Crystal balls. Don’t you wish you had one when you were preparing for a big sales call? Even more when you were in a big sales presentation?

GREAT NEWS: A sales crystal ball is nothing more than taking a look at information derived from reading existing stuff and then asking powerful questions about it. Information that (when understood) will predict the future. The outcome.

Predicting the future is actually pretty easy, when you’re armed with 3.5 things:

1. Information about the prospect and his business.

2. The right questions.

3. An idea or two that helps the prospect.

3.5 The ability to see and understand the customer’s big picture.

There are two places to find crystal ball information. The past and the present. No rocket science there. Just look at the elements of each time period — how the past and present affected the prospect and his use of your product and/or service — and presto, you create your own ability to predict the future. Cool.

Here is the information you need in order to become a successful predictor of the future (of your order):

Study the past. The past may have pain — it’s where experience comes from. Success and failure have their roots in what has already transpired. Your job is to gather the historical information so you can understand the best way to communicate your ability to help in the future. Knowing the past is an easy way to gain an insight to, and understanding of, the present.

• Study the customer’s original needs.

• Study how they and why they bought before.

• Study all the players and their emotional ebbs.

• Study how the decision was made.

• Study the problems that surfaced and how they were resolved.

The key word is study.

Be Present in The Present. The present is fleeting. No one (especially your prospect) has time to do much more than put out fires, and deal with the day to day. Stephen Covey differentiates between urgent and important in his Habit #3: Put first things first. And that’s the real path to success. If you are able to get your prospect to see you as important, you can get him away from what he perceives as urgent (but really isn’t). Urgent is his situation — important is your ability to communicate help. (NOTE: Help first, get the order second.)

• Collect information about what’s working and not working from the customer’s point of view. Share your company’s perception of these issues.

• Collect information about the changes that have taken place in the customer’s company, how they have impacted the decision makers who your company has worked with in the past, and how that relates to their present situation. 

• Study their website.

• Read all company literature, newsletters, annual reports, and their industry trade magazines. Become fluent in the prospect’s company and industry.

• Determine what past problems still exist — and may be preventing present success.

• Share recent changes in the industry with the customer and what the impact of those changes will be on the prospect’s business.

• Share the changes that your company is going through, and the impact of those changes on the customer.

• Share your big picture in a way that creates a leadership image.

Talk about and ask about the future. People love to talk about their plans and dreams. If you can get them going, they may see (and verbalize) how you fit in. Past is important, present is more important, future is most important — because that’s where you will develop and live your relationship. You need to know the path your prospect wants to take — their road map, their vision — so you can get on that path, and become part of that vision.

• Ask about the company’s specific future plans and needs. Find out the one big goal or project for the year. Find out specific plans for achievement. See if you are in any way able to help them achieve it, even if it’s not directly dealing with your product or service.

• Ask the customer about what changes they see, future industry trends, and what impact they will have. Ask them how these changes will impact their business.

• When appropriate, share your industry trends that will affect how your company will do business in the future, and how those trends will impact your business.

• Share some of your company’s future plans. Show how that will establish (or maintain) a leadership position.

Nothing complicated presented here. On the surface it appears to be just basic fundamental blocking and tackling. Almost. It’s executing the fundamentals from the customer’s perspective. It’s information that impacts the prospect’s point of view — you know, the only one that matters.

I’m looking into my crystal ball, and I see big sales in your future. Do you?

The only reason to get media coverage is to generate qualified leads. Therefore, all communications with the media must carry lead generation messages. The three classic messages are best expressed as questions that the customer needs answered:

• Why should we buy?
• Why should we buy from you?
• Why should we buy now?

In addition, any communication with a media source must also answer two additional questions:

• Why is this newsworthy?
• Why are you contacting this writer?

Unfortunately, most software companies hire PR people who don’t understand the basics. Instead, they just scattershot media inquiries and send out press releases full of useless gobbledygook.

