Author: Jay Mitchell



Make your customer and prospect meetings count, part 2: Serving your buyers during the meeting

March 30, 2017
Jay Mitchell

Many salespeople leave most of their customer meetings with the thought, “That went pretty well.”

Yet surveyed prospects deem 89% of meetings as failures and B2B buyers believe just 8% of salespeople focus on driving “valuable” end results for the buyer. (Forrester Research) Fifty-six percent of all buyers rate their buying experience as “less than satisfied.” (DemandGenReport)

This isn’t the customer’s or prospect’s problem — this is a problem sales leaders and their teams must address, as their revenue performance hangs in the balance.

In this three-part series, we will tackle how to prepare for your meetings with buyers, how to serve your buyers during the meeting, and how to follow-up to ensure you will serve your buyers for the long haul.

 

How to best serve your buyers during the meeting:

By this point, you should have done more than enough research to understand your buyer’s situation. Assuming that is the case, you should be in good shape to lead a valuable meeting. That is what your customers and prospects seek after all — value. In order to ensure your value gets communicated, keep these three things in mind.

1) Position the conversation from your buyer’s point of view — not yours or your company’s.

As human beings, our conversations naturally flow from our own perspectives, based on our own experiences, knowledge and pain points. Fight the urge to follow this pattern in client conversations — because your customer or prospect meeting should be all about your customer or prospect, not about you. When you position your conversation and your pitch from their situation and perspective, you make the meeting about their needs — not your solution. You add value to their business, rather than guiding the conversation to help your own company make a sale. And, most importantly, you become a member of their team, not an outsider.

Show you truly care about their needs by being an expert in their industry. Discuss with the buyer the research you did leading up to the meeting and leverage that knowledge to share insights with them and leading practices that can enhance their process execution. And begin to establish a business case for where they really need your help. At this point in the conversation, it is more about where they need to improve and less what you have to offer.

2. Leverage the sales-ready assets marketing created to communicate your story.

All too often, the sales-ready assets from marketing end up in the bottom of a desk drawer. Although, if done well and leveraged properly, these assets can bring your story and solution to life and help show your buyer the value you can deliver that others cannot. Plus, these pieces arm your buyer with tools they can then take to other stakeholders within their company who may hold a role on the decision-making committee.

Consider bringing a hard copy of the following with you or emailing them over as a follow-up to the meeting:

  • Any value messaging and related industry insights relevant to that buyer
  • Your unique value proposition
  • Relevant client value stories that would resonate with that buyer

Your customer won’t have a lot of time to read through everything you give him or her, so review the materials — even if briefly — while you are there in-person or over the phone.

3. Do not avoid difficult conversations — embrace them.

During the course of interacting with your buyer you are going to encounter some push-back. Seize the opportunity while you are with them to address their concerns.

Objections can feel like defeat, but if you embrace them and see them as opportunities to share the true value of your solution, you will continue to draw the buyer in to your story and lead them closer to solving their pain. Use the objection they are voicing to get to the heart of what their concern truly is, and seek clarification where necessary. Each time you are able to tackle a concern and provide calm to their worry, you are one step closer to the “yes.”

Often before your buyer is willing to pull the trigger on choosing you, they will want to make sure the outstanding questions in their mind — or the ones their boss will ask them — have been put on the table and appropriately addressed. If you are getting objections, then your buyer is often ready to engage you as the solution provider. So don’t be timid, but don’t be abrasive either. Maintain the posture of serving them first, which you established from your initial interaction.

I realize it is not easy to tell your customer that they could be doing something better. But if you position your dialogue with them in a way that focuses on solving their problems and what they will gain by heeding your advice, and offer relevant insights and perspectives along the way, your customer will thank you in the long run. Plus, they will see you as a long-term partner.
Stay tuned for the final “Make Your Customer and Prospect Meetings Count, Part 3,” where I’ll share vital components to following up with a buyer after a meeting.

