The Sales Evangelist

Sometimes as sales reps we don’t bring enough value to the table and there are 3 crucial signs you need to add more value so you won’t be judged only on price.

Dion Travagliante runs Madison One Consulting, a consulting practice where he solves problems for SAS businesses. He said he loves the fact that sellers have latitude in their careers and he loves the chase of finding the potential customer and then uncovering the issue and working to solve it.

People have a preconceived notion that sales is just talking with no science, rhyme, or reason behind it, but he calls it a challenging world that you can train yourself to succeed in.

Sellers often struggle to stand out against other competitors and they struggle against being viewed as simply a commodity. The key is to become the winner of the account.

Dion defines value as improvement in a client or prospect’s individual situation. That centers on solving problems. Any company that is selling something originated around the idea of solving someone else’s problem.

That means as a sales rep, you’re a steward of your company’s solution in the marketplace. That should free you to talk to anyone about the challenges they are facing.

Flip the script. There will always be people who perceive salespeople as slick operators who try to jam products down people’s throats. No one wants to have that persona.

Instead, approach every customer as someone with a pain point whose problem you’d like to solve. If you do, you’ll be better than 95 percent of the sellers out there because you’ll be thinking about someone else.

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Watch for these 3 crucial signs you need to add more value.

When you’re talking with a prospect and they start negotiating price during the sales cycle. Do not go down the rabbit hole of arguing price.

The worst position you can be in as a sales rep is negotiating against yourself. If the prospect wants to lower the price, it becomes a game of limbo: how low can you go? Instead of just acquiescing, you want to push back on that. They are telling you that they don’t see the inherent value in the price you’ve determined for your product.

You can never negotiate against your own price, but you can flip the script.

If, for example, a single client averages $60,000 and your product costs $20,000, the purchase pays for itself three times over. If your product can speed up the process, the relevant issue is how much money they’ll derive from using your solution.

If the person you’re dealing with is an intermediary and they insist on dropping the price, what they are saying is that they don’t feel confident taking this solution at this price point to the decision makers.

The quicker path is to lower the price. Instead, arm them with more things so they look like the hero when they show up to present it.

When your prospect asks you for a referral, what he’s really saying is that he’s interested in what you’re selling and he wants to continue down the path, but he wants external validation.

Mike Brooks, who calls himself Mr. Inside Sales, wrote a book called The Ultimate Book of Phone Scripts where he shares 500 scripts that you can use to address objections. He suggests acknowledging that you’d be happy to connect the customer with a host of satisfied customers but then asking what sticking points still exist.

They want someone else to verify that they should buy this because we’re all somewhat tribal in nature. Get out in front of it.

Your own self-limiting beliefs can prompt you to negotiate with a client instead of seeking to provide enough value to get them across the finish line.

Practice saying that phrase so that it becomes second-nature. Because 90 percent of decisions are made with the subconscious mind, you should train your mind to respond this way automatically.

Courage isn’t the absence of anxiety or fear; it’s acting in spite of it. The people who improve are those that put themselves in uncomfortable scenarios. Human beings learn by pain.

When you’ve done the discovery call and you’re in the demo and the prospect says, “You know, I think we’re going to stay with our current solution,” that’s an indicator that you haven’t provided enough value. The prospect is telling you that it seems like a lot of work to transition to your option, so they are going to stay where they are.

They are telling you that you haven’t exhibited enough value to drive them to switch. Sales decisions are made emotionally and then justified logically.

Todd Caponi, in his book The Transparency Sale, talks about the psychology of sales and the fact that if your customer’s logic is preventing them from closing the deal, you need to stoke some emotional flames.

You must provide enough value to make switching worthwhile.

The best sales reps try new things. They put themselves into difficult scenarios that allow them to learn. They also end up selling more.

Always think about the prospects and their solutions. Get out of your own way and help your prospect solve a problem and better his solution.

Ask pointed questions. Figure out the plight. You’ll come off as more genuine than if you toss around buzzwords.

You can connect with Dion at madisononeinc.com and you can email him at [email protected].

Grab a copy of the two books Dion recommended: The Ultimate Book of Phone Scripts by Mike Brooks and The Transparency Sale by Todd Caponi.

You’ve heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we’re offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester in April.

You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group. The program includes 65 videos altogether, and we just completed a beta group that helped us improve the program and maximize the information in it.

If you and your team are interested in learning more, we’d love to have you join us. Call (561)578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You’ll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

When your prospects find 100 new email messages waiting for them on Monday morning, if your emails give no value, your prospects will never open them.

