Book Review: Own the Room: Business Presentations that Persuade, Engage, & Get Results

Put a classically trained actor, an award winning director, and a clinical psychologist together and what do you get?  Why a book that should be on every seller’s bookshelf, of course.

David Booth, Deborah Shames, and Peter Desberg, the authors of Own the Room: Business Presentations that Persuade, Engage, & Get Results (McGraw Hill: 2010), are not the typical authors you’ll run across when looking for a book that can help you increase your sales and income.  I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that none of the authors can define the Puppy Dog Close, write a top notch cold calling script, or coach you through the negotiation process with a tough customer. 

They don’t know sales; they know people, they know presentation, they know how to connect with others.  They know how to use words, body language, voice, props, and silence—all the things that we sellers use every day, usually with little grace and less control—to gain and keep someone’s attention.  More importantly, they know how to turn attention into genuine interest. 

Own the Room isn’t going to close deals for you, but it is going to give you the opportunity to close deals by showing you how to really engage your prospects and make presentations that will bring the prospect along with you; and frankly, you can’t sell if your prospect has turned you off and is daydreaming about what they’re going to have for lunch—or the relief they’d feel if they could throw you and your damned PowerPoint presentation out the window.

From your opening sentence—you’ve got 30 to 60 seconds to grab (or lose) your audience’s attention—to your closing remarks, Own the Room gives solid, tested and proven guidance.  Guidance is what you  get in Own the Room, not just tips and tricks, and because the authors are giving guidance and I’m dense, I sometimes wished they’d been more concrete and said “Thou shalt do this in exactly this way” instead of giving an example of the concept and leaving the rest up to me.   

Booth, Shames, and Desberg take on all aspects of the presentation from preparation to dealing with stage fright to using PowerPoint to using physical movement to make your point to how to make effective team presentations.  The book seeks to be comprehensive in scope without smothering you with needless detail.

Whether your make presentations to a single potential buyer or to a room of thousands at a formal dinner, you’ll walk away from Own the Room with some very practical guidance that will make your presentations more effective—or very likely, transform them altogether.  Either way, you’ll sell more of whatever you’re selling.

Using Incentives to Get Referrals

I’m often asked why I don’t advocate using incentives to influence clients and prospects to give referrals.  My reasoning is two fold:  first, if your referral generation process is effective and you execute it correctly, you don’t need to give incentives; and second, if done correctly, incentives can be very effective—but most salespeople find giving effective incentives to be cumbersome and time consuming.

Let me explain.

I coach and train clients who use incentives very effectively.  They are a key part of their referral generation process.  They follow the PWWR Referral Generation System™ to the letter—with the exception of their explanation of why it is in the client’s best interest to give them referrals.  Instead of explaining to the client how their being referral-based is an asset to the client and why giving referrals insures the client receives the purchasing experience they want, these salespeople prefer giving incentives.

The difference between the incentives they give and those most salespeople give is the secret to why their incentive program is so successful—and why it is so cumbersome.

Typically, salespeople will make one of three mistakes when giving incentives:

• The incentive is not an incentive, it’s a bribe—a sizable chunk of money, at least in relation to the cost/value of their product or service, in the hopes of getting referrals.
• The incentive is not an incentive, it’s a come-on—it is nothing more than a discount for their own products or services which many clients see as nothing more than another way for the salesperson to get more business from the client.
• The incentive has limited appeal.  For instance, they’ll give a $10 gift card to Starbucks or coupon for a car wash.  That is, an incentive given to everyone but with limited appeal.

Incentives need to be just that—an incentive, something that encourages people to give referrals, not a reward, not a bounty. 

What does an effective and reasonable incentive look like?

Let me give an example from one of my clients.

I have a small IT client who uses incentives very effectively.  As a matter of fact, prior to working with me, they gave cash incentives believing money would motivate clients.  Although they initially resisted changing their incentive program, since changing they’ve increased their referrals by over 1,700%.  Much of that change is due to implementing the PWWR Referral Generation System, but the incentive they provide is their reason referrals are in their client’s best interest to give.  Not only have they saved a small fortune by not giving large cash incentives, the incentive itself is far more effective.

They focus mainly on installation and service work for small to mid-size companies.  They, of course, are constantly looking for other small to mid-size companies that don’t have an IT department that they can help with both their installation and performance issues. 