For example, we recently received a truly awful email from the PR person for a software firm requesting media coverage for their product. Here’s the email and why its so lousy:

From: Kristin
Subject: Acme Releases Warehouse Management SMBs [1]

Hi Geoffrey [2],

SMBs face the same challenges as large enterprises and require solutions with the capabilities that enable them to successful navigate each challenge. [3] As supply chains become increasingly more complex, SMBs require solutions that fit their specialized needs, provide the deep functionality of enterprise solutions, are easy to implement and maintain, and will grow as their business grows. [4]

“Acme” today launched Acme SCM Warehouse Management Business Edition to meet the needs of SMBs to help improve inventory accuracy, optimize work and task management, and maximize the utilization of warehouse space and personnel. [5] Utilizing built-in best practices, the new solution is designed for rapid implementation and easy maintenance two critical elements required in an SMB solution. [6]

If you are interested in arranging an interview, please let me know. [7]

COMMENTS:
[1] Message title is dull and meaningless. Why would I care?
[2] Informal greeting clashes with email’s generic boilerplate style.
[3] Say what? That’s circular logic. And what’s with the typo?
[4] Who says? If this is common knowledge, why state it here?
[5] It does lots of stuff; so do other packages. Why is this better?
[6] Too much buzzwordery. What’s this really about?
[7] Call to action is weak. Likely response: the delete key.

The email utterly fails to answer any of the key questions. It will probably not result in an article, and if it does, the article won’t generate any leads. (They’re certainly not getting any leads from this article, eh?) Here’s a rewrite:

From: Kristin
Subject: Interesting Story Angle on Supply Chain [1]

Dear Mr. James [2],

I’ve run across an interesting story line for you and some suggestions where you might pitch it. [3]

One of my clients, Acme, has figured out how to simplify supply chain software so that even small businesses can use it. [4] Since supply chain is a classic “enterprise” application, this is quite a feat [5] and (according to Gartner [6]) unique in the market. [7]

I notice you’ve written in SellingPower that supply chain is increasingly important in complex business-to-business sales deals. [8] If you’re game, I can set you up with some customers who are doing AMAZING things with supply chain as a sales tool [9] and trouncing their competition in the process. [10]

COMMENTS:
[1] Title is designed to pique the interest of a reporter.
[2] Starting with a professional greeting shows respect.
[3] There’s not a writer in the world that won’t read the rest of the email.
[4] This is the gist of the story. No buzzwords required.
[5] Answers question: “Why is this newsworthy?”
[6] Citing a credible source adds credibility.
[7] Setup for lead generation message: “Why should we buy from you?”
[8] Answers question: “Why have you contacted this writer?”
[9] Setup for lead generation message: “Why should we buy?”
[10] Setup for lead generation message: “Why should we buy now?”

If you can get your marketing team to write email more like the rewritten one above, you’ll find that your company will start getting more media coverage and that the media coverage you get will help attract qualified leads into your sales process. Trust us on this one.

T services are poised to become high tech business’s first trillion-dollar market. If your firm isn’t participating fully, you could find yourself on the short end of the revenue stick. Here’s why.

The market research firm IDC recently issued a report forecasting that companies and government agencies will spend more than $746 billion on external services in 2008, representing a growth rate of 6.8 percent over 2007. And this is going to happen despite (and in some cases as a result of) a weak U.S. economy!

Turns out there are multiple market forces that are driving businesses to continue to turn to service vendors for assistance. Additionally, increased customer use of new and often disruptive delivery options (like hosting, SaaS, and utility computing) encourage service providers, especially outsourcers, to focus their investments in these areas.

And that means a major opportunity for you and your firm, according to IDC program manager Marianne Hedin. “The worldwide services competitive landscape keeps intensifying with many new entrants with new business and pricing models as well as the strengthened capabilities of up-and-coming players that are extending their reach into new markets,” she explains. “This is a time for service vendors to aggressively review their portfolio of offerings, account targets, investment strategies, business processes, and delivery practices.”

Highlights of IDC’s report include:

• Hosted applications will experience big growth. Though representing the smallest outsourcing market, hosted application management is expected to grow the fastest at a five-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 15.9 percent, followed by business outsourcing services at 10.4 percent.
• IT Services are the largest market segment. In 2007, IT services continued to represent the lion’s share (74 percent) of the overall services market. But the business services market that IDC tracks is slowly catching up, with a much faster CAGR of 9.6 percent compared with the IT services market’s CAGR of 5.6 percent.
• Service providers are rapidly going global. Service providers continue to aggressively pursue a geographic expansion strategy to increase their footprint across the globe. While service vendors based in the United States and Western Europe are focusing on building their presence in the emerging markets, service companies based in those geographies are expanding into Europe and the United States.
• CIOs are trying to align business and technology. The growth of outsourcing of non-core processes and the adoption of service-oriented architecture (SOA) are prompting enterprises to shift toward tighter alignment of business and technology. Ultimately, organizations will seek to eradicate any distinction or separation between IT and business in order to obtain convergence between them.

