7 Tips For Building Value

Building Value is a function of strengthening your Value Propositions with additional examples within a Value Opportunity (VO), applying multiple Value Propositions to a VO, and repeating this process throughout multiple VOs (for complex sales).

7 Tips Related To Building Value
1. Building value with many little proofs (examples) is a subtle way to build acceptance and rapport. It is nonthreatening to the prospect, and they don't feel as if they're "being sold."
2. If you can keep adding specific Value Propositions that address a VO, you will gain acceptance.
3. Doing this shows you are actively listening to the customer. It validates your understanding of the customer's VOs.
4. It can increase the amount of your sale. Even if they want to buy, deepening the acceptance of value provided on already identified Value Opportunities can increase the amount of the sale.
5. You come across as having more in common with the customer. You don't feel like a stranger, and rapport is built quicker and stronger.
6. You come across as someone who understands their issues and has put thought into what real solution could be, as opposed to just pushing your product on them like many other sales reps do.
7. Once you feel you have reached a point where you can trial close, a powerful tool will be going back to summarize the multiple Value Propositions provided over multiple VOs.

How To Build Value
If you have deeply probed to gain a full understanding of a customer's particular VO and presented customer-specific value, you should get acceptance. Once this initial acceptance is revealed, present additional Value Propositions that you know will address that VO.
* Presenting more of the same Value Proposition: Present more specific examples of a Value Proposition to address a VO. For example, if the Value Proposition is the Marketing Director of the prospect company "needing qualified leads," then present to him or her more examples of the same type of leads you can offer them through your marketing service.
* Presenting additional Value Propositions: Your goal is to address multiple VOs with multiple Value Propositions and build enough overall acceptance to close. For example, if you are selling an truck to a customer, they may also need help selling (or trading in) their current vehicle. Plus, they may need guidance purchasing accessories for the truck, including a truck bed cap and a tow hitch. The more value you show them in those areas, the higher the likelihood of you making not just the vehicle sale but add-on sales.

When Building Value, keep it conversational. Don't get into a canned sales speech, and keep it in a context that's specific to the customer. Keep building value on a point that they like to talk about. Try to find as many examples of specific value as you can to ensure maximum acceptance.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of four leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, VertMarkets, and Howland Peterson Consulting.

Professionals Prepare Pitches & Proofs

Let's start first with definitions Pitches and Proofs before we talk about how to make them work for you. A Pitch is a snippet of information presented in a somewhat broad sense to show how you can provide a product/service that will address the client's Value Opportunities. It's a claim you make -- the concept of what you can do. It is possible to make sales on the concept alone, but it's more effective if you offer Proofs.

Proofs are specific examples that prove what was described by the pitch. It's a validation of value. Here are some principles of strong Proofs:
1. More powerful if someone else (another customer of yours) is saying it. Think reference letters and testimonials.
2. Uses specifics to show or imply the benefits of your features. "Company X is great to work with" isn't very specific. "Company X and their MarketConnect product provided me with 100 leads which increased my sales by $250,000" is much more specific and effective.
3. Includes specific numbers and stats.

How To Deliver Pitches & Proofs
Delivery of Pitches and Proofs is important in determining whether or not the pitch/proof results in accepted value. When using QACF (Question, Answer, Comment, Feedback) to probe, the comment can be a pitch or proof. Do not deliver until you are sure the pitch/proof is both:
1. Appropriate -- adds value to address an identified Value Opportunity
2. Complete -- tells not just what you can do but how it will benefit the client.

It's a good idea to compile and organize a stack of proof sheets so that as fast as you are identifying Value Opportunities, you can find proofs to reinforce the value you deliver. The client should control how quickly you reach a point to deliver a pitch/proof. Let them take their time to define the Value Opportunity. Accuracy is more important than speed.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of four leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, VertMarkets, and Howland Peterson Consulting.

The Art Of Offering Value Propositions

Throwing out value without knowing that it will address a Value Opportunity of your customer is uneconomical. There's no reason for a person to buy something unless it satisfies a need. If the customer can see exactly how your products/services can help them, they will be much more likely to buy.

When To Offer Value Propositions
You should initially offer value at the following times: (This does not include offering additional value to build acceptance. We covered that in another posting.)
1. During probing for understanding, once you are confident the Value Proposition will effectively address their Value Opportunity. Delivering customer-specific Value Propositions will build acceptance and lead to closing on the sale.
2. To get the attention of a non-responsive customer if they are trying to get rid of you. You must make an educated guess what value will match their needs based on your precall plan.
3. Part of soliciting feedback to show you're listening to their needs.

