George Bronten is the Founder and CEO of Membrain. In markets where your solution looks very similar to the competition's, how you sell is the big differentiator. George digs into the elements of how most sellers sell and the role of sales technology in making the how of selling better and not just faster.

He also discusses the key metrics that sales teams should be paying more attention to, but in all likelihood, are not. The very words sellers use also matter and George defines some terms which are commonly used in sales, such as buyer's journey but are often confusing in their interpretation.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES

Learn to use language strategically to build trust - George: "How will we stand out in this competitive market? When we talk to clients, I mean even down to which words we use because if you sound like every other seller and you're just self-centered and that comes through, you won't build that trust that you need to gain their business in the end. It's like the trust equation. You divide it by the level of self-interest that you convey."

Measure metrics around sales effectiveness and outcomes - George: "They should be measuring the increased win rate for the client, not the adoption rate, and how many times they log onto the product. So there's a big mismatch there. I think in many companies, including ours, if we're selling win rates and sales effectiveness, why aren't we measuring increased win rates and deal sizes? Why are we looking at adoption rates? I mean, that's not really what the customer's interested in."

Find out more about George in the links below:

More on Andy:

Connect on LinkedIn

Get Andy's new book "Sell Without Selling Out" on Amazon

Learn more at AndyPaul.com

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Unlock exponential growth with an AI-powered RevOps platform | Revenue.io

Scratchpad | The fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes, and stay on top of to-dos | Scratchpad.com

Blueboard | World’s leading experiential rewards & recognition platform | Blueboard.com

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

Mark Stiving is the Founder and Chief Pricing Educator at Impact Pricing LLC, as well as the host of the podcast Impact Pricing and author of the book Selling Value. Today, Mark talks about what value is and how it relates to both buyers and sellers. He digs into how sellers must be keen in determining if a buyer is in a will I or which one buying decision.

He defines the different types of values such as inherent value, relative value, and economic value, and says that understanding each is important to sell better from your buyer's perspective. Mark also shares the 4 value-based characteristics that buyers and sellers should look for and the concept that buyers trade off price for value.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES

Defining inherent and economic value for a business - Mark: "Inherent value is what's the value of solving the problem? If you're gonna go buy something, I don't care what it is, as a consumer, as a business, if you're gonna go buy something, the reason that you're buying it is that you believe it has more value than the price you have to pay for it." 

"If we go back to economic value, as a company, I'm only gonna buy something for a hundred thousand if it makes me at least a hundred thousand more in profit, preferably about a million more in profit, but it better be at least a hundred thousand or I'm not gonna spend that."

Relative value shows what you can do that your competitor cannot - Mark: "What is the value of my product relative to my competitor's product? What are the things I do differently? What are the problems that I can solve that they can't solve? What's the dollar, the economic value of the problems I can solve that they can't solve?"

The difference between WILL I and WHICH ONE decision - Mark: "Typically, when a buyer buys something, we make two different purchase decisions. The first decision we make is, will I buy something in this category? Am I gonna buy a new car? Yes. No. Well, if the answer's no, great. I'm not shopping. As soon as I say yes, then I switch to, well, which one am I gonna go buy?" 

"And now I'm shopping BMW, Porsche, Lexus, you know, whatever the brands are that I might consider and the styles inside there. So I'm now making a which one decision. When people are making a which one decision, they're very price sensitive. When people are making the will I decision, price isn't driving that decision. Something else is."

Find out more about Mark in the links below:

More on Andy:

Connect on LinkedIn

Get Andy's new book "Sell Without Selling Out" on Amazon

Learn more at AndyPaul.com

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Unlock exponential growth with an AI-powered RevOps platform | Revenue.io

Scratchpad | The fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes, and stay on top of to-dos | Scratchpad.com

Blueboard | World’s leading experiential rewards & recognition platform | Blueboard.com

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

How do you start a new RevOps position? Do you hit the ground running or take it slow and learn as much as you can about your new environment? Sara Bush is 60 days into her new role as the Senior Director of Revenue Operations at Revenue.io, so she's perfectly positioned to share her checklist of how to tackle your first 100 days as a RevOps leader.

