTRAL VALUES OF SALES LEADERSHIP Value #1 Successful sales management is based on being a coach and leader (not doing things yourself as the "Head Doer") - You cannot do their job, you can only coach and advise them on how to improve how they do their job - The three levels within a company: - "Managing Manager" Their only responsibility is to manage, coach and lead others. They have no personal production responsibility. Their success is fully measured on what their team or department is able to accomplish - "Doing Manager" They have a shared responsibility of personal production as well as supervising or managing others. A sales manager who manages others but also carries their own accounts (acting to those accounts as a salesperson) - "Doer" Their front line job is to do something. Nobody reports to them. They are only responsible for their own production or efforts Value #2 Effective sales managers are balanced in their communications and focus Coach Motivator Drill Sergeant Disciplinarian Bean Counter Number crunching Value #3 Persuasive sales managers blend their positive to negative feedback - Effective coaching is based on successful questioning and challenging skills in a positive environment - What percentage of your communications is positive vs. negative? - Affirm the individual and their efforts at the same time you challenge their actions, plans, progress or results - "I know you're working late and trying hard, but we need to figure out a way to get your numbers up by the end of the year" - Positive feedback in public Negative feedback in private Page 16

18 THE FIVE CENTRAL VALUES OF SALES LEADERSHIP Continued Value #4 Effective sales managers are proactive - Leaders initiate - Managers respond - As a coach, do you initiate discussions with your team or do you wait to be asked and respond? Value #5 Successful sales leaders believe in the "Best Practices" and structures of selling - The only way to successfully coach someone to improve their skills is by breaking down those skills into the component steps or processes - I doubt if you will be an effective golf coach if all you suggest to your students is to try "Whacking it harder" Page 17

19 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section II - Class #5 The Role of a Sales Manager on a Sales Call WHY ARE YOU, AS SALES MANAGER, GOING ON A SALES CALL WITH YOUR SALES REP? - Positive reasons for a sales manager to ride along on a sales call with their sales rep - Observe and coach a sales rep on how to improve their product, technical or selling skills - Confirm past conversations affirming commitments and promises made - Affirm customers thanking them for their business and asking how your company can improve your service and support - Solve problems/fight fires helping rectify or satisfy a customer's problems - Help finalize negotiations of complex or aggressively competitive customer buying situations - Sometimes a customer does not believe your final offer until they hear it from someone higher up in your company than their sales rep - Talk bigger picture issues (more tactical, strategic and future focused issues or opportunities) - Help the sales rep get "Higher, wider and deeper" within their account - Strengthen the account relationship independent of the rep as backup protection and to be an "escape valve" in case your customer becomes unhappy or angry with their sales rep - The job of a sales manager is not to sell or to close business - Taking over the sales role on a sales call just means your customer will lose faith in their sales rep believing things only happen or decisions are only made when you are involved Page 18

20 PRE AND POST CALL PLANNING ARE CRITICAL COMPONENTS TO YOU RIDING WITH A SALES REP - Pre-call planning and discussions to help understand and prepare for your call with a sales rep - You can only observe the skills of your sales rep when you understand what their goals were for this call and what they had planned - Pre-call coaching questions to ask: - "What is the goal(s) of this sales call?" - "Why are we calling on this individual?" - "What are your long term plans and direction with this account? - "What problems or challenges do you expect to have on this call with this buyer?" - "What will your next few steps be after this call to win the business or grow the account?" - "Who else do we want to see or meet when we are with this customer?" - "What role would you like me to play on this sales call?" - Post call briefing to help your sales rep understand how they can improve and to guide them through continued skill awareness and development - Critical to maintain a balance of positive to negative feedback - Balance your History Today Future conversation - Positive coaching conversations are most likely future-focused conversations Page 19

21 HOW AND WHEN DO YOU AS A SALES MANAGER STEP IN AND INTERRUPT A SALES CALL? - It is better to allow a sales call to crash before you step in than to "save the day" by taking over the sales call before the sales rep realizes how much trouble they are really in - Stopping a sales call too early before the sales rep realizes the problems they are in only upsets the sales rep - "Why did you stop the fight? I only needed to punch their fist with my face a few more times and I would have had em" - When to stop or take over a sales call - When the sales rep asks for help (set up ahead of time in your pre-call coaching) - When you see the sales rep beginning to damage their relationship with your company - When you can see the resistance visibly rising within your customer - When the sales rep has backed themselves into a corner with no way to save themselves or the selling situation - It is best, if possible, to pause a sales call instead of taking it over to completion - Completing the sales call like you would have wanted the sales rep to do will only turn you into the doing sales rep your customer will now start to depend on and want to see - It is better to pause a selling situation saying something like "It's evident we need to do more research and to bring you a better thought out solution. Would you allow us to regroup and come back later with something more definitive to propose?" - If you talk with a customer (without the sales rep present) be careful not to destroy all of his/her power and respect with this customer - Use "we" language (we the sales team) instead of "me the manager" language - Whenever possible, questions asked by a customer to a sales manager are best followed up later and then answered by the sales rep - "Let us do some more research on this and we will get back to you by the end of the day" Page 20

22 THE THREE LEVELS OF ALL COMMUNICATIONS - 1st level of all communications "Chit Chat level" - Conversation is over meaningless or inconsequential issues - "Public knowledge" conversations they would not care if shared with others - "Chit Chat" lowers others resistance to you and your ideas but accomplishes little business - "Who do you think's going to win the game this weekend?" - 2nd level of all communications "Thinking level" - Conversation starts to become important and is "on the record" - Conversation begins to focus on the real issues, what they think about what is happening (or needs to happen) - This is the most productive level of selling and persuasion - "What do you think it will take to solve my shrink rate problem?" 3rd level of all communications "Feeling level" - Conversation takes on a more personal, and intimate level of "How will this impact me personally?" - The other person would be uncomfortable to learn you shared too much of your conversation with others - This level can become too personal distracting from the business reasons you have with this customer or buyer - "I just don't know what I'm going to do about this problem but can already see this is going to make me and my department look really bad" - All conversations start at the "Chit Chat" level - Similar to pulling a cork below the surface of the water, all conversations start at the "Chit Chat" level and will then proceed, based on your relationship with this person, into thinking, or even feeling topics of conversation - If a conversation is interrupted it will immediately go back up to the "Chit Chat" level - You are having an intensive conversation with your customer. Their phone rings, they answer it and then turn back to you saying "So where were we?" (A "Chit Chat" question) Page 21

