S&MM SoundOff

Change Your Strategy

I play softball in a mixed league and our team is evenly divided between men and women. Although we play well defensively, we do not score enough runs to consistently win. This is largely due to the fact that not everyone is effective at batting which means we often leave people stranded on base. An insight from one our players may change this.

League rules state that no more than two men can bat in a row and our team captain has been alternating guy/girl in the batting order. However, one person on the team suggested that we place our best hitters (male and female) close together in the line up. While we may go hitless in the latter innings we should be able to generate more runs because the strongest hitters will be grouped together.

How does this relate to sales?

Too many sales people use the same strategy even when it doesn’t work. If you aren’t getting the results you want, it is essential that you change your approach and apply a new strategy. Doing what you have always done will only get you so far. If you want to get better results you need to change your strategy.

Kelley Robertson helps sales professionals and businesses discover new techniques to improve their sales and profits. Receive a FREE copy of 100 Ways to Increase Your Sales by subscribing to his free newsletter available at http://www.RobertsonTrainingGroup.com. For information on his programs contact him at 905-633-7750 or by email.

Five Signs of Trouble with Office Management

By Ruth Haag, www.ManageLiving.com

Is your office people-environment normal?  Many things that we wish wouldn't happen, do happen every day in a normal office.  Deadlines are missed, people don't get along with one another, someone breaks the rules.  All of these things are normal, day-to-day problems that can be easily dealt with.

So, how do you determine if things are a bit off track, and your office management is in trouble?  Here are some clear signs.

1. The leadership is reactive rather than proactive
When leadership is good, proactive things happen, and workers are all generally moving toward a positive goal.  When management is reactive, all work in the office is focused on solving problems.  In a reactive environment, it is very hard to make progress.

2. More than 50% of the time 100% of the staff isn’t working
I often ask supervisors in my training classes how productive they think their employees are.  The normal response is 50%.  This means that 50% of the time, most supervisors feel that their staff is producing a good product. If a staff is less productive than this, it is a sign that there are problems.  Rather than working, the staff is either complaining about their supervisors, or consumed with senseless tasks.

3.  The staff mutinies
When an entire staff refuses to work, there is a problem.  A mutiny is often tied to safety issues.  The staff feels that, if they continue to work, they will be in danger of having an accident.

4. Most of the staff is complaining about the leadership
It is normal for everyone to complain about their supervisor sometimes, especially just after a new policy or procedure is put into place.  What is abnormal is if all of the staff is complaining about the leadership all of the time.

5. Good, well-respected workers resign
A normal office has a steady flow of workers in and out.  What is abnormal is entire departments turning over each year, or a steady outflow of the best workers.

Ruth Haag is the President and CEO of Haag Environmental Company, a hazardous waste consulting firm.  Ruth is also a business management consultant. She and her partner Bob Haag host the weekly radio show “Manage Living,” which can also be heard on-demand at www.manageliving.com. Ruth has authored a four-book series for supervisors. She offers business management courses through Ohio colleges, and she also provides private contract training. She is the publisher of Ohio’s monthly newspaper for thinking people, A Sandusky Bay Journal.

Sales Performance Measurement

By Dave Stein

When we ask sales executives how they measure sales performance, 60% of them tell us that they don’t measure it at all.  Of the remaining 40%, a majority depend solely on a single trailing indicator-performance against quota.  If other metrics are even mentioned, they are typically the size/trending of their pipeline or the number of proposals they submit resulting in a win.

When you consider a typical enterprise, you’ll find that almost every department has a set of processes or procedures and metrics by which performance is measured:  finance (GAAP), manufacturing (ISO 9000 and/or Six Sigma), customer service (customer satisfaction surveys), HR (employee retention, 360 degree surveys), logistics (throughput, on-time delivery), IT (TCO: Total Cost of Ownership), and even marketing (direct marketing campaign conversion rates, for example).  In most companies, the last bastion to institutionalize formal processes and comprehensive and accurate measurement is sales.  (Some sales training companies are leaders in the area of helping their clients measure sales performance.)

Why is Sales Last When It Comes to Measurement and Process?

The root cause of the sales function being last in line is related to the personalities, traits and established behavior patterns of many typically right-brained sales executives who came up through the ranks of sales themselves. Back when they were salesreps, process and measurement was uncommon in sales. It was much less of a critical component for success than it is today.  At that same time, the engineers, accountants and factory workers in that same company were driven by process-the output of their work carefully monitored, measured and adjusted along the way by typically left-brained management.

