“Thetraditionalself-focusedselling approachisnolongereffective becausetoday’snewbuyers are unwillingtofollow you.Theydon’t want to be‘sold’. Theywantto makeeducatedbuyingdecisions.To make a sale,you must jointhemon a buying path.”
KevinDavis, Getting intoYourCustomer’sHead
You do not have to ask any sales person what they most dislike about their job– prospecting. You do not have to ask most executives what they most dislikeaboutgetting cold calls – salespeople. No wonder they are universalresponses.
With all the rejection rates and repetitive writings surroundingprospecting, inexperienced novices up to consultatively trained, customer-focused sales pros,all relate to how they dislike the task. Many will flat out refuse to do it, using email asa poor substitute to direct selling via the phone to avoid verbal rejections. This aversion toprospectingis the leading cause of revenue inconsistencies; especially among high-techvendorswhich count on extensive, new business pipelines to fuelgrowth.
There is a near universal distrust for cold calling sales people, based onthesheer fact that most often, they talk at and not to, the customer. Thecustomer’simmediate reaction to a cold call is “what’s in it for me”, and most salespeople fail to rapidly address this question. Not surprising, the answer may be in the titleof the sales person as an “Account executive” (non-specialists and buyers prefer tobuy from specialists), the name of the vendor if they are a total unknown, and how the pitch delves right into what the vendor does. Prospects arealwaysfully ready to embrace a consultative analysis of an active or “latent” problemand a suggestive mention how the salesperson can help address theissue.
If you immediately share that your company has had success with other customers on the specific pain of your prospect this will undoubtedly build aquick trust level with the prospect, thus the “reference mention”. Unfortunately, thisisnot the motis operandi with the vast majority of technology sales people.Theywould rather retreat to a safe haven and sell what gives the lessdiscomfort:product, technical features, benefits, and companybackgrounders.
How to lead your team to focus onvalue
VPs of sales have a distinct advantage in helping their own sales team, because theyare many times the target of salespeople. As in all consultative selling (free “gifts of Knowledge”), it beginswith selling to power, starting at the CEO level and spending most of your timewith designated VPs. Top down selling is the fastest path to power and actuallybringsabout less rejection as a whole.
What do you do next? Send us an email and we’ll arrange for you to speak with Ed to chat about how these learnings can help build more sales just for your business.