If there's nothing in the subject line or the first sentence of the message to grab their attention, your prospects will probably never even open the message. Sellers must give thought to what their first sentence is saying to uncover how their emails are performing.

Consider your own email inbox.

You're busy. You don't have time to read every single email that arrives in your inbox. If you've got 100 new messages waiting, you're not going to read them all. You'll travel the path of least resistance by eliminating as many as possible.

The subject line is crucial, so your goal is to minimize it as much as possible. Get to the point quickly with as few words as possible.

Make sure the first sentence of your email relates to the subject line and make sure it has nothing to do with you. Avoid statements like "I have something I want to share with you," or "My company helps clients who..."

Avoid including sentences that, when you think about them, simply aren't helpful. "I hope this message finds you doing well." "I hope your quarter is going great." These are both fillers and they won't compel anyone to open the email.

If you're using the same content and the same statements as other sellers, your emails give no value, and no one will open them.

One of the worst mistakes you can make is using a subject line that has nothing to do with the email content itself.

If you bait your reader in with one idea and then switch ideas within the email, you'll probably get black-listed. At best, you'll get sent to the spam folder so you're toast forever.

Do something totally different. Personalize your message and don't include a huge pitch in your first email.

Think about it from your buyer's standpoint. He has countless sellers reaching out to sell him something, and many of them are sharing similar messages. What if your first sentence offered something to help him?

Consider this example from Todd.

He got an email from a seller who recognized that he was a CEO who had to create and give presentations. The seller provided a PowerPoint template he could use to present metrics and then another template he could use to create a sales handbook.

The sender gave no information about himself or his company. The only reference was information in the signature block that Todd could access if he was interested.

Buyers aren't stupid. If you send a helpful, beneficial email, I'll like go to your site. Even if I don't need your product right now, I'll know where to go in the future.

Give something of value. Provide some education. Think of it from the buyer's standpoint. Give him something that will help him be more effective and efficient in his role.

When you give value, provide something that will address a problem that your ideal customer struggles with. It doesn't even have to be something you're an expert in, and in fact, that sometimes makes it more genuine.

Imagine I sell HR software to HR directors. If you send a document titled 5 Things HR Directors Should Consider When Selecting A Software, he'll smell the bias from 10 miles away. If I provide something beneficial that isn't in my wheelhouse, they'll recognize that I'm not trying to sell something.

The goal is to build interaction by getting him to respond and open a dialog.

If the thing you're sharing will benefit him even if he doesn't buy your product, go ahead and share that with your prospect. Just don't make it gimmicky.

Give something that has value and then connect other places like on LinkedIn or over the phone. Many of us are stuck in the mindset that a single email will open the door to a deal.

Focus on the content you're sharing. Focus on the type of content and how it applies to him as an individual. Then focus on how you can make his life easier.

Create emails that prospects will want to open so you can build meaningful conversations and then ask effective questions. #ColdOutreach

Grab a copy of the book The Transparency Sale: How Unexpected Honesty and Understanding the Buying Brain Can Transform Your Results by Todd Caponi.

Try the first module of the TSE Certified Sales Training Program for free.

This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.

TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump.

If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that. The new semester of TSE Certified Sales Training Program begins in April and it would be an absolute honor to have you join us.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

When you interact with your prospects, your goal should be to provide such great value that you leave people better off whether they buy from you or not.

We've been talking about value all month, and today hypnotist Jason Linett talks about how people can change their thinking to grow their business. Growth isn't just about your platform but it's largely about how you tell the story to your audience.

We often miss the power of a story and its impact on our potential customers.

In almost every category, there are others out there who do the same work you do. Storytelling is the one thing that truly sets you apart from the competition so that you're no longer just a commodity. Your customers can go find another business coach or web designer, and even another hypnotist.

Jason points out that he didn't get married by approaching a pretty girl at school and announcing that they were going to have children together. Instead, they built a relationship through the natural progression that occurs when people get to know each other.

Look at the relationship building aspect of it. You know that you want to help people, so look for something that will help the customer. Find things you can set in motion that will help your prospects win.

Suddenly, there's a collection of people out there who didn't need your entire service but they are in the raving fan category. Some of those that you helped will move forward in the funnel in order to see how you can help them even more.

Most people don't seize this concept because they fear giving away too much. They believe that if they give away too much, people won't buy from them.

Jason said that he has given away more than most people in his industry. He has also earned more than most of the people in his industry. He believes the two naturally go together.

Think of it as a difference of show versus tell. I can tell you what methods may be helpful and you can research them and dig into them in order to determine whether they might truly work, or I can get together with you and actually help you do it.

