I was listening to an audio version of Dave Lakhani’s book Persuasion today and he made a point which really made me sit up and think.

His point was that when persuading - or in our case when selling - it’s critical to understand the underlying beliefs of the person you are trying to persuade.

People tend to demand far more evidence for a statement or recommendation that clashes with one of their existing beliefs than they do for one that is more in line with what they already believe. So as a sales strategy, it’s usually far more effective to work to position your recommendations as building on an existing belief than to have to challenge and overcome one.

In reality, most salespeople rarely think consciously about the beliefs that might be impacted by what they are selling. But a little thought can cast a great deal of insight and help shape a more effective strategy.

For example, if you’re selling some form of management consultancy services then it may seem that what you’re doing doesn’t challenge any significant beliefs in your potential client. After all, you are highlighting ways for them to improve their business by using your services - what could be challenging about that?

But if what you are proposing to do falls under the remit of the potential client or other person with influence over the buying decision then you had better be careful. It could well be that a belief you are challenging is their belief that they need to be seen as not having any weaknesses in their capabilities. In other words, if they need you to help them, doesn’t that make them a bad manager? Shouldn’t they be able to do this stuff themselves? Very often potential clients are seriously concerned about whether hiring you may make them look weak in the eyes of their managers, staff and peers. What you are selling challenges their belief that they need to be “on top” of all the activities in their remit.

For this reason, when selling consulting services I always look for a “get out clause” for my clients. A reason why it’s OK for them to need me that isn’t damaging to their self image and their fear of what others might think. I explicitly look for a rationalisation for why they can’t do this themselves. There has been a change in what customers need that they couldn’t have been aware of, for example. or perhaps they need to focus on managing their team and optimising today’s performance while someone with an “objective viewpoint” looks at their strategy. The logic doesn’t have to be iron-clad. Just something to make them feel at ease and comfortable hiring me without feeling they are admitting failure somehow.

Of course, different issues will arise in different selling situations - but it’s surprising how often what seems like a purely rational buying decision will have a powerful emotional dimension due to the impact of the decision on the underlying beliefs of the buyers.

Ian

* Image courtesy of Skeptical Enquirer magazine. You can find a very interesting article on the persistence of beliefs by psychologist George Lester here

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

Today’s post is from Peter Motley - MD of Marketing Crew - looking at current trends in social marketing for BtoB.

Will 2008 be remembered as the real start of business to business (BtoB) social marketing in a way that is much more than just debating whether to start a blog? Can we finally see a change in the way marketeers communicate!

The answer on social marketing for BtoB seems to revolve around the real purpose of the activity itself; whether it’s business people networking to gain personal benefit or to market their product/company brand! A new report by think-tank Demos has concluded that staff should be encouraged to use social networking as part of their business activities as it can boost staff loyalty and morale.

It would reasonable to predict that social networking sites like Viadeo, Linkedin, Plaxo, Ning and Ryze will see their membership ranks soar in the next few quarters as widespread insecurity drives people to connect with others to boost their social capital.

Can the same be said of product and service placements in blogs, podcasts, business groups in networking sites, etc? In recent months we have seen a rise in online BtoB business networking sites being offered, especially to small businesses.

Any long run success of business social networks will come down to basics, which are their ability to become a new channel to market, or to take the cost out of the marketing equation. If these are achieved we will see the seed corn that is driving current developments turn into some very big opportunities.

Large players like BT are heavily promoting BT Tradespace, in a bid to gain a foothold in the online business networking space, somewhere between directory sites like Yell.com and networking sites for boutique consultancies, dominated by online entrepreneurs like Thomas Power with ecademy. Plus there are emerging regional offerings like “Lets Do Business” in the South East and “Your Business Club” in the North West.

Add to the mix the popularity of social networking sites being used for business, such as Facebook, and Bebo, plus the explosion in business blogging sites and business videos loaded on You Tube, you have countless outlets to post entries which promote your offerings. One example that has become legend is Blendtec’s Will it blend on You Tube that has catapulted their high quality blenders from obscurity to leading brand awareness in the US.

In Mintel’s recent study of 2,000 Britons, which is based on extensive research into both social networking and viral marketing, they claim, “the emergence of online social networking is transforming the way we communicate and how we spend our leisure time, on- and offline”. The watchers are now looking to see if this success can be replicated in the business world.

Despite the fact that the report focuses on viral content and talks quite extensively about email marketing, I think we are seeing the convergence of a number of ways of sharing content via social and pseudo social networks. Be it some key marketing message, product placements, professional networking, industry watching, negative product or company reaction, all are now in the “marketing mix”.

