Friday Rant – Economic Woes and Lead Nurturing
The economic prosperity of the last few years has begun to resemble Newton’s observations of gravity: What goes up, must come down. News of the impending recession is everywhere, and if you listen to cable news you would think the entire country is about to collapse. While that may be somewhat exaggerated, what is true is that marketing budgets are usually the first to get cut by CEO’s looking for ways to cut costs and keep the company afloat until economic growth can be measured.
Of course, marketers we know that the few companies that actually invest in marketing during a downturn are those that will come out of the recession with a competitive advantage, having kept open the lines of communication with potential clients. Does it have to be a big investment? Not necessarily.
Lead nurturing tools are a great – and inexpensive – marketing investment that can bring considerable returns and also help your sales team pinpoint their message in a refined manner. First off, nurturing your leads means that you will no longer throw away the majority of your prospects simply because they aren’t ready to buy: you can keep them in the system and educate them about your product over time by sending them emails and white papers. When they are ready to buy (and a lead nurturing tool helps you keep tabs on everything your prospect is doing), your sales team will be there, ready to make the sale.
Another great feature of lead nurturing tools is the ability to provide you with an ROI on your marketing dollars. In tough economic times, nothing is more important for marketers than being able to show that the money spent is generating sales for the company. Finally a way to show the CEO and CFO that marketing doesn’t just produce costs, it also creates revenue flows.
When the going gets tough, lead nurturing is the way to go.
Plus, it really makes it easy on those of us in sales, who are trying to capture a seemingly shrinking market, and nurture prospects along.
Friday Rant – I Love Adam “Roud” – The Importance of Competitive Intel
It’s critical to have competitive intelligence. There are a number of ways to get competitive intel – One of the tried and true techniques is to contact a competitive organization, pretend to be a prospect, and ask pertinent questions. The following is a story of such an attempt:
While I was on vacation in NYC, I received a voice mail from a gentleman named Adam Roud (If you’ve read my posts before, you’ll know that I always change the names to protect the innocent) from a company named “Sequento” (Google it…it doesn’t exist). Adam’s voice mail asked a pricing question about an application component that could not be purchased alone – This would be similar to calling the Mercedes dealership and asking the price of the drivetrain (”No, I don’t want to know anything about the car, just tell me how much the drivetrain costs.“). Immediately I realized that this question doesn’t pass the “Smell Test” (e.g., if it doesn’t smell right, it probably isn’t right), but I called Adam anyway, to try to get an idea of what he was hoping to accomplish, and determine if my company’s solution might meet his needs.
Cell Phone, with no company name provided - things are smelling worse.
I left a VM asking for a time to chat and determine exactly what he was looking for. Qualify young reps – Qualify. Since he didn’t call back, and for all of the items I’ve identified above, I considered him a junk (unqualified) lead, and I set a 30 day follow up in Salesforce.
When I saw the reminder earlier this week, I thought back to the Smell rule, which prompted me to search Adam’s name in LinkedIn. Lo and behold – Adam works for a competitor. I called the competitors office, asked for Adam, and let him know that I would love to chat with him, since it’s always good for competitors to get to know each other. At the time of this posting, Adam has not called me back, and has likely joined the witness protection program.
So here’s my point – Competitive Intel is King, so how can you get it?:
1. Act like a Prospect - Note to Adam’s boss – Get him acting lessons, because if he’s as bad of a sales support engineer as he is an actor, you should probably cut him loose.
- Make the Cover Story fit - In the era of Google, it’s probably a bad idea to name a company that doesn’t exist
- Pretend to be someone else - With resources like LinkedIn, Spoke and JigSaw, you probably shouldn’t use your real name.
- Ask relevant questions - Back to the Mercedes example – You should probably ask questions about the solution as a whole, and sound like an educated prospect (”After looking at the BMW, I feel this Mercedes is the better buy because it has Leather, Sunroof and Heated Seats for the same price…but I’m curious about the drivetrain?”).
2. Research on the Internet - Again, in the era of Google, you should probably just search for your the information you seek.
3. Post-Mortem Follow Up’s - Talk to your customers who you’ve won during a competitive procurement, or wrap up with prospects you’ve lost. Always preface with – “I don’t want you to cross any ethical lines, but…..” Satisfied customers can provide insight about the competitive landscape, and prospects who didn’t select your solution can tell you why they went with someone else.
In the end – Adam – I love your moxie. You did the right thing, but you aren’t getting any Academy Awards from me.