They use incentives as their reason that it is in their client’s best interest to give referrals.  But their incentive isn’t a discount nor is it dollars.  Rather, they get to know their clients very, very well.  They get to know their clients so well that they can focus their incentive to meet that individual client’s personality and interests. 

For instance, one of their clients is a small publishing company.  The company publishes cookbooks.  The owner of the company collects antique and rare cookbooks.  Although her collection is quite large, she is still constantly looking to add to her collection.  Every time she refers someone to her IT service company, they go to a used and rare bookstore and purchase her—you guessed it, an antique cookbook.

They never spend more than 25 or 35 dollars.  The incentive is small—nothing compared to what she will spend with them over the course of the year—or what they would have given her in the past.  But she will kill to find new referrals that she can make because she appreciates the attention they give her.  Obviously, they aren’t giving every client who refers someone to them a cookbook.  They go out of their way to show their appreciation to her by doing something unique just for her.

Another of their clients is a minor league baseball team.  This team has been around since the 50’s.  Over the years, they’ve had hundreds of players come through their team and eventually go on to the majors, some for only a few days, others have become stars.  What do they do for this client?  Every time the team gives them a referral they find and purchase a baseball artifact associated with one of the players that had played for the team who eventually went on to the majors.  The team has started a “museum” (read trophy case) based on the artifacts they’ve received from their referrals.  Again, they only spend a few dollars on each item.  The dollars they spend isn’t what gets the client’s attention—it’s the attention to detail and the uniquely personal nature of the incentive.  Like the publisher above, the baseball team is always looking for referrals to give—and new artifacts to include in their display.

Obviously, this incentive system requires getting to know the client well.  That’s actually the easy part.  The tough part is finding the incentive item.  The IT company above may spend weeks looking for the appropriate incentive gift for their minor league client.  Instead of investing money in the client’s incentive, they invest their time, their effort, and their creativity.  Most importantly, they invest their attention and their sincere interest in the client.

Using incentives can be very effective and need not be costly if done correctly.  Avoid costly bribes.  Don’t give money; give personal attention.  Certainly, don’t give a discount coupon or any other “incentive” to spend more money with you.  And avoid blanket incentives that are easy to give and have little impact.

The key to an effective incentive program isn’t the dollar value—it’s the personal value.

Guest Article: “Avoiding Self-Sabotage on Sales Calls,” by Art Sobczak

Avoiding Self-Sabotage on Sales Calls
by Art Sobczak

Art regularly responds to reader e-mails with hand ons, how- to type advice for becoming a better salesperson. Here’s part of an email he received from a reader, and his response.

“Art, an email I received from a vendor, in response to a question we asked about a policy issue, started out with, ‘You’re not going to like this, but …’

“I continued reading, now feeling bitter. However, what was said was really nothing more than what we already knew and expected.

“I would love to see your take on something like this. A piece on the things we do to sabotage ourselves when all we were intending to do was soften the cold hard reality.”

OK. Good idea. Let’s look at a few.
 
Pointing Out Negatives They: Probably Wouldn’t Notice

I was talking to guy about some training for his small business and mentioned I visited his website. He immediately apologized for some things (which he perceived as negatives) on the site I hadn’t even noticed. After he mentioned them, I guess I did recall them, but really didn’t feel they were negatives at the time.

Some people obsess about things that no one other than them would ever see. But, when they’re highlighted for us, then we tend to see them. For example, red cars in the parking lot outside your building. There. Now I bet that you’ll look for them.

And just think about anyone who has ever said, “Do I look fat in this?”

It’s All in the Positioning

I remember years ago when my kids were little, my wife made the comment, “I’ll let the kids know that they have to stay at Grandma’s house tonight since we’re going out.”

Of course she didn’t intend that to sound negative, but sometimes we say things that can be interpreted
differently than we intend (to say the least!). Leaving nothing to chance, I told her that I would tell them.

So, I put a different spin on it:

“Kids! Guess what? You GET to go spend the night at Grandma’s!”

“Yay!”, they screamed.

Giving TMI (Too Much Info)

I’ve heard many-a-sales rep talk too much about facts irrelevant to what the prospect/customer cared about. The danger here is creating objections.

A sales rep handled an incoming call where the buyer asked for information on a new calculator model he was looking carry in his catalog since he had heard good things about it. Understand now, that the inquirer was interested in placing a large order right then and there for an initial shipment. Things were progressing smoothly until the rep added, “Now of course, these don’t come with the AC adapter.”