Customer and prospect meetings

Make your customer and prospect meetings count, part 1: Planning ahead for success

March 23, 2017
Jay Mitchell

When your customer takes a meeting with you or your sales team, your team has to deliver — with value, relevance and consistency. You need to bring your A-game for this meeting and for all other meetings, because every communication touch point you have with your customer or prospect impacts your long-term relationship — it is a “moment of truth.”

Many salespeople leave most of their customer meetings with the thought, “That went pretty well.”

Yet surveyed prospects deem 89% of meetings as failures.* B2B buyers believe just 8% of salespeople focus on driving “valuable” end results for the buyer.* Fifty-six percent of all buyers rate their buying experience as “less than satisfied.”**

This isn’t the customer’s or prospect’s problem — this is a problem sales leaders and their teams must address, as their revenue performance hangs in the balance.

In this three-part series, we will tackle how to prepare for your meetings with buyers, how to serve your buyers during the meeting, and how to follow-up to ensure you will serve your buyers for the long haul.  

How to prepare for your meetings with buyers:

Today’s world keeps us running fast with too little time and unending to-do lists. Salespeople land meetings with buyers sometimes on a moment’s notice. Whether you have an hour or a month before your meeting, always make the time to prepare.  

Aspire for a More-Personal Meeting

Your prospect or customer either accepts your invitation to meet or requests a meeting with you. You may be tempted to take the easiest route of communicating your solution: email.

I urge you to push for a phone call — or even better, a face-to-face meeting. In person, you can read nonverbal cues, take better control of the situation and show your buyers that you are there 100% to serve their needs. Think how many other solutions are sitting in their inbox. Set yourself and your solution apart by investing in some face-time.

Do Your Research

According to a CSO Insights report, just 47% of salespeople believe that they understand the buyer’s situation before pitching a solution. Even worse, just 42% of those same salespeople surveyed think they can effectively deliver a compelling value proposition.

You and your sales team need to step up to the other half. Know your customer, and know their industry and their business. Learn your prospect’s pains. Devote a small chunk of time every morning, or over every lunch break, or every afternoon — whenever you have time — to read up on and learn more about your buyer’s industry and business.

Your buyer will be impressed with your insights on their current business outlook. They will be even more thankful when you can educate them on new challenges in their industry and likely impacts on their business. You will then be positioned well to lead them to solutions that will help them stay ahead and prepare for what’s to come — giving them a competitive advantage.

Work With Marketing to Create the Right Sales-Ready Assets

Sales professionals waste two days a week creating sales cycle content.***  This statistic isn’t just alarming from a productivity standpoint but also from a value standpoint. Marketing departments are equipped with professionals who specialize in creating these materials, while your and your sales professionals’ time is best invested engaging, communicating and serving prospects.

Instead of doing all the work yourself, partner with your marketing team to:

Stay tuned for “Make Customer and Prospect Meetings Count, Part 2,” where I’ll share vital components to leading a successful meeting with your buyer.

*Forrester Research
**DemandGenReport
***CMO Council
Bridge the gap between sales and marketing

3 Things to do this quarter to bridge the gap between marketing and sales

March 17, 2017
Jay Mitchell

We don’t need to take much time in this post to make a case for the gap between marketing and sales. We all know it exists and experience the chasm to some extent every day. But in case you need to be reminded, here are two statistics that should cause everyone in the industry to stop in their tracks:

  • 60–70% of marketing content is never used. (Content Marketing Institute)
  • B2B companies’ inability to align sales and marketing teams around the right processes has cost them upwards of 10% or more of revenue per year. (IDC)

This isn’t a little problem — one to push off until next year or even next quarter. Your bottom line depends on you taking action today.