23 HOW TO TEAM SELL ON A SALES CALL 1st Sales rep starts off sales call talking with the customer - Rep starts progressing through "Chit Chat" into the "Thinking level" of communications CUSTOMER DESK SALES MANAGER SALES REP 2nd Sales manager, being left out of the call, joins the conversation offering a comment or observation - Manager breaks the channel of communicating between the rep and customer taking the conversation back up to the "Chit Chat" level CUSTOMER DESK SALES REP SALES MANAGER - The longer someone talks on a sales call, the deeper a conversation will get into the "Thinking" or even "Feeling" levels - What can you do during your pre-call planning to organize what you and the rep want to say so you each get longer times to talk without interruptions from the other (sending the call immediately back to the "Chit Chat" level) Page 22

24 SALES RIDE-WITH FORM Page 1 - Pre-Call Planning Sales Pro s Name Sales Manager s Name Date of Ride-with I - About your upcoming customer visit/sales call Tell me about our upcoming call It is positive if you can discuss the questions in this first section before starting your ride-with time with a sales rep. Fill out one page for each customer to be visited. Account Name 1 - Who are we meeting with on this call? 2 - Why does the customer/prospect think we are coming? 3 - What do you plan to accomplish on this sales call/visit? 4 - What would you like my role to be as a sales manager on this call? How can I help contribute and add value to your selling efforts? 5 - How would you like us to coordinate who says what and when? 6 - What are the next several steps you have planned with this account after this (assumed to be) call is successfully completed? 7 - Anything else I need to know as a sales manager going with you on this call? Page 23

25 SALES RIDE-WITH FORM Page 2 - Sales Call Feedback (After the call is completed) Sales Pro s name Sales Manager Name Date of Ride-with 8 - Overall how well did the sales professional do and how well did the sales call go? 9 - What percent of the sales call did the sale professional talk? - Would more have been accomplished on this call if the customer would have been doing more of the talking? 10 - How well did you feel the sales call went? Did you accomplish what was planned and expected? 11 - How well did the sales rep brief and prepare your briefing for the just completed sales call? Were you surprised on the call? 12 - How comfortable are you that the sales professional has a solid understanding and proactive control of what s really happening with this customers/prospect? 13 - Suggestions to help improve the next pre-call account briefings 14 - Suggestions to improve the selling skills or efforts (observed on this call)? 15 - (Space for additional comments) Page 24

26 SALES RIDE-WITH FORM Page 3 - Sales Professional General Discussions and Feedback (After the call is completed) 16 - About your territory and selling efforts So how s your year progressing? - Consider discussing their top 3 to 5 selling opportunities currently being pursuing. Where are their selling efforts with these accounts at this time and what are their planned next steps? - Any account or selling situation you want to discuss or receive feedback? 17 - About your selling skills and abilities Are you good enough to get better? - Discuss what selling skills do you feel this sales professional has best mastered? - Discuss what key selling skills, disciplines or efforts, if improved, could offer this sales professional the most skill improvement and increased potential for selling success? - Discuss what specific skills, disciplines or efforts you want this rep working on prior to your next ride-with 18 - About your job and life So how are things going for you? (This discussion can be on or off the record) - Discuss how your sales professional feels things are going for them at work - Discuss how satisfied they are with their job, their career with us, and selling for your company - Discuss how you (as their sales manager) feel their career is progressing. Overall how good a job are they doing? How valuable are they to you and your company? - Discuss what they feel senior management most needs to be working on that will best improve our customer experience? - Ask your sales professional if there is anything else they want to ask or talk about? 19 - Any final or overall impressions with your time riding with this rep? Page 25

27 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section III - Class #6 How to Strengthen Your Coaching Skills HOW TO INCREASE YOUR PERSUASIVE COACHING SKILLS - Successful coaching requires patience - A successful coach understands coaching is a process of baby steps - Do you have the patience to allow imperfect behavior? - Do you have the patience to allow someone you are coaching to discover on their own what you already know? - Do not push for too much change too fast - Persuasive coaching is very similar to selling - The fundamental two steps of selling - 1st - Lower their resistance - 2nd Deliver your message - You cannot coach or deliver a message to someone with high resistance - Effective coaching only occurs when the person being coached believes in your leadership and trusts you want them to be successful - Does your team believe you are on their side and have their best interests in mind when doing your job as sales manager? - Communications structures to help your team believe you are on their side and want them to be successful - How balanced are your communications - Listening vs talking? (Ask /Tell) - Positive vs negative communications? - People vs task discussions? - How much are you talking about them and how they are doing vs. talking about what they need to do in their job? - History focused vs today focused vs future focused communications? - How much time are you spending talking about what happened vs what they need to do moving forward? - Would you trust and believe in your manager if they were always negative, only focused on the past and what wasn't done, and shows no concern or interest in how you are personally doing? Page 26

28 THE GOAL OF COACHING IS TO CHANGE BEHAVIORS AND OUTCOMES - Goal of coaching is to change behaviors or direction without destroying their positive attitude, ego or energy - How a "Selling Process" coach measures incremental change: 1st look for a change in attitude 2nd look for a change in effort 3rd look for a change in progress 4th (and final) is to look for a change in results Page 27