[Tweet "Be willing to give away your best content to your customers sometimes. Give away an abridged version that helps them along on the journey and prompts them to consider what more you might have to offer. #BuildValue"]

Many people want to try an at-home version before they commit to the live "being in the room" version.

How do we get people to care before we ever really ask them to listen?

We need to think differently. It's about listening to the audience and responding to their requests.

Jason calls hit pitch "The Hollywood Effect." It's based on the tendency of movies to launch you directly into some piece of the action, get you swept up into it, and then rewind to tell you the back-story.

He launches into a story about murder, and about a new mother who moved into a hotel after seeing a bug in her home. By the end of her first meeting with him, she killed a housefly with her bare hand.

Draw in the entire room. Get them to put down their food and listen to what you have to say.

Do the opposite of what everyone else is doing. If everyone else is doing things one way, let that be your cue to do it differently.

As you decide how to move forward, pick the option you are most comfortable with. That's your first entry point and you should flesh that out completely and make it exactly what you want it to be.

Once that piece has become a machine that's running itself, you can branch off to some other thing.

Jason suggests that there's no such thing as "finding the time." It's a game we invented to trick ourselves into not doing things we're absolutely capable of. Instead, we should use the mechanism of making time.

Consider putting everything on a scheduling platform. Make use of color-coding. Choose one color for the events that cannot be changed.

The number one tip is to listen. So often we catch ourselves trying to mind-read our audience instead of starting with the ask and discovering the customer's greatest need.

Sometimes what they want is different than what they need. You're selling what they want, so you'll deliver what they want, but along the way, you can overdeliver by providing what they need.

You can connect with Jason at jasonlinett.com or on social media as Jason Linett.

You can also grab a copy of his book, Work Smart Business: Lessons Learned From Hypnotizing 250,000 People and Building a Million-Dollar Brand. Head to worksmartbusiness.com for a freebie called the Positive Influence Power Pack that will teach you specific strategies to influence yourself and others.

You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester in April.

You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group. The program includes 65 videos altogether, and we just completed a beta group that helped us improve the program and maximize the information in it.

If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561)578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

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Building value is a critical part of any sales process, and the discovery meeting is an important step in that process.

How much should you prepare for the discovery meeting beforehand? What should you know? What should you do?

The insights I'll share come from the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, designed to help sales reps perform to the best of their ability, find more ideal customers, build strong value, and close more deals.

The discovery meeting is an opportunity to learn about the challenge your prospect is facing. It's a chance to go a little more in-depth.

It's not necessarily a chance to get all the information about the company or about its history. That's boring for the client who doesn't want to have to educate you. The client is likely meeting with other sellers and they aren't interested in working to educate all of them.

Do your research beforehand so your discovery meeting can focus solely on understanding the prospect's true problem and understanding how you can bring value and help them learn more about what you have to offer.

You can easily find information about the company and its history on the Internet or the company's website. If you show up to discovery seeking this kind of information the prospects will likely think less of you.

I've said it before, but you also have the option to call into the company and ask the receptionist for more information. The organization may be able to share an information page or other company literature. The PR department may be able to provide the information you're seeking as well.

This information is vital to the discovery meeting because it will help you have a meaningful discussion when you meet with the prospect.

Make sure you also understand recent developments related to the industry and the company's role within the industry.

If the company is in the housing industry and I discover that the housing industry is booming in states like Arizona, California, and Florida, then that will impact my presentation.

If I'm selling marketing services to companies in the housing market it will be important to know that the market is growing. I'll also need to know the top challenges that companies within the housing market are facing.

Then, determine how those trends will correlate to your product or service.

If you have a previous or existing client that is similar to your prospect, consider sharing that information. Has one of your clients faced the challenges of growing in a high-growth market? Have you helped a client tackle some of the issues inherent in that situation?

Is there a business case study I can share that helps my prospects understand the challenge they are facing?

I did an episode some time back about case studies and the folks over at Gong outlined four main steps that should exist within every business case study.

1. Identify the problem. What is preventing the client from growing? What challenges are hindering the company from accomplishing its goals?
2. Develop a measurement. How can you measure the challenges the company is facing? How can you quantify the issue the company is facing?
3. Determine the consequences of the company losing those deals or opportunities. Did they have to let people go or close their doors? Make a dramatic point without going over-the-top.
4. What transformation did your product or service cause in this company?

[Tweet "Case studies help companies see what you have done in the past and what you can do for prospective customers. #CaseStudies"]

What things did the company try previously that didn't work?

The more questions you ask the more you'll learn about them. Go deep. Ask them to tell you more.

You may discover that they are currently working with a company that isn't providing the kind of results they need. Why don't they like the current company? Incorporate those facts into your own presentation so you can address their challenges.

