Author Archive

THEY’RE JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU. (Free Webinar!)

written on May 15th, 2012 with no comments
Date: Wednesday May 23, 2012
Time: 3:00pm EST / 12:00pm PST
Duration: 29 Minutes
Registration: http://bit.ly/KHxj0h


I’m doing a webinar with one of my clients, OnPath Business Solutions, and a sales expert I have never met and look forward to meeting online, Mark Hunter of The Sales Hunter. Dan Scheunert, the CEO of OnPath, has been asking for a while if I was interested in being a subject matter expert on a webinar and when we came up with this concept, it clicked.


These are, apparently, very live, unrehearsed webinars with a lot of candid answers and shooting from the hip. Should be interesting!


B2B prospects don’t care about your fancy packaging or glossy brochures. What they care about is how you can help them solve their business problems. Just like the book “He’s Just Not That Into You,” people often misconstrue the intentions of others. Understand the subtle signs of your prospects and you will be more successful selling.


Join us for 29 minutes as Mark Hunter (President, The Sales Hunter), Susan Englehutt (President, Vision to Value System) and Darryl Praill (Host, OnPath Business Solutions) discuss the five reasons why prospects are just not that into you and what you can do about it.


You’ll learn:
1.         If prospects are not calling you back, it’s because you’re not on their mind.
2.         Not everyone is a prospect. Sometimes you’re just wasting your time.
3.         It’s very tempting when you really want a sale to settle for much less.
4.         Prospects say things they don’t mean. They make promises they don’t keep.
5.         We’re taught to look on the bright side. Not in sales. Assume rejection first.


Are they into you? Register today. Can’t attend? No problem. Just register for the event and a few days after the live session, a link to the recorded version will be emailed to you.


Registration: http://bit.ly/KHxj0h

Beat Your Competitors: Strategy 3 of 3

written on April 23rd, 2012 with no comments

In the last two posts, I suggested two strategies for beating your competitors: 1) using different types of differentiation at different stages of the buying cycle; and 2) differentiating with your services.

Today, I suggest that you differentiate by Changing the Game.

Most companies and sales reps look at differentiation as a way to win the DEAL – that “special-something-feature” or “silver bullet” that will turn the tables in their favour. I encourage clients to think BIGGER and use differentiation as a way of changing the GAME.

Take some time and think about the business problems that your customers have that you could solve but aren’t solving right now. Or, think of the problems you are solving for them but not charging for!

I believe that to REALLY solve their business problems, your customers need more than just a piece of technology, or an assessment, or a workshop. What would the ideal set of products and services look like for your ideal customer that would solve their business problems in a deeper and more lasting way?

Chances are, your competitors haven’t thought this through and they won’t be able to compete with your new offering.

That is CHANGING the GAME.

Beat Your Competitors: Strategy 2 of 3

written on April 18th, 2012 with no comments

In the last post, I shared the first strategy for beating your competitors. I suggested that you use different types of differentiation in different stages of the buying process. (That was a mouthful!)

Today, I am going to suggest that you Differentiate Using Services.

If you look at the “Services” section of your competitors’ websites, you will see a SCARILY GENERIC list. But, I KNOW that what makes one company better than the next is HOW they work with you – their business process, their implementation process, their account management process, etc.

Look for the secret sauce in your services. You can even go as far as naming your services offering distinctively and powerfully – e.g. The Profit Generation ProcessTM.

Beat Your Competitors: Strategy 1 of 3 . . .

written on March 29th, 2012 with 2 comments

Feel squeezed by competition?

Welcome to the crowd! Ten years ago, my clients used to say that 80% of what they sell – features – looks, smells and tastes like what their competitors sell. Lately, I’ve been hearing more and more companies say they feel their products and services are only about 5% differentiated.

Let’s be realistic, products can only be changed so often and there are only so many useful features!  By the time you introduce a new feature, your competitors are already huddled around their drafting board. In a few weeks, months or a year, your competitors could release a new product that beats you to the punch.

Competing on product features is VERY HARD.

There are better, more POWERFUL strategies.

Let me share three of them with you.

Strategy #1:Use different types of differentiation in different stages of the buying process.