29 HOW TO CONDUCT EFFECTIVE IN-HOUSE SALES TRAINING WITH YOUR TEAM - The best environment for sales team training and coaching - Keep the meeting interactive - Ask questions instead of lecturing - The best learning environment is when you ask questions and your sales team talks - Don't try to be the content expert use other's materials and ideas - Your success is not in presenting as an expert but instead facilitating as their coach and leader - A successful trainer/coach helps you discover what they already know - Include a sales training module (30 to 60 minutes) in each sales meeting whenever possible - Take one skill topic or idea per meeting - Select an article, audio or Internet video clip that best communicates the topic you want to discuss - The four questions to ask when coaching/training a sales team - Coaching questions to ask after you have played an audio, read an article or shown a video Question #1 What did you think of the article/audio/video? Question #2 How relevant are those ideas to our industry, company and unique selling environment? Question #3 What do you plan to do different based on what we discussed? - And after your training when you talk or see them in the hall ask Question #4 What success did you have (or have you been having) with the ideas we discussed and you promised to try? Page 28

30 THE BEST PRACTICES OF RUNNING AN EFFECTIVE SALES MEETING 1) Keep the meeting positive. - Remember the "love sandwich" concept when you do need to present negative or challenging feedback to your team. - Always start off the meeting with a positive/affirming comment from you. - Always end the meeting with a positive/affirming comment from you. 2) Never run a sales meeting without a prepared detailed agenda. 3) Define the starting and ending times and then stick to both. 4) Cover the most important ideas first (in case you run out of time). 5) Cover the fast/brief ideas first leaving the most detailed discussion issues to the end (in case it takes longer than expected and you run out of time). 6) Whenever possible have team members present ideas or topics to be discussed so you are not the only one talking. 7) Make sure to keep the meeting balanced so one or two sales reps do not dominate all of the conversations. Call on specific team members for their comments to help keep everyone involved and talking. 8) Bail out of an intensively negative or involved discussion that is not productive by tabling the topic to your next meeting with the promise (and follow-thru by you) of creating a team to look into this in more detail and to report back at the next meeting. 9) Work to make sure that each sales meeting has something covered that is tactical and something that is strategic. Otherwise the entire meeting will be operational "administrivia." 10) Invite at least some of your inside people to each meeting so they feel part of the sales team. Page 29

31 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section III - Class #7 How to Build a New Sales Team, or Improve an Existing One HOW TO BUILD OR STRENGTHEN A SALES TEAM - New sales teams (or individuals new to selling) need to work on all four skill levels - Start with building attitude and energy (how to maintain a positive attitude in the face of rejection) - Next help them master the operational product and personal selling skills of your industry - Finally work with them on their control of their tactical selling processes and structures as well as their strategic message and positioning skills - Experienced sales teams need more tactical and strategic skill coaching and leadership - It is challenging to try changing operational skill behaviors (such as the steps of a sales call) after a salesperson has been selling for five or more years - Better to first focus on tactical and strategic skill coaching then work on their basic selling skills later when you have earned more credibility and they are more likely to listen to your more fundamental coaching suggestions (such as ask more questions on your sales calls) - The three most critical selling skills to work on with an experience sales team - The three skill sets to work on with your experienced sales team that will generate the strongest results and increases in sales volumes 1) Strong response to Why buy from you? consistently delivered by your entire team. 2) Defined (and coached to) Selling Process Best Practices. - ID to Close new business selling process. - 1/1 to 12/31 processes to support your best customers. 3) Proactive Selling Process coaching to all team members. - Including leading your team through individual account coaching and planning sessions for important customers Page 30

32 WHAT SELLING SKILLS DO I NEED TO BUILD OR IMPROVE IN MY TEAM? Strategic Focus and Positioning - Communicating Your Philosophy and Market Position - Answering the Question "Why, based on all of the competitive alternatives available to me, do I want to buy from you?" Tactical Tools and Controls - Understanding and Controlling Your "ID to Close" Selling Process - How to Call "Higher and Wider" Within a Customer's Organization - How to Utilize the Rest of Your Team in Your Selling Process - Time and Territory Management Skills - Effective Negotiation Skills Operational Skills and Abilities - Steps of a Sales Call - Personality Awareness Skills ("Why people buy") - Persuasive Communication Skills - Product and Industry Knowledge Attitude & Energy Page 31

33 INCREASING YOUR TEAM S SELLING SKILLS - What to expect from strengthened strategic selling skills - The ability of your sales team to sell at higher margins because they understand you are not in a price driven market - The ability to answer persuasively a customer asking them why, based on all the alternatives available to me do I want to buy from you? - What to expect from strengthened tactical selling skills - Sales professionals planning their daily and weekly activities or travel schedules in advance and in a logical way that is visible to everyone within your sales team. - Sales professionals better able to answer where any customer currently is and what they have planned to maintain or grow their business - Sales professionals being more proactive and initiating competitive protection activities sooner and with a higher degree of effectiveness - More ongoing new business prospecting efforts - What to expect from strengthened operational selling skills - A more consistent and persuasive sales professional able to handle a wider range of customers, their concerns, their needs and expectations. - A sales team who will come across to your customers as more customer focused, more professional and of more value than your competition. - What to expect from strengthened attitude and energy selling skills - A sales team who has earned customer's loyalty due to their proven professionalism, values, and commitment to helping. - A more energized, excited and harder working sales professional. - A "coachable" sales team open to your suggestions and guidance. Page 32

34 SWAT Team Selling Leading Your Team to a Competitive Advantage "Is your sales team functioning as a collection of independent gun fighters each choosing their own targets or a trained unit with process, structures, strategy and direction?" - Step 1 Senior/Executive level Commit to a more Selling Process Coaching style of sales management. - Who will take responsibility for actively coaching each sales team member? - How will you free up sales management time and responsibilities so they have more time to coach and lead their sales team? - Step 2 Senior/Executive level (with input from selected sales managers and senior sales reps) - Identify & develop your team s Selling Best Practices - Account planning forms and coaching process Standardized account planning and coaching forms to help your sales reps prepare for their management coaching sessions - Why buy from me messaging - Having a brief message of strategic competitive uniqueness and value being consistently delivered by all members of your sales team - ID to Close new business stepped selling process - Multiple-stepped plan to proactively strategize and implement when selling to a new prospect or selling a new business opportunity to an existing customer. - 1/1 to 12/31 plans to support and grow your best customers - Multiple-stepped plan to proactively maintain and grow an existing customer. - Step 3 Front line Sales Managers - Teach your sales managers how to shift from being Transactional Managers to Selling Process Coaches. - The average sales manager today does little coaching or leadership but instead focuses all of their efforts on merely supporting their sales team with special pricing, expediting, problem solving and customer thank you calls. Time, and coaching skills, needs to be committed each week to get more involved as a coach and strategist to each member of your sales team. Page 33