Find out who will be making the decision and how they will decide. Find out what their budget will be and when they are hoping to make the change.

Is there an unconsidered need they aren't aware of?

This stuff works. We teach it in TSE Certified Sales Training Program and we're seeing fantastic results.

If you or your team want to check out the program, we'll let you try the first module risk-free. If you love it, we'd love to have you join the TSE Certified Sales Training Program to improve your selling skills.

I share this because I want to help you find more ideal customers, have more meaningful conversations, build stronger value, close more deals, and I want to challenge you each and every day to do big things.

Try the first module of the TSE Certified Sales Training Program for free.

This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.

TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump.

If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that. The new semester of TSE Certified Sales Training Program begins in April and it would be an absolute honor to have you join us.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. 

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

Many sellers understand the challenge of using emails to reach out to prospects, but Chad Sanderson tells us that using brief, compelling stories in sales emails can leave a memorable impression on a prospect who is inundated with noise.

Chad has worked as a marketer, seller, sales leader, and entrepreneur, so he understands the perspective of everyone listening to this podcast.

Chad points out that most emails suck. We're all connected to our devices and we're constantly inundated with impressions through Facebook messages, videos, emails, LinkedIn requests, and even WhatsApp or Snapchat messages.

That doesn't even include impressions you get while watching television.

The only way to effectively break through the noise is to put yourself in the other person's shoes. Everything is moving at a ridiculously fast pace, so if you never slow down enough to truly consider the other person, you'll probably fail to truly connect.

You must connect with people in a way that's valuable from their perspective.

[Tweet "People still buy from people, so if they don't know and trust you, you must build rapport before you earn the right to talk about yourself. #BuildRapport"]

As if the crowded inboxes aren't enough, it's also true that many of the emails people send are just drudgery. Chad points to one company that has been pursuing him for several months, and as he mapped the cadence of the messages, he noted that the messages never included anything from his perspective until about email 14. The messages were always about the company.

He said it happens all the time because sellers don't realize that approach doesn't work.

And though he tries to be kind because he works in this world too, he sometimes has to unsubscribe because the messages aren't valuable.

To make the idea simpler to understand, think about this in the context of your friends. Everybody has at least one friend that will not stop talking about themselves.

Even in a social setting, people will eventually move away from that person. It's true in sales, too.

We seem to assume that the rules are different in sales. We forget that we're in the people business and that relationships matter in sales just as they do outside of work.

Sales has always been a discipline. It has always been tough. It has gotten tougher because now everyone can get to everyone else and everyone believes they have something important to say.

Slow down and take a deep breath. Think about your general target audience. Instead of thinking about Donald or Chad, think about reaching out to podcast hosts who focus on B2B revenue generation.

Then you'll have a little bit of context. You still won't know those people, but you'll have a good place to start. But you have to be able to reach out to prospects at scale.

Chad read a report last week about a company that ran a test of 7,000 emails, personalizing half of the emails to the challenges the person would face based upon their role. Think industry/company personalization rather than individual personalization.

They found that the open rates were four to five points higher on cold emails that were crafted to highlight challenges the receiver was facing.

Some people argue that isn't personalization, but what we really need to do is understand the conext these people are working in and then show them something that will tap into their curiosity circuit.

The next level of personalization involves those who responded to the first round of communication.Instead of researching 100 people I only have to research the 10 who indicated interest in my product or service.

Stick to the rule of thumb that you'll do 15 minutes of research on an industry, 10 minutes of research on a company, and 5 minutes of research on an individual. If you can stick to that and not be distracted by dog videos or Tiger winning the Masters, you'll be able to effectively personalize your messaging.

Make them curious so that they'll be waiting for the next email.

Chad related the story of a friend who went into a Men's Warehouse to get a tux. Then he used the experience to reach out to the CEO of the company to highlight how his company could help fill in some of the organization's gaps.

Using his own individual experience, he crafted an email that was still only six or seven sentences long so that it fit on a mobile screen.

In a B2C environment, share how that brand made you feel or how an individual made you feel. In a B2B environment, tell a story about how you've helped someone whose situation was similar to the person you're targeting. Explain how you were able to help him turn his situation around and tell him about the results you were able to produce.

Tell him about the person who is like him.

Although you don't know him yet, you know someone who is like him, so tell him that story.

If you want to understand story structure better, grab a copy of Creativity, Inc, a book about how Pixar creates stories for its movies.

Very few people can write an email the very first time that communicates well and fits neatly on one mobile screen. You'll likely need multiple drafts to get it right.