The prospect immediately changed his tone and said, “Hmmm, I didn’t really expect them to, but now I’ll have to think about this a bit.” Lost sale.

Here are a few others:

Instead of, “I’m just calling today …”, try, “I’m CALLING today…”.

Instead of, “So you probably don’t want to buy?”, try, “Shall we move forward with the delivery?”

Instead of, “I imagine you’re not looking for another vendor?”, try, “What plans do you have for a backup vendor in case you need something and your present source doesn’t have what you need, when you need it?”

Instead of, “Well, it is expensive, the price is …”, try,”You’re getting (benefit) and (benefit) and it’s only…”

Instead of, “I’ll have to check on that for you.”, try, “I’ll be happy to research that for you.”

I have just scratched the surface here, and I’m sure there are plenty that sound like fingernails across a chalkboard. (I just realized that some people reading this might not have ever seen a chalkboard.)
 
If you have sabotaged a call with a phrase or question, or have a pet peeve, please share them with me and I’ll pass a few along to readers in a future issue.

For over 26 years Art Sobczak has helped sales pros say and do the right things to minimize resistance and rejection, and get “yes” answers by phone in their sales and prospecting. Get his free weekly emailed tips, see more examples of articles like this one, and hear recordings of actual calls at his Telesales Blog, http://www.TelesalesBlog.com

An Immodest Proposal

The holidays are upon us and many of you sales leaders may be wondering what you might get for your team members.  Certainly there’s the typical take ‘em out for lunch or maybe a drink a day or two before Christmas.  Maybe you plan on doing what most team leaders do—nothing other than wish them a Merry Christmas.

Well, I have an immodest proposal for you.  Why not get them something that is inexpensive but that will significantly increase their production next year?  That’s a win/win situation since it will increase both your and their income, make you both look good, your sales reports will shine, and you just might get that promotion you’ve been wanting—all for about $15 per team member.

So what’s going to do all of this for only $15?

I suggest you purchase each of your team members a copy of my book, Creating a Million Dollar a Year Sales Income: Sales Success through Client Referrals. (Wiley, 2007)

No, the title doesn’t claim that every one of your team members will be making a million dollars a year after reading it.  The title comes from how the book’s referral process was developed.  I interviewed 47 sellers across the US and Canada who each make a minimum of a million dollars a year and who generate the majority of business from referrals from their clients.  I wanted to know what they were doing to be so successful with referrals while most sellers were struggling to get even a few great referrals a year.

What I found, not surprisingly, is they don’t ask for referrals like most of have been taught, but instead generate referrals by working closely with their clients to earn the right to get referrals and then to identify highly qualified prospects for the client to refer them to.

That’s the crux of the book—the disciplined process they use to generate a large number of high quality referrals from each of their clients.

Best of all, it’s a process you and your team members can learn and implement to greatly increase the number and quality of referrals you and your team members get.

A Few Book Endorsements and Reviews:

David Straker, ChangingMinds.com

“In the end, the joy that earns this book a rare five stars is the practical, thorough and innovative treatment of referrals that can have literally massive benefit to anyone, not just in sales, who wants to connect with valued other people.

Quite simply the best book on gaining and using referrals.”

 

From Dave Stein’s Review of Creating a Million Dollar a Year Sales Income

“Here is my recommendation for sales leaders. (A full-fledged plan will contain considerably more detail—this is just a starting point….) 

1. If your sales team hasn’t been effectively leveraging existing customers for referrals, determine why. 
2. Benchmark the level at which referrals business is being converted to sales.
3. If the reason is that (you and) your salespeople don’t know how, invest in this book.
4. Take the time to study Paul’s referral process and his recommendations.
5. Set an objective.  For example, referrals will be the source of 10% of our business next year.
6. Devise a plan for adopting his process across your team.
7. Build appropriate coursework, tools, coaching mechanisms.  (This is a difficult proposition for a busy sales manager.  You probably don’t have either the time or the skills. I’m sure Paul would be delighted to engage with you on this…)
8. Train your team or get them trained.
9. Deploy the process, measure results against your benchmark and objective and refine.”

 

CRM Magazine

“required reading.”

 

Rolf Dobelli, get abstract

“You can keep working hard all alone clearing stumps and moving rocks with your current approach, or move to more fertile ground where your best clients can make your life easier by helping you find new clients just like them. getAbstract recommends this book to any professional who needs to sell . . . .”