How To Offer Value Propositions
Reactive - these are delivered during the call. You react to what they say with the pitches and proofs you know.
1. Use QA (Question/Answer) to gather as much information as possible about the different needs they have that legitimately match up to the services we provide. Do not promise what we cannot deliver, but make sure you uncover all of the ways we can help.
2. Use their excitement level as a way to gauge which needs are of higher priority. They may also tell you their priorities.

Active note-taking (and accurate CRM entries) are crucial to ensure you don't miss anything. Don't just "vomit value." Value should be customer-specific to ensure that you are always adding to their acceptance. What is valuable to one prospect may not matter to another.

Proactive - these are delivered offline, not during the call. You evaluate their Value Opportunities and develop creative Value Propositions and/or creative ways to communicate with them. Here are some ways to offer value if you can't get a meeting with the DM:
1. Email -- but don't get lulled into doing everything via email
2. Fax or Direct Mail -- remember when we used to do this all the time? Well fewer people are faxing or sending direct mail pieces nowadays, so your message will stand out (if it's a good one). Don't just send your marketing materials; always, always, always include a personal note.
3. Through social media - do they have a Facebook page, Twitter account, or LinkedIn listing?
4. Call before or after hours (when the gatekeeper isn't in)
5. Send them a greeting card -- you can find people's birthdays on many social media outlets
6. Send them a personal item -- if they like jellybeans, drop off a bag for them with a note attached.
7. Send their staff a gift -- we recently sent a customer $1 scratch-off lottery tickets for their staff and it was a real hit.
8. Send them a testimonial letter -- this can work especially well when the testimonial is from a competitor of theirs.
9. Join groups they are a member of -- like the Erie Sales Club!

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of four leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, VertMarkets, and Howland Peterson Consulting.

The 'Shotgun Approach' vs. The 'Rifle Approach'

We've talked previously about identifying Value Opportunities (VOs) and getting to the decision maker. Let's talk today about how to align your Value Proposition(s) with their VOs.

We see too often that a prospect presents a VO and we rush to throw out our Value Proposition(s). The Value Proposition is often mismatched because we do not fully understand the VO first. This does not build acceptance, it can create skepticism and/or indifference, and you can lose credibility when you're wrong in this guessing game. Also, trying to align value too soon is not consultative. You become just another pushy salesperson trying to pitch them something.

There are two approaches to aligning your Value Propositions:
1. Shotgun Approach: Providing value that you THINK is valuable. Maybe the value is important and addresses a Value Opportunity, or maybe it doesn't. It it unlikely the Value Proposition will address the VO.
2. Rifle Approach: Providing value to the prospect that you KNOW is valuable to them. By fully understanding the VO, you know (vs. you guess) the Value Proposition you offer will address the VO.
Obviously the Rifle Approach is the only acceptable method.

If executed properly using the Rifle Approach, eventually you transition from how you could possibly be helping them to how you will be helping them. This can lead to them closing themselves. All of this is rooted in taking the time to ask the right questions. You cannot simply pull VOs from a list, and every customer will have different VOs.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of four leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, VertMarkets, and Howland Peterson Consulting.

Conversation Helpers: Segues And Bridges

Segues (pronounced SEG-ways) and bridges are important to executing your line of questions (LOQ) effectively. Segeues are logical, smooth transitions into another line of questions. Segues usually feel very conversational. The customer may not even realize you have shifted to another LOQ. Bridges are more abrupt changes in your questions. It will feel to the customer like a change in the direction of the conversation.

Sometimes you can make the bridge feel like a segue by using what the customer has previously said to make the transition into anther LOQ topic. Example: "... so to tie that back to what you said a few minutes ago about meeting with Jason Smith next week, how is he involved in the decision making process?" This provides two benefits -- it shifts the conversation where you want it to go and it shows you are actively listening to what they're saying.

Usually it's required and appropriate to segue from one of your LOQs to another to fully understand one Value Opportunity. This means that you will often segue to another LOQ topic before fully exhausting the current LOQ topic. If this occurs, you must segue back to the original LOQ topic later in the conversation to ensure you gather all of the necessary information in that LOQ. That could be kind of hard to follow, huh? This is why we encourage you to take good notes during your sales conversations.

Some LOQs will warrant deeper probing and more questions than others. Ask yourself, "What do I need to know to about this subject to sell this account?" Once you have gained that information, move to the next appropriate LOQ topic. You should go to a depth necessary to close them before moving to another LOQ without overselling.