Follow the Hosts on LinkedIn:

Alastair Woolcock (CRO, Revenue.io)

Howard Brown (CEO, Revenue.io)

And our Special Guest:

Sara Bush (Senior Director, Revenue Operations, Revenue.io)

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Powering high-performing revenue teams with real-time guidance

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

*If you'd like to ask the guys a question that could get answered on the show, call our new message line at (323) 540-4777. Just leave your name, where you're from, and your question and we'll do our best to answer it on an upcoming episode.

Jeff Bajorek is an advisor and coach to B2B sales leaders, author of Rethink the Way You Sell, and host of the podcast of the same name. Sales leaders tend to forget that managing sellers are pretty much the same as how sellers engage with their customers.

Sellers are a sales leader's product. With this perspective shift, sales leaders create accountability for how their sellers are working and, by extension, how much they're hitting quota.

An environment of accountability, knowing that the people up the ladder have your best interests at heart, is actually a part of enablement. But accountability goes both ways and Jeff gives his insights on maintaining quality control and leadership training that appears to be lacking in today's environment.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES

Managers can't lead when they don't know what's happening at the front - Jeff: "The worst managers I've ever worked for were only behind their computer, just doing what the numbers were telling them, and there was a lack of intuition there. There was a lack of your finger on the pulse of what was really going on. There was a disconnection between the management level and what was going on on the front lines. How do you manage someone in a situation you're unfamiliar with?"   

Accountability is a partnership between the seller and the manager - Jeff: "Accountability is a partnership. Micromanagement? Not a partnership. Micromanagement is a nightmare. But accountability is a partnership. Andy, if I'm reporting to you, if you're my leader, we're going to sit down at the beginning of the year, the beginning of the quarter, maybe the beginning of the month, and we're going to talk about expectations. We're going to talk about what you need me to bring in in terms of revenue and I'm going to look you in the eye and I'm going to say, yup, I've got that, or I might have to tell you that I don't think that's coming."

Find out more about Jeff in the links below:

More on Andy:

Connect on LinkedIn

Get Andy's new book "Sell Without Selling Out" on Amazon

Learn more at AndyPaul.com

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Unlock exponential growth with an AI-powered RevOps platform | Revenue.io

Scratchpad | The fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes, and stay on top of to-dos | Scratchpad.com

Blueboard | World’s leading experiential rewards & recognition platform | Blueboard.com

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

Josh Kamrath is the CEO of Bongo, a skills validation and sales enablement tool that helps sellers put their knowledge into action. Josh digs into how their asynchronous format allows their users to demonstrate their skills and competencies in an authentic way by leveraging AI feedback and coaching.

Josh shares some of their more common use cases, such as helping salespeople overcome objections, as well as providing real-time feedback to both the salesperson and their manager. There is a trend today where sellers receive a ton of training but not enough practice—and Bongo helps to bridge this gap.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES

Explicit Monitoring Theory states that people are overly self-conscious with a "Big Brother" type of setup - Josh: "When you're being monitored on a high-stakes, high-consequence conversation, there's no reason to put more stress into that equation. I'd rather and our users would rather practice and prepare for that stressful high-stakes conversation, and that's really where Bongo's focused."

Encourage sellers to become better in a judge-free, practice environment - Josh: "That's been our philosophy is encouraging practice, creating mechanisms or workflows to have automated feedback take place so it's like we were saying, it's not judgy. It's encouraging of that behavior."

Practice sellers on the things that make a difference in sales - Andy: "Like Bongo, if companies want to use it correctly it helps people practice on the things that actually do make a difference because product knowledge doesn't make a difference because it's out there. What makes a difference is, say, building credibility and trust or asking the right questions."