Friday Rant – The Importance of Nurturing
Last week, I wrote about the importance of Marketing and Sales working together as a team. I probably used more sports metaphors and analogies then you’re used to as well.
More specifically, I emphasized the usefulness of drip marketing and nurturing leads that aren’t sales-ready. Dale Underwood over at The Confident Marketer recently wrote a piece arguing that drip marketing doesn’t do much for salespeople. I respectfully disagree, and here’s why:
Leads that aren’t ready to buy don’t want to talk to salespeople. That’s the simple truth. And that’s why drip marketing is such a powerful tool. In my view, there are plenty of sales opportunities out there that can take months to develop. Rather than having the sales team jump all over every sales opportunity, marketing should be in charge of slowly but surely nurturing leads until they are actually ready to buy. Today’s commercial software is often complex and requires the potential client to do a lot of research before being ready to buy. Drip marketing is a great way to do this: marketers can customize the information that the lead receives, and make sure that a prospect is receiving information at regular intervals. In no way am I saying that drip marketing should be doing all the work, rather it should be a tool that assists Sales along the way.
The other great advantage of drip marketing is that it requires minimum involvement. Trying to sell to leads too early in sales cycle is risky and often unproductive. No one wants to feel like they’re being pushed to buy. On the other hand, having the sales team manually nurture leads is a waste of time. Salespeople should be able to spend their time doing what they do best: selling the product to leads that know that the product is about, and showing these leads why your product is better. Drip marketing lets the Sales team concentrate on what it needs to be doing, and ensure that Marketing is creating high-quality leads, instead of handing-off poor prospects that will be counter-productive and a waste of the sales teams’ time.
This kind of teamwork is critical to creating a seamless sales cycle that begins with carefully designed marketing campaigns (including automated drip marketing) and ends with a salesperson that closes the deal. Drip marketing doesn’t make a sale on its own, but it sure helps.
Winning one for the Gipper: Marketing and Sales unite
We’ve all heard the phrases and more than likely utilized them. “There is no I in team,” and “Don’t give up until you reach the finish line.”
You probably think I’m referring to sports, whether it’s utilized in basketball, football or baseball. In fact, these quotes, analogies or any of the Vince Lombardi phrases that people toss around are applicable in business.
The world of business utilizes sports analogies and phrases so much for one reason: both sports and business rely heavily on teamwork. Without it, you wouldn’t be able to accomplish much of anything on the playing field or in the board room.
Recently, I was playing in a church league basketball game. With my team engaged in a tight contest, we suddenly found ourselves a man short on the court. This was not due to an injury or for a lack of players, but because one of our players decided to take a breather by going to the bench to catch his breath.
Now, imagine our surprise when we realized we had only four players on the court to the opposing teams five. When up against superior numbers in a team game, the side with fewer people will always lose. Look at how hockey teams in the NHL do in power play situations. Have an advantage over your opponent, especially in terms of a numerical advantage, translates to scoring and the ultimate goal: winning.
Taking this story and applying it to the business world would be interesting. Imagine your team is comprised of sales and marketing individuals. The marketer’s job is to promote brand and consumer awareness of your product or service. By advertising and distributing information on your company, the marketer does everything in their power to create an atmosphere where the sales team will be successful in that selling that product or service.
By making the public or other businesses desirous of your good or service, the marketing team has done their part, and then they hand off the task of closing the deal to the sales team. If the marketing team has done their part, then a slam dunk will occur on the sales-side of things.
Say though, the prospect is like most potential clients, and requires a longer sales cycle then the slam dunk prospect we are all hoping will come along.
At this juncture, the marketing team must continue to assist the sales team if a prospect needs to be nurtured along the path to the promised-land: the deal.
But what is the best way to utilize both sales and marketing department’s valuable time? Drip Marketing.
Through drip marketing/drip emails, the sales team can stay in touch with a client that is not sales ready and send out personalized emails on a timed basis. These periodic, automated emails ensure that you stay in touch with a client and nurture them to sales ready status, all along automating the process to further qualify your lead. This can help to free up valuable time for both sales and marketing teams, leading to high fives all around.
In short, marketing and sales teams working together to both nurture and ultimately convert the prospect into a client is the end goal. If one falters then the team suffers, much like the basketball team I play on when we were in a four-on-five match-up. By using drip marketing/drip emails, both sales and marketing can focus on other avenues and constantly stay in the prospects mind, without to much of a time investment.