Companies with aligned sales and marketing generated 208% more revenue from marketing. (MarketingProfs)

Leaders must bring together their teams to stop wasting precious company time and money. But all too often leadership doesn’t know where to begin, or they only apply bandages where major surgery is needed. Here are three tangible things you can do this quarter to begin to mend one of the biggest issues attacking your revenue performance:

  1. Agree on the target buyer profile (characteristics, attributes, personas).

    This seems like a simple step, but this is where a majority of miscommunication and mistakes begin. You may think your sales and marketing teams are aligned and after the same prospects, but there is a good chance there are more discrepancies here than you think. Even small variances in audience profiles cause marketing to generate unqualified leads and/or create irrelevant content for the sales teams. Take the time this quarter to sit down with both sales and marketing to ensure everyone understands who the target buyer is. Have both teams capture for you (and one another) the characteristics (e.g. industry, size, geography), attributes (catalysts like M&A activity, executive turnover) and personas (e.g. CFO, CIO). This will reveal any disconnect and kick start the dialogue for alignment on a common target buyer profile.

  2. Invite marketing to support some sales cycles (e.g, preparing for the conversations, developing the proposal, identifying the differentiators)…even if it is behind the scenes.

    You might be asking, “Who has time for this?” Go back and look at how much revenue is potentially being lost annually (10%) and make the time. Even if your sales and marketing teams are strategically placed in close proximity doesn’t necessarily mean your employees communicate regularly. And even if your employees say they communicate regularly, doesn’t mean they are having the fruitful, aligning conversations you envision. Inviting marketing to take part in the daily grind of the sales team, allowing them to see where their work flows and how it is used, will dramatically change their point of reference and thus what they create on their end —in turn providing more value to your sales professionals.

  1. Invite sales into the campaign planning meetings (e.g. market segmentation/territory coverage alignment, activity timing, sales’ role in the campaigns).

    Inviting sales into the marketing world empowers ales to pose necessary questions to be asked and processes to be refined. Create space for the teams to understand each other’s challenges and find ways to work together to overcome them. Is marketing not providing enough leads in general? Are there too many unqualified leads passing over to sales? Is sales even using the leads marketing is providing? Take the time to dig in and address the issues both teams have been complaining about.

    This relationship needs to flow both ways. The current divide between sales and marketing is not one team’s fault more than the other. Be sure as you initiate these proven techniques, to emphasize the importance of everyone working together toward the common goal of boosting revenue performance.

    Bonus step 4. Set up a regular cadence to not only review the pipeline but also the three items above on a monthly basis.

    Yes, monthly. These steps are not meant to be a checklist but a new process. This process creates more than mutual understanding. It establishes lasting alignment that equips your sales and marketing teams to take your company’s revenue performance to new heights.

 

Want to discuss how Mereo can help your team implement these game-changing steps? Email us at information@mereo.co.



Dive inside the mind of your buyer — and discover a solution to serve them

February 28, 2017
Jay Mitchell

I see this issue often: A salesperson engages their buyer a couple times, getting a feel for their business and needs, and quickly responds by spewing a scripted pitch, focusing solely on landing a deal. They wonder, after their buyer passes on their “solution,” what went wrong.

Even though buyers might look and sound like one another does not mean that they are well-served with the same solutions — or when examined closer, even similar at all.

According to Forrester, only 27% of buyers believe salespeople are knowledgeable about the buyer’s specific business.

That means 73% of buyers see salespeople as product pushers, not as individuals who can — and care to — solve their problems. In today’s business world, sellers must dive deeper to understand specific struggles in order to deliver unique and valuable solutions. In doing so, salespeople become trusted advisors and valuable resources to their buyers.

How?

1. See your buyer’s pains through their perspective.

Sellers need to know more than a person’s job title and wife’s name. They need to spend enough time with their buyers — quality time either on the phone or in-person — to understand the intricate details of the buyer’s business, motivations and needs.

Ask your buyer about their everyday operations. Engage your buyer in relevant, meaningful dialogues. Walk in their shoes and understand their world. What issues keep cropping up? Learn the specifics.

If you have a buyer who tells you, “Every day at 11 a.m. I get this report that’s missing these three vital components…” take note of those and help your buyer find a solution.