 

Frank Rumbauskas, NY Times best-selling author of Never Cold Call

“Having spent over ten years as a top-producing sales rep, and now having spent over four years teaching and training salespeople – and having read hundreds of sales books in that time – I can tell you that Paul McCord’s book is hands-down THE BEST book on referral selling ever written!”

 

AllBooks Reviews

“Salespeople from every industry will find this a useful and comprehensive sales referral guide. Chapter after chapter of excellent advice that dispels myth and rumor related to referral selling.”

 

Dave Lakani, best-selling author and coach

“This book lays out in systematic detail the most effective selling and referral system I’ve seen. It doesn’t make getting referrals easy but it does make getting them predictable.

Even though I consider myself a good referral sales generator, I cringed more than a little at the mistakes I identified while reading this book and how much money I left on the table through missed sales and missed opportunities.

I also like this book because it is a quick read with plenty of great examples, the author doesn’t belabor points to fill space, he just gets right to the point . . . so you can implement and earn.

Excellent book, I highly recommend it.”

 

Selling Power Magazine, Sales Management Newsletter

“Referrals are a tricky business if you don’t know what you’re doing – and many reps don’t. Many say they don’t want to ask for referrals because they don’t want to irritate a customer with whom they have good rapport. Or, in an effort to be casual about it, they ask in such an oh-by-the-way manner that the customer quickly dismisses it. Or they ask once and drop it. And none of these approaches will result in good, solid referrals.

So what’s the answer? Referrals must be an integral part of your sales approach, from first contact through post-sale. (McCord’s) PWWR system addresses the issues that keep most sales people from generating large numbers of quality referrals.”

 

Forbes Book Club

Creating a Million Dollar a Year Sales Income: Sales Success through Client Referrals was, I’m proud to say, selected as an offering of the prestegious Forbes Book Club.  Unfortunately within months of my book’s selection the book club closed  I’m hopeful–and fairely sure–that selecting my book wasn’t the cause of them going out of business.

 

You can find Creating a Million Dollar a Year Sales Income: Sales Success through Client Referrals at all find booksellers, including:

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

My website

Want the audio book instead?  It’s Here

A Titanic Merger that Will Rock the Sales World

Well, OK, so maybe it isn’t quite that big but my good friend Jan Visser has merged the old SalesTeamTools.com and the old SalesMarks.com into the newly combined Sales Marks.

If you’re not familiar with either of these sites, you’re missing a great deal of important material, so combining them into a single site is a fantastic idea that will give visitors to the new Sales Marks a huge platform of great stuff all at a single location.

The old Sales Team Tools focused on examining and evaluating tools—phones, contact management software, business card scanners, you name it–to make sales and selling easier.  Tools that have been around and new ones alike have been evaluated.  One of the best aspects of the site was that salespeople who have used the various tools get to comment on them and present their opinions and experiences.  Sales Team Tools has been a great place to keep up the sales world’s tools—both those tools designed specifically for sellers and those general technology tools that make selling easier or more efficient.  If you’ve been a Sales Team Tools regular, you’ll lose nothing—just gain everything that Sales Marks had to offer.

Sales Marks offers a number of high quality downloads from Tibor Shanto’s newest e-book published by Sales Marks “6 Ways to More Sales Appointments” to How to Organize a Sales Blitz to a free Sales Activity Report template and lots more.  The site also has hundreds of articles from top sales trainers such as Zig Zigler, Dave Brock, Tom Freese, Jeff Thull, Colleen Francis, Bill Caskey, Jill Konrath, myself and many, many more.  Best of all, Jan has a section called 100 Tips that lists the newest 100 articles, saving you a great deal of time searching through the entire article database. 

But, WAIT!  There’s MORE! 

The site offers a number of free sales guides—for instance one on tuning your sales pitch or another on writing a cold calling sales script.   And as a bonus, there are dozens of great sales quotes from everyone from Florence Nightingale to Pappa Joe (Joe Paterno, Head Coach of Penn State for those non college football fans) to Eleanor Roosevelt (can’t think of her in terms of sales?  Go find out) to Milton Berle—and even some real sales folks like Zig, Brian Tracey and others.

But Wait!  There’s Even MORE!

And now, Jan has added some great new things for his visitors.  Here’s how he described them to me in an email I received yesterday:

It’s almost 2010 – so I thought I’d run a tally on available selling days in 2010. The result was 254! Only 254 days and that’s not including vacations and days around the holidays. Sales and small biz people better make sure every day counts! That’s why I developed a few fun resources.