We have seen examples of “good old” word of mouth marketing on social business media sites like twitter with London Theatre, and SEOmoz having a dramatic effect. However, the outcomes of which, if not handled professionally, could cause such rapid impact that it makes Gerald Ratners famous comments look snail paced!

The future of social marketing in this social media era is not about the next emerging happening, as I feel it did arrive in 2008, but now about understanding how it’s reinventing the way that we all need to communicate?

Peter Motley is passionate about marketing and about delivering value for money for his clients. Peter sees real business to business marketing as turning the business plan into an achievable marketing strategy and ensuring its delivery. You can contact Peter at Marketing Crew

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

One of my favourite and most frequently visited sites is RainToday. It’s a fantastic source of articles, white-papers and research reports, webinars and premium content - all focused on marketing & selling professional services. It features some of the best writers and experts on professional service business development - from Bruce Marcus, Ford Harding and Alan Weiss to in-house gurus John Doerr and Mike Schultz.

They’ve just released a new report on Business Networking for Professionals, including:

• The golden rule of networking
• Who to network with and where you can go to find them
• 3 tips for starting a conversation
• 6 open-ended questions to get contacts talking and to build a relationship
• 8 common networking stereotypes to avoid

The best news is that if you sign-up for a free 7-day trial of annual membership you can download the report and all the other available tools and guides for free. RainToday’s promise is that if you’re not satisfied with your membership you can cancel at any time during the free period and not only will you not be billed, you can keep all the content you downloaded during the trial.

Given the high quality of the content and the no-risk guarantee, it’s a pretty irresistable offer in my view.

Ian

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

How do you turn an initial contact with a prospect into a fully-fledged business relationship? It’s the essence of sales - but it’s an area where many people really struggle.

Robert Middleton has an excellent analogy for this process which he calls “Marketing Ball”.

By the way, if you’re an independent professional (a consultant, coach, therapist, psychologist, etc.) and you want to attract more clients and win more business then head over right now to Robert’s Action Plan Marketing site and sign up for the free marketing audio and workbook. I must warn you though - within a week of reading his free material I had been so impressed I bought his “whole shebang” package.

One of the core principles Robert introduces via the analogy is the importance of progressing “one base at a time” in sales. You can’t expect to go from initial contact to a sale in one hit. In fact, it may be too much to expect to go from first contact to even a meeting directly. You need to take things one step at a time by adding value and providing information to your potential client to build up the trust needed for them to take the next step.

A case in point: one valuable source of new opportunities for service businesses is new startups. Lacking an incumbent, there’s a much better chance than normal for accountants, solicitors and other providers to establish a relationship.

When I started my new business, I had nearly a dozen letters from accountants, web designers and marketers - each keen to talk to me about how they could help me (or perhaps, more accurately, how they could get business from me).

To give them fair credit, they had at least made the effort to scan for new business formations to identify high potential clients for themselves.

However, none of them took it further than that. Other than sending a letter to make me aware of their services - none of them did anything for me that would make me want to do business with them.

If they’d perhaps sent me a short guide to start-up finances, or successful small business websites or other useful information related to their business. Or if they had offered me something of value for free - 30 minutes of their time to share some of their experiences on what works well in their field. Perhaps even mocked up a website for me or made suggestions for my marketing approach. Any of this would have demonstrated both their competence and their client-focus - their desire to be helpful and their willingness to invest in doing so.

But no. Just an advert. Just them telling me how good they were.

All that effort to find me, then they couldn’t get past first base.

Ian

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

I’ve been “tagged” by Ford Harding to take part in an interesting concept: a “blog meme” – a series of posts by different bloggers on the same topic. You can see Ford’s post here and the original idea from “Bizzie Guye” here.

So here goes……

Warming Up Cold Contacts
In “Managing the Professional Services Firm”, leading professional services guru David Maister labels cold calling as a third-tier “desperation” measure.Certainly the vast majority of professionals intensely dislike cold calling and are more than eager to accept the many pronouncements that “cold calling doesn’t work”.

But the reality is that many professional service firms and sole practitioners have used cold calling very successfully to grow their practices.

One of the keys to making cold calling effective is to “warm up” the call beforehand. In many cases this means pre-establishing a fledgling relationship with the prospect before the call is made. Perhaps sending a letter or an article in advance, or getting an introduction form a mutual contact.

But there is another – often overlooked – method for ensuring your prospect is more receptive to receiving your call. It’s simply to focus your calls on people who actually need your services.

It sounds ridiculously simple. Surely that’s what everyone does anyway?

In reality, it’s not. The majority of cold calling is to relatively unqualified prospects. Sure, they may be in a target industry, or be “likely” to need your services. But do they definitely need your services right now? Usually not.