How you differentiate tells me a lot about where you are in the buying cycle and how successful you will be. If you differentiate on features, it tells me you are playing in the second stage of the buying process which is known to be “impossible” to win. (Well, not impossible, but very hard.) If you use that same trick in the first stage of the buying process when you are talking with business people or executives, you have missed an opportunity to differentiate based on how well you understand their business and your ability to solve their strategic problems.

So, for the three stages of the buying cycle, there are THREE DIFFERENT TYPES OF DIFFERENTIATION: 1) based on how well you understand their business and your ability to have a business conversation with them; 2) based on your ability to solve their business problem – i.e. your solution, not your product features; and 3) based on your product or service features and…your price. (Which is why you don’t want to play there and do that.)


More next time . . .

Note: This content was first published in an interview with SalesSHIFT’s Jill Harrington. Get to know SalesSHIFT here.

A BOARD GAME FOR SALES AND MARKETING ALIGNMENT!

written on January 24th, 2012 with no comments

The last post was about sales and marketing alignment.

Somebody asked me what other advice I could give. Get started, I said.

This could be really complicated. Or it could be simple. It could also be really boring. Let’s choose simple and not boring. And let’s focus on making one small but powerful change.

A piece of paper and 7 quick steps.

Here are 7 quick steps you could take right away to create the first version of your sales and marketing playbook – what I like to think of as a sales and marketing board game! All you need is a blank piece of white paper and a Sharpie.

1. Draw a rectangle. Divide it into two parts.

2. Label the left side WIN and the right side LOSE.

3. Add a middle section. Label it COMPETE. You can also win here IF you have strong differentiators. This is a basic sales process.

4. Add these labels: WHY, WHO, HOW MUCH. This is a basic buyer’s buying process. You now have a sales process that is built on the buyer’s buying process.

5. Workshop what information the buyer needs in each step. Here are some hints: why should I change? what would I need? is there a payoff for changing? is there a risk in not changing?; what are my peers doing?; who has solutions? how do they compare? do they meet my needs? what successes have they had? who are their customers? what results have they gotten?; is their company reputable? did I get the best price?

6. Decide who creates the information – the PUCK. And who will deliver it – the PLAY. This is your sales and marketing playbook.

7. Call me if you need help.

Congratulations on getting started!

SO, YOU THINK SALES AND MARKETING ALIGNMENT CAN’T BE FIXED?

written on January 18th, 2012 with no comments

To those who say it can’t be fixed, I say: You’re right. No silver bullet here. If there were one, I would be surfing in Tofino, not writing this post. However, I have found something that works.

And to those who say it doesn’t apply to them, I say: You’re wrong! Are you are involved in sales or marketing – as a sales manager, a marketing manager, a one-woman team or a do-it-all-yourself business owner – your left hand is sales and your right hand is marketing. Ever tried to work with one hand behind your back? Hard.

What best practices do we recommend to get sales and marketing working together?

1. Get-on-the-same-team.
Sales and marketing are two different teams. With different coaches. Different playbooks. What happens when two hockey teams compete? They fight. They miss the puck. Somebody wins. Somebody loses. A better idea is to think of sales and marketing as a SINGLE team passing the puck BETWEEN team members to orchestrate a spectacular play. EVERYONE wins. Except the competition.

2. Create a common playbook.
One team can only handle ONE playbook. Yes, throw out the separate sales and marketing playbooks and make a new one. The new playbook is based on the buyer’s buying process. That is, the steps the buyer goes through to buy from your company. By making it all about the customer, you avoid the deadlock that happens when the conversation disintegrates to being about sales versus marketing or marketing versus sales. Nobody can argue with the customer being first.

3. Talk about more than leads.
Sales and marketing alignment issues are usually all about leads. And why there aren’t enough leads, or that the leads aren’t good enough. The reason the lead topic is negative is because all kinds of other things are negative. Fix those things and the lead issue will be fixed or be ready to be fixed. What are those other things? Clearly defined targets. Clarity on the business problems of those targets. Who influences their buying decision and, therefore, needs to be influenced. Packaging of solutions for specific target-problem scenarios. Differentiation. And nurturing.

4. Work on your sales and marketing message.
Most companies and even one-man teams tend to dive for the tactics first. If you put sales and marketing tactics before your sales and marketing message, you will have a machine and no gas to run it. That is another reason why lead management becomes the central issue. Deal with the cause first – no focus and poor messaging – and then build your tactical machine.