Communicate to your audience that you're paying attention to them and what they are dealing with. Acknowledge awards they won and acknowledge articles you've read about that address a problem they might be having.

Consider Barb Giamanco, who reached out to female chief marketing officers to recruit help with a project. She emailed each of them by acknowledging an award each had received.  Then she asked for their perspective on a project she was working on.

The emails indicated that she was paying attention to the CMOs' careers. It acknowledged a problem that the CMOs might be having and a desire to address it. It wasn't until the very end of the email that she even mentioned her own intentions.

Be authentic and genuine.

Realize, too, that once you get an email dialogue started, you have to have the skill set to keep it going.

Think about your prospects as human beings. Slow down and think about your target.

Check out Chad's podcast B2B Revenue Executive Experience and you can find him on LinkedIn, but you must send a note with your connection request.

You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester in April.

You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group. The program includes 65 videos altogether, and we just completed a beta group that helped us improve the program and maximize the information in it.

If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561)578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

A sudden influx of new leads seems like a dream come true, but you often have to determine which type of customers are the best in order to assess whether it's really a good thing.

If you haven't yet grabbed a copy of The Transparency Sale: How Unexpected Honest and Understanding the Buying Brain Can Transform Your Results by Todd Caponi, get it before he joins us on the podcast in the near future.

In the book, he discusses the three types of buyers.

The active buyer is looking for a solution. He understands the problem and he wants to solve it. These are your inbound leads.

They understand their problem well enough to initiate research to try to find a solution to the problem. They may seek a quote for your product or service, and they are proof that your marketing is working.

These buyers are finding your website.

These buyers are also more than likely going to commoditize you. They are likely considering three to five different vendors and because they don't have all the details about your company, they are going to try to differentiate you based on price as well as features.

Although they know they have issues that they must solve, they don't care about the intricacies of your company. They simply need to solve a problem and get the best deal possible.

The passive buyers recognize that a problem likely exists but they aren't prioritizing it.

In his book, Todd compares it to the small problems at your house that need to be addressed eventually but that aren't a priority right now. Maybe the handle on your door is broken or the blinds need to be repaired. It isn't the end of the world if you fail to complete them.

Passive buyers will eventually get around to solving the problem.

These status quo buyers are happy with things as they are. They aren't thinking about the future; they've learned to operate just fine the way things are. Imagine the guy who has a flip phone and doesn't see the need for a smartphone.

He doesn't want to change, perhaps because he doesn't recognize that better options exist. Or maybe he's worried that the smartphone will be too complicated and he won't be able to learn it well. Change feels too complex, so he decides to stay with the status quo.

But what if someone could educate him and teach him to use the cell phone?

In my own experience, many of my most challenging leads were the active buyers. You might be thinking that these are the kinds of buyers we'd most like to have, and that would be the case if they were always perfectly ready to buy.

If my company was always the front-runner, that would be a great situation for us. But we're not always the front-runner, and sometimes we're simply an after-thought.

The buyer is likely considering several companies before making a decision because that's how the buying department has structured its purchases.

The question becomes can we persuade them to buy once we're having a conversation?

From my coaching and training experience, and based upon Todd's recommendations, we've discovered that the status quo buyers are often the best ones.

[Tweet "The customers who don't know that better options exist are ripe for you to educate them. #EducateCustomers"]

Your job is to teach them and help them to recognize unconsidered need.

Consider the book The Challenger Sale. When we can open the prospect's mind to something he doesn't know about, we can create the possibility of change. If you can reveal the problem, you can be the front-runner.

Also check out the book Three Value Conversations to help you understand the education process that sellers must adopt.

You'll ultimately discover that you have all three kinds of customers in your pipeline and you must learn to manage them. The perfect buyers that are the perfect size who reach out to you? Those are the unicorns.

You must prepare for all three kinds of buyers. You may even find that you're better equipped to interact with one kind of customer over another.

I'd love to hear your insights about each of these kinds of customers and which you like best.

Grab a copy of The Transparency Sale: How Unexpected Honest and Understanding the Buying Brain Can Transform Your Results.

Also grab a copy of the book The Challenger Sale and the book Three Value Conversations

You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester in April.

You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group. The program includes 65 videos altogether, and we just completed a beta group that helped us improve the program and maximize the information in it.

If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561)578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

Sellers can guide prospective customers through the purchasing journey by holding prescriptive conversations with buyers. 

Tom Pisello launched into the topic of prescriptives because he was a product manager who was launching products in the marketplace, with a sales force that had never engaged these particular customers.

In an attempt to help buyers make decisions, he created prescriptive tools that would help customers analyze their existing situation and compare it to the new product.