Oh, and just to put a further exclamation on the point: we lost that game by 19 points.
Delegating Duties Down – Ideas to Improve Sales in 2008
A website I try and frequent for timely and provocative information iswww.salesteamtools.com. This fantastic compendium of knowledge offers those of us who make a living in sales a vast portal of knowledge and ideas to incorporate into our thought process and stimulate our thinking.
Upon returning from the winter holiday’s, I went to salesteamtools.comand read a fascinating post, entitled, “How I Improved My 2007 Sales Results.”
This got me thinking. What were the things I did in 2007 that not only improved my sales results, but conversely, what did I do to to hinder my sales results?
One of the things those of us in leadership roles in sales try and do is take on too many tasks, instead of delegating assignments to other team members. Instead of trying to tackle every new project or starting work on an ongoing project that would have monopolized my attention and produced less than stellar results, it is sometimes vital to delegate that assignment to another team member. Offloading tasks can be the best way to ensure that:
A. You finish the tasks and jobs you currently have on your plate and give the proper attention to them that they deserve.
B. You learn where your strengths and weakness are and where to focus. If you have a task you feel you aren’t suited for, then the best idea is to delegate that duty to another team member.
C. Your relationships with your existing clients won’t suffer, as the days of trying to make everyone happy will be over. Let one of your team members help out.
D. Your time management skills will increase/ coupled with increases in productivity and efficiency.
E. You will energize your team members by improving their self-reliability.
It might be to late to work on offloading duties in 2007, but with the start of brand new year, implementing this approach to your leadership style will produce big results in 2008, not only for yourself and your individual goals, but also your company’s sales goals.
Ranting Again – Dancing with the Customers
Two months is a long time to go without fresh material. Don’t worry; the writer’s strike currently afflicting the American television audience with re-run after re-run wasn’t to blame for my sabbatical. Interaction with potential clients, core customers and working to close deals kept me from communicating with you, the readers of this blog.
That’s what brings me to restoration of the Friday rant and subject matter that is near and dear to a sales manager’s heart: his or her time.
In a given day, you have only eight – 10 hours of time that you can work and dedicate to your clients and potential clients. With meetings with your marketing team, support team, etc., you really have only between six – eight hours a day where you can perform one of the most graceful dances known to mankind: the art of the sell.
Building a relationship with your client and working to convince them of the profits they will reap if they use your product; the demonstrations of the product you give to them; and then the follow-up sales calls to see when their ready to pull the trigger and make the purchase, can be as graceful as watching Emmitt Smith and partner dance on “Dancing with the Stars.” (Note: For those unaware, the former NFL star won the ABC show a few seasons back)
When you find the perfect client who is immediately sold on your product and its viability, the art of the sell is a beautiful dance that is beneficial to both of you.
There is no wasted time or productivity in this sales interaction. However, not all clients can be such a gracious dance partner.
How many times have you had a potential client that could never commit to you, but wouldn’t necessarily say no – a la the old duck and dive strategy employed by Muhammad Ali.
After the initial call and perhaps demo, you receive no concrete communication on the next step forward, which sends toppling over and tripping up the sales process.
Subsequent calls or emails go unanswered, taking up precious time that could be devoted to another client or prospect. Conversely, the person you’re calling and sending emails to wasting their time deleting your message and trashing your email.
All it would take is a simple, “Get back to me in 30 days, when we have a better idea of our budget,” or a simple, “No, we just can’t allocate funds to your product right now.”
Selling really is a dance, but when one partner refuses to go along with the right moves, it throws the whole routine out of sync.
I’m sure you remember going to your first school dance, and the awkwardness of being asked by someone for a dance. You could either say yes or no. If you were shy at first and non-committed, the person asking you to dance would think you were leading them on.
The interaction being the professional salesperson and client should – ideally – be just as simple as this analogy.
Building a solid relationship with a client requires both the salesperson and client to engage in honest discourse. When this happens it makes the deal go that much smoother.
Selling is always beneficial to both parties involved, and working to ensure a smooth deal should be priority number one.
Being non-committal and refusing to give a timetable for when you might be interested in making the deal only throws off the dance.
A “yes I’m interested,” or “no, I’m not interested,” is the best thing a professional salesperson can hear.
Friday Rant – Cleanliness is next to Godliness – Keep your CRM Data Clean
I’ve had several conversations this week with Sales Managers who lament that, although their reps are utilizing the CRM, they aren’t mandating that the data be clean,, which really shortchanges themselves in the form of implementing automation. 2 places where cleanliness can show immediate dividends is in your CRM’s E-mail and Assigned Rep fields.