35 SWAT Team Selling Leading Your Team to a Competitive Advantage Page 2 - Step 4 Sales Reps and their Sales Managers - Teach your sales team how to best utilize your defined Selling Best Practices and account planning. - The marketplace has changed. Customers are less loyal, more demanding and are more price sensitive. Your competitors are effective selling professionals with a solid set of existing customers, offering proven products at a very competitive price. - Your ability to win competitively in this intensive market will be based on your capability to consistently implement all areas of your selling expertise, functioning with your team (and sales manager) to apply the SWAT Team Selling Best Practices and proven philosophies that can best increase your competitive advantage and selling success. - Goals/outcomes from completing these four steps toward SWAT Team Selling - Sales professionals utilizing a SWAT Team Selling multiple-stepped thinking, planning, and selling approach - Sales professionals better maintaining and growing their important customers through structured account planning and coaching from their sales manager. - All sales team members communicating a consistent and stronger message of competitive uniqueness when any customer asks Why do I want to buy from you? - All sales team members understanding and following a consistent set of Selling Best Practices. - All sales team members gaining an understanding of how to sell, as a team, a single solution of customer-focused value through all departments within your organization. - All sales team members gaining an appreciation and confidence that they are good enough to get better. Page 34

36 STAYING IN THE 'COACHING ZONE'" Strategic Focus and Positioning Future - Forecasts and quotas - Communicating your philosophy and market position - Answering the question "Why, based on all of the competitive alternatives available to me, do I want to buy from you?" - Strategic planning - Coaches the team on what to do before anything is done Tactical Tools and Controls Today - Understanding and controlling your "ID to Close" selling process - How to call "higher and wider" within a customer's organization - How to utilize the rest of your team in your selling process - Time and territory management skills - Effective negotiation skills - Status reports - Call planning meetings - Customer sales calls - Problem resolution activities Operational Skills and Abilities History - Steps of a Sales Call - Personality Awareness Skills ("Why people buy") - Persuasive Communication Skills - Product and Industry Knowledge - Call reports - Expense reports - "What happened?" meetings - Only complains about what wasn t done after the fact Attitude & Energy - The Coaching Zone occurs when you keep your coaching conversations... - Tactical - Strategic - Future focused Page 35

37 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section III - Class #8 How to Train a New Hire/Entry Level Salesperson SEVEN IDEAS TO HELP YOU TRAIN A NEWLY HIRED/ENTRY LEVEL SALESPERSON Idea #1 Don't assume "Experienced = Trained" - Evaluate the selling skills of any new hire no matter what their seniority or past experience - What skill gaps or opportunities for improvement exist with this new person? Idea #2 Have your new hire spend their first week riding with various members of your team - Helps promote a "Single Enterprise" (respecting and understanding the importance and contributions of all team members) - Helps create awareness and respect for how challenging other jobs are within your company - Positions to have your newly hired rep spend a day riding with and observing: - Outside sales rep - Inside/counter sales - Driver/delivery/shipping - Inventory/warehouse picking - Administrative/credit Page 36

38 SEVEN IDEAS TO HELP YOU TRAIN A NEWLY HIRED/ENTRY LEVEL SALESPERSON - Continued Idea #3 Develop an entry level training manual and stepped training process - so you do not have to reinvent your training process every time you hire a new salesperson - Three ring binder with a section tab for each week of your planned training - Training and coaching can continue even after they start in their territory - Keep the original copy so you do not lose already completed additions to your manual - Pay a small bonus (a few hundred dollars) to the new hire for: - Successfully completing their sales training - How they improved their entry level training manual - How did they help you fill out your training? Documenting steps or procedures to make it easier for your next new hire - You should have an effective training manual after two or three new hires complete your training (and contribute to the improvement of your manual) Idea #4 Establish an ongoing one-on-one new hire coaching session each week - You can share these coaching sessions with two or three newly hired sales reps if they start about the same time - Allows you to review their progress, offer suggestions, and coach them on your expectations for their next week of sales training assignments - Suggested newly hired coaching agenda/questions to ask: - "How do you feel your training is going so far?" - "What did you do/learn last week?" - "Any problems, concerns or questions so far?" - "What do you plan to work on and accomplish next week?" Idea #5 Get each newly hired salesperson a mentor - Meant to act as an informal personal coach and guide - Select a mentor from your sales team that best exhibits the attitudes, values and skills you desire in a member of your team Page 37

39 SEVEN IDEAS TO HELP YOU TRAIN A NEWLY HIRED/ENTRY LEVEL SALESPERSON - Continued Idea #6 Suggested order of skill building in a newly hired salesperson (with not much selling experience or established skills) 1st Learn the company and the company values 2nd Learn your products and application usage 3rd Learn how and why your customers make money and how they benefit from your products and services 4th Learn your company's message of value and competitive uniqueness 5th Build the skills of selling (Attitude & energy, Operational, Tactical and Strategic) 6th Learn account planning and how to control and lead a customer Idea #7 Utilize role playing and practice sales calls - Set up simple, yet relevant role playing scenarios for your newly hired salesperson to design, prepare and present - Use other managers or senior sales reps as the customer/call taker - Sample role-playing sales calls can include: - How to present your message of competitive uniqueness to a prospect ("Why should I buy from you?") - How to give a product demo or conduct a site inspection/tour - How to prepare and deliver a proposal and price quote - Have them develop a parallel proposal to an actual selling situation currently being worked on by another member of your team Page 38