And that’s why most cold calls get rejected – the repeated experience of prospects that the call is a waste of time. We’re an interruption to their busy schedules, and they’ve learnt that 9 times out of 10 a cold call is going to offer nothing of value to them. So they’ve learnt not to take calls from people they don’t know.

But what if you could be sure that the majority of people you call actually do need your services – right now? If that was the case then in the first few seconds of the call you could establish your value and they would be willing to listen further. Instead of calling hundreds of prospects for a tiny and therefore uneconomic response, a small number of calls to highly qualified prospects would result in a high number of positive responses and follow-ups.

How can we do this? It really depends on the situation:

• For certain types of product or service we can use desk research to identify the customers who definitely need our service. For example, a consultant who specialises in helping technology start-ups find their first customers will almost always get a good reception when they make targeted calls to these types of firm.
• If emerging customer needs are visible from outside the client firm, this can be used to identify prospects with definite needs. For example, a “trigger event” such as a change in leadership or the divestment of a business can generate specific service needs.
• The “grapevine” – networks of allied professionals and service providers close to a target client can provide information on their specific needs.
• A “low risk” cold call can be made to staff lower down the organisation than the target prospect. By calling people less likely to reject the call, vital information and real insights can be gathered on the true needs of the prospect.
• Allowing prospects to self-select and identify themselves is also possible. For example the typical on-line strategy of using pay-per-click advertising to offer a free report or resource in a specific area will allow prospects with needs in that area to identify themselves.

Other methods are also possible – always following the principle of investing before the call to identify highly qualified prospects.

Of course, such a strategy isn’t always possible. And it could be argued that such an investment in advanced research is more costly than simply calling a large number of loosely qualified prospects and finding out who’s interested by trial and error.

But doing detailed qualification in advance does two very positive things.

Firstly, it gives the sales person confidence that they are likely to get a positive response from the people they are calling. This confidence will come across in the call and make the prospect more likely to listen – creating a virtuous circle of success.

Secondly – and to my mind more importantly – it shows respect for your clients. Even if it costs you more to do detailed research in advance that it would to call in a less qualified manner, it shows that you have prioritised your client’s time over your own. It shows you care enough not to waste their time on a “fishing expedition”. Doesn’t that in itself speak volumes about the kind of sales person you are?

Ian

Now, I’m tagging Craig Elias and Paul McCord – both of whom I’m sure will add their own unique insights to the meme.

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

Ok, so perhaps not the person you’d most expect to be dishing out vital sales tips - but as it turns out, this year’s Spongebob Annual (UK edition) has avery useful piece in it.

Here’s the plot: Plankton’s wife/computer has run away. Plankton, by the way, is the rather tiny, evil nemesis of Spongebob & Mr Krabs (Spongebob’s boss). In order to win her back he writes her a love letter as follows:

Oh Karen, you are my computer
Crawl back to me, the world’s best suitor!
I went to college, don’t you forget
The smartest guy you ever met!

I am so great, I am so fine
And I own you, so you are mine
Remember though it may annoy you
Do as I say, or I’ll destroy you!

Spongebob, of course, is horrified by this self-centred poem and so re-writes it. As it turns out, Karen much prefers Plankton’s original. But in the real world, very, very few customers have Karen’s tastes.

Unfortunately, a great many sellers do seem to have Plankton’s writing style though. Perhaps not the “do as I say, or I’ll destroy you” elements - but certainly the self aggrandizing, self-centred approach to writing.

Sales - particularly sales of large, complex or intangible products - is very similar to the process of courting: of attracting, maintaining and growing the attentions of another.

You can’t demand that someone falls in love with your product, just like you can’t demand someone falls in love with you. It has to be earned. And although courting often begins with a certain amount of attention-grabbing behaviour, if it is to succeed over time it must switch to attention-giving. A successful relationship is characterised by growing mutual giving and growing mutual trust. The self aggrandizing attention-grabbing must give way to thoughts and acts focused on the needs of the other.

And it’s the same with sales. Once you have the attention of a prospect you must focus on their needs - and your communications must reflect this. As the old saying goes: Before They Care What You Know, They Need to Know You Care.

Onward!

Ian

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

We all know that good follow-up is vital in sales. According to the Gartner Group, almost 70% of leads are mishandled in some way. So great follow-up will give effective salespeople a huge advantage over less rigorous competitors.

But how many times have you come back from a meeting or networking event and received this sort of email?

Dear Ian

It was lovely to meet you earlier today. If you ever have need of our services in the future, feel free to contact me on xxxx xxx xxxx.

Yours, Mr Never-likely-to-get-a-call.

Have you sent out something similar? I hope not. How can anyone think this sort of follow-up is going to bring results?

