Squeeze in one more phone call 📱 or email 🖥

There is a popular quote by Muhammad Ali on how he trained to become the no. 1 boxer of all time:

I don't count my sit-ups; I only start counting when it starts hurting because they’re the only ones that count.

Since starting in a new sales job, I have applied Ali’s philosophy to sales: 

• before going for a lunch break I make one more phone call; or 
• send one more outbound email before going home

Your sales efforts begin to compound when you increase your outbound efforts.  

So far the results of this approach has yielded a lot of success.  

Give it a go 😀 

Rainbows 🌈 and Unicorns 🦄

At the start of my sales career I worked alongside George, a mature tele-sales representative whose individual sales transactions were less than $200. 

I could not believe how positive he was on each phone call, knowing that he needed to make A LOT of phone calls to make budget. 

George was clearly delusional!

However George was always sounding enthusiastic and happy to speak with customers. You could tell by the sound of his voice! When the rejection did occur, he just shrugged it off and kept dialing. 

In order to get good at his job, George needed to have an irrational perspective. To really believe the customer you are speaking with needed his product! When rejection occurred he needed to not take it personally. 

George’s perspective carried him through years of making a good living through sales.  

At the time I was fascinated by his “rainbows and unicorns” perspective.

Now nearly 20 years on I realise that I am also delusional! 🤪

Fear of Rejection

I can’t believe that after 18 years of continuous selling I still get nervous calling new or important customers!

I just made a call to someone that I worked with quite closely in a precious role. The response was warm and I could not believe I was feeling nerves...

But nerves can help sharpen your mind and provide focus to the situation. 

If you are a startup and new to sales, don’t feel bad that you are uncomfortable. It’s completely normal. 😀 

Your Physical/Mental Health and it’s impact on Sales

Many who are new to sales, worry about the impact of rejection on their psyche. 

Its true that to be successful you MUST remain positive, despite having the occasional bad day.  

Underpinning your positive attitude is the need to keep your body and mind in a good healthy state.   

Why is health connected to sales? 

Firstly being an entrepreneur is a job. Your job requires many years of effort to see the fruits of success. You won’t make it in the long run if you ignore your health. 

Everyone has a different approach for maintaining their health. Some go to the extreme with highly competitive sports and training. Others will timebox activities with families and friends to keep the balance.  

The second reason is that we all want to buy from people we like and can trust. You and I can sense when someone’s life is out of balance by the way they speak and the tone of their voice.   

Sales is about being in a state of happiness, working with customers and genuinely caring about helping them make progress.  

You cannot fake that.  

As humans we have well developed detectors to sense when someone is trying to “sell” us. Nobody likes to be sold to.

However they are more than willing to work  with partners keen to see their success.   

In short

• Take care of your mental and physical health.
• Be happy!
• Enjoy the thrill of helping customers succeed through your efforts and solutions.  

Take your time to develop the solution collaboratively with your customer!

Today I had a first meeting with a senior manager for an existing customer. 

Over the past few weeks I had been socialising a novel approach to solve one of their ongoing challenges. The reaction so far had been warm. However when I described it to this senior manager, she got excited and asked for a full description of the solution.  

If you are the technical founder of a startup, it is very tempting at this stage to dive into a technical briefing. But don’t do it! 

If you elaborate the solution too early you risk missing aspects that will enable you to win the sale. It is far better to work collaboratively with the customer, with SMEs (Subject Matter Experts) from both sides, to develop the solution. 

 You cannot always collaborate. But when you do, it can be very powerful.  

I know this is really simple stuff but even experienced sales people can fall into the trap!

A great tactic to implement this approach is offering to run a workshop with SMEs on both sides. Your proposal will then be designed for acceptance! 😀

Fostering an environment for customer openness

Wherever you work in the world and whatever corporate culture you are dealing with you should always foster openness and from your customer.   

Being open with a potential supplier carries with it many risks. Can they trust you with sensitive information? If your proposal is accepted and then it fails, what will be the consequence?

Some cultures are comfortable being extremely DIRECT with you, but how can you get them to trust you? One of the best books that have addressed customer trust is  The Trusted Advisor  . 