Today those former sales reps, who are now sales leaders, are behind the curve when it comes to process and especially measurement.  They didn’t “grow up” with it, and now they are too busy to embrace it. Instead, they are regularly involved with helping the bottom third of their team drive business while hoping to somehow make their numbers, depending on forecasts aggregated from uncalibrated individual pipelines from their reps.

What’s the Answer? 

As an integral component of your sales methodology, monitor five to eight carefully selected leading and lagging indicators to measure ongoing productivity-not activity-of every member of your sales team.  Based upon those behavioral and performance indicators, you can make adjustments to your processes when necessary, redeploying resources, responding quickly to new competitive threats and providing the field with the right messages, tools, strategies and tactics before its too late.

Here are two of the metrics companies employing performance measurement best-practices are using to gain transparency into what is really coming down the pipeline:

• Accuracy of reps’ date forecasts for opportunities moving from one phase of the sales cycle to the next. 
• Average opportunity attrition rate from one phase of the sales cycle to the next. 

The Bottom Line

Installing, then monitoring leading and lagging sales performance indicators and making appropriate real time adjustments in approach, process and behaviors is a critical component of stellar sales performance.  As Peter Drucker said, “You can’t improve what you don’t measure.”

This post is originally from Dave Stein's personal blog at http://davesteinsblog.wordpress.com/, June 19, 2008. Dave Stein is CEO & Founder of ES Research Group, Inc. He is also a monthly strategy columnist for Sales & Marketing Management magazine.

"I Sense Some Hesitation"

We have all experienced situations when a prospect seems reluctant to move forward with a buying decision. Everything seemed to go well during your conversations and they were responsive to your solution. However, now, things have stalled. They aren’t saying no but they have not agreed to move ahead either.

Here is an approach that can help you find out what is behind the delay.

Say to them, “I sense some hesitation.” Then wait for them to respond. It may take a few moments as they collect their thoughts and figure out the best reply. However, this approach is a great way to find out what the other person is thinking. Here is why it works.

1. It is non-threatening. You are not demanding an answer or challenging their decision. You are simply making a statement that indicates an awareness of the other person’s behaviour.

2. It is not a rebuttal. Too often salespeople continue to rebut objections which can cause people to become defensive.

3. It is phrased as a statement. Statements like this can be easier to answer because they are non-confrontational.

These four words are a great way to uncover a customer’s true objection and reason for not moving ahead with their purchase or buying decision.

Kelley Robertson helps sales professionals and businesses discover new techniques to improve their sales and profits. Receive a FREE copy of 100 Ways to Increase Your Sales by subscribing to his free newsletter available at www.kelleyrobertson.com. For information on his programs contact him at 905-633-7750 or by email.

Communication Made Simple: Get to Your Point Quickly!

By Brian Shannon

Once your reps have mastered the above concept, interaction with their prospects will become markedly more productive. It's a lesson I've learned the hard way: When I was first starting out, I was taught a sales process that had me asking lots of questions to avoid giving the buyer too much information about my proposed solution. My sales meetings would typically take 60 to 90 minutes, yet by the end of them, my target buyer sometimes had no idea what it was I trying to sell them or how much it would cost.

You see, my training dictated I first gather as much information as possible, and then bring it back to my team for a discussion. At that point, we would figure out the right way to deliver a proposal. Not only did this process seem to irritate some of my prospective clients, I found it to be a huge waste of my time.

Yes, I am a proponent of asking good questions. But I’m not an advocate of dancing around questions made by the client in order to hide what your solution might really be. Direct questions deserve direct responses. Your reps prefer that when dealing with a potential buyer, and they desire the same kind of treatment in return. Why wait to the end to give them the bottom line?

I advocate starting most presentations by stating the meeting’s objective. This seems to disarm the buyer, but it also sets a tone of candor with them. Direct communication is often reciprocated by the client. The benefit of this approach is that it’s easy to determine how serious the prospective buyer is right from the start.

Company executives tend to make up their minds in less than five minutes. If that is true, then why wait to the last five minutes of a 90-minute presentation to tell them what the bottom line is? Most likely they have already tuned out of your presentation or have left the meeting because “something else came up.”

I think of myself as a straight shooter, and I respond best to people who try to sell me in that fashion. Salespeople who are direct with me may not always win the business, but they will know where they stand after a short meeting. Direct conversations will likely lead to more constructive sales engagements for both parties.

Brian Shannon is a noted sales guru, public speaker and writer. Find him online at www.brianshannon.net.