If IDC is correct, the IT industry is likely to be moving away from traditional software licensing schemes and development efforts that require on-premise software development within the customer’s IT shop. In the new landscape, software will be primarily delivered as a service, which means that you need to be positioned to sell software in an entirely new way.

To take advantage of these trends, your software firm will need to take active steps to provide higher value-added services and innovation to your clients, according to IDC. Specifically, you should be looking at different delivery models and tuning your sales processes to emphasize the development of an ongoing relationship rather than a period sale of software upgrades.

In addition, your firm should be investigating new types of partnerships with other service vendors in order to deliver best-of-breed offerings and full-service capability at the lowest cost. It’s going to be a brave new world out there, but one where software sales is likely to become ever more important.

Top sales professionals recognize the importance of nonverbal communication in the selling process and have learned to “listen with their eyes.” They understand that one of the easiest and most effective ways to close sales is to be aware of prospect’s “buy signals.”

Body language reveals your deepest feelings and hidden thoughts to total strangers. Body language is a mixture of movement, posture and tone of voice. Research indicates over 70 percent of our communication is done nonverbally. In fact, studies show that nonverbal communication has a much greater impact and reliability than the spoken word. Therefore, if your prospect’s words are incongruent with his or her body language, you would be wise to rely on body language as a more accurate reflection of true feelings.

Gain the Competitive Edge
There is absolutely no substitute for a positive first impression. Research shows that we decide in the first few moments whether we like someone or not. You can create a favorable first impression and build rapport quickly by using open body language.

• In addition to smiling and making good eye contact, show the palms of your hands, keep your arms unfolded and your legs uncrossed.
• Create harmony by matching and mirroring your prospect’s body language gestures. Matching and mirroring is unconscious mimicry. It subconsciously tells prospects that you like them and agree with them.

You can build trust and rapport by deliberately, but subtly, matching your prospect’s body language in the first ten to fifteen minutes of the appointment. For example, if you notice that your prospect has crossed his arms, subtly cross your arms to match. After you believe you have developed trust and rapport, verify it by uncrossing your arms and see if your prospect will match and mirror you as you move into a more open posture.

If you notice your prospect subconsciously matching your body language gestures, congratulations, because this indicates you have developed trust and rapport. Conversely, if you notice your prospect mismatching your body language gestures, you know trust and rapport has not been established and you need to continue matching and mirroring.

Body Language Basics
Be mindful to evaluate the flow of gesture clusters rather than isolated gestures taken out of context. Here are some important body language gestures that will help you close more sales in less time.

There are two categories of body postures: open/closed and forward/back. In an open and receptive body posture, arms are unfolded, legs uncrossed and palms are exposed. In a closed body posture, arms are folded, legs are crossed and the entire body is usually turned away.

Here’s a quick body language reference guide:

Posture

• Leaning back and closed = Lack of interest
• Leaning back and open = Contemplation and cautious interest
• Leaning forward and closed = Potential aggressive behavior
• Leaning forward and open = Interest and agreement

Head gestures

• Head neutral = Neutral and open attitude
• Tilted back = Superior attitude
• Tilted down = Negative and judgmental attitude
• Tilted to one side = Interest

Facial gestures

• Eye rub = Deceit, “see no evil”
• Eye roll = Dismissive gesture that indicates superiority
• Looking over top of glasses = Scrutiny and a critical attitude
• Nose rub = Dislike of the subject
• Hand or fingers blocking mouth = Deceit, “speak no evil”
• Chin stroking = Making a decision
• Thumb under chin with index finger pointing vertically along the cheek = Negative attitude and critical judgment

As a professional salesperson you must continuously monitor your prospect’s body language and adjust your presentation accordingly. By knowing your prospect’s body language gestures you will minimize perceived sales pressure and know when it’s appropriate to close the sale!

I’m sick of customer satisfaction. The worst companies in the world tout the fact that they won some satisfaction award. It’s not just a bad joke. It’s a pathetic statement.

Every company is hoping that their customers will reorder. They’re hoping that their customers will spread the word about how great their products are, and about how great their people are. And they’re hoping to proactively encourage others to place an order or do business with them.