The B2B purchase decision is more challenging than ever for buyers because there are six to 10 decision makers in every decision. Buyers spend incredible amounts of time on their own gathering, processing, and deconflicting information.

And 94 percent of buyers have participated in a buying cycle that just evaporated. Buyers are frustrated. About 84 percent report that the buyers' journey is taking longer than they expected.

There's a big opportunity for sellers as well as a challenge for them to overcome: to help buyers through a journey that has become much tougher and longer than ever before.

The problem is that most sellers show up to meetings talking about themselves: about the company, the product, the services, themselves, and the customers they are working with. Then when the competition shows up for their meeting, they do the same thing.

They all sound exactly the same, so the buying process becomes a shootout.

Instead of talking about the typical things, talk about the challenges the prospect might be having. Then, use that to do some teaching about the challenges you're seeing at other companies.

Then, pivot to a Socratic approach. Ask probing, diagnosing questions to identify whether your prospects see themselves in the other customers you described. Do a little bit of cooperative discovery.

If you sell office furniture, start by sharing current research about what makes a good office setup. Is open office the way to go? What about standup desks? Instead of pitching yourself or your product, share information about productive office environments.

Talk about the challenges of collaboration and flexible work environments. Mention health and engagement. Talk provocatively about these challenges and how they affect your prospect.

The book The Challenger Sale by Matthew Dixon and Brent Adamson tackles this approach well.

This leads naturally into you sharing stories and examples about how you've helped other customers with their office furniture needs and about how successful they've been as a result. From there you'll use the Socratic method to dig deep.

Be careful how much of a challenge you present early on because it's possible that you haven't earned the right to do that. Start with something provocative, but then pivot away from the research to your questions.

The goal is to move into a collaboration with the customer.

Buyers prefer this process because you're solving a problem and uncovering problems they didn't even realize they had. But even for issues they knew they had, you're putting some numbers to them. You're clarifying how their employees will be impacted by the purchase of office furniture.

That's why pivoting from research to personal is important. You're putting it into a perspective your customer can understand and telling the customer exactly what the problem is costing and how you can help solve it.

You're helping them to prioritize all of these challenges and becoming a prescriptive consultant to them.

As a seller, it's your moral obligation to act as a guide to the customer.

Because the buyer's journey has gotten complicated, you need to provide a map of sorts so the customer knows what to expect. Then be prepared to proactively provide information to the buyer along the way.

If you know the company will ask for a business case, proactively provide it. Don't wait for the customer to ask.

[Tweet "Be an evolved seller who is ready for requests that occur during the buyer's journey. Inspire the customer to buy and then provide the right content at the right time. #EvolvedSeller"]

The buyer's journey is hard. As you're proactively providing content, you can also use smart sales enablement systems to track whether the content is being consumed. If they aren't consuming the information, they may not be as far along in the process as you think they are.

You've got to anticipate every step so that you'll have the visibility to know whether you're progressing or not.

Bring up your buyer's objections before they become objections. Realize that your prospects spend two-thirds of their time gathering, processing, and deep conflicting. Streamline that for them when you can.

Marketing plays a vital role in putting together inspirational content.

We must identify the content that will inspire our customers. We're not talking about content that is only about the products or services. It must be shorter, based on the challenges they are facing.

Then we need to enable sales to use the Socratic questioning.

Look back to your last presentation to determine whether you led with information about the product or service or whether you addressed challenges.

You can connect with Tom at [email protected]. Check out his blog Evolving Sellers From Pitch to Purpose or grab a copy of his book The Frugalnomics Survival Guide. Keep an eye out for his newest book Evolved Selling™: Optimizing Sales Enablement in the Age of FRUGALNOMICS.

This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.

TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump.

If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that. The new semester of TSE Certified Sales Training Program begins in April and it would be an absolute honor to have you join us.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

The trend in sales now is to provide value to your customers, but there must be some kind of exchange in the transaction, so you may find yourself asking, "When should I talk about price?"

How do you bring it up? What exactly will you say when it's time to talk about it?

Today we're going to share ideas that will help you provide tremendous value and ensure an effective, value-rich conversation for both parties.

This is a segment from our TSE Certified Sales Training Program and we're going to share a snippet from one of our training programs and then offer some ideas based upon what you hear. It will let you learn something about selling and offer you an experiment that you can test for yourself.

You'll hear the challenges that other sales reps are facing and share with you what has worked for the group members.

We've been taught that it's taboo to talk about money, so many of us shy away from it. New sellers face the biggest challenge, usually because of limiting beliefs.