Do you know your buyer well enough? Ask yourself these questions to see.
  • What does a day in the life of your buyer look like?
  • How does your buyer’s job function within his/her overall department? The overall division? The overall organization? What ripple effect do their issues have in the hierarchy?
  • What worries are top-of-mind for your buyer that they want to fix, accomplish and/or avoid? How can you help alleviate these?
  • What motivates your buyer? Saving their company money? Beating the competition? Serving their peers and leadership? Making more money?
  • What are your buyer’s goals? What are your buyer’s company’s objectives? How can you help them reach or better yet exceed these?

2. Deliver your buyer a solution — not a product.

At Mereo, our mindset always comes back to this core tenet: seek to serve, not to sell™. Once you have gained your buyer’s perspective and gotten into their mindset, you can begin to see solutions from their point of view and how they can apply to their world. You can see the true value behind products and services, and you can help your buyer understand how these solutions can serve them.

Are you serving your clients instead of selling to them? Ask yourself these questions as you review your solutions.
  • Will this solution help my buyer do their job better?
  • Will this solution help my buyer better serve their boss, team, co-workers and/or customers?
  • Will this solution make my buyer’s life easier?

3. Follow up often to review their gains.

For me, business has always been about more than dollar signs. When I work closely with people, I come to truly care about their wants, needs and desires. As such, it is important to maintain a close relationship with your buyer even beyond selling a valuable solution. This allows you to review the impact of your solutions and to evolve your understanding of your buyer’s world as it changes.

Did your solution truly serve your buyer? Ask your buyer these questions to know.
  • What were the tangible outcomes after the solution was implemented?
  • Did you have any issues with incorporating or maintaining the solution? Why?
  • What did your business gain with this solution?
  • Did you reach your goals? Why/why not? What can be done to refine those outcomes?
  • What could have improved the solution on your end?

Taking these three simple steps, and asking these suggested questions will help you better understand your buyer, allowing you to serve them and other buyers down the road.

Need help getting in the mind of your buyers? Contact us at information@mereo.co.



Caution for the optimistic CEO in 2017

February 9, 2017
Jay Mitchell

While the business world always shifts when a new leader steps in, this political season caused more chatter and anxiety than most. As business leaders adjust to what seemed like an unlikely election outcome, their optimism for the year ahead is something to take note of:

“CEOs are surprisingly optimistic about growth: 38% are very confident in their company’s 12-month revenue growth prospects.” (PwC)

In meeting with clients and colleagues around the world over the past few weeks, I have seen an unfamiliar trend in budget cycles. Many companies are delaying their budget planning to February, giving them time to adjust appropriately to the upcoming economic shifts. The presidential election result is causing a ripple of optimism in the business world, leading to larger budgets and investments for 2017.

Business leaders are planning for capital expenditures — adding numbers to their sales and support teams, putting extra money toward development of new solutions and planning to get products out the door in 2017 that were slated for 2018. While this is an exciting time after years of disappointing revenue growth since the recession, here are a few tips to move forward wisely in these uncharted territories.

1) Proceed with caution.

If you were planning on growing 8%, for example, but now think you could grow 12%, why not settle on a target of 10% to keep from overshooting? The current optimism isn’t unwarranted, but be careful not to set yourself up for failure. If you want to increase your spending by 2%, awesome — but watch to see how the first half of the year goes and allow yourself the opportunity to readjust in June after assessing performance trends.

2) Have an upside contingency plan.

You may be used to having a downside contingency plan, but now is the time to institute the opposite as well. Over the last decade business leaders were prepared to miss their numbers, but now, if the optimism produces its predicted results, you should have a plan in place if you happen to exceed your numbers.

3) Be prepared to grow your sales team.

A common mistake I see too often is sales leaders unprepared to hire new talent. If you are just getting your hands on your budget for new hires, between the recruiting and interviewing, it will be June before you fill your team. You should constantly be recruiting — keeping your eyes and ears open for the right talent at all times. Even if you do not officially have the headcount to hire for several months down the road, you should have relationships built and candidates in your pocket, so when the time comes, you can move efficiently and quickly. This will allow your team to keep its forward motion. Spending weeks or months waiting to add vital sales professionals to your team could cost your company missed sales and opportunities — a big loss, especially in a good year.