Find out more about Josh in the links below:

More on Andy:

Connect on LinkedIn

Get Andy's new book "Sell Without Selling Out" on Amazon

Learn more at AndyPaul.com

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Unlock exponential growth with an AI-powered RevOps platform | Revenue.io

Scratchpad | The fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes, and stay on top of to-dos | Scratchpad.com

Blueboard | World’s leading experiential rewards & recognition platform | Blueboard.com

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

Running a successful business means creating a high-achieving, predictable, and well-understood revenue engine. Sean Lane, VP of Field Operations at Drift, returns to break down the best ways to surface insights and measure success within a RevOps framework.

Follow the Hosts on LinkedIn:

Alastair Woolcock (CRO, Revenue.io)

Howard Brown (CEO, Revenue.io)

And our Special Guest:

Sean Lane (Vice President, Field Operations, Drift)

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Powering high-performing revenue teams with real-time guidance

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

*If you'd like to ask the guys a question that could get answered on the show, call our new message line at (323) 540-4777. Just leave your name, where you're from, and your question and we'll do our best to answer it on an upcoming episode.

Oscar Trimboli is the author of Deep Listening and he teaches that listening is the requirement to understand a prospect's needs and gives value to their words and beliefs. He digs into the differences between hearing and listening and shares research that shows that up to 55% of a seller's day is spent listening.

A good seller will listen for what is not being said and ask questions that lead the prospect to say what they really need. Oscar also discusses hearing versus listening and the 5 levels of listening, as well as the power of pausing in a conversation to allow the prospect or buyer to fill in the gaps.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES

Ask questions about what's not being said - Oscar: "People who listen okay in a selling situation are listening to get the sale and beat the competition, but great sellers and great listeners are listening for the business case and listening for the customer's problem. I think there's a listening that's a little bit more systematic in sellers that are orientated around the business case that the customer has to sell internally."

"And they do a really good job of listening, yes, there'll be some objections around functional fit or the pricing or the terms and conditions or implementation time schedules or whatever they may be, but I think really good sellers ask questions like who's involved in the approval process, what do they care about, how long does this take?"

Make recommendations because there is value in your network - Oscar: "Sometimes sellers don't realize their real value is the network of connections they can make to help whoever's in front of you solve some bigger problems that you can't with what you sell. So that way, you build trust and you're trusted in a way that somebody just selling a product won't ever be."

Practice making thoughtful pauses in a conversation - Oscar: "A lot of people ask me how do I increase my credibility with executives that are completely mismatched, they might be 3 or 4 decades down in their career path. Just pause. You're not getting paid for the speed of the answer, and they're not getting paid for the speed of the answer, you're being paid for the quality of the conversation. And the quality of the conversation will improve if you pause because, I guarantee you, they're not used to it and they will fill the gap for you."

Find out more about Oscar and learn where your listening barriers are below:

More on Andy:

Connect on LinkedIn

Get Andy's new book "Sell Without Selling Out" on Amazon

Learn more at AndyPaul.com

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Unlock exponential growth with an AI-powered RevOps platform | Revenue.io

Scratchpad | The fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes and stay on top of to-dos | Scratchpad.com

Blueboard | World’s leading experiential rewards & recognition platform | Blueboard.com

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

Pouyan Salehi is the CEO and Co-founder of Scratchpad. Sales is a complex job, and it is made even more complex when salespeople are part of a larger organization. The fast pace and the need to constantly be finding and managing new and existing customers make it difficult to execute well.

Over time, things tend to become more complex, rather than simpler. This is due to the introduction of new technology, different types of buyers, and various processes. The question is whether or not this complexity is necessary, or if it could be streamlined to make the selling process easier.

Andy and Pouyan agree that just because something can be done with new technology, doesn't mean it should be — and that this often falls on the back of the sellers. They believe that time is not the only factor that is impacted by complexity, but that the emotional hit it takes on salespeople is also significant.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES

A complex tech stack drains much more energy than many might think - Pouyan: "You look at a sales organization and you think, okay, I have X number of salespeople, they have this amount of time and they can sell. Well, guess what, they're also human." 