That is NOT customer satisfaction.

That is customer LOYALTY.

Every company must have loyalty as its mission, not satisfaction.

Every company must have loyalty as its imperative, not satisfaction.

Corporate drivel mission statements talk about exceeding customer’s expectations, talk about being number one in the world, talk about shareholder value, and say NOTHING about the one word that makes all of these things happen: LOYALTY.

The reason that companies, especially big companies, don’t stress loyalty is because it’s much more difficult to achieve, and requires both an investment, and a commitment on the part of senior management to instill.

Customer loyalty is a hallow statement unless it is preceded by a mission.

REALITY: The company and its executives must be loyal to its employees, loyal to its product quality, and loyal to its service excellence. This means they must both invest in and support a loyalty imperative.

HERE’S THE SECRET: Loyalty must be given before it is received.

No company can ensure customer loyalty until they have secured employee loyalty. It amazes me that big companies will layoff thousands of people in the name of profit or shareholder value, and think nothing of what it does to internal morale, or the impact that it has on the reduction of service to its customers — even a reduction in the quality of its product.

Loyalty is both an action and a process.

Look at the best companies in the world. They have great employees. They have great products. They give great service. And they’re easy to do business with. This makes them attractive. And these are the elements that create loyalty.

The one element that is most important is great service. Memorable service. Loyalty-based service. And that flies in the face of satisfaction (the lowest level of acceptable service).

In my seminars, I teach the 5,000-year-old ancient Chinese proverb, “To serve is to rule.” Giving great service is an integral part of the loyalty process and it’s a fundamental part of “giving loyalty before loyalty is received.”

Here are a few ideas to incorporate into your company’s loyalty imperative:

1. List all reasons that customers call you for service. There are probably less than 25.

2. List all barriers that you place in front of a customer connecting with you. There are probably less than 10. (Automated attendant, voicemail, lack of 24-hour availability, inadequate website.)

3. Once you have all the opportunities and all the barriers listed, have a weekend retreat with senior management and front-line people to determine best practices, generate new ideas for serving, and making it easier to do business with your company. Document (record) everything.

4. Put the ideas and the best practices into action. Create a training program for best practices, and invest whatever is necessary for making your company “barrier-to-place-an-order” free.

5. Rather than announce all of these changes in the form of a bragging advertisement, or internal hoopla, let your customers have an opportunity to react and respond to your new and better way of doing business. Let the referral part of your business begin organically. Let it be earned, not asked for.

5.5 All members of senior management must support this process both verbally and visually. If you’re going to evolve from satisfaction to loyalty, it has to be “hands on,” not just “words on.”

I wish more companies would add to their mission statement that they’ll be loyal to their employees — so that their employees would be loyal to their customers — so that their customers would be loyal to the company.

That is a loyalty chain. And it doesn’t start with satisfied customers. It starts with senior management understanding that loyalty is a way of life, not just a word. That loyalty starts at home, not at a customer’s place of business. That loyalty is earned by a process, not by a wave of a wand, or even by product excellence.

And loyalty is easily measured. Just look at your repeat business.

Satisfaction is also easily measured. Just look at the customers you lost.  

In many sales organizations, performance management sounds something like this:

“Are you going to make your number?”
“How many did you sell?”
“You need to get in front of five customers a day.”
“You did great this year. That’s why I know I can count on you for an additional 10 percent next year.”

By nature sales organizations are revenue and numbers focused. Whether or not these organizations achieve their numbers depends, in large part, on how well they manage and leverage their human capital – their sales people.

Performance management, when designed and executed effectively in sales organizations, boosts sales productivity and helps retain sales talent. Below are seven best practices for implementing performance management in sales organizations. How does your organization stack up?