Reading The Prospect
Prospects may provide a cue to prompt you to segue. Examples include:
* Tone of voice: The customer may be excited or particularly animated with their response to your questions about a specific subject.
* Repetition: The customer may mention another LOQ topic several times.
* Their Answers: Trial close them and ask for feedback.

When a prospect throws out a cue to segue to another LOQ topic, you should:
* Recognize the cue and if it will move you off the current Value Opportunity you are discussing
* Decide if you should segue right then or not. If you are going down a path that is important to them, stay with it. It is preferred to fully understand the Value Opportunity, give value, and get acceptance before covering the next VO.

If no cues are presented, move to the next LOQ topic once you have a good understanding of the current topic. When moving to the next LOQ topic, refer to the customer's responses to the previous questions that you noted to keep the discussion conversational.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of four leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, VertMarkets, and Howland Peterson Consulting.

How Is Sales Like Basketball?

College and pro basketball have a shot clock, ranging from 24-35 seconds depending on the league, to quicken the pace of the game and to ensure one team doesn't dominate the ball. Sales doesn't have an official shot clock, but you should adopt one if you want to be a successful sales rep. We call it the 30-Second Rule.

The 30-Second Rule improves communication and understanding between two parties because it keeps individual points separated, making them easier to digest and understand, even in long, in-depth conversations. Basically, the guideline with any discussion is to talk 30 seconds or less each time you speak so you don't jeopardize the effectiveness of the conversation. If you talk longer than 30 seconds at a time, the higher the likelihood the person will miss your point. Obviously, this is not a hard-and-fast rule, but it's a good guideline to make sure you don't overwhelm the other person with too much information.

To be effective with the 30-Second Rule, provide small pieces of information on the topic you're trying to convey. Follow up by asking for feedback (QACF). Doing this provides improved communication between two parties because you actively engage the other person in the conversation. While more complex topics require more explanation, the information will be more easily understood if you stop and ask for feedback during the explanation. Resist the tendency to keep talking until you exhaust the subject.

Here are some techniques to help you stay within the 30-Second Rule:
1. QACF
2. Ask for feedback or questions every 30 seconds.
3. Plan your conversation in advance of you opening your mouth.
4. Ask more questions. An excellent (and brief) question is "Why?"
5. Ask the person if they need more data before you continue. Speak for them, not for you.
6. Lead with the punchline. Nobody likes it when you "beat around the bush." So don't.
7. Use silence.
8. Warn the person in advance if you are going to break the 30-Second Rule.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of four leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, VertMarkets, and Howland Peterson Consulting.

We've Got Some Questions For You

Here are 5 topics that you should ask questions about to learn more about your customer (and their company if it's a B2B sale):

1. Company Goals: Fully understand what the customer is trying to accomplish in relation to the product/service you're discussing and what's preventing them from accomplishing the goals.
2. Expectations: Fully understand what the customer expects to gain if they purchase your product/service.
3. Competition: Fully understand how the customer views and evaluates your competition.
4. Company Information: In addition to understanding their goals, understand the basics of their company.
5. Personal: Understand enough about them as a person to make a connection. People buy from people they know and like.

Here's a sample line of questions related to #4 Company Information:
* What makes you different from your competition?
* What's the most unique thing your company does? Why do you do that?
* What are the biggest changes your company has experienced recently?
* What changes are on the horizon?
* How many locations do you have? Do you plan to add more?

And here's a sample line of questions related to #5 Personal:
* What do you do for a living? Tell me about your career path that got you there.
* Why did you make your last job move?
* What are your future plans?
* What do you like about your job?
* What do you like about the city you live in?
* Tell me about your family.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

QACF: Question, Answer, Comment, Feedback

No, QACF is not the sound a duck makes when it's trying to quack and eat at the same time. QACF is an acronym that represents the pattern your sales call should follow: Question, Answer, Comment, Feedback.
* Q & A is the process where you ask the contact a probing question and they answer it (information gathering). When you ask questions, they should be clear and succinct. Speak plainly. Avoid cliches such as "hot button" and "pain point," as the contact may feel as though they are being sold.
* C is when you comment in response to their answer. The comment validates your understanding of the answer. You can present a Value Proposition to address one of their needs.
* F is when the contact provides feedback. Did you understand the information provided in their answer?

When gathering feedback, you will uncover the contact's attitude. It will fit into one of four categories (1) Acceptance: "I agree. I like that." (2) Skepticism: "I don't believe you." (3) Indifference: "I don't care." (4) Objection: "I won't."

