July 18, 2023

1079: Challengers Don't Settle for the Status Quo, with Jennifer Allen

46 minutes

Jennifer Allen is the Chief Evangelist at Challenger™. She shares the 5 sales mindsets they discovered: Relationship Builder, Hard Worker, Lone Wolves, Problem Solver, and Challenger. The last one, Challengers, are the debaters of the world. As sellers, they don't settle for the status quo and achieve this by presenting insights to clients on the costs of remaining in the status quo. Jennifer also discusses their Challenger Loop and how surveys still work to provide feedback on deals they lost or are in danger of losing.

HIGHLIGHTS

The 5 sales mindsets and how Challengers challenge beliefs

Finding talent and retaining them by ensuring good fit

A no decision is NOT because of price or product

The Challenger Loop

QUOTES

Pairing your sales mindset with a methodology Jennifer: "I think Challenger is really about arming someone like me who is a Relationship Builder to rewire their brain to say, 'You don't have to be this person's best friend.' They're not going to buy from you because you took them out to lunch or you were super nice to them on the call. They're going to buy from you because they think you have insight that helps their business.”

Hiring questions to ask Challengers Jennifer: "What information, beliefs, assumptions lead them to believe that current state is good enough? And that's what I'm looking for. Are they looking at CEO podcast interviews? Are they watching content online? Are they a student of the customer? And then three, how would you think about reframing them through questions?"

Why "better" ends up as a no decision Jennifer: "My job as a seller is not to show why it's better. My job is to show the cost of an action. What is the cost of the status quo? Before I ever start going off about what I have to offer and what that looks like."

Find out more about Jennifer in the links below:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenniferallen1121/

Website: https://www.challengerinc.com/