1. Communicate company and sales organization goals, vertically and horizontally. Does every manager, salesperson, and support staff member know the sales organization’s strategies and goals – and where their department and individual goals fit? Test this by asking various people in your organization to explain the links to you.
2. Focus on manager behavior first. Define manager competencies by doing a validated job analysis. Make sure the competencies stress performance management behaviors, such as setting clear expectations, observing salespeople in the field, coaching, addressing performance problems, and developing talent.
3. Make sure all leaders talk about your culture and vision often. Do leaders just talk about numbers and revenue performance…or do they also talk about how to get those results? From the top down, send the message that your company expects people to get the “right results, the right way.”
4. Define and communicate competencies for salespeople. If you already have sales competencies, review them. Do they read like a generic job description (self-starter, aggressive, closer) or are they specific and unique to selling at your company? Think about what distinguishes your best sales performers, in terms of both results and behaviors. Chances are, in addition to being good closers, they show adaptability, they’re open to coaching and feedback, they’re constantly learning, and they welcome the opportunity to coach others.
5. Focus your sales efforts, new products, and strategic initiatives. Avoid flavor of the month. When changes do happen, communicate them clearly and have an open dialogue with the sales organization. Not everything is equally important. When you introduce a new initiative or product, ask, “What can we take away or stop doing?” Confused salespeople = confused customers. They don’t know what to sell and can’t keep up with the changes.
6. Link sales training, selection, incentive, and performance management systems to your business goals and competencies. A rigorous, competency-based selection process will give you a clear profile of each candidate’s strengths and development needs. When you do make your hiring decision, use the selection process data to help you create a development plan for the salesperson, starting him or her off on the right foot. Fold this development plan into the performance management process. Coach the new hire to leverage his or her strengths and develop in other areas.
7. Hold managers accountable for coaching and managing performance effectively. Often managers are accountable on paper, but in practice…managers who make their numbers are “forgiven” for poor interpersonal skills, lack of coaching, or “not having time” to work with their reps. Decide if this is acceptable in your organization. If managers get their numbers, does it matter how they treat their salespeople, whether they have high turnover or whether they coach and develop their teams? If it does matter, put some teeth into your systems. Reward and recognize managers who develop salespeople and make their numbers. Assign consequences to managers who ignore or consistently mishandle the people side of management. And don’t forget to look at whom you’re promoting into management positions. Do salespeople get promoted to management as a reward or entitlement for good sales performance…or do they get promoted because they’re motivated to lead others and have the skill and patience to coach?

One of the time tested methods for surviving a tough economy is to hone in on prospects who match the profile of your most successful customers. This may sound like Sales 101 but it’s worth your attention right now because when times get tough, the opposite happens – namely, desperation can make it tempting to pounce on any lead that wanders in the door. Instead, urge your reps to obtain a deeper understanding of their current customer base and then use that understanding as a springboard to narrowing the list of leads they pursue.

“Know how your product is being used, by whom, and what value it brings to their business,” says Michael Pace, regional vice president at Infor Global Solutions and co-author of The Selling Machine (New Model, 2006). “Be brutally honest in understanding your customers so you can determine whether or not they are successful.” A slow economy is a great time to go back and dig deep with your current customers. Spend some time asking detailed questions – What aspects of the product is the customer using? How it is being used? By whom? With what specific results? Quantify everything as you go so you can start putting together a solid understanding of the value you provide.

It’s important to keep two things in mind as you go back to your customers. First, don’t gloss past generalities; pin customers down on specifics. All too often, says Pace, reps ask whether customers are happy with a product and whether there are any problems – and when they get the right yes and no answers, they hang up the phone feeling pleased with themselves. Don’t accept this kind of superficial exchange, warns Pace. “We need to go deeper and ask, ‘Why are you happy and how exactly are you using the product?’ ‘What tangible, real benefits are you receiving?’”

Second, don’t shy away from unhappy customers. It’s a natural human tendency: we want to spend our time with the people who are happiest with us and steer away from those who are least pleased. Don’t fall into that trap, warns Pace, because it’s just as important to know why a customer is unsuccessful as it is to know why another is successful. Ask the same kinds of probing questions of your dissatisfied customers that you ask of your satisfied customers. You may discover that all you need to do to is re-engineer a valve or change the appearance of your software to optimize your product for that customer. Or you may learn your product has diminishing returns for companies larger than 1,000 people. Guaranteed, you’ll learn something and whatever it is will be useful in some way.

When you go through this exercise you’ll come away understanding two important things: You’ll be able to create a detailed profile of the type of customer for whom your product or service is ideal. And you’ll be able to create a solid value proposition, with numbers and quantifiable success stories. When you combine these factors – by targeting prospects that fit your ideal profile and offering them a compelling value proposition – you’ll see your win rate increase dramatically, regardless of economic conditions.