7 Tips For Effective Use of QACF to Advance an Account
1. Listen to the contact's answers and react to their cues naturally.
2. Don't assume anything.
3. Let them fully answer your questions. Don't interrupt. Use live note-taking to capture pertinent points that you want to come back to later in the conversation.
4. Engage the client. Talk about what's important to them.
5. It helps to have a good understanding of your products/services. While you listen to the contact's answers to your questions, there may be a point in time where your internal alarm should go off to tell you, "Hey! There's a match. We can help them with that."
6. Listen! You should be succinct with your Q and C. The contact should be more verbose with A and F.
7. If you talk too much, the contact may:
- Feel as though you are not trying to understand them
- Not have the time or opportunity to fully answer your questions
- Begin to ignore you
- Think as though you are serving your own agenda, not theirs

I could go on-and-on about the topic of QACF ... but I don't want you to begin to ignore me or think I'm serving my own agenda and not yours.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Super Reps Ask Excellent Questions

The only way to determine if your contact is a good fit for your products/services is to begin asking questions to understand their goals and other vital information. You are doing them, your company, and yourself an injustice if you do not get a complete understanding of their needs. The person must feel a bit of comfort with you before you can begin asking those key questions. If you are too aggressive (or not aggressive enough, depending on the contact's personality), you may have your conversation cut short before you get any information on the client's Value Opportunities. If done properly, you will get an explosion of information, and they'll do most of the talking.

Two Types Of Questions
Surface-level questions are used early in the conversation to determine if the contact could be a good fit for your products/services:
* Does your product/service match what they do? (You can't sell a jitney to a doctor.)
* Can they afford what you're selling? (Good luck selling enterprise-level software to a mom-and-pop operation.)
* Is the contact part of the decision making process?

In-depth questions are asked after you determine the client could be a fit for your products/services. Because that list of questions is almost endless, we'll just list the category headers here:
* Identify and fully understand their Value Opportunities and business processes
* Identify and present the specific value that will build acceptance from them
* Better understand and respond to their objection
* Better understand and respond to skepticism if necessary

If you're hit with a smokescreen, stall, or objection early in your conversation, that should be your cue to begin asking questions. Then you can understand, isolate, and eliminate the objection to continue the conversation or to acknowledge it, put them at ease, and keep going.

Here's the mindset you should have: Ask questions as though you have $50,000 to invest with them and you need to determine who you will invest in.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Prospecting & Cold Calling Advice

At the Erie Sales Club Workshop on Nov. 9, our group discussed Prospecting & Overcoming the Fear of Cold Calling. The attendees exchanged tons of good information. Here are some highlights and comments from that discussion that we hope you'll find helpful:

1. What are the reasons you hear why salespeople fear cold calling?

- Fear of rejection
- Don't want to appear "salesy" or pushy
- Believe they will eventually be more effective if they could just arrange a convenient meeting some other way (email, face-to-face, etc.)
- They're more comfortable maintaining current customers
- They feel like they're interrupting someone else and infringing upon their time

2. Many sales “experts” say don’t cold call. What do you say to those who say you shouldn’t cold call?

- Depends on what your definition of "cold" is. If it's "call someone who doesn't know you and bother them," then you shouldn't cold call. If it's "calling on someone we believe we can help, but we don't have a relationship with yet" -- then I'd defend that to the death. Why wouldn't you want to do that?
- There are a lot of so-called sales experts screaming that sales has changed and we have to do everything different these days. I think we have to look at what's changed and what hasn't changed. Today buyers are more informed than ever. They have the web, social media, and they get information from networking with their peers. They know a lot about our products and services before we ever have a chance to interact. As salespeople, we know a lot more about our prospects, because we have the web, social media, sales 2.0 tools like LinkedIn, etc. We have more communications options (face-to-face, mail, phone, mobile phone, email, text, social media, etc.) True "cold calling" is less effective -- because buyers have a right to expect you to know a lot about them before you call. What hasn't changed in the world of complex products and services is that you can't buy or sell effectively without a conversation. No matter how much they read our product brochures, advertisements, and websites, buyers won't know what they should know unless they interact with a professional salesperson. And, no matter how much homework we do on our prospects, we won't be able to provide the right solutions without a conversation. So it has to start somewhere and that's the first call.