"And so, yes, they may have that time, but one of the things that I struggle with in the job that I do is the context shifting. When you have to shift contexts quite a few times, it drains your energy and so the 8 hours or 10 hours you may normally have may actually look very different when you have to switch context a bunch of times."

The trend today is reducing the cost and complexity of the tech stack - Pouyan: "I think right now, we're probably in the stage of tool reduction. When you're in the growth at all costs stage and let's say that comes down from the very, very top, from the board, from the investors saying, hey, you have all of this capital, deploy the capital so that it can turn into growth, and that drum is constantly being beat on, well, the execution turns into, okay, well, let's spend. And so, the threshold to buy something, to implement something, goes down generally.

Find out more about Pouyan in the links below:

More on Andy:

Connect on LinkedIn

Get Andy's new book "Sell Without Selling Out" on Amazon

Learn more at AndyPaul.com

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Unlock exponential growth with an AI-powered RevOps platform | Revenue.io

Scratchpad | The fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes and stay on top of to-dos | Scratchpad.com

Blueboard | World’s leading experiential rewards & recognition platform | Blueboard.com

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

In today's competitive climate, endless amounts of products and services are vying for a customer's attention. The winners must differentiate and truly understand the needs of every prospect individually. Alastair and Howard sit down with Sean Lane, VP of Field Operations at Drift, to discuss the best ways to address those challenges and meet your customers where they are.

Follow the Hosts on LinkedIn:

Alastair Woolcock (CRO, Revenue.io)

Howard Brown (CEO, Revenue.io)

And our Special Guest:

Sean Lane (Vice President, Field Operations, Drift)

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Powering high-performing revenue teams with real-time guidance

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast

*If you'd like to ask the guys a question that could get answered on the show, call our new message line at (323) 540-4777. Just leave your name, where you're from, and your question and we'll do our best to answer it on an upcoming episode.

Casey Graham is the CEO of Gravy and the Co-Founder of Command AF. There are real nontraditional benefits to building a strong LinkedIn culture in your organization. Casey shares how personal brands give sellers headstarts for success, and that helping these individuals do so circles back with mutual benefits down the road.

Casey digs into how he created Gravy's LinkedIn culture by fostering freedom of expression and using metrics that demonstrate the impact of a LinkedIn personal brand. One of Casey’s greatest lessons for others is that creating a personal brand is something that you get to keep forever regardless of educational attainment. 

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES

Breaking down the posts that work and don’t work guides sellers - Casey: "We broke it down to where there's 13 different types of post that I post and we branded them different things to say, hey, this post is the Twitter post. This post is what we call the vulnerable proverb. This post is called this, and so we would break it down and create a system that would say this is this type of post and this is the structure of the post and this is the question that you ask of this kind of post or this is why you do it."

Create a culture in your organization that people don’t want to leave - Casey: "People say, well, you're helping all these people, and what happens if they all get recruited away? And I go, well then that means we didn't create a good enough culture for them to stay. So my job is to create a culture where they want to stay even though they're getting recruited away and if they do, then it's a good opportunity for them. There's a win-win for everybody."

A rich LinkedIn network beats a flashy resume - Casey: "It's not about where you went to school or any of that. The number one way to get any opportunity in your life is who you know. So the best who platform currently is LinkedIn. And so that's why, while the window is open, which I think is a very short window on LinkedIn, we're going to help as many people as possible build this personal brands."

Find out more about Casey in the link below:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseygraham1/

More on Andy:

Connect on LinkedIn

Get Andy's new book "Sell Without Selling Out" on Amazon

Learn more at AndyPaul.com

Sponsored by:

Revenue.io | Unlock exponential growth with an AI-powered RevOps platform | Revenue.io

Scratchpad | The fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes, and stay on top of to-dos | Scratchpad.com

Blueboard | World’s leading experiential rewards & recognition platform | Blueboard.com

Explore the Revenue.io Podcast Universe:

Sales Enablement Podcast

Selling with Purpose Podcast

RevOps Podcast