Don't Become a Statistic

Way, way back in our August 2002 issue, S&MM did a cover story on a gentleman by the name of Ken Krusensterna. Six years later, I wouldn’t be surprised if anyone who read it still has nightmares.

On November 4, 1998, Krusensterna—then the president of a Dallas-based trucking company—was abducted shortly after crossing the Mexican border. He had entered the country after dark (against his better judgment), set up by an employee in league with the kidnappers.

For the next 14 days, while his abductors demanded a $350,000 ransom from his family, Krusensterna was held captive and tortured. Luckily, Mexican officials working with the FBI succeeded in tracking the kidnappers. Krusensterna was finally freed in a dramatic rescue operation, but the physical and psychological after-effects of the experience were substantial. Following his recovery, he closed his business and opened a security consulting firm in Phoenix, determined to help other traveling businessmen avoid a similar fate.

Needless to say, overseas travel for Americans has become anything but safer in the decade following Krusensterna’s ordeal. And for the upper-level sales executive—an individual whose appearance and behavior are often tantamount to holding up a big neon dollar sign—the dangers are magnified tenfold.

In the forthcoming July/August issue of S&MM, you’ll find an excellent article penned by Ed Lee, a retired U.S. State Department Regional Security Officer who spent much of his career protecting U.S. diplomats and business executives abroad. Presently the managing director of Sleeping Bear Risk Solutions (www.sbrisksolutions.com), he’s also the author of the new book Staying Safe Abroad: Traveling, Working and Living in a Post-9/11 World.

As his credentials and the title of the book would lead you to believe, Lee is someone who knows a thing or two about staying safe overseas. And in the upcoming story, he shares proven strategies for doing just that with S&MM’s readers. Give it a read—the few minutes it takes to do so may well add years to your life.

New Brands Show Mixed Results

Strawberry Shortcake eating fruit and talking on a cell phone? Care Bears shedding pounds? This can only mean one thing: companies are transforming classic cartoon characters for the purpose of appealing to young toy-buyers. Notwithstanding the displeasure felt by some older people, these changes represent a well-entrenched phenomenon showing corporate America’s near obsession with reinventing old brands. While people are sure to take sides, it’s too simplistic to say "new branding is good" or "new branding is bad." Sometimes it's great. Sometimes it's downright horrendous. Sometimes it's in between.   

New branding is great when, for example, a company takes a long-time product and makes it better in some substantial way. Take water enriched with vitamins. Here, an ingenious person has taken our most vital resource, the stuff of life, and made it tasty and nutritious. Now, I can drink water that contains a delightful blend of apple and raspberry, to go along with providing vitamin C and zinc. Whereas I once had to consume a boring, but vital substance in order to hydrate, I currently do so with a taste I enjoy. 

If that’s not progress, I don’t know what is.

Commendable brand changes can also come in more stylistic ways – as seen with cartoon characters, companies can modernize a product’s image and still appeal to older people’s nostalgia. Many toy companies have demonstrated a capacity for executing this tricky maneuver. For instance, Mickey Mouse – after all these years – brings in about $5 billion dollars a year for its parent company, Disney. While some people bemoan such a change, I think it shows the character’s ability to grow and stay with the times. As long as Mickey still has that timeless, endearing quality there’s no need for alarm.

That said, however, some brand changes miss the mark completely. On occasion, a company, looking to innovate, takes a perfectly good item and mutates it into something worthy of disdain. If you were curious enough to try Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper, you know exactly what I’m talking about (the awful taste and icky feeling in your body induced by all the chemicals made me wish they had just stuck with classic Dr. Pepper).

Other times, a company cultivates a new image that, I think, people are basically indifferent to. For example, I don’t think too many people were picketing when the long-time car company came out with an advertisement campaign sporting the catchphrase, “Not Your Father’s Cadillac.” Up until that point, old men may have identified with the line of luxury automobiles; however, I don’t think they held the kind of emotional attachment many people have with, say, a cartoon character. Similarly, I don’t think too many people in their 20s and 30s were getting ecstatic in their living rooms. 

With these examples in mind, there’s no blanket statement that should be thrown on the notion of companies reinventing their brands. Such changes range from the hits (check Vitamin Water) to the misses (check Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper). Considering there will be plenty of them in the future, I think we should all sit back and assess them on a case-to-case basis.