In the past when I was selling software training classes, I didn't understand that it was worth $10,000 for customers to earn their certification over a weekend. I didn't think anyone would be willing to pay it.

I didn't understand that for their $10,000 expenditure, they were going to see a $20,000 to $30,000 increase in their earnings over the course of a year.

All I knew was that $10,000 was a lot of money. My self-limiting beliefs made me apprehensive, and this is a common problem for new sellers.

You must believe in the product or service you're offering and the value it provides to your prospects. When you do that, you'll develop more confidence in your messages, and it won't matter what the course costs.

Once you've identified a product you believe in, when do you bring up the money? That depends largely on the product or service that you're selling. If it's software that costs $30 a month and they won't commit, they probably weren't the right fit anyway.

Let them go.

If you're selling a software solution that you have to customize for the organization, you're going to need more time. You'll have to gather more information in order to give them effective pricing.

If the customer can see the prices on your website, they can weed themselves out at the beginning. People who really want to learn more and have more value-rich conversations will engage. In the later conversations, we can discuss what they'll get for their investment.

We'll tap into emotion by addressing how our product or service will help them.

• What will happen if the client doesn't get coaching?
• Why do I need coaching right now?
• What results will I see if I get coaching?

Because people make emotional decisions and then justify those decisions logically, if we build value well, the $1,500 price tag for coaching won't seem like a big deal. The return on their investment, the ability to provide well for their family, and the possibility that they will advance in their careers will justify the cost.

In the case of a more complex solution, when the customer asks about price, be honest when you tell them that you can't predict exact numbers right now. If you can't yet determine all the variables and if you can't determine the exact infrastructure, explain that to the customer.

Then invest the time to understand the setup and the infrastructure. Find out what challenges the prospect is facing.

It's possible that the customer is simply fishing, or in other cases that he is simply looking for a ballpark figure. In the latter case, perhaps try giving him a range for other similar clients.

Don't give the customer your lowest number if you provide a range. If the cheapest you've done is $5,000 and the most expensive is $20,000, don't offer the $5,000 number. Go a little higher.

Instead, offer a higher number, like $8,000 or $10,000. Once they have a number in their minds, you'll determine whether they are truly serious about moving forward.

In this situation, effective blog posts that describe the return on investment will help your customers gather information. Especially if yours is a complex solution, you'll help them understand the components involved and what they should be looking for in a vendor.

In the case of sales training, perhaps you'd have different blog posts that describe the different levels of training and the different types of service that you offer.

The prospect can determine what courses are available and what his options are for in-person training, group training, or workshops.

Consider, too, outlining entry-level solutions, mid-tier solutions, and a higher tier. Each solution, based upon the complexity, can solve specific problems.

The prospect can do some research ahead of time and find answers to some of their basic questions. Because this will be an enterprise solution, he'll have to come to the table prepared to invest money.

At this point, it's appropriate to talk about budget because you don't want to begin building presentations or demonstrations if the product or service isn't a fit. Get an understanding of what kind of investment the prospect is looking to make.

Be up front. Acknowledge that you'd like to know as soon as possible if the prospect determines this isn't a good fit. Promise to do the same for your prospect.

Ask if the company has already earmarked a budget for this project. Find out if they are planning the project for this year.

Once you've discovered the pain, use that to see if you can move them toward the project right now. Anticipate that they may not be able to do the whole thing right now, but they might do half this quarter and half the next quarter.

Once we have an understanding we can move forward. If you built rapport with this prospect and created communication, it will be easy to discuss finances.

New sellers might ask about the proper words to use. Rather than budget or payment, I use the word investment. That's a given, right?

They are investing in sales training to solve a problem. They are expecting to see a return on the money they spend.

If it's a new seller who wants to become the best in the company or a female business owner in a male-dominated industry, they are expecting to show some results from their investment. The word payment sounds too transactional.

As you're having these conversations, understand that you should wait to mention the money after the buyer has a sense of the value you're offering.

They must see the value before they can comprehend the investment.

Connect with me on LinkedIn or on Instagram and let me know how this worked out for you.

You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester in April.

You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group. The program includes 65 videos altogether, and we just completed a beta group that helped us improve the program and maximize the information in it.

If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561)578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

Human behavior plays a huge role in sales and understanding what makes people tick is one of the most important concepts sellers in all industries should seek to learn.

Joe Sweeney has worn a variety of different hats over the course of his career, but he loves human behavior and he says it's the key to success in sales.

You must understand why someone would buy your product. Joe's philosophy, as described in his book Networking Is A Contact Sport, is that networking, business, and sales are about giving and serving rather than getting something.