First, there’s a section called “Sales Months” – a new PDF poster every month, showing the current/next month – displaying selling days and a motivational sales quote. They can be downloaded for free at http://salesmarks.com/sales-months/

Then, there’s a need to remember that we only have 254 days in 2010.  For that purpose, I created a Sales Days Sheet – a PDF poster listing selling days for 2010 per month, per quarter – with a reminder to make sure you make every day counts. They can be downloaded here:
http://salesmarks.com/sales-days/

 Finally, a recession brings pressure for sales people looking for a job and for hiring sales managers alike. We thought we’d help both a little with a new download called Sales Interview Questions. They saved me from mis-hiring a few times and thought I’d share them with others. They can be downloaded here:
http://salesmarks.com/sales-interview-questions/               

All of this for only one easy payment of—NOTHING!

That’s right; you pay absolutely nothing for this amazing offer.  All you have to do is use this incredible site to help build your sales business.

Anyway, go check out Jan’s bigger and better site HERE

On My Honor–Randy Pennington’s Great New Book

Randy Pennington has written one of the best books on personal and business integrity and leadership on the market today: On My Honor, I Will: The Journey to Integrity-Driven Leadership. As you may have guessed by the title, the Boy Scout Oath plays a prominent role in the book as Randy demonstrates has the oath contains all the foundational aspects of true leadership and integrity.  And you thought the Scout Oath was just for teenage boys.

I suggest you head over to www.onmyhonorbook.net to learn about the book and then click on the button that says “Free Gift With Purchase” to find out how to receive additional learning resources at no charge with your purchase of the book. 

Randy has written a great book that should be on every book shelf—and more importantly, in every set of hands with eyes on page.  Read it, turn it into behavior.

The Last Thing Your Sales Team Needs is a Manager

Does your sales team need someone to:

• Monitor every activity in the sales office?
• Be every salesperson’s best friend?
• Close the deal for every team member?
• Set sales goals designed to make them and their team look good?

Over my three decades in sales I’ve seen lots and lots of sales managers.  The vast majority fall into one of these four types:

The Hall Monitor

The Hall Monitor sees their job as one of chronicling activity, taking names, dispensing discipline, focusing on procedures, thinking those are the keys to generating results—or at least to keeping their job.

Hall monitors tend to be oriented to process, are organized, and have a strong sense of discipline.  All admirable characteristics—but they’re misguided.  The Hall Monitor makes a great bureaucrat, a lousy sales manager.  He’ll make sure everyone knows their place and that procedure is followed—at the cost of morale and sales. 

Although the Hall Monitor is focused on enforcing procedure on subordinates, she feels justified in fudging (lying) to upper management when completing reports.  She has no intent of letting her subordinates hold her down or put her job in jeopardy.  If numbers aren’t met, margins aren’t being held, or sales calls aren’t being made, she is fully capable of showing management why it isn’t her fault. 

The Visitor

The Visitor is going places—fast.  Their current assignment of managing the sales team is temporary—and the more temporary, the better.  Their key to moving is getting some numbers to catch the eye of management.

The Visitor cares about no one other than himself and that translates into demanding sales at all costs.  Price is never an obstacle—sell it no matter what.  His message to his team members is get out and get orders and don’t come back until you got ‘em.  His implied message to the sales team is “the quicker you get the numbers, the quicker you get rid of me.”

Need help?  Need advice?  Need coaching?  Don’t ask The Visitor because frankly, he doesn’t give a damn.  If it isn’t something that’s going to help him get the next promotion and get it NOW, forget it.

Have a suggestion or advice to give?  Don’t bother because The Visitor doesn’t care—doesn’t plan on being around long enough to implement it anyway.

The one thing you can count on from The Visitor is a sales goal he is sure he can easily obliterate.  Oh, yeah, management will see those numbers destroyed, guaranteed.

The Good Buddy

The Good Buddy is everyone’s friend.  Managing is a popularity contest that he intends to win.  He’ll be a great drinking buddy, a top notch shoulder to cry on, a guy you can trust to cover for you.  He’ll make sure the office atmosphere is loose, that everyone feels welcome, that the office is a fun place to be.

Discipline?  Well, that’s not something you’ll find in his office.  An insistence on hitting quota?  Something else that isn’t a priority.  Coaching?  Nope.  Lots of back slapping and high fiving, but no coaching.  Decisions?  Don’t expect The Good Buddy to make the hard decisions because he might hurt someone’s feelings. 