Unlike popular belief, the recession (or at least the ripple of it) is still being felt. Our research has proven that these past few years have been hard on businesses of all sizes. In 2015 29% of Fortune 500 companies had negative revenue growth, and 40% grew at a less than 2% rate [see our revenue performance report]. We hope 2017 will bring a turnaround, the uptick many companies desperately need. But in your optimism, move forward wisely.

Want to talk about how to develop a revenue performance plan to make 2017 your best year yet? Contact us at information@mereo.co



A profound sales lesson from a Christmas classic

December 23, 2016
Jay Mitchell

It is a joy to be able to sit back and reflect on another year. Along with our ongoing clients, 2016 brought many new opportunities and relationships. We are extremely thankful for each and every one of you. Serving you is our purpose and our passion. Reflecting on this year – one that will be remembered as the good kind of crazy – brings back many good memories and successful metrics to back up the work we were able to do together.

We head into 2017 pressing forward in excitement and anticipation to support our current and future clients as they reach new levels of success. Part of this passionate mission is to reverse some frightening statistics that frankly get under our skin:

According to Forrester Research, executive buyers believe only 8% of salespeople are focused on driving a “valuable” end result for the buyer. Another study done by DemandGen Report, reveals that 56% of all buyers rate their buying experience as “less than satisfied.” Yikes. This means many buyers 1) no longer trust sellers and 2) they are not pleased with their experience.

However, sellers often feel they are doing their job. They see themselves as passionate about what they’re selling, yet it comes off as pushy, which is unattractive to buyers. How can sellers fix the disconnect between the buyer and themselves?

It all comes down to mastering the skill of seeking to serve and not to sell – the idea of putting the customer’s needs before making a profit. This is the foundation that Mereo is built on, and we strive to exemplify this in all of our relationships as well as enable clients with the confidence to embrace it unwaveringly.

The holiday season always reminds me of a classic Christmas movie that has long helped paint a picture of what seek to serve, not to sell™ personifies in practice. In “Miracle on 34th Street” there is a scene where Kris Kringle is working as Santa Clause in a Macy’s store, and a woman and her son approach him. The son, Peter, asks Santa for a very specific fire engine, one that his mom had searched for throughout the entire Macy’s store and could not find.

The “typical” salesperson would have tried to talk Peter into a different toy that Macy’s carried to make the sale (Seeking to SELL). But Kris does something different, something memorable and noteworthy, he directs the mother and son to different store that still has toy fire engines in stock (Seeking to SERVE).

 

The mother was in disbelief. “Macy’s is sending people to other stores? … I don’t get it. I just don’t get it!” she exclaims. Kris made a lasting memory for this desperate mother, and showed her that Macy’s cared more about HER than a profit.

Having this attitude, this unexpected approach, stands out in a buying culture that can feel forceful and void of relationship. Seeking to SERVE buyers, although it may cause you to miss out on an immediate sale, will in turn build trust and relationships, which can lead to referrals or future sales. Putting buyers first and being an authentic salesperson always wins.

Our hope is to always display this in our interactions and to encourage each of you to do the same. In a culture constantly pushing us to be self-focused, we hope you and your teams can go against the grain and focus on your clients and their needs in 2017.

If you would like to make this a priority for your team this next year, but need some direction, don’t hesitate to reach out. Shoot us an email at information@mereo.co.

Wishing you, your teams and families a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Watch the clip from Miracle on 34th Street.

Stay sharp over the Holidays with these recommended reads.



Creating a proposal framework that closes

November 4, 2016
Jay Mitchell

Tell your prospect a story.

Recently we covered four common proposal pitfalls that are sabotaging your deals. Now we’re expanding on the proposal framework that can help take your proposals from review to close. When you have the proper framework for your proposal, you better communicate the necessary elements and your game-changing differentiators to your prospect, providing them with a compelling reason to choose you as their solution partner.