40 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section IV - Class #9 How to Improve Attitude and Energy Selling Skills IDEAS TO IMPROVE A SALESPERSON'S ATTITUDE AND ENERGY Idea #1 The attitude and energy of a salesperson (especially a newer one) tends to be a mirror to you and your attitude and energy - If you are positive, future-focused and excited then the rest of your team will tend to follow Idea #2 An overly excited and emotional sales team is normal - The majority of sales people are emotional - When sales are up they are happy, excited and tend to work more - When sales are down they get sullen, depressed and work less - Active one-on-one coaching and discussions can help manage or minimize disruptive emotions within a sales team - Balance your communications between both the task side ("How the job is going") and the people side ("How do you feel about how things are going?") Idea #3 To increase sales your team will likely need to first increase their energy and work efforts - Do they really believe they can sell more? - Do they really believe they can improve their personal selling skills and effectiveness? - and that improving their skills will also increase their sales? - Do they really believe your leadership skills and coaching efforts can help them improve their sales results? Page 39

41 IDEAS TO IMPROVE A SALESPERSON'S ATTITUDE AND ENERGY - Continued Idea #4 Keep talking to your team especially in tougher times - When facing a tougher market or economy you need to communicate they didn't cause today's weaker business economy but they can sell their way out of it - Talk to your team about the value and strength that comes from functioning as a team and sharing ideas - The safer and more protected they feel with you and their team then the more risks they will be willing to take within their territory - More risks taken (when managed properly) tend to generate more new sales - In challenging times hold weekly sales meetings (face-to-face or by phone) to review and congratulate progress, debate recent selling challenges (and what to do about it) and to discuss improved selling skills or processes to be tried Idea #5 Ask permission to help them make more money, get better and sell more - Remind them how your measurements and compensation are tied to their (and the rest of the team's) performance - "As your sales manager I'm the only one in your lifeboat with you so will you let me help us?" - Keep asking your team if you are helping and of value - You cannot share your messages and ideas until you have lowered their resistance Page 40

42 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section IV - Class #10 How to Improve Operational Selling Skills STRENGTHENING OPERATIONAL SELLING SKILLS MAKES YOU MORE PERSUASIVE AND CREDIBLE - It is challenging to teach operational selling skills to experienced sales professionals - Operational selling skills tend to center on the skills also considered habits by experienced salespeople - Changing habits is challenging - Most of us do not think about the steps or structures of our established habits - It is easiest (and best) to teach operational selling skills to salespeople within the first five years of their selling career - The most critical operational foundations of successful selling to master: 1st - Product and technical knowledge 2nd - Steps of a sales call Page 41

43 STEPS OF A SALES CALL 1st - Lower resistance 2nd - Ask questions and qualify - ID customer needs. - Learn/understand their environment. - Qualify the relevance and appropriateness of your solution. 3rd - Present your solution 4th - Close - Where do we go from here? - What happens now? - What do we need to do next? 5th - Agree to your next contact Page 42

44 THE THREE MOST CONSISTENT OPERATIONAL SELLING WEAKNESSES FACED BY ALL SALES PROFESSIONALS Weakness #1 Sales people without control of their steps of a sales call will talk too much of the time in front of customers - What percent of a sales call do you talk vs listen? - Most sales calls are interactive, but the salesperson still does as much as 90% of the talking - Customer asks a 5 second question Why are you so expensive? - Salesperson provides a 10 minute response - Take a test Next time you are making a sales call over the telephone record your side of the conversation on your cell phone. You don t need to record your customer, just assume any silence on your recording was when your customer was talking. Go back afterward with a stop watch and record what percent of your call you talked versus listened - What do you think would be the best persuasive balance of you, the salesperson talking compared to your customer talking? % salesperson talking / % customer talking Page 43

45 THE THREE MOST CONSISTENT OPERATIONAL SELLING WEAKNESSES FACED BY ALL SALES PROFESSIONALS - Continued Weakness #2 A salesperson without control of their steps of a sales call will collapse under pressure and only present/talk - Pressures caused by: - Selling pressures - Relationship pressures - Time pressures - Competitive pressures - Environmental pressures - A salesperson without control of their steps of a sales call will forget about lowering resistance and asking questions and will only talk sometimes not even asking for an order or next contact - How would you handle a customer saying You ve got five minutes what do you want? - The impact of selling under pressure without selling structures. Sales professional in control and using their steps of a sales call Sales professional without control of their steps of a sales call 1st Lower resistance 2nd Questions and qualify 3rd Present 4th Ask for the order 5th Agree to and/or set up next contact Sales pro just talks spending all their time presenting, asking few questions Page 44

46 THE THREE MOST CONSISTENT OPERATIONAL SELLING WEAKNESSES FACED BY ALL SALES PROFESSIONALS - Continued Weakness #3 All sales people are using the same steps even the high pressure Slime Balls - The problem they are using the exact same steps of a sales call you are using - The difference between the most ethical customer-focused sales professionals and the highest pressured slime balls is in how they apply the steps of a sales call "Slime Balls" sell by talking and "pitching" 1st Lower resistance 2nd Questions and qualify < 25% Asking > 75% Talking 3rd Present 4th Ask for the order 5th Agree/Set up next contact "Low Pressure Selling Professionals" sell by asking and listening > 75% Asking 1st Lower resistance 2nd Questions and qualify < 25% Talking Page 45 3rd Present 4th Ask for the order 5th Agree/Set up next contact

47 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section IV - Class #11 How to Improve Tactical Selling Skills STRENGTHENING TACTICAL SELLING SKILLS PROVIDE SELLING CONTROL AND MULTIPLE-STEPPED THINKING AND PLANNING - A tactical competitive advantage is based on thinking and planning more moves ahead than your competitors - The three tactical selling processes to master and follow - With prospects and new selling efforts Identify Close - With existing customers you want to maintain and grow January 1st December 31st - Within your larger customers - How do you get Higher, Wider and Deeper? Page 46