The Good Buddy is weak and lets his team members run the office.  Ultimately, most everyone in his office ends up unhappy.

The Super Closer

We all know the Super Closer—the guy or gal who believes they can close anyone, anytime.  They generally have a massive ego, more than likely a strong sales history, an A type personality, and little respect for the others on their sales team.  The Super Closer sees their charges as grunts who know nothing about sales and whose only job is to go out, work through the chaff to find the prospect, then call in The Super Closer and watch the master work.

The Super Closer is concerned with one thing and one thing only—today.  Get today’s numbers, Numbers, numbers, numbers.  By gosh she’s never missed a quota and she’s not going to start now.  If you suckers can’t get the business—and God knows you can’t, she’ll close it for you.  Her sales team doesn’t have to worry about anything except getting her in front of a prospect.

Planning?  Who needs it?  Reports to management?  All they care about are quotas being met and exceeded, so she’ll tell them what they want to hear and then worry about making it true. 

The managers above have developed their own definition of what a manager is because:

• They misunderstand the nature of their position.  Most companies don’t train their new sales managers.  The assumption is that good salespeople will know what needs to be done.  Consequently, most companies simply instruct new salespeople to call their manager if they have questions, maybe give them a day or two introduction to the reports and paperwork they’ll need to complete. 
• They believe that today is more important than future days.  Get today’s numbers today and worry about tomorrow tomorrow.  This often comes from a demand by management—stated or unstated—that numbers be met today.  Many senior managers mouth a long-term growth philosophy while demanding numbers be made today so they get their bonus–and to hell with tomorrow (Wall Street anyone?).
• They aren’t manager material to begin with.  A great salesperson will not necessarily be a great manager.  Often great salespeople make terrible managers.  They know what they are good at and want to continue being the sales superstar but with a management title.  Converting to be a real manager is impossible for some of these sales stars.
• They can’t make the adjustment from being one of the group to being the leader of the group.  They want the new position but they don’t want their relationships to change.

The Sales Leader

Fortunately, there is a fifth type of sales manager—the real deal.

Currently it is common for sales managers at all levels to be called ‘Sales Leaders.’  Nice title that really doesn’t fit most managers.  A true sales leader is very different from the more typical managers we saw above.

The true sales leader:

• Isn’t focused on today but rather is looking into and planning for the future with the intent of molding the future instead of being molded by it. 
• Is looking to coach his or her team members to stardom, not to be The Star themselves. 
• Manages through demonstration and inspiration, not intimidation or fear.
• Is a student, open to suggestion, criticism, advice, and continual education. 
• Leads by being trustworthy and demonstrating integrity and honesty.  His/her team members may not like The Sales Leader’s decisions, but know the decisions are honest and based on what the Sales Leader believes is best for the team.
• Is a decision maker, not afraid to make the hard decisions and to live with the consequences. 

The Making of a Sales Leader

A Sales Leader doesn’t just happen, they are created, they’re formed, they’re developed.

The development starts with the selection of  the new manager.  Traditionally companies have selected top producers to become the new frontline sales manager.  Sales management is viewed more as a reward for production than as a critical job in its own right.

What makes a great manager isn’t what makes a great salesperson.  The activities are very different.  The relationship building needs are different, the communication, planning, and organizational needs are different.  Unless a company is seeking a Super Closer or a Visitor, promoting a top producer may not be a wise idea.

Although the management problems start with the selection of the new manager, more important is the “training” most new managers undergo—none.

One of the most common training formats companies have is upon promoting the new manager, the new manager is are given a day or two training on hiring and firing procedures, how to handle sexual harassment issues, and how fill out payroll paperwork.   From there, the new manager is told to call his or her manager if they have questions or need guidance.  After the first few questions directed to their manager, they begin to notice their phone calls aren’t returned as promptly as before, their manager’s tone of voice is a little sharper, the answers and guidance more and more abrupt. 

Soon they realize they’re on their own to sink or swin as they can.

No wonder they have no idea how to be a leader.

To create a Sales Leader companies must invest in their new manager.  They must either create a multi-disciplinary in-house management program or hire an outside company.  In addition, each new manager needs a coach—either an in-house coach or an outside professional manager coach.

Each new manager must be schooled in the skills of management, but more importantly must be guided in the roll of and skills of leadership.  Filling out paperwork, creating a sales plan, assigning territories, and resolving issues with shipping are all important, no doubt. 