3. What advice do you have for someone who fears cold calling?

- Don't make cold calls, make "warm" calls by doing your homework on the prospect.
- Understand your product and your industry. For example, a real estate agent should know about other houses in the area and where interest rates are.
- Use referrals and/or marketing that produces warm leads.
- Don't make your cold call your sales call. Advance the call but don't close on the first call. Determine 1 or 2 other basic outcomes for your cold calls (qualify, appointment setting, trial close, etc.).
- Build an action plan for these conversations. Not a script but an outline.
- Don't stick your toe in the water. It's cold and if you don't like cold water it'll just prolong your misery. Jump in and swim as fast as you can or you'll never get warm. Jump in all the way, give it a real effort.
- Have a strong belief (conviction) in your product and yourself. If you don't have this, get it.
- Practice: test and track what's working and what isn't working.
- Study and memorize your delivery and value -- own it.
- Look for trigger events to integrate into your call. For example, a newspaper article on the company.
- Start your day with a warmup call -- to your spouse, a good customer, even a co-worker -- to get started right.
- Record your calls and listen to them.
- Wear your company logo attire everywhere so people you call are more familiar with your company name when you call.
- Use brutal honesty: Tell the contact it's a sales call right off the bat.
- Discipline yourself: "At 10 AM every day, I will make 5 new business calls." Get an accountability partner to hold you to it. You don't have to like it, just do it.
- Work through all your fears. Successful sales reps live outside their comfort zone.

4. What cold-calling techniques have you seen that have NOT worked?

- "Let me tell you how great I am."
- "Bait and switch" or any other type of trickery.
- "Weather, vomit, close." How's the weather where you are today? Let me tell you how great I am! Buy now!
- Unprepared pitches -- the rep doesn't know anything about the company they're calling.
- Calling on a cell phone with poor reception makes a bad first impression.
- Bullying -- browbeating the contact and talking over them to force them into a sale.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Best Door-To-Door Salesman Ever?

Kenny Brooks is quickly becoming a YouTube sensation. Some of what he says in this video could be considered offensive, but you have to admire his enthusiasm, how he interjects original humor, and how he's mastered delivery of his sales pitch.

How To Contact The DM (Part 3)

Contacting and influencing the Decision Maker (DM) and others in the DM process is required. It's part of your job as a salesperson. In addition to contacting the DM and those in the DM process, you must:
* Identify each person in the DM process
* Validate each person's role in the DM process
* Determine what to accomplish with each person in the DM process

When your initial contact is a blocker (or other non-DM), there are several ways to get around them and reach the influencer or DM. This is a partial list -- you can come up with your own to fit your situation:
1. Ask to have the DM paged
2. Mail them a personal note
3. Mail an article from the newspaper or a magazine that would interest them
4. Send them a new report pertinent to their industry
5. Send them a testimonial from a competitor
6. Send them a personal gift
7. "Carbon copy" the DM on an email to the non-DM
8. Join a club or organization they belong to
9. In your voice mail or email, lead with value to get their attention and increase the likelihood they will contact you.

Leaving a vanilla, generic email or voice mail is rarely effective. Same with sending a form letter. They are a waste of your time and their time.

Important note: No matter what method you use to get to the DM, you MUST be honest with your words and actions.

If you get through by bypassing a blocker, you must be ready with a presumed value to give the DM based on your company research, your market research, and your knowledge to keep them engaged with you. Depending on how much time they have and how much value they perceive in you, you may have to schedule an appointment when you and the DM can talk further.

Final Words On The DM Process
We've talked a lot about the DM process, but we haven't mentioned everything. Here are some miscellaneous tips about the DM process that we've found helpful:

1. It's OK to ask your contact if they are a DM as long as you ask appropriately.

2. Don't just believe their words. Measure their actions against their words to validate if they are a DM. Scrutinize the results you get when working with them.

3. Once you reach the DM, don't allow yourself to get pushed back down. Earn the right to stay at that level by aligning specific Value Propositions to directly address their needs.

4. You need to build relationships horizontally with others in the company to increase your chances for retaining their business. Don't limit yourself to just one contact. The more people you reach and help, the more widespread your acceptance will be.

5. Even with a team decision-making approach, there is typically one driver.

Our final note on DMs comes from Woody Allen: "In my house I'm the boss, my wife is just the decision maker."

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Understanding the DM Loop (Part 2)

If your initial contact does not have a title that indicates a decision maker (DM), you must quickly get through them and to the DM. Titles that typically indicate influencers or DMs (these are guides, not absolutes:
* Influencers: Managers, some Directors
* DMs: Some Directors (especially of a division), VPs, Owner, President, CEO

These can vary with company size and management structure. For example, a Director in a very large company may not be the DM, but in a smaller company they may be part of the executive management team.