48 HOW STABLE AND PROTECTED ARE YOUR TEAM'S MOST IMPORTANT CUSTOMERS? - Getting Higher, Wider and Deeper - Higher - Calling on more senior managers or company executives - Wider - Calling to other departments or users who are impacted by your products or services - Deeper - Calling on the front line operators or users of your products or services - How many of your team's customers are "One car wreck" away from you losing the business (or having it put out to competitive bid)? - The "Car wreck" sales test (Ask a sales rep) "Did you hear the news? Your main buyer contact at your most important account was just killed in a car wreck will you still keep the business?" - Having only one contact within a customer exposes your sales rep (and your company) to an "end run" where your competitor convinces other departments or more senior executives on the value and uniqueness of doing business with them instead of you - The average "business to business" sales rep has over 50% of their accounts exposed due to them only calling and being connected with a single buying contact at their customer Page 47

49 IDEAS TO HELP YOUR TEAM GET "HIGHER, WIDER & DEEPER" Idea #1 - Look for exposed accounts where a sales rep has not successfully gotten "Higher, Wider and Deeper" - Put those customers or prospects through your account planning coaching to identify plans to correct this situation Idea #2 - Include discussions about how to get "Higher, Wider and Deeper" within all of your account planning discussions with your sales reps - Getting "Higher, Wider and Deeper" does not happen naturally within an account relationship - It takes creative planning and selling to get above a main buyer Idea #3 - Never let your sales reps go around a buyer take them with you - Your main contact/buyer will need to see the value to them in you getting higher, wider and deeper than just calling on them Idea #4 Make sure your reps have a reason to be calling on someone outside their normal buyer contact - Have a reason to meet them - "Just wanted a chance to meet you and introduce myself" just tends to irritate customers - Great reasons to get a few minutes in front of senior customer management - Explaining a new industry direction (and its impact on their business, profitability or usage) - Significant new industry technologies, products or services that can dramatically impact this customer, their business and profitability Idea #5 - Use your senior managers - The easiest way to get a meeting with customer senior management is when "My senior manager wants to meet with your senior manager to discuss how we can be of more value and assistance to you and your company" Idea #6 - Change your message the higher up you get within your customer - The higher up you go within a company the more your language and focus of discussion will change Page 48

50 ADJUSTING YOUR LANGUAGE AND SELLING MESSAGE TO YOUR BUYER Owner/CEO Level STRATEGIC LEVEL (Proactive) How will this help me improve our brand, profitability or market share? Direction, profitability, growth and market share Vice President Level How will this help me improve our performance, profitability or effectiveness? Department Head Level TACTICAL LEVEL How will this help me improve my department s budget, performance or quality? Department profitability, budget, tracking, product and quality improvement Manager Level How will this help my team by making their job simpler, faster or lower cost? Worker Level How will this make my job easier or improve the quality of what I do? OPERATIONAL LEVEL (Reactive) Maintaining productivity and quality Page 49

51 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section IV - Class #12 How to Maintain and Grow Your Team s Most Important Customers WHERE DO YOUR CUSTOMERS SEE YOU? Trusted Advisor - Increasing customer order size and loyalty Business Growth and Profit Generator - Offering new ideas and suggestions PROACTIVE REACTIVE "Specials" Presenter - Covering as many "special deals" as possible Order Taker / Problem Solver - Taking care of your customer's problems Page 50

52 WHAT IS YOUR TEAM'S PLAN TO MAINTAIN AND SUPPORT YOUR MOST IMPORTANT CUSTOMERS? - The "What are you doing to support your best accounts now?" test - Drawing this visual, ask each sales rep to write down everything they have planned for their most important customer over the next twelve months that will help maintain and grow their business 1/1 12/31 - Expect to hear three sets of responses from your sales reps: 1st "This is how often I call on this account" - But only solving problems and asking the same four questions of: - "Anything you need? - Anything coming up? - "Anything I can help with?" - How's the family?" 2nd "This is the social activity I have planned with this customer to strengthen our relationship" 3rd "The only efforts I have planned are the things I plan to personally do" - Notice no efforts being done by the rest of your team will be part of their list or plans - Is your team each supporting their most important customers as independent gunfighters, giving different levels of support, or as a "Selling SWAT Team" with structure, defined processes and active coaching? - Notice the majority of support being offered your best customers is merely reactive support due to either your buyer asking for specific help or your team just repeating the same support levels and efforts as in previous year's efforts - What can you do as their coach and leader to get your team to do more proactive support efforts? Page 51

53 WHAT EXTRA "WOW" EFFORTS CAN YOU OFFER YOUR MOST IMPORTANT CUSTOMERS? - Customers do not tend to remember reactive service and support efforts (unless there was a problem) - Invest in your most important customers by offering or initiating efforts to help - Your proactive selling efforts will separate you from your competitors - Helps improve a customer's overall satisfaction and loyalty - Gives you an excuse to get "Higher, wider and deeper" within your account - What can you offer or suggest to provide extra value to your most important customers? - In-house safety or skill training for their workers - Personal contact (phone or face-to-face) with your senior leadership - Senior management asking "What kind of job are we doing for you?" and "What can we do to make it even better?" - When your customer's business is significantly smaller than yours, offer free business training seminars or consulting conversations with your corporate experts - How to make more money (or lower your costs) in your business - HR or management organizational issues - Participation in special projects looking for new opportunities or efficiencies - Arranging a private meeting with your support team to discuss how you can improve your support and make working with you easier - Attended by your sales manager, outside sales rep, inside sales rep(s), service or warehouse manager Page 52

54 SUGGESTED ACCOUNT PLANNING COACHING SESSION AGENDA 1) History (Brief time) - What s been happening? - What s the latest? 2) Crisis and transactional closing problems (Brief time) - What s it going to take to close this business? - What s it going to take to solve this problem? 3) Review and discuss planned actions with your selected account To whom are you talking? What equipment/products do they currently have? What additional equipment/products do you think they will need? What other competitors do you expect to be going after this business? Who do you think you should be strengthening your relationship with at this account? How do you plan to position our company s philosophies and messaging with this customer? 7. What is your 90-day plan to work to win this business? 8. What can you do to increase your competitive advantage with this account? 9. What else can you do to get your profitability up on this sale/proposal? 10. How can you best position our higher price? 4) Recap and summarize identified action plans and completion deadlines Page 53