But far more important to the success of the company and the sales team is getting the most out of team members, developing team members who have the desire to succeed, who are willing to invest the time and effort to be the best.  These aren’t instilled by a manager, they’re brought out by a leader.

The last thing your sales team needs is a manager.  You need Sales Leaders. 

If you want Sales Leaders, do the things necessary to develop them—investing in them is investing in your company’s future success.  Refusing to invest in them is an investment in your company’s failure.

Not Sure if Coaching is Right for You or Your Sales Team? Take a Test Drive to Find Out

Not sure if coaching is right for you or if I’m the right coach for you? Afraid of investing a ton of money and then discovering you’ve made a mistake? Hay, I understand. Engaging a coach is a major step. Coaching isn’t cheap and it can have an immense impact on your business and success. So how do you determine if coaching is right for you or your team or if I’m the right coach? Take a coaching test ride.

Trial Coaching for Individual Sellers or Sales Leaders Before you engage my services in a three, six or twelve month contract, invest only $200 and get three full coaching sessions to help you determine if this is right for you. What are the three sessions? Session One: Exploring your coaching goals and objectives Session Two: Setting out your coaching plan with specific, measurable goals Session Three: Coaching session Each session is an hour long and each has a homework assignment that builds upon the session and works toward the next session’s objectives.  Between sessions I’m available via email or in a real emergency, via phone. Have a Sales Team that Needs Coaching? Would you rather have group coaching for your team?  Certainly is less expensive that a whole host of individual coaching contracts and as long as the coaching goals and objectives are the same for each member of the group, small group coaching works very well. Group coaching is appropriate for groups of 3 to 10 sellers and the format is virtually the same as for individual coaching. Small group test drive is only $500—again, about a 67% discount over the normal price for. Beginning Sunday you can log onto http://www.mccordandassociates.com/coaching_special.html and get more detailed information and/or register for the test drive.  This special will remain open until I’ve filled the three coaching openings I currently have.

Big Changes Coming to Sales Training?

I usually don’t use this blog as a forum to comment on posts on other blogs, although I do reference other posts when appropriate.  However, I want to point out a discussion that Dave Stein is having on his blog about the issues and changes currently taking place within the sales training industry and its corporate customer base.

To date Dave has posted two pieces of the discussion (I don’t know whether he intends to continue the discussion although I hope he does as I think he can flesh out many of the issues and potential solutions more fully and maybe bring in some other perspectives–possibly from large and small training companies as well as buyers). 

The first installment of the discussion is an interview he did with Tom Martin talking in fairly general terms about some the changes that need to take place to make sales training more effective and user friendly for companies and for trainers. 

In the second post, Dave delineates 9 major obstacles sales training, and more specifically sales trainers and training consumers, must overcome in the coming months and years such as the reactive nature of sales training consumption, moving consumption from the purchase of “tips” training to effective process training, and the necessity of trainers to be more insistent on post event coaching as the necessary element for the training to have the desired impact on the sales team.

As a lone wolf sales trainer that generally works within a narrow area—prospecting and personal marketing, I’ve certainly noticed the need for change within the industry.  There is still a significant segment of the market—whether talking about individual sellers or corporate purchasers—who are looking for the magic tips and tidbits that will magically change their pipelines.  They don’t want training, they want a motivator to come in with lots of hype and few tips and then they expect change.  Foolish? Yes, but also very common.

Equally frustrating is the discussion with buyers about follow up coaching or a training the coach segment.  Seems that many trainers are not educating prospects on the critical nature of managed follow up with training event attendees to make sure the appropriate behaviors are being instilled.  For decades one of the primary complaints from training buyers has been that training is in general ineffective.  That I believe is because of a misunderstanding of what a training event really is.  A training event is nothing more than information exchange but the goal is ultimately behavior change.  The behavior change doesn’t happen during the training event, it happens afterwards when the seller is back in the field—but it won’t happen for the vast majority of sellers unless they have support and guidance that must either come from the initial trainer, the seller’s manager, or the company’s training department.  Even though we know the result of training without follow up coaching, few are insisting that coaching or training the coach be a part of the contract.

Head over to Dave’s blog and spend some time there—both posts and the comments are well worth the time spent.