Before we get into the framework specifics, the most important thing to remember throughout the entire proposal process is to make the proposal about the prospect. This is not about you and what you can provide, but about them, their problem and how your solution will lead them to success.

People love stories. Stories resonate, stories illustrate and stories captivate. So when you arrange your proposal into a story format — featuring the prospect as the main character and protagonist — you will naturally compel your prospect to interact and react.

A compelling story — like an action adventure — starts with a villain (the pain). The hero (you, the solution) enters the fray to change the outcomes (the gain) for all parties. The story concludes with a big celebration highlighted on the front cover of the newspaper (the proof) about the victorious results.

That story formula — pain, solution, gain and proof — draws the buyer into the dialogue because it starts with them and positions the proposed scenario in their point-of-view. The story elements work together to create a bridge between the prospect and their pains, and you and your solutions.

Proposal Element 1: The Pain

First, when creating the content for the proposal, always begin with what we heard. This is your opportunity to speak specifically to the pains the client expressed in your discovery meeting and remind them of their own words.

Example: “John, when we talked on the phone last week, what we heard is that your team is struggling with “A.” You shared with us that you believe the reason for this is “B.”

It is important to remind them of why they contacted you in the first place, show them you were listening and have become an expert on their problem, bring them back to their pain and then drill down even further.

“Every moment you delay, you are losing more money. We need to fix these problems, and we need to fix them now.”

With the framing “what we heard”, you also have the opportunity to make refinements based on their confirmation of your situational summary. While respectful to them, it also fosters the partnership with your prospect.

Proposal Element 2: The Solution

Next, outline the solution essentials – that is, those solution capabilities that both you and any competitors (identified or potential) offer.

“When you work with us, here is the core package you’ll receive.”

This is your opportunity to set the bar. The prospect is likely having similar discussions with other solution providers, and you need to be sure to cover the essentials they are receiving everywhere else. You don’t want to miss important basics of what they need.

Following the solution essentials, it is time to bring your “wow factor” — your differentiators.

“But if you work with us, this is what you get above and beyond what you will receive elsewhere. This is the specific thing you will receive from our team that will take you to a whole new level of success.”

Earlier you set the bar with the essentials, and now you have the opportunity to raise it, setting-up an unfair competitive position™ for you in the mind of your prospect. They are receiving “A,” “B” and “C” everywhere else, but you need to expand on “D” — your competitive advantage — the factor that makes your solution worth the premium price you command. Make your differentiator the missing piece that truly solves their pain.

Proposal Element 3: The Gain

The next step, unveiling the solution outcome, will show the prospect the gain by choosing you.

“By working with us, the issue you came to us with will be solved.”

Discuss the outcomes in light of the “what we heard” summary you reviewed with your prospect earlier. Throughout the entire proposal you have been creating a sense of pain and urgency that has led you to this point. Now you are linking the gains they desire to the pains you spotlighted–  with your solution as the only bridge between the two.

Proposal Element 4: The Proof

This is the final, most underutilized piece necessary to help the prospect choose you and your solution. Providing proof, through case studies, client testimonials and even solution demonstrations, when appropriate, will show you are more than talk.

“Here is an example of a client we worked with who was suffering from a similar issue, and this is what we did to not only solve their problem, but we were also able to help this key metric improve by 10%.”

Again, this is about the prospect and their pain, so show them they are not alone in their struggle — but more importantly, show them what it can look like on the other side of the chasm they find themselves today. Give them a visual, a written testimony or client value story, and you can even put them in touch with a customer reference. Alternatively, highlight the elements of your solution (ideally differentiators) in a demonstration that directly address their pain, and deliver the target results.

Prepare for the proposal.

You may be wondering who has time for all of this. Surely, not your sales team!

