A Dating Approach to Sales

Managing Your Network Increases Your Return on Investment
by Steven Brown

One of the critical lessons for becoming successful in sales is realizing that you must call on the person who can commit to the sized deal you want to close. You have to open a conversation with them, develop rapport, and then ask for the order. This same strategy needs to be considered when networking for business, career, or pleasure.

Enterprise sales executives are masters of the complex sale. They know how to execute corporate level discovery of needs by examining the career aspirations and objective responsibilities of various people. They know how to get introduced to new people they need to meet. Even when those people do not want to meet them. These sales people know their success depends upon the specific skill of discovering the needs of the right people and proposing a business relationship to address those needs.

This same skill is pertinent in job searches. 99% of the people I meet who are looking for a new career opportunity aren't aware of who they need to be meeting, or are befuddled as to how to get to that person. Then, to my amazement, this same high percentage simply don't ask for what they want.

These same issues exist in dating. To illustrate, let's look at a friend who was single when we met. Despite being a successful salesman with a fantastic townhouse, a healthy investment portfolio, and in fantastic physical condition, he was having some trouble with his dating. I have to admit I was quite surprised. Of all the people I knew, this guy seemed to have the social scene down and be able to banter with anyone. I was intrigued by the reasons contributing to a salesman having trouble with dating.

As a creative person I thought I'd offer a systematic approach I use in business to help him solve his problem. When he agreed, we started with open ended fact finding, first defining the goals for closed business. Next, we analyzed the steps in the sales process, and examined the alignment of the value proposition with the desired audience and reviewed the sales approach. Finally, I suggested that he look at the success rates for each of the transition phases in what is called the sales funnel. Within this process sales growth inhibitors are usually quite obvious.

During this process, and to my surprise, I discovered that my friend was actually pretty shy. While he appeared to banter easily, he was actually only interacting with people he already knew ( trying to increase revenue by simply selling more to existing customers ). He had subscriptions on Match.com and was a regular on Craigslist personals, but he wasn't happy with who he was meeting from either effort ( Networking the wrong way, and / or in the wrong places ). His dating problem was that he simply was not prospecting properly. Without an adequate number of introductions ( possibilities ) to potential dates, he was dependent upon unrealistic success rates ( turning opportunities into trial sales ) on his way through the process.

Strategy in hand we began with basic metrics - in this case his dating ( business ) goals. I won't be explicit, but let's just say he wanted to achieve what every successful, attractive man wants to achieve when he's not feeling like he's dating well ( he wants more sales ). He wanted to date a lot ( increase opportunities ). We defined his goals in terms of how many women he wanted to meet ( possible sales ) and how often he wanted to meet new possibilities ( deal flow ). This approach may sound strangely male oriented, but the tables can certainly be turned should my friend have been a woman. Only the prospecting, sales approaches, and offering would have been changed.

By identifying conservative success rates for each step in the sales funnel, we determine how many client prospects were needed. In my friend's case we decided that he needed to say "Hi" to 5 new women every day. All he had to do was say "Hi", and the normal processes ( discovery ) and the odds of personality alignment ( rapport building ) would take care of themselves. He would in effect increase his discovery rate, and make offers from there. I'm not sure which of us was more surprised with the results he produced.

Today, the good news is he's happily dating one special woman. I'm very happy for him and like her immensely. I've been told I should be a dating coach, or write a book on dating. That feels a bit smarmy to me. But I have to admit the parallels of the dating process and the sales process can be a powerful parallel as these steps do apply. And the analogy can be an insightful one that might not be obvious to small, medium business owners stuck in a rut about increasing sales.

Understand The Customer - Do What You Love

Capitalizing on Passion as the best form of Specialization and Financial Gain
by Steven Brown

We've all heard the career advice of "do what you love, the money will follow". As an investor, Warren Buffet states it a bit differently: "I buy businesses I can understand". Unfortunately most people don't know how to act on this advice, frequently allowing the unknown of finding buyers to prevent them from creating opportunities. Taking a first step becomes too difficult and nothing happens with their dream.

Here's an example of a very smart woman I know, developing her passion into expertise and business opportunity. Stacy Menas is a college educated IT professional, working at the forefront of automating healthcare business. She also happens to ride a sportbike. Fast. Think race track fast. I personally have driven my sportbike at more than twice the speed limit, but I was essentially going straight. Stacy goes at least as fast while cornering, her knee extended to graze the ground. In the process of going very fast, she's also educated herself on all aspects regarding women riding sportbikes.

Along the way of enjoying her passion she realized that her friends and acquaintances were asking for advice. They recognized her expertise and sought that value from her. She eventually developed her knowledge into a book and is marketing that book through her various sportbike connections and activities. The book, "Starting Out Sportbike: An Introduction to Sportbike Riding for Women", is a getting-started guide for women who want to make good choices with their time and money. The book is now available on Amazon.

I've enjoyed observing the process and brainstorming various marketing venues, messages, and techniques. One that has gotten the most response from her clients is "For those of you Angels that have a little Devil in you", and other variants on that theme. I'll let your imagination run wild about those other variants, and you're probably right.