55 ACCOUNT PLANNING FORM - Page 1 of 4 - Where we are now Account Name: 1. Important top contacts you have already met: Status - Champion (and supporter of your company) - Friend (of your company) - Neutral (toward any company) - Biased (toward another company) - Unknown (where they stand) Name Job Title Status 2. Current products used: Products Quantity Part # Date first purchased 3. Products requested by customer or expected to be proposed Products Quantity Why? Expected Delivery 4. Who else do we expect will be proposing? Competitor Strengths Weaknesses 5. Who currently has the competitive advantage to win this business? Page 54

56 ACCOUNT PLANNING FORM - Page 2 of 4 - Where we want to go Account Name: 6. Most Important top contacts still want/need to meet: Importance - Critical (to us winning this business) - Important (to us winning this business) - Positive (for us to be talking with them) - Unknown (what their real impact will be on their final decision to buy) Name Job Title Status 7. Our current competitive strengths and weaknesses with this customer: Strengths Weaknesses 8. How we plan to position our company and our philosophies and messaging with this customer: Our selling message 9. Key goals we want to accomplish with this customer Goal #1 Goal #2 Goal #3 Page 55

57 ACCOUNT PLANNING FORM - Page 3 of 4 - How we plan to win this business Your planned selling strategy with this customer Selling to-do s and action plans to win this business Page 56

58 Sales Professional: Account Planning Form For Existing Accounts Page 4 of 4 Account Name 1st Quarter 2nd Quarter Date Prepared 3rd Quarter 4th Quarter Account Growth Plan - New products to propose Contact Growth Plan - Existing accounts - New contacts - New locations Business/Executive Review & Growth Planning Introduce New Products and Technologies Executive Involvement Social Entertainment Customer Service Reviews Page 57

59 IDEAS TO ESTABLISH THE MOST POSITIVE ENVIRONMENT FOR YOUR INDIVIDUAL "SALES REP ACCOUNT PLANNING SESSIONS" Page 1 1) Positive to have more than the sales rep present. - Great time to have any sales reps sitting in so they know what is happening in the rep's territory (and how they can help). - Also a great time for others in management to attend to learn more about what is happening with this rep's selling activities and direction. 2) Be sure and provide positive feedback and congratulations on positives. 3) Be sure and utilize the concept of the "love sandwich" if negative feedback needs to be provided. - "Love sandwich" 1st State something positive about the person and their efforts. 2nd State the negative or what you are concerned about. 3rd State something positive about how hard the person is working or the potential you know they have to do better and how important they are to your team. 4) Each person in attendance should have a pad of paper for any assigned "ToDo's" that come out of the discussions. 5) Remind all in attendance that this is a positive coaching session meant to help the sales rep to be more successful and for others to better understand how they can support the selling efforts of the rep. 6) The more negative the comments are to the sales rep then the less effective, and helpful the coaching session will be. - Overall performance negatives need to be handled at another meeting and time. - This is not a meeting for you to be a "Drill Sergeant" or to hammer them. Page 58

60 IDEAS TO ESTABLISH THE MOST POSITIVE ENVIRONMENT FOR YOUR INDIVIDUAL "SALES REP ACCOUNT PLANNING SESSIONS" Page 2 7) Work to keep the meeting "tactical" and "strategic" focused vs. being bogged down in "operational" details. 8) Work to keep the meeting more "future focused" than "history/today" focused. 9) Confirm in advance the agenda and overall goals of this coaching session. - Identify what accounts you want to discuss in detail. - Ask them what accounts they want to go over. - Identify starting and ending times (and stick to them). - Eliminate the less important accounts if the coaching session is going long. - Critical to still cover the personal employee issues at each coaching session. 10) Important to conduct ongoing reviews of the monthly coaching session plans every time you ride with a sales rep or have any quiet time with a rep. Page 59

61 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section IV - Class #13 How to Improve New Business Selling Skills WHAT IS YOUR TEAM'S "ID TO CLOSE" MULTIPLE-STEPPED NEW BUSINESS SELLING PLAN? - Majority of sales people have no defined multiple-stepped new business selling plan - The "Define your new business selling process" test - Most of your sales reps have been selling for your company for several years but cannot define the steps they go through to sell new business to a new company (or new business to an existing customer) - Drawing this visual, ask each sales rep to write down the steps or plan they follow from the time they identify a new prospect or selling opportunity until the time they close on the sale (even though the relationship will continue) - Expect few to give you any kind of response or defined selling plan - Tactical multiple-stepped coaching and leading reps through account planning are critical components of successfully leading a sales team Page 60

62 SUGGESTED TACTICAL "BUSINESS TO BUSINESS" SELLING PLAN - Identify potential "selling success factors" for each selling step that, if achieved or understood, will increase your team's chances of winning - Examples - Getting samples, plant tour or meeting with a senior manager Step 1 Set up, positioning and establishing an appointment - What job title is the best initial contact at a new prospect? Step 2 - Initial sales call, plant tour & ID of next best application to promote - Position your buyer s evaluation/decision process by recommending they ask all vendors (including you): 1. What s my total cost? 2, Can you support me? 3. How much risk am I taking doing business with you? 4. How will you help me improve my business? - What step are you on as an organization? 1st Decide pain / 2nd decide direction / 3rd decide solutions / 4th decide vendors / 5th decide process Step 3 - Do more research/positioning and get higher wider & deeper Step 4 Validate your working relationship - What does your buyer most want from you and your company? - If an existing customer remind them of your past service and quality - If a new company prospect share your references and past proof of success - Review how you support a customer and what level of service they can expect Step 5 - Proposal positioning & delivery - Never deliver a proposal to a buyer that contains new information or surprises - Review major proposal points and pricing in advance so you can defend or adjust what you are proposing Page 61