Our advice is to have a template prepared in advance. This is going to save your front-line sales team crucial time and energy. The CSO Insights’ 2016 Sales Enablement Optimization Study shows that proposal templates are the top assets sellers leverage in the buying phase (see image below). Proposal templates empower sellers to tailor the content to the customer’s unique buying scenario — versus creating the content from scratch. Empower marketing and product marketing teams to collaborate to develop proposal templates. This partnership ensures the content includes necessary building blocks.

By following this framework and including these essential pieces to your proposal, you are sure to close more deals. If you have any questions on how to guide your team through this process, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at information@mereo.co.



4 Pitfalls sabotaging your proposals

October 4, 2016
Jay Mitchell

Oftentimes when we get to the proposal stage with a client, we assume their business is a sure thing. But if you have been in this business for a while, you know clients have ample time to back out — and occasionally they do. We’ve exposed 4 proposal pitfalls to help you learn how your proposal structure and process could be working against your business and, more importantly, strategies to avoid these issues.

1) No Pain:

If you were effective during your first interaction with the prospect, you were able to discover some of the pains they want to rectify. But in the time that passed from that first conversation, they may have forgotten why they are seeking out your expertise in the first place. You need to help them remember their pain. All too often when proposals are created, they are templated and focused on what you, the provider, can do. Make it personal instead. Speak directly to the specific pain the prospect expressed, and remind them why they need change — and why they need you. Use the proposal as an opportunity to highlight their issues, and prove how you can solve them.

2) No Urgency:

Don’t just make a case for why the prospect needs you, but prove why they need you now. “With each day that passes, you are losing “x” dollars by doing this manually. If you implement our solution within the next six weeks, you would save “y” dollars.” Help them realize the longer they wait, the bigger their issue will become. Give examples of why this is an urgent matter and how your solution can remedy the pains in order to activate the urgency to address those pains.

3) No Differentiation:

Chances are, your proposal sits among a pile of others your prospect is reviewing. Be sure your proposal provides clear examples of what you do that your competition cannot. How do you stand out? How are you different? How do you provide more value than others? Why should your client employ your solution, even if your price is higher, instead of someone else’s? Use your proposal as an opportunity to highlight the specific things only you can do to help take your prospect to the next level.

4) No Presentation:

If you are like most, your inbox overflows with junk and jumble that you may never open. If you send a proposal to your client’s inbox, there is a good chance it too will get lost. And worse, you are missing out on an opportunity to personally explain your solution, which could help prove your value to the client and investment in their business. Instead of just emailing the proposal, plan a call, a face-to-face meeting or a web conference to walk them through the essentials, and to prove why not moving forward with you could be detrimental to them achieving their goals. Show them they are important by giving them the time they deserve to better understand how they can move past their current problem.

Do not let your proposals be a hang up. Instead, make them the key to beginning a new client relationship. Your proposal is your opportunity to prove your worth and value — and a generic proposal, not tailored to the audience’s situation, will likely not be compelling. Put yourself in the prospect’s shoes and think about what would help you make the decision to choose your solution.

Stay tuned: Next week we will hit this topic again — providing some key elements to developing and delivering winning proposals.

status quo

King Arthur and status quo: A tale too often played out in sales

August 23, 2016
Jay Mitchell

Do you know what movie this picture is from?

It’s from Monty Python and the Holy Grail– a classic parody movie packed with humor and one-liners.

In this specific scene, King Arthur had just witnessed the Black Knight defeat the Green Knight in a duel. Arthur then approaches the Black Knight to congratulate him and offer him a seat at Arthur’s court on the Round Table, but the Black Knight only stands still, holding his sword, and makes no response until Arthur moves to cross the bridge. The Black Knight refuses to stand aside. Reluctantly, Arthur fights the Black Knight and, after a relatively short exchange of sabers, the Knight’s left arm is severed.