The important lesson here is Stacy is having fun. On those rainy days in November through March she was thinking about her passion and writing. On sunny days she rides, fast. And all year long, people now pay her money to share that passion.

Profits - Even in a Tough Economy

One of my favorite clients is a Veterinarian in a small Oregon town. Besides liking him as a person, I'm extremely pleased that he has not only incorporated my advice, but has profited from it as well. Both financially and in peace of mind.

The story begins when we first met through friends at a social gathering. The normal "what do you do" information was exchanged, and we quickly began discussing the tough economy and how that was slowing business at the practice. Being a sole proprietor, he was also the book keeper, payroll clerk, CEO, CMO, and night janitor. It was hard work, long hours, and being on call for midnight pet emergencies was no picnic. There was genuine concern about his ability to stay in business.

My favorite topic is strategy around targeting customers. And I believe that the customer defines the business - the concept is surprising to some clients I've worked with. So I asked "tell me about your best customer. Who do you make the most profit from? Who is most satisfied with your services?"

It didn't surprise me at all to learn that his best clients were those that view their pets as members of their family. They take proper care of their pets. They are proactive in the care of their pets. And the financial costs for this care is not as important as the fact that their pet is comfortable, healthy, and a happy part of the family. Of course there are limits to their abundance, but the opportunity to work with such clients produces profits and happiness for all involved.

As counter examples, there are no end to the number of potential clients who ask for free pet care. As if the typical care for animals that most Veterinarian's share should lead them to be willing to forego all financial concerns to help any animal that comes along. Or those people who expect normal charges for weekend service, because that is when they are available to bring their pet in.

This leads to a tremendously easy business strategy: pay lots of attention to those clients that treat their pets as members of their family. And minimize or eliminate time spent on actual or potential clients who don't. His employees all of sudden are happier. Why? When a pet owner calls to explore becoming a client, every employee can easily identify whether to pay lots of attention, or whether to not. It makes employees happy to know what to do. In this case, it also helps that they deal with a more pleasant client. This takes a lot of pressure off of the owner.

We then brainstormed how to keep existing profitable clients happy, and find new ones. He created a "pet wellness program" and was amazed at how easy it was to upsell these clients. He even gives his cell phone to these clients, telling them they are special.

I then asked "how much do you want your business to grow? How much profit, how much revenue? How many clients do you have? What are your fixed costs?" And a few other pertinent questions. The primary business goal was to achieve 7% growth in profit each year.

From this basic financial information I assembled an estimated balance sheet and income statement. I added variables to the spreadsheet so I could use the estimated incremental cost and income information to explore the performance of his business. From this simple calculation I was able to demonstrate that 2 new clients a month would easily grow profits 7%. That simple spreadsheet brought a lot of peace of mind to my friend. "Only 2 new clients a month? That's easy!"

The moral of this story is to focus on profitable customers. Train your team to identify them. Set your business goals and processes to focus on them.

Peace of mind and profit.

Relationship Selling ( I )...

Why developing "relationships" is the key to sales success
by David Bookout

Many of the small to medium enterprise ( SME ) owners and executives I've worked with over the years have one thing in common relative to sales and selling.

They either don't like to sell, or they just don't consider themselves sales people.

However, at the end of the day, somebody has to buy something from someone else to make the world go round. So, I would offer that this orientation, and the narratives that go with them are a big mistake for three reasons.

First, the identity component. Clients want to know that they are dealing with decision makers, people that they assess to really have the power to make things happen should the need arise. This is particularly true in more expensive, or more complicated offers, which may include business process changes. In these situations relegating sales, specifically the closing part of the sales process, to sales people often doesn't produce the client confidence necessary to close the deal. This is often why we see a drop in sales, instead of sustained growth, when SME owners and executives bring in sales people to manage the sales process. In these instances prospects and even existing clients can feel betrayed when these transitions aren't handled in a way that meets, or exceeds their expectations.

Second up, narratives are equally important, and these new sales people often struggle to embody these narratives fast enough, or effectively enought to sustain satisfactory growth rates. Also, to often, these new sales people find the need to materially change these stories, or personalize them in a way that no longer resonates well the desired audience. This can form a double disbelief, including the identity component, and effectively short-circuiting the sale.

Third, and perhaps most important, is the relationship component. SME owners and executives that are trying their hardest to get out of the sales role seem to forget the simple fact that he, or she that has the relationship with a client has the power. How many times have you heard of sales people who get disenchanted with their employer, leave the company, and take a significant number of customers with them to cash flow their new venture. Forget the fact that this is illegal unless there is a significant amount of money at stake, which wouldn't even be an SME situation in the first place, and your certain you can win.

In conclusion, these three rules will help SME owners and executives effectively transition sales roles and facilitate growth:

1) Keep the closing role. Owners and executives that maintain their client relationships by staying involved in the sales cycle tend to have steadier growth charts.

2) Monitor narratives for effectiveness and migration. Continue to go on sales calls, and maintain a commitment to help new sales people establish effective story telling skills.

3) Maintain relationship. By focusing on number 1 and 2 above, it is much easier to not become a stranger to your hard earned customers.

Our next installment in this series will focus on relationship building skills and practices.