Most people we meet casually, or at networking events tend to fit into the “might do business with, but might not” category. For most of us, we don’t have time for a “follow-up coffee” with people in this category - we have to reserve our in-person follow-ups for people highly likely to give us business themselves or refer business to us.

And it’s the same in reverse. Many people who we would like to build a relationship with may not immediately see the value in building a relationship with us. But we can significantly increase our chances of this if we follow-up effectively.

The best follow-up is one that adds value to the recipient. Perhaps some thoughts to help them, or links to useful resources. The more it’s clear you’ve thought about them and how to help them, the more likely they are to classify you as “someone to trust”.

Of course, in order to do that, you need to understand what might be useful to them. And that means that you need to ask them questions during the event (and remember or take note of the answers) to identify what would be helpful. Understanding their business challenges or goals is critical to this.

If you can’t add value straight away tell them you’ll be looking out for them in future - and specifically name what you’ll be doing. For example “…I found your ideas on growing your business through relationships with accountants in your local area really interesting. If I identify any accountants who fit the bill in future I’ll be sure to pass on their names to you”.

And of course, you really must make good on your promise.

Personally, I keep a list of all my “interesting and important” contacts with bullet points on the sorts of things that would be useful and helpful for them. I review this list monthly so that my radar is always active and on the lookout for how I can be helpful. For high priority target clients I review this weekly and frequently build in time to my schedule to actively look for resources to help them.

It’s not guaranteed to have impact - but it’s a darn site more likely than the more common “…if you ever have need of our services…” email.

Onward!

Ian

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

In my experience, sales is mostly about doing - about taking action.

Thinking in advance is important, vital in fact, to focus action on the right things, and to make action “automatic” when it’s time to act.

But at the end of the day, sales happen “in the moment” face to face with clients.

In line with this, most sales people tend to be action-oriented. So I find when I’m helping most sales people to improve their performance, my work often focuses around helping them with their thinking. Perhaps they need to better target and select their customers. Perhaps they need to identify better ways of generating leads. Or perhaps they need to rethink the way they hold sales meetings and interact with clients.

But when I work with the people who sell professional services - the lawyers, accountants, consultants and other professionals themselves - it’s a different story.

Most professionals tend to love thinking. They’ll analyse and debate a problem to death. So I find that my work with many professionals is to get them to be more action oriented.

The professional’s seemingly inbuilt fear of rejection and losing face adds to this tendency to think rather than do. Doing involves risk - the possibility that you’ll have an unpleasant interaction with a potential client. Thinking is safe - at least in the short term.

In sales, the second best plan implemented today is often much better than the best plan implemented tomorrow. But that really goes against the grain for professionals trained to search for the very best solution to any problem.

With professionals, the key to helping them improve performance is therefore often less about new ideas and insights - and more about coaching and coaxing to take action.

Ian

PS If you’re wondering about the graphic - it’s an Einstein Action Figure - the perfect combination of thought and action!

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

OK, it may not be sales related - but this story on google’s gmail blog announcing a new feature amused me no end: Google’s Mail Goggles.

Basically, the gist of it is that if you send out a piece of email late at night via gmail, it gives you a little bit of a sobriety test in the form of a few simple maths problems before releasing the email.

Judging by some of the dodgy late night emails I’ve seen in the past, this can only be a good thing.

Now if only Wordpress came up with something similar for late night blog posts…..

Ian

By the way - you can get those fantastic beer goggles in the picture from buycostumes.com

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.

In my previous post I pointed to Jan Visser’s SalesTeamTools site for a great overview of the best online Contact Management Systems.

Spurred on by my own recommendation I tried to find a system that met my own criteria:

• Simple - just the basic features I need
• Easy to use
• Some form of compatibility with my iphone

After trying out a bunch of systems, I’ve settled on BatchBook

It’s got all the basic features I need for simple contact management; it’s easily tailorable via the “SuperTags” feature; and it has a simplified online iphone version which works just like the iphone contact book.

From reading the user forum it looks like the developers are very much on the ball. They respond quickly to requests from users and are working on features such as open format sync-ing which some of the other easy-to-use systems (ahem, Highrise) don’t seem to want to bother with. Best of all, the lead developer seems to be an iphone user - hence the prioritisation of the mobile iphone version and hopefully some more nice features in the near future.

Another neat feature is the ability to forward any emails you get from contacts to the system where they are automatically logged and linked to the contact details. There are other features which I don’t really need - like To Do lists and the ability to have the upcoming ones emailed to you every day. But these don’t get in the way of the ease-of use side. The pricing is great value too.

Anyway, I’ll shut up before I begin to sound like a geek….

Ian

©2008 Sales Excellence. All Rights Reserved.