Communication in Uneasy Economic Times

By Mona Piontkowski, SeminarInformation.com

Trying to come up with a hot topic to write about in this blog I just wandered over to my website, SeminarInformation.com, to see what types of seminars have been added to the huge database of seminars and conferences -- figuring I'd be able to see the trends in business based on the types of seminars being given.

Throughout the years, we've been in business since 1981, we've been able to predict the hot trends for the coming year by utilizing the information coming into us by the seminar sponsors. We're the largest database of seminars on the Internet listing courses for over 600 seminarmsponsoring organizations. Over the years some of the topics and titles of the seminars have been intriguing, to say the least. One of my all time favorites was "On a Clear Day You Can See Your Desktop."

What would I find--oh there are seminars on the foreclosure crisis, seminars on childhood obesity, women's health issues, the multigenerational workforce as well as the usual seminars on the latest software from Microsoft, the latest edition of older software, courses on finance and accounting, general management topics.

What really stuck out were the number of seminars directed towards managers and supervisors, both new and experienced that dealt with how to communicate with workers and how to handle or deal effectively with disruptive employee behavior. What with the economy crumbling around us and with the cost of just about everything going through the roof one would think that employees would be on their best behavior so as to assure their continued employment. Yet the opposite seems to be true. Is it the stress of current conditions, the inability to keep up with mortgage payments, the feeling of being robbed everytime you fill up your gas tank, employees are acting up at work. Managers find it harder to communicate and be understood as workers close down or act up.

Take a look at a few of the offerings they may help you with your own communication skills:

"Communication Skiils: Results Through Collaboration"
http://www.seminarinformation.com/qqbdnd/communication-skills-results-through-collaboration

"Building Better Work Relationships"
http://www.seminarinformation.com/qqaauu/building-better-work-relationships-new-techniques-for

"How To Become a Better Communicator"
http://www.seminarinformation.com/qqaywv/how-to-become-a-better-communicator

and if you're still having problems:

"Dealing With Difficult People" http://www.seminarinformation.com/qqbsfu/dealing-with-difficult-people

Looks like it's going to be a long summer.

"Describe for Me"

My wife operates a secret shopper program for one of our clients, and as part of the screening process, she asks applicants to complete a questionnaire before being accepted. One of the questions begins with "Describe your most memorable experience at..." and how each applicant answers this question gives my wife great insight into the person's reporting ability.

Some applicants include a lot of information in their response which means our client will likely get a detailed report whereas some people simply write basic information. Ultimately, the people who are selected to be secret shoppers demonstrate passion and enthusiasm, as well as high-quality information.

Here is what this means to you.

When you are asked what you do, do you respond with a short statement like, “I sell life insurance” or do you answer with an energetic reply such as, “I help give people comfort and peace of mind in knowing that their loved ones will be taken care of in the event of a crisis”?

You can also use my wife's question when talking to new prospects or existing customers. For example, "Please describe the decision-making process for purchases of this nature." This question is a non-threatening way to encourage someone to divulge information.

Kelley Robertson helps sales professionals and businesses discover new techniques to improve their sales and profits. Receive a FREE copy of 100 Ways to Increase Your Sales by subscribing to his free newsletter available at www.kelleyrobertson.com. For information on his programs contact him at 905-633-7750 or by email.

Female Entrepreneurs Keep Speaking Out

By Kelly McCormick

A few months back, I asked female entrepreneurs "What should vendors know when selling to you?" and shared their responses in "Gender Bender: The Real Deal on Female Entrepreneurs." The women (ages 29 to 79) had a lot to say. This month, I’ll share some more of their insights and feedback, which went straight to the heart of sales. Get ready for the report card.

Sales Grades

The bad news: Companies and sellers still don’t understand many key things about how to sell to women business owners.

The good news: The female “solo-preneurs” offered tremendous insight as to what you should know about their buying style—information that could help continually increase your profits, stressed the women. So let’s get started.

You just read the opening of my recent online column for the Manage Smarter Web site. Read the full article to find out what it takes to sell to female entrepreneurs. Go to ManageSmarter.com. © 2008 Kelly McCormick, All rights reserved.

About Kelly McCormick
Kelly McCormick, from OutSell Yourself™, is a sales expert.  She writes an online monthly column on women and sales for Sales & Marketing Management. Get Kelly's OutSell Yourself™ tips and information on her ‘Sell to Women’ and ‘Sell to All Buyers’ sessions and keynote talks at www.OutSellYourself.com. Kelly's book, OutSell Yourself™: How to Sell Without Selling, is soon to be released.  Kelly can be contacted by calling 800-889-9637 (PST).