The role of each person in the DM loop is not always tied to a title. If it is not an obvious DM title, you need to test them. Regardless of title, use skepticism to ensure you identify their true role in the process:

1. Ask about the DM process. Get into the details, and if they are not the DM they will not be able to answer effectively. Surface answers usually indicate they are not a DM; once this is recognized, you should consider ending the conversation and going upline ASAP. The longer you talk with a non-DM, the more rapport you build and the harder it becomes to end the conversation.

2. Do they make recommendations to the DM? Sometimes it's a rubber-stamp situation where the DM will sign whatever the contact recommends. Often you need to talk with the ultimate DM because your contact is only an influencer. Many people will speak to their ego and say they're the DM when they have only a small amount of input.

3. Exhaust your questions on the DM loop. Get the information you need, but don't go to the point of offending the contact.

4. Should you circumvent the contact and go upline? Some contacts want you to go upline to make their job easier. Some don't. This is a judgment call based on their personality and the rapport you have built.

If you're going by titles, it's much better to aim high and get referred back down than to start low and have to claw your way up. You may get talking to the DM right away, but worst case you get talking to an influencer and have not burned any bridges. You can usually validate influencers by asking:
* Would you present this and support this to the DM?
* Why would the DM like or dislike our product/services?
* How often does the DM follow your recommendations?
* What was the last thing you recommended and was it successful?

Because "Getting To The DM" is a make-or-break subject in sales, the Erie Sales Club will devote several entries to this subject. This article is Part 2 of our series on "Getting To The DM."

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

No Sale Unless You Get To The DM (Part 1)

Although many sales reps have anxiety about getting to the decision maker (DM), reaching the DM is important because:
1. In order to make a sale, you must talk to the person who makes purchasing decisions to show that you can help them.
2. Prompt identification of the ultimate DM and influencers prevents wasting time speaking to someone who either cannot make the ultimate decision or cannot influence the person who does not make the ultimate decision.
3. You can have a textbook conversation with a non-DM and sell nothing. You can make mistakes with a DM and still make the sale.

How To Identify & Contact The DM & Influencers
In today's collaborative business environment, sometimes there are multiple people in the DM loop. If this is the case, you must reach the ultimate DM and all their influencers to understand what's important to them. What do they need to see in order to purchase your product or service?

Here are some tips on doing that:
1. Schedule separate conversations
2. Develop separate action plans
3. ID different Value Opportunities
4. ID if there is an upline influencer and contact them
5. Keep everyone in the DM loop informed when appropriate.

If your discussions are out in the open, recap discussions of accepted value and "cc" the entire DM loop as a follow-up to your conversations. If you cannot reach everyone in the DM loop, then ensure you keep the influencers informed of all the discussions you have with the ultimate DM you do talk with.

Because "Getting To The DM" is a make-or-break subject in sales, the Erie Sales Club will devote several entries to this subject. This article is Part 1 of our series on "Getting To The DM."

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Don't Just Listen -- Be An Active Listener

Everyone knows how to listen. But top-of-the-line sales reps are Active Listeners. Active Listening refers to being engaged in the conversation and paying attention to what the contact is directly and indirectly telling you. You need to understand not only what they say, but their tone, their change in responsiveness, and what they don't say.

If done well, Active Listening can:
1. Help you accomplish your Business Outcomes and Emotional Outcomes for your call.
2. Help you identify as many Value Opportunities as possible to probe deeper to gain more information.
3. Reveal cues about how a contact is feeling. Often the cues are subtle. They contact may not state their thoughts and feelings explicitly about how they feel about you, your products/services, your company, and their own company.
4. Help you understand their personality type.
5. Help you identify potential issues with the customer before the issue is stated.
6. Shorten the sales cycle.
7. Help you know where to go next on the sales call.

Understand there are direct answers and indirect answers. A direct answer is a response that absolutely answers your question. An indirect answer answers your question but also includes important information to things outside of the question asked. The additional information may be important to advancing the account. For example, you ask a prospect if they will be available for a longer call next week. They say they will be out of town at their biggest trade show of the year. If you are actively listening, you should probe to understand details around that trade show and how it impacts their business. An indirect answer also includes their attitude or tone plus repeated phrases/words.

How You Actively Listen
1. Keep an open mind during the conversation -- don't assume what they are going to say next or what they're thinking. Don't anticipate an answer. Pay attention to what they're actually saying.

2. Be aware of what the contact wants to discuss. Don't simply follow your own set of questions. To get the outcomes, you'll have to steer the conversation; but don't hijack it.