Not Getting Enough Quality Referrals? Here’s Why

Virtually every seller has been taught that generating referrals from clients and prospects is the way to sales success; but less than 15% generate enough referrals to significantly impact their business.  Most of the time, the problems sellers have generating referrals is due to the training—or lack thereof–they have received, rather than with their performance.  The traditional referral training has been to “do a good job and ask for referrals.”  Yet, it has been obvious for decades that it really does not work very well.  Using the traditional approach, the typical seller will get an occasional name and phone number or two from their clients but seldom do these names and phone numbers result in a sale.  Certainly, on occasion, these referrals become clients, but the close ratio tends to be quite poor.

The failure to generate a large number of high quality referrals actually lies in the traditional method’s approach to the client.  The traditional “do a good job and ask for referrals” approach creates several roadblocks to getting referrals.

First, by waiting until the sale is complete and then asking for referrals, your client has not had the opportunity to prepare for your request.  To the client, the request comes from out of the blue.  When you approach your client with your request without giving them an opportunity to think about it, you have put them on the spot.  You are only giving them a few seconds to go through their mental file cabinet to come up with quality referrals and that isn’t realistic.  More than likely in this situation, they will not be able to immediately produce the number or the quality of referrals you want.

Second, even if your client takes a few seconds to think about it, they really do not know what you want.  It may seem obvious to you, but your client really has not a clue what a good referral for you is.  This may seem a little difficult to accept, but it is true.  You assume that because you sell a whole array of financial products and services, your customer is immediately going to think, “Who do I know who needs or uses any type of financial advice, guidance or products?”  Wrong assumption.  What they actually think is “what does this person want from me?”  Or, more likely, “how can I get out of answering this?”  Without having defined for your client exactly what a quality referral for you is, you stand very little chance of getting quality referrals.

Third, the traditional method of “do a good job and ask for referrals” does not give your client a reason to give you referrals.  We make the assumption that if we have done a good job, the client will like and respect us and be willing to give us referrals.  Again, this is far from the case.  Although a small percentage of clients will, most clients will not give good, quality referrals just because they like you or because you have done a good job for them.  You must give them a reason to give you referrals.  We spend a great deal of time in the sales making sure the client understands the “What’s In It For Me,” but when we get to referrals all of the sudden we think WIIFM doesn’t matter?  They need to understand why it is in their best interest to give you referrals—and after the sale is complete, it is too late to try to explain how giving you referrals benefits them.  Clients assume that whomever they refer you to will be more demanding and critical they have been.  When a client gives a referral, they are putting their reputation and image on the line with the person to whom they are referring you.  They are concerned about what their friend or acquaintance is going to think of them, particularly if you mess up.  Consequently, you must give them a good reason why they should go out on the limb for you.

Fourth, the traditional referral generation method does not give the client an objective standard by which to measure the quality of your performance.  You and your client may “feel” you have done a good job, but when you ask for referrals, they begin to think back over the sales process more critically and question whether you have really performed up to standard.  If the two of you agree up-front on exactly what you need to do in order to “do a good job,” they will have an objective basis to decide if they trust you enough and if you have earned the right to be sent to the people they really know and respect.

And finally, although not a direct result of the traditional referral generation method, an equally serious issue is studies show that the majority of the times advisors do not really ask for referrals—rather they suggest referrals.  Instead of asking a direct question seeking referrals such as “John, which of your friends, family members or acquaintances do you know that I may be able help solve some crucial issues?” the typical seller will make a weak request such as “John, if you happen to know someone I can help would you mind letting me know?”  Or, “John, if you run across someone who could use my services would mind giving them my card?”  Rather than a request for referrals, these are throwaway sentences, quickly forgotten by most clients.

Traditional referral training is inherently unfair to you and your client.  It does not give you the tools needed to successfully work with your client to generate quality referrals, and it does not give your client a reason to give referrals, nor does it give them a chance to become comfortable giving you referrals.

Yet, it is possible to generate a very large number of high quality referrals from your clients.  You need to make sure that your interaction with your client eliminates these shortcomings.  Preparing your client during the sales process to give referrals by informing them up-front that your business is referral-based; defining for your client exactly what a quality referral for you is; educating your client on why it is in their best interest to give you referrals; and then coming to an agreement with your client on exactly what you must do during the course of the sale to earn their referrals will quickly give you a large pipeline of quality referrals. 

By recognizing and resolving the problems of the traditional referral generation method, you can turn these issues into your strengths, generating a large number of high quality referrals from almost every one of your clients and prospects.