Remember Dolly, the cloned sheep? No doubt many a sales manager privately wondered if the same science could be applied to their top performers. After all, if you had an entire sales team comprised of top performing reps, you’d never have to worry again about making the numbers, even in today’s economy. Until human cloning becomes a viable option, however, sales managers are left to struggle with how to replicate the performance of their best reps. One solution: provide across-the-board access to the collective genius.

“Great salespeople are all good at tapping into the collective genius. They have strong internal networks,” observes Jeff Summers, EVP and CMO of SAVO, a company specializing in sales enablement solutions. When customers have a question or a problem, he explains, top performers know who to call in marketing or shipping or finance – and they get support because they’ve built the right relationships.

So how do you replicate this capability throughout your entire team? There are four core components to doing it right, says Summers:

1. PUSH. Push expertise, knowledge, and content to salespeople rather than forcing them to go on what Summers calls “an archeological search.” In other words, rather than expecting your reps to find the information they need for each call, use a system that gives them what they need. With SAVO, for instance, reps preparing for a sales call can enter some basic information about that call – the level of the person they’ll be calling on, the industry, where they are in the sales process, the prospect’s objectives and so on, and the system recommends the best information for that call. “We must push the best expertise to our sellers based on the selling situation,” says Summers, “because unless I know what I’m looking for, I don’t know where to find it.”
2. CUSTOMIZE. According to the CMO Council, salespeople spend 40 percent of their time creating customized deliverables – and often the result is inconsistent with their company’s brand and image. Thus, once reps find the right slides or letters or other collateral, they must quickly be able to customize the message for their particular customer following company guidelines for appearance.
3. CONTRIBUTE. Allow anyone, regardless of role, to contribute to the collective genius. And allow them to contribute in the way that’s most convenient for them. “A lot of the things that salespeople create to share back and forth aren’t necessarily in document form – it’s tribal wisdom,” says Summers. You need a system in place to collect this wisdom, whether it’s passed along through emails, documents, or postings by subject matter experts answering sales reps’ questions.
4. FEEDBACK. Reps should be able to see at a glance whether information on a particular topic has been found useful by others. With SAVO, users can provide feedback using both a star rating and written comments. That way, reps searching for information on a particular topic can see at a glance which entries others found most helpful and why. They also can see what information is being used and how often: one section lists the most popular sales assets such as most popular competitive intelligence or most popular letters. The bottom line: feedback is crucial to helping reps cut through the clutter of the collective genius and hone in on the information others have found most compelling.

   It’s important to remember, concludes Summers, that by providing reps with access to the collective genius, you aren’t solving a content problem, you’re solving a conversation problem. “Salespeople don’t need the twelve-page white paper to have [effective] conversations,” he says, “but they do need the one-page summary of the prospect’s industry, or the three bullet points that address the most common objections.” When reps have quick access to this information, their prep time drops dramatically while their conversation quality improves.

Often, the problem of selling in a down economy isn’t so much that pipelines are empty, it’s that prospects reach decision time and become paralyzed with worry. Are they taking too great a risk in light of market conditions? Will they realize value from their investment? Might they find a cheaper alternative elsewhere? Besieged by doubt, they put off the decision, forcing reps to come home empty-handed again and again.

It’s a tough reality, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing you can do about it. On the contrary, there are six tangible steps you can take to offset the challenges of selling in today’s economy, say Robert Kear and Andrew Plunkett, CMO and director of solution marketing, respectively, of Sales Performance International. In a recent Webinar, “Selling in a Down Economy: Six Strategies for Success,” Kear and Plunkett examined each of the six steps for successful selling in today’s tough business climate.