3. Don't assume anything. Ask follow-up questions to gain a full understanding. If you believe you know the answer, say, "I think I know the answer to this but I'd like to clarify to be sure ..."

4. Sometimes, you have to let the contact talk for an extended period without interrupting them. In this case, Live Note Taking is critical. You must have a method for capturing and recalling the useful information the contact gives you.

5. Comment on what the contact is saying throughout the call -- that's the only way they know you're Actively Listening and engaged in the call. Your comment can simply be a reiteration of your understanding, or you can deliver value that is specific to the contact. Example: "So you're saying that you're outsourcing those responsibilities but you're not happy with their timeliness, and you're interested in us because we have an on-time guarantee. Is that right?" This confirms that what you heard is what the contact actually said and meant.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

No Value Opportunity, No Sale

A Value Opportunity (VO) is a need, want, or desire that is important to the person or company that would cause them to buy from you. There's no reason for a person to buy anything without that thing satisfying a need, want, or desire. Once you identify and fully understand what's important to the customer, you can show them exactly how your services/products will meet their need, want, or desire, thus prompting them to buy. If you don't identify the VO, then you're just throwing mud against a wall to see what sticks.

In order to identify VOs, you must actively listen to the contact and take notes during your conversation. Usually, as you are probing to identify a Value Opportunity, other VOs present themselves. Ideally, you want to fully understand the current VO before moving to another VO. However, if the contact wants to discuss a different VO, follow the contact's lead. Probe to fully understand the VO the contact wants to discuss. After you've exhausted that VO, be sure to go back to the original VO to finish probing to fully understand.

Some VOs are surface level. If you dig deeper to understand WHAT they are trying to accomplish in these areas and WHY, you'll uncover a core VO that you might be able to address with a greater number of services/products. That's key to generating additional sales from one customer.

A few other thoughts on VOs:
1. If you identify and fully understand a potential customer's VOs before making a proposal, your consultative approach will separate you from your competition.
2. VOs will vary among the decision makers and influencers. So, it's important to ask probing questions to everyone in the decision-making loop so you get a complete picture of the opportunity.
3. You may have to use multiple lines of questioning to fully understand each VO. You can segue between topics as much as necessary to fully understand a VO, as long as the dialogue remains conversational with the customer.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Recognize The DM's Personality, Then Adapt

Understanding, recognizing, and responding to the decision maker's personality is important for a variety of reasons:
1. It allows the conversation to continue. You can stay on phone with the contact or keep the face-to-face meeting alive.
2. You can appropriately establish rapport with your contact at the beginning of your sales call. How well you establish rapport depends on how well you recognize and respond to the contact's personality.
3. It leads you to establishing a relationship with the contact. People buy from people they know, like, and trust. A contact won't give you any business information until you establish a personal and/or professional relationship with them.
4. You can effectively identify and influence decision makers or those in the decision-making loop to advance a sale.
5. You can effectively steer the conversation toward a sale.

During a sales call with a contact, you can recognize their personality by:
* How did they greet you?
* How did they answer your first few questions?
* How did they interact with you or others?
* Were they responsive?
* How well do they progress the conversation? Do they stay on business topics or stray to personal topics?
* Do they have high drive or low drive?
* What questions do they ask?

How To Respond
Mirroring is the act of tailoring your response to a contact and presenting in a way that does not offend them. Your initial goal is to recognize how the contact is behaving so that you can mirror your response and have an effective conversation. Your longer-term goal is to have an idea of their personality tendencies to that you can influence them appropriately.

To work effectively with a dominant personality, you should be direct and succinct, deliver value as soon in the sales call as you can, don't waste their time on non-business topics, and stress their agenda and how you can help them.

For a more influential personality (high drive and highly responsive), you should be direct with your questions and be sure to speak to their agenda. Let them drive the conversation as long as they stay on the path towards a sale.

For a personality with more social tendencies, you may need to keep pulling the contact back to the business topic, but you'll need to do it without being pushy. Let them talk about what's important to them, but don't let them get too far off the path. You may need to spend more time in the warm-up.

For more compliant personalities, such as an engineer or accountant, you will likely need to emphasize detailed, specific data points, using statistics where possible. You should be more to the point, be specific and detail-oriented, and be prepared to give them time to consider the data you supply them.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Don't Be Pushy, Don't Be Mushy

Being over-aggressive has led to the term "pushy salesperson." Oftentimes, just the word "salesperson" includes the connotation "pushy." But if a salesperson isn't aggressive enough, they don't make the sale. What to do? The key is to combine empathy with aggressiveness.