In the meantime here are some practical tips that I have found to enourage openness: 

• Cafe or Coffee meeting. I personally don’t drink coffee! But meeting with a customer for a drink to discuss business can create a neutral environment which encourages openness.  
•   Making phone calls . Don’t be so eager to sell sell sell! First check if they are free for a minute, then briefly explain your proposal to meet with them. When booking a time give them over a week to two weeks ahead in the calendar. This shows that you are not desperately trying to sell to them. 
• Ask more questions in the first meeting.   The first meeting is an opportunity to build rapport and learn more about the customer’s situation. You will greatly impress them by asking questions, listening and speaking less!
•  Find a small way to add value in the beginning. This could be a non-monetary way of helping your customer. It could be offering them free research, or an invitation to an event that relates to their professional life. When you provide someone with value they are more likely to trust you more. 
• Be willing to admit to your past failings or limitations.  Use this tactic carefully as it can backfire in a big way 🙂. The customer does not want to hear how bad you have stuffed things up in the past. But they will value someone that is open about what you are good and not so good at. Sharing an experience that emphasises a learning and new direction can also be helpful. 

These are some of the tactics that have worked for me. Do you have any additional experiences or tactics to add in the comments below? 

“Leaving money on the table” discussion

I shudder to repeat the phrase, leaving money on the table phrase because it’s been used repeatedly over the past 20 years. 

If you are new to sales or negotiation, it’s commonly referred to not being thorough enough with unpacking all the customer’s needs. Once you have identified what you think is a big deal, you prematurely conclude the meeting. 

Very recently (a few hours ago) I had a meeting with an existing customer, which was going very well! I was ready to conclude the discussion. We had a very good meeting and my colleague and I felt we had been fully briefed on the customer’s requirement. I had already asked whether they had any other need to cover and the answer was “no”. 

It was only when I recalled a separate conversation with a colleague who incidcated there was an additional opportunity to raise. When I raised it, the immediate reaction was that they had sourced the product/solution via a competitor. However as I indicated we could supply them immediately with their requirement, I began to get interest. 

Long story short, the meeting concluded with a commitment from me to provide two proposals instead of one. 

The value of the second proposal is somewhere between $50,000 and $250,000!   

If it was not for the insight of a colleague, the second opportunity would have definitely been left on the table! 

Helping customers to open up

I recently discovered a question that helps customers get to the heart of their motivation to purchase from you:

What progress are you seeking to make?

The question is simple in its nature, but a powerful way to encourage a customer's openness and transparency. 

Once the customer has shared what progress they are trying to make, you are more prepared to know how your startup can help them. 

Switching Hats

As a startup entrepreneur you will have to balance more than one hat or responsibility. For example you need to perform in the following roles:

• finance hat: managing the cash flow of your startup. 
  
• product hat: lead the development of your product’s features 
• management hat: managing the people that work for the startup, cofounders and all suppliers. 

 Sales Hat

As a startup entrepreneur you should be dedicating at least 1-2 hours each day on outbound sales activities. 

This daily effort will compound the growth of your startup when you complete the following: 

• setting up meetings with people you know (often via LinkedIn) who might be customers, or can introduce you to their network. 
• outbound emails and calls people you don’t know to setup meetings with new prospective customers.
• meetings with potential customers.
• sending short follow up emails after a meeting to summarise the commitments made.
• ongoing contact with your network to keep them engaged. This might include inviting to a Meetup, update on a new product features or announcements when new customers that have joined.  

If you commit yourself to these tasks every day you will be building the growth of your new startup.  

Many entrepreneurs I work with are very disciplined in blocking out 8.00am - 10.00am each day for outbound sales activities.

Happy prospecting! 

First Meeting: the most important question you need to ask!

You find yourself  in an introductory meeting with a potential customer.

It appears to be going very well!

It is often tempting on these occasions to keep the happy feelings going, and not go into "tactical mode" with very direct questions. 

There is one question however that cannot be left out: “How does your organisation make decisions?” 

This question can be rephrased in many different ways: 

• If you were to proceed with this [INSERT YOUR PRODUCT] who else would need to be involved? 
• What is your decision process? 
• How does [COMPANY] make decisions like this type of thing? 

When you ask this upfront in the first meeting, it might raise a few eyebrows but most will respond positively.  

However not asking the question will lead to frustration and confusion when your contact does not return your calls or emails. There is no way of finding out what is happening (which can be frustrating).  

If you are able to have a discussion about the customer's decision process, you will be free to follow up at future times to verify or receive an update on how their decision process is going. 

An added bonus to this tactic, is that it helps your contact to start thinking practically on how they will buy from you!

Trust me on this!