1. Sharpen your targeting. Companies that understand their ideal customer profiles and focus on prospects that match these profiles achieve 20 percent higher quota attainment, says Kear. Spend time looking at customers who have been very profitable for you. Determine the criteria for accounts that are an ideal match in terms of their problems and your solutions, and hone in on these prospects. Resist the urge to retreat to your cash cows and do account management when times are tough. “We see reps relying too much on this strategy, even when those accounts have little additional business potential,” observes Kear. Instead, seek out high business potential accounts that fit your ideal customer profile and pursue them.
2. Sharpen your messaging. It’s a challenge even in the best of times – once you’ve gained access to an executive, what do you say to him or her? Even in good times, 90 percent of salespeople don’t position value effectively and up to 80 percent of marketing materials go unused because they aren’t what reps need to make a sale. In tough times, this problem is exacerbated, says Plunkett. Make sure your materials are problem oriented and distilled down so reps can have meaningful conversations. “We know if you have problem oriented messaging delivered to the right person at the right time, you’ll move forward in the sales process,” says Plunkett.
3. Get credit for the value you’ve delivered. A paltry 5 percent of sales people go back to their customers and get credit for the value they’ve delivered. As a result, most initial value propositions are very generic. Yet, the more specific you can make your value proposition, the more successful you’ll be. That’s why Kear and Plunkett urge reps to go back to their customers and document value. From that effort, you’ll get reference stories, detailed numbers, and other specifics that will help you create a compelling value proposition for your new prospects.
4. Create some urgency. Sales reps who help their prospects create the criteria for solving their problems win 85 to 92 percent of the time; those who simply respond to RFPs win only 8 to 15 percent of the time. “We need more salespeople in this down economy to move people from a latent to an active state,” says Kear. Help your prospects see the impact of their problems – in terms of cost, time, staffing, etc. – and then help them craft RFPs to solve them and your chances of winning skyrocket.
5. Sharpen your competitive tactics. In slow times, buyers are more willing to overlook relationships with sellers and ask themselves, Can we get it cheaper somewhere else? You’ll be able to defend against this trend if you’ve been rigorous in defining your competitive differentiators. Jettison your generic laundry list of features and advantages and approach each prospect with customized specifics – which product advantages are most desirable for each customer?
6. Leverage existing relationships. Kear and Plunkett acknowledge they sound contradictory: in strategy #1 they warn against relying on your cash cows; in strategy #6, they recommend going back to them. Here’s the difference: you should go back to your existing customers if you’ve done your homework and discovered a match between a problem they are experiencing and a capability you provide. Here’s how: Take a sheet of paper and across the top write down all the capabilities you provide. Down the side, write down the high priority pains your customer is experiencing. Now cross out all the pains you have already solved and whatever is left is an opportunity. If there’s one there, by all means pick up the phone.

We’ve known for a long time that sales leaders who recognize their employees have greater employee engagement than their non-recognizing, warm-as-Russian-shot-putter peers. But our recent research study of 200,000 people shows another startling difference: managers who do recognition right get vastly superior revenue growth versus those managers who do recognition incorrectly.

So what is an incorrect way to recognize?

Here’s just one: We found a large group of leaders who offer recognition with strings attached. Think of this group as the Don Corleones of management.

If you have seen The Godfather movie, you know that when Don Corleone grants a wish there is always an expectation of performance in return. In one scene, the Godfather whispers that one day … without warning … he will ask for a favor in return. Refuse him, and you may end up with a horse head in your bed.

Maybe you aren’t the Don Corleone of your company, but perhaps you are offering recognition with an expectation of something coming back to you. We found that sales leaders who manage in this way approach recognition as a transaction and treat their salespeople as objects to be manipulated into greater returns. These leaders hand out awards, but expect, for example, that the employee will work the next weekend when asked.

While employees who work for these types of leaders agree that some recognition is always better than none, they see through their bosses’ approach. Said one salesperson of her manager, “When he recognizes I think, ‘And…?’ I always feel like I’m being set up to take on something new.”

This perception is not shared by employees of leaders who recognize in the right way. These leaders reward people not to manipulate them, but to show genuine appreciation for performing tasks or hitting goals that are valuable to the team or organization and that help employees achieve their own personal goals. These leaders understand what motivates each individual who works for them.

These managers recognize more frequently and are more timely in celebrating great behavior, and that makes their efforts vastly more authentic with employees and much more successful in spurring greater achievement.

One of these leaders we met in our interviews was a leader in Dallas. When he spoke of his people, he didn’t call them staff, employees, troops, or even his team. They were his “posse.” He talked about “hanging with them,” and he spoke of the trust that they shared when they went into a sales blitz together. When asked if he felt he could give his people too much recognition, he looked at us as if we had lost our minds. “These guys walk through fire for me,” he said. “Do you think ‘thanks’ for them ever gets old?”

Recognition. Get it right, like this guy, and your employees will look forward to it as a true celebration of their accomplishments. Get it wrong, and employees will see recognition as an expectation of more work on the way. Joked one employee, “Recognition from my boss reminds me of Homer Simpson giving Marge (his wife) a bowling ball for her birthday. Homer says, ‘It’s for you,’ but really it’s for him.”