Even at this, the Knight refuses to let King Arthur pass, insisting his arm wound “‘Tis but a scratch”. The Knight claims he has “had worse”, and fights on while holding his sword with his remaining arm. Soon after, the Black Knight’s right arm is cut off by King Arthur, but again, the Knight still does not concede even though he has literally been disarmed. When Arthur points out the Black Knight’s injuries, the Knight insists “It’s just a flesh wound!” Then Arthur chops off the Black Knight’s right leg. After more banter, the Black Knight replies by saying, “I’m invincible!” to which Arthur replies, “You’re loony!” With an air of resignation, Arthur finally cuts off the left leg as well and sheathes his sword. Now reduced to a mere stump of a man, the Black Knight says, “All right, we’ll call it a draw”.

Sounds like “STATUS QUO” won in that battle of mortals.

Have you experienced something similar with your clients? While you, like King Arthur, may see the major issues clients are facing – outdated solutions/no arms to fight back – your clients continue to reply “‘Tis but a scratch” or “we are fine and will work through it.”

The problem with “Status Quo” is that, for most organizations, it is rooted in a belief that the problem is not as severe as it really is. Choosing Status Quo is perceived as comfortable and requires little risk and little effort. But oh, what a fallacy that is, and sadly enough the failure often lies at the feet of the seller. Why the seller? Isn’t the buyer just being stubborn and harming themselves by refusing to acknowledge their dire straits?

Our purpose in selling is to help solve client’s problems – their pains – but that must begin with clients acknowledging that their problem is indeed painful…that is more than just a scratch.

As sellers, it is our job to help clients understand the risk in not making a change is higher than stepping-out and trying something new.

The best way to bring insight to your buyers is to help them gain a more accurate reality into the pains their underlying need is causing. There are three categories of pains that sellers need to activate within the buyers:

  • Business pains are typically associated with symbols, such as % and #. They are measurements including: declining customer satisfaction levels, deteriorating department reputation, lost market share and higher employee attrition.
  • Financial pains are typically associated with currency symbols such as $, €, £ and ¥. They often are directly correlated to the business pains, and include performance metrics like higher operating costs, lower revenues and increased customer acquisition/retention costs.
  • Personal pains typically associate with the symbols L, J and !, and this is ALWAYS the pain that matters most to a buyer. Examples include reduced compensation/bonus/equity payouts, increased threats to job security and reduced personal time/quality of life.

As sales professionals, it is fundamental we embrace the opportunity to help buyers recognize their problems keeping them from success. Like King Arthur, you may see the severe catastrophe and bleeding right in front of you, but unless you enable your client to internalize the true pain of their current state, and find ways to make them see it too, “Status Quo” will continue to win and your clients will never reach their true potential.



Unplug to charge-up

June 30, 2016
Jay Mitchell

“Unplug to Charge-up” –doesn’t that sound like an oxymoron? When your iPhone warns it only has 5% battery, if you are like me, you quickly search for your charger and get your phone plugged in ASAP. Where we, as humans, often seek out busyness in our schedule, both professionally and personally, when our batteries run low– the opposite of what we should be doing. And sadly, the impact of inserting busyness when we need rest often pays diminishing returns.

A couple weeks ago, I had the opportunity to get off the grid with my family — an opportunity to truly unplug. We took the time to hang out with one another and disconnect from the distractions of life – no TV or iPads, no summer reading for school, no practices/games/competitions for the kids, no housework for mom and no business work for dad. That last one hurt a bit with some great client engagements on the plate 🙂 It meant I physically had to turn off my laptop and smartphone, but oh how rewarding that was. While we didn’t get much sleep, as we were having a blast together all day and late into the evening, we came home from our vacation more rested and recharged. Our time was still packed, but with activities that filled our tank and fueled our relationships.

This time spent with my family was more than relaxing, it charged me. A number of mornings, I got up early and spent some quiet time reflecting on what really matters, on why I do what I do, and found these moments gave me renewed energy for being the best I can be. And not just the best business leader and client advisor, but the best husband and best dad. They are all intertwined, you know. If I am weak in one area, I am weak in them all.  

I challenge you to take time this summer to just unplug from the busyness of your daily routine– and don’t just say it, but DO it. Turn your phone off. Walk away from your desk. Invest time and energy in your family and friends, and enjoy the remarkable return on a treasured investment.