63 SUGGESTED TACTICAL "BUSINESS TO BUSINESS" SELLING PLAN - Continued Step 6 Justify your higher price lower total cost philosophy - Walk your buyer through the ROI (Return on Investment) of buying from you Step 1 Apples to apples (Talking the same products and specs?) Step 2 Prove Hard Savings (Can be quantified and validated) Step 3 Prove Soft Savings (Not as quantified and harder to validate) Step 4 Explain your Insurance Policy (Can t quantify or prove the savings of this point but it is important to the buyer) Close is to say For only $xx/month (or unit or assembly) you get all of this extra support, coverage and protection Step 7 Post sale support to identify and position your next application solution - What can your team do to so impress and amaze this buyer that they want to do more business with you in the future? Step 8 Evaluate, adjust & prepare for your next sale - How does the multiple-stepped plan or supporting tools need to be added or adjusted to improve our chances of winning in the future? Page 62

64 YOU CAN ALWAYS SELL MORE HOW TO IMPROVE ANY SALES FORCE How to Manage, Coach and Lead Your Sales Team Section IV - Class #14 How to Improve Strategic Selling Skills HOW TO IMPROVE STRATEGIC SELLING SKILLS - Strong strategic skills position your team's selling philosophy, value and competitive uniqueness - Majority of sales people have unorganized, or ineffective messages of value and competitive uniqueness - The "Why buy from you?" test - Ask each sales rep to write down the major bulleted points they would cover with a prospect asking them: "You're the third vendor I've talked to about this stuff today. Why, based on all the competitive alternatives available to me do I want to buy from you and your company?" - Expect each sales rep to have a different answer than the rest of your sales team. Also expect them to be saying about the same things your competitors are also saying Page 63

65 TEN STEPS TO STRENGTHENING YOUR TEAM S MESSAGE OF COMPETITIVE UNIQUENESS Step 1 Agreement - You are not in a price driven market. - All markets are value focused. You increase your ability to win against lower priced competitors by increasing your value and uniqueness not by dropping your prices. - Your goal is to communicate how you are not the lowest price but can prove how and why you are the lowest total cost for your buyers. Step 2 Identification - Your uniqueness and competitive edge will no longer likely come from your products, but from your support organization to help your customers increase their utilization and ease of using your products. Step 3 Build a team list - on a flip chart pad or white board, of the major points to answer a customer or prospect asking you, Why, based on all the competitive alternatives available to me do I want to buy from you? Step 4 Put your completed Why buy list through the four consistent problems or tests of your uniqueness message. - This proves to your team how and why their current responses need to be strengthened and improved. Step 5 Discuss the Four Core Values and how they apply to your organization. - To prove these core values fit all buying opportunities ask your team to identify any terms on their Why buy list that do not tie directly into at least one of the four core values. Step 6 Discuss as a team how you can repackage your value and uniqueness into one consistent message delivered by all members of your team. - Once you develop your new message do not put it in print, in a brochure or on your website so you can keep your message away from your competitors Page 64

66 TEN STEPS TO STRENGTHENING YOUR TEAM S MESSAGE OF COMPETITIVE UNIQUENESS... Step 7 Test your message to insure you are moving in the correct direction. 1st - Share your new message with some of your best customers ( We ve been working to clarify why others would want to buy from us do you think our new message accurately describes our competitive value and uniqueness? ). 2nd - Share your new message with prospects ( We ve always described our uniqueness and value based on ). 3rd - Start sharing your new message with everyone your company talks to, either existing or new. Step 8 Discuss your expectations of how much of your message you expect each member of your team to be able to communicate. - Salespeople your complete message - All non-sales managers you want them to talk at least at the overview level - Service and support people (including your drivers) you want them to at least mention or reference your key message points in their conversations with customers Step 9 Work with all members of your team to learn and consistently communicate your new message of value and uniqueness to all prospects and customers. Step 10 Monitor your customers and competitors to insure your message continues to accurately communicate your competitive value and uniqueness. Page 65

67 THE FOUR CONSISTENT PROBLEMS WITH A SALES TEAM S MESSAGE OF UNIQUENESS Problem #1 Everyone s saying the same thing - Four most common answers: - Our high quality products or services - Our strong level of support - Our competitive prices - You get me Problem #2 Everyone has different answers (when they aren t saying the four same points). - How many different responses did your team generate? Problem #3 Sales reps only talk about themselves. - Give your answers the X s and O s test - X out every time you say us, we, our, your name, your company name or your product/service names - O circle every time you say you, your, or mention the customer by name or use their company name - What is your balance of X s to O s? Problem #4 Your answers assume you are alone in the world. Page 66

68 USING THE FOUR CORE VALUES ON A DAILY BASIS TO INCREASE YOUR COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE - Focus on core values, not just product intangibles - Why do your customers really buy? - The closer you identify to your customer's core values, the stronger your position of uniqueness. - Positioning your product versus your competitors - How can you incorporate the four most critical core values into your selling message? - Lower my risk - Make my life or work easier - Lower my total costs or increase my profitability - Increase my competitive advantage Page 67

69 VISIT PANCERO.COM TO ENHANCE YOUR SALES AND SALES MANAGEMENT TRAINING - Blog Articles for Sales Pros and Sales Managers to help you with In-House training. Each article has a "Print & PDF" button that will format the article for your printer or create a PDF, your choice. - MP3's - MP3 audio training by Jim that you can listen to while on the go, can be played from your phone or tablet. - Videos - Watch training videos from Jim. Sales and Sales Management topics are covered, including new videos covering SWAT Team Selling and more coming so bookmark the site. TAP INTO THE APP! Have Jim s expertise at your fingertips, Videos, Audios, Articles, Sales Evaluation, available anytime to help sharpen your selling and sales management skills. Available now for iphone, ipad, Android, Tablets. Search for: Jim Pancero Page 68