People ask about the number one mistake that salespeople make, and it's believing that the process is about us. We think it's about our product. It's not.

Joe gives talks all the time and he starts by saying, "You don't sell anything. What we do is help people get what they want."

Instead, sellers tend to take the opposite approach and we talk about ourselves and our product. But your buyer doesn't care about that. All he cares about is whether your product can solve his needs and relieve some of his pain points.

Joe said he spent a portion of his life criticizing other people because he represented a lot of high-net-worth people who did stupid things.

When, for example, he encountered a woman outside a hospital dying from emphysema and smoking a cigarette, he made the connection. The pleasure she got from nicotine was greater than the pain she experienced from emphysema.

The takeaway is to get good at understanding what makes people tick without criticizing them. All human behavior makes sense, even when we don't.

• Don't be critical of their actions.
• Understand people's needs and wants.

Keep everything simple.

Although we could all likely point to hundreds of needs, we really have three basic, common needs.

1. We need to belong to something bigger than ourselves.
2. We need to love and to be loved.
3. Finally, we all want to know that our life has meaning and that we've made a difference.

The greatest sales companies in the world have understood that.

Perhaps our greatest need is the first one: the need to belong to something bigger. It's counter-intuitive today because with all the social media we falsely believe we're all connected but the truth is that we're less connected than we've ever been.

Stated another way, we're more isolated now than ever.

The company that really understands this concept is Harley Davidson. Its number one competitor is BMW which far surpasses Harley, but Harley outsells everyone.

The Harley Ownership Group, or HOG, makes its owners part of something bigger. It's about belonging.

Remember the old TV show Cheers? Its tagline captures this desire. Sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name.

In this technology world, we pretend that we're connected to a massive network but we aren't.

Coca Cola marketed to this need with the ad about teaching the world to sing. It was kind of a kumbaya moment with people holding hands singing together.

They portrayed the feeling that if you drink Coca Cola, you'd feel all this love. Coca Cola understood the Maya Angelou quote: People will forget what you say. People will forget what you do. People will never forget the way you make them feel. 

Joe asks his groups, "What are you doing to answer the needs of these people? The belonging needs and the love needs."

We all want to know that our lives have meaning, and Mastercard captured that with the ad campaign that assigned prices to different products.

Fishing poles, $29. Worms, $3.25. An afternoon fishing with your teenagers, Priceless.

Most of us approach the sales process with the sense that we have to tell people about our benefits. Instead, we should take two steps back and work to understand what makes people tick.

Work to understand your buyers' needs. The greatest companies do it and I recommend that your listeners do the same.

If you're going to be really good in sales, you should wow people.

If you sell office furniture, what would differentiate you from the competition?

Find something personal, and then do something memorable. Little things in sales mean everything. #BeMemorable

Imagine that you have a customer who likes Egyptian art. At the close of your interaction with the customer, hand him a piece of Egyptian art that you printed out. It cost you nothing, but none of the other competitors will have done that.

Joe suggests that sales isn't about making money. Although that's a by-product of sales, it's really about creating an environment where we can service people. You can do the same thing in education and in government.

Morph your sales job into a servant leadership role.

Joe's sister-in-law told him that she always assumed that business was a bunch of greedy people trying to make money. There was a negative energy around sales.

Joe reframed it as a positive thing and created a forum where people can serve each other and get what they want in life.

Daniel Pink wrote a book called To Sell Is Human all about humanizing sales. I needed that as a young seller when I was guilty of seeing CEOs as something other than human beings. I didn't see a woman who runs a business and has two kids in middle school.

Joe said he hates networking and what it represents. We tend to think of an alpha male chasing someone down with a business card. It's about understanding pain points and needs and then responding to them.

Many salespeople are too aggressive and competitive because we feel the pressure. Instead, we have to reframe networking and sales.

It's not about us, but that's a tough concept in this narcissistic culture.

Joe suggested using a 5-10-15 process in which he holds a minimum of 5 meetings, 10 pieces of written correspondence, and a minimum of 15 phone calls.

It's less about the numbers and more about the system. Your listeners could start with a 2-4-6 system. Make a plan that keeps you accountable to yourself.

We're basically all independent contractors and this kind of system will create internal accountability.

You can connect with Joe at joesweeney.com/networking where you can access inexpensive online training programs. They can help your listeners move the needle in their business and sales lives but also in their personal lives.

You can also grab a copy of his book, Networking Is A Contact Sport.

This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.

TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump.

If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that. The new semester of TSE Certified Sales Training Program begins in April and it would be an absolute honor to have you join us.

This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.

Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.

I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.

If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.

Mentioned in this episode:

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS

HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS