August 05, 2022

A Conversation with Steve Hall

49 minutes

Steve Hall is an executive sales coach and Australia's leading C-level sales authority. He brings with him decades of experience in several industries and roles, from bricklaying to middle management to sales leadership to executive consulting. He learned that even the most complex sales involving millions of dollars still boil down to the basics: sales is a people business. He shares how to get in the mindset of a C-level executive, create a message that gets you a longer conversation about your solution, and find the best way to send that message as cold emails do not work with the C-level.

HIGHLIGHTS

Sell to the person who has the authority to approve

Focus on accounts, not leads: Sales is about creating relationships

A conversation with the C-level is going to be about strategy

Get a meeting with the C-level then prepare for it

QUOTES

Even complex sales are about relationships Steve: "One of the biggest sales I made, the COO of an 8 billion dollar company in the states, or UK actually, wanted to meet the president of our company not to look at how the software works, but look him in the eye and say, will you support us if we get in trouble? At the end of the day, it's still about relationships. I'm not saying people will buy off you because you've got a good relationship, but they shouldn't buy off you if you haven't got a good relationship because that's a huge part of making things work."

Empathy and business knowledge are important when selling to the c-level Steve: "To be able to talk intelligently, business, to a senior executive, you've got to be vaguely intelligent and know a little bit about business. And you also need to have the capability of putting yourself in the shoes of the person you're speaking to. That's one of the most important and least understood skills of the salesperson—look at things from your customer's perspective."

The two things you need to speak to the C-level Steve: "You need two things. You need a message which will make them want to talk to you, and you need a way to get it to them. And the message depends on the circumstances but it could be we want to help you reduce the risk in your automotive department, for instance, or reduce the downtime on your machine, so whatever it might be for that particular customer."

Find out more about Steve in the link below: