Sales people don’t sell anything.Their stories sell. Their stories do the hard work.

They convince someone to listen to them, to talk to them, to answer questions and to take the next steps with them.

And the reason is that your mind, and those of your customers are hard-wired for stories.

Selling yourself, your brand and your business is inextricably linked with stories

Today:

What stories in sales are

How stories work in the brain

Coaching questions to ask yourself

Some coaching questions to ask your team

Check it out now!

Marianne was working on an opportunity which she desperately needed to close in-quarter in order to hit her goal.

That’s when you discovered a load of holes, assumptions and information gaps and decided to intervene. 

You could have approached this in one of two ways:

Hey, Maria. Got 10 minutes? I’ve been reviewing your opportunity. There are whole bunch of things we’re missing if this is to close. Here’s what I need you to do. Grab a pen. 

OR 

Hey, Maria. I’m glad you asked for 10 minutes of my time to help you with your opportunity. Let’s start with your assessment. Where do you need a different perspective so that you can advance this and hit your goal?

What did you do?

Which approach did you take? Did you direct Maria and tell her what to do or did you invite her to ask for your contribution to her opportunity?

Was this a dialogue? Or was it more of a monologue? Were you doing all the talking or were you helping Marianne to find her own answers?

Be honest. You were tempted to tell her exactly how to open her next follow-up call with her prospect. And you nearly did, right?

A lot of Managers default to directing people rather than developing people. 

They a mental block when it comes to coaching. Is this true for you?

Maybe. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

In today’s episode: How do I get over my mental block about coaching?

Last week we looked at the issue of your salespeople not using the CRM and how to coach them to use it.

This week, it’s another behavioral challenge - the issue of your sales people not organizing themselves and how to coach them around this.

You can have brilliantly talented sales people but unless they can translate that talent into sales behaviour that gets sales results, it’s not much good to anyone.

Success in any endeavour begins with personal organization, routine and structure. This matters especially when leading people.

But it’s not your job to organize them. Coaches create the space for people to organize themselves.

I talked before about autonomy It’s difficult to lead people if they can’t manage themselves.

Being able to get your sh*t together is probably about as basic (yet essential) a behaviour as you can expect of your team.

You have to look in the mirror and ask yourself this age-old coaching question: What would the world be if everyone in it was just like me?

In sales terms: What would my team be if everyone in it was organized like me.

To what extent is your team’s self-organization a reflection of yours?

In today’s episode:

Why your team’s ability (or inability) able to organize themselves affects you

Some coaching questions for you to ask yourself

Some coaching questions to ask your rep as part of a coaching session

Susie emailed me two weeks ago:

Hey, Mark! I have inherited a team of 4 AEs and 3 BDRs. They’re not using the CRM.

Thanks, Susie! That’s fairly typical.

Most reps don’t use their CRM e.g. Salesforce, Pipedrive, Dynamics anywhere nearly enough.  

CRM adoption (or the lack of it) is a perennial problem.

Wherever I coach, Sales Managers are invariably unhappy with reps forgetting to (or deciding not to) add their notes to the CRM.

There are numerous possible reasons for this.

Perhaps your software is cumbersome (skill issue).

Perhaps your reps don’t know how to navigate all the fields and menus (knowledge issue).

Perhaps your reps just don’t bother (attitude issue)

Or perhaps they are simply not being coached for reinforcement (behavioural issue). 

In today’s episode:

Why not using the CRM is a major problem

What you are losing out on when your reps don’t use the CRM

Some coaching questions to ask yourself

Some coaching questions to ask your reps

Tips to prepare for this coaching conversation 

Some ideas to get results from your team’s use of the CRM

Check it out!

This week we’re talking to Art Sobczak, author of ‘Smart Calling’ now in it’s 3rd edition. 

Mike Weinberg gave this book glowing praise when I spoke with him last year. 

Most human beings fear rejection. It’s natural.

Sales people have it toughest of all because we’re told no every day. 

In today’s episode:

What’s changed about cold-calling in the 21st century

Which are the most common mistakes people make?

Do we have to use scripts?

How can your reps overcome fear and rejection?

Today, we’re talking with Joe Venuti VP Inside Sales at Sendoso

Joe leads a team of approx 50 ISRs over in Scottsdale AZ and he gave me time out his busy schedule to share how Direct Mail is getting results in a world where so many reps can only think digital when it comes to prospecting and prospect engagement. 

In this week’s episode

What does Sendoso do?

What is Joe’s role as VP of InsideSales?

What is the makeup of his sales org?

What role does Inside Sales play in the sales org?

How does he find and nurture talent? (SDR / BDR / XDR?)

What does it mean to Joe to be a coach to his team?

Check it out now

Today, we’re talking with Sindre Halland Founder and CEO of SalesScreen.

You’ve maybe heard of SaleScreen. Several of my clients use it. 

SalseScreen is a sales gameification platform - Native to Salesforce

It leverages the science of game theory to motivate sales reps to make more calls, to engage in follow-up activities.

You can create sales competitions to leverage your sales teams innate desire to compete using prizes, bonuses - you can create a shop of rewards and sales people can spend their credits on what they want.

You can create motivational challenges for your sales people in all kinds of contexts. 

One that sticks out for me is aiding salesforce adoption!

In today’s episode 

What is SalesScreen from a high-level overview?

What is the science behind game theory and gamification 

What is a sales competition from the perspective of SalesScreen?

How do sales competitions work? (leaderboards / web Shop / badges etc.)

How does it aid adoption of salesforce?

What kind of dashboards / data does it pull into one place?

How do you get everyone to “play the game”?

Check it out now

Are you doing your sales person’s job? Many managers fall into the trap of doing what the org hires other people to do.

They often end up not doing what the org pays them to do. Does that make sense?

3 Questions for you:

Why are you doing it?

What is it costing you?

What should you be doing instead?

There are no rewards for taking over when someone gets stuck.

If they don’t learn how to get themselves unstuck, they will never learn.

There is clear benefit to you and your team to let them suffer from their own shortcomings and getting them to a point where they can recognise the consequence of mistakes.

What you need to think about is being selfishly productive.

You want the economy of autonomy.

When your people are autonomous, they are more likely to think for themselves.

We talked talent pipeline a few weeks ago - what about the other pipeline - the main pipeline? 

Pipeline is a snapshot in time - the volume of opportunities - the value of those opportunities at this moment in time and the velocity with with which we are progressing them from MQL alway the way through to close. 

Inevitably things will need to be qualified out / prospects will change their mind / org requirements will change

You want to see activity, motion, consistent filling of the bucket, progression, activity

There is the saying that pipeline cures all problems - this is partially true - pipeline is an output but it’s the product of a mentality

You need your team to understand pipeline and to build pipeline consistently. 

So how do you coach on pipeline?

That’s what today is all about

This year marks the 25th anniversary of Daniel Goleman’s book “Emotional Intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ”

You are more than likely familiar with IQ.

We typically think of ‘hard’ technical skills when we think of IQ.

We might even hire people based on academic performance in subjects which have no bearing on sales ability.

But what about looking for and developing EQ in (Emotional Intelligence a.k.a. Emotional Quotient) and why does it matter in sales?

To paraphrase Captain Obvious, sales is a people business.

As a sales leader, you need people who can connect with people, build empathy, understand personalities and of course manage themselves and their own performance.

Sales needs people with high-levels of EQ can:

• Be self-aware and able to reflect on their own performance so they can get unstuck   
• Be better at understanding prospects by making connection and building empathy
• Be better at picking up on signals, cues, feelings that indicate prospects’  true sentiments and values
• Be better team members by understanding and supporting you and their colleagues
• Be better candidates for leadership positions as part of your succession planning

In this week’s episode:

What EQ is and why does it differ from IQ

Why your sales people need emotional intelligence

How to enable your sales team to develop EQ

Listen now (Link in comments)