Let's define these terms first. Empathy is caring about what the customer does, how they're trying to do it, and what hurdles they're facing. Empathy is not soft; it's sharing the feelings of your client without letting emotions dictate your actions. Empathy is different from sympathy in that even though you may be able to share their feelings to the same depth, you allow your intellect to dictate your actions. This allows you to make clear-minded decisions that are in your clients' best interest. Aggressiveness is continually trying to advance the account to a sale. Aggressiveness is not harsh; it's simply your persistence in driving to close the sale.

Empathy ...
* Makes the client feel like you're working to their agenda
* Makes the client like you personally
* Earns you the right to ask difficult questions
* May get you off the path to closing the sale if you use it too much. You'll never get to closing on the sale if you're overly empathetic.

Aggressiveness ...
* Advances the discussion towards a close
* Results in fewer calls to advance the account to a close
* Keeps the call valuable to the client (they have a busy schedule, too!)
* Helps you gain a better understanding of what's needed to close the sale

How To Combine Empathy With Aggressiveness
Empathy and aggressiveness should be integrated throughout each call. You should always be doing both. The more aggressive you become, the more empathetic you need to be. Both should be applied as overarching principles throughout the call, such as combining emotional outcomes (empathy) with business outcomes (aggressiveness). Example: You call a prospect and they have a meeting in five minutes. Ask, "When can I call you back?" and make sure you get a specific time and date.

The mix will be dictated by the situation. Aggressiveness should be constant throughout the call to drive towards closing. The amount of necessary empathy may be dictated by the cues or by your amount of aggressiveness. Example: During a phone call, the client sounds disconnected, and you hear typing in the background. You could stop and ask if this is a good time or, "Should we reschedule another time that would be better?"

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

Tips For Your Initial Sales Call

Many reps think closing calls are more important than prospecting calls. They'll zip through the prospecting call in hopes that their next call could be a closing call. The correct approach is to understand the importance of the prospecting call so you will plan and execute it effectively.

On every call, including the initial sales call, you should be trying to advance the account as far as possible towards a sale. The goal of each call is the same -- to get them to a close, not to send them your literature or schedule the next call. Half the battle is getting people to talk with you. Why would you want to cut it short?

There are a few components that are unique to your initial sales call:
1. Introduction: This occurs when you are calling on a new customer or a new contact at that customer. You need to share your niche statement and introduce yourself as their salesperson.
2. Ask key "knockout" questions: Some standard "knockout" questions center on budget and decision-making ability. If they don't have money to buy what you're selling or they don't have the authority to buy what you're selling, why are you talking with them? If you don't ask your knockout questions on your initial sales call, you will waste your time (and theirs) until you get those questions answered.
3. Establish their first impression: You only get one chance to make a good first impression. Much of their attitude towards you will be based on this initial sales call.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.

"What Do You Do?" Tailoring Your Niche Statement

You can't make the sale if the person you're talking with has no idea what you do. And they won't give you half an hour to explain it to them. That's why it's important for you to take the time to craft a niche statement. A good niche statement isn't "one size fits all." A tailored niche statement, combined with your statement of purpose, gives enough information so the contact understands who you are, what your product is, and why you're calling. But don't give enough information for them to think they can make an informed purchasing decision.

Tailored niche statements:
1. Are only applicable on your initial sales call
2. Get the prospect's attention quickly so you can continue the conversation
3. Let them know who you are and why you're calling without providing too much detail.

You will leave them wanting more information about you. If you say too much, you give them an opportunity to develop a preconceived opinion that you're not a good fit for their needs. It's better to leave them wanting more information about your company. This can be a way to spark interest.

How To Tailor Your Niche Statement
1. Set up the framework for the rest of the call
2. Be direct and succinct. Think "elevator pitch." If you cannot describe your product to a prospect while on an elevator by the time they reach their floor, it's too long.
3. Be accurate and applicable
4. Purport a potential fit between the customer and your company
5. Convey your overall focus
6. Convey a stature or uniqueness (e.g. "We are the leading..." or "We are the only...")
7. Be tailored to the prospect based on information you've gathered about them. For example, if you're selling to a family doctor, you should emphasize family doctors in your niche statement. Then, when you're calling on a specialist, you should mention their specialty in your niche statement. Remember point #3 when tailoring your niche statement -- it has to be accurate and applicable.

The Erie Sales Club is a joint effort of three leading local businesses: Jameson Publishing, Marsha Marsh Real Estate Services, and VertMarkets.