E-mail: Although you may not have the customer name spelling right, and multiple people can have the same name (yes Bill Smith…I’m talking to you), e-mail accounts are always unique. Even if it is a free account provider, they enforce a 6 month waiting period before another person can get kewl_guy7@hotmail.com (Yes Bill – I’m still talking to you). Ensuring that you have the e-mail address, and that it is unique allows you to nurture your prospects via e-mails, newsletters, press releases, etc…. Also, many third party marketing systems (Bulk E-mail Marketing, Marketing Automation) will attempt to put information into your CRM, and the most logical key to utilize to synchronize that data is the e-mail address field.
Assigned Rep: When you are automatically nurturing prospects via e-mail correspondence, the best way to make it APPEAR as being individualized is to have it originate from the assigned sales rep, which is information contained in the CRM system. Although getting an automated e-mail from your sales rep can appear sincere, getting an e-mail from the guy who hasn’t worked for the company in 6 months looks disengenuious. And what if the message resonates with the person and they respond to the old rep’s account??? Does that address bounce? You just lost a prospect. (AUTHOR’S NOTE: Most CRM systems allow for the bulk update of Account Rep, so if it isn’t right, it’s easy enough to fix)
De-duping the e-mail address field, and keeping the assigned sales representative field up to date can open a world of 1-to-1 “lights out” e-mail marketing, which is personalized, inexpensive, and can be highly effective as a sales and marketing tool.
Have a Great Weekend Everybody !
Friday Rant – Doing Me a Courtesy, or Why Everyone Should Have 1 Sales Job
I had an eye opening experience yesterday that I wanted to lay out there and rant about. I had a customer do me “a courtesy”. Let me explain.
Following the lead of “Dragnet” the names in the following story have been changed to protect the innocent:
Courteous Person – I’ll call this guy “Clien Clodeberg“, so, in the off chance he does me “the courtesy” of reading my blog, he won’t be offended.
History - So I had called Clein several times over the past few weeks, because he was the logical point of entry at a business who fit my ideal customer profile (and yes…I’d done my research to ensure that we would be able to add value to a customer of this type). Clien didn’t return my calls, however he did shoot me an e-mail, asking for a meeting.
Sales 101 - Qualify the candidate - So I called several more times, trying to investigate his marketing pain, and try to identify ways in which a software solution could streamline his marketing to sales process. No return, however a few days before the meeting, I sent him a note with a brief list of Features and Benefits of our solution, and indicated that I would be equipped to perform a sales demonstration.
Yesterday - I drive across Atlanta in lunch hour traffic to meet withClien. When I get there, he indicates that (a) his organization has no need for this type of solution, (b) he does not care to see any sort of demonstration, and that (c) he was simply doing me the “courtesy” of meeting with me, since they are a vendor to our parent company.
Here’s my confusion - How was he doing me a courtesy? In making me miss lunch to go to his meeting? In the burning of $3 of petrol? In the 2 hours lost of what would have been productive phone time calling west coast customers, in an attempt to schedule meetings that mattered?
You’ve heard the adage – “Everyone should have to wait tables once in their life”. I’d propose that everyone should have to be in sales for a month. The world would be a kinder and gentler place for the sales professional.
A couple of things that customers would do if they had ever been on the sales side of the equation:
1. Take 5 - Just take 5 minutes to discuss challenges ways that my solution may be of benefit or review information to determine if you see the value in what I’m proposing. As the sales professional, I’ve already done my part – determining if your organization is a fit, and crafting a value proposition that would be of value to you.
2. Thanks but No Thanks - If, in 5 minutes, you didn’t see the value, simply thank me for my time, and agree to a call 6 months down the road. AUTHOR’S NOTE – not responding (call screening, not responding to e-mails), makes me think that maybe…just maybe you’re still a candidate, so being honest with me will allow us both to get on with our lives.
3. Don’t do me any courtesies - This is where you have to practice”tough love”. If it’s not a fit, or now isn’t a great time, identify a mutually agreeable time to reconnect. Please don’t:
- Drag me away from ACTUAL customers to meet when it’s obviously not a fit.
- Since I don’t subscribe to “interruption sales / marketing”, my initial call always asks for 5 minutes at a time when we can both focus on the matter at hand – discussing a solution that will make your life easier. Agree to a meeting time, and then call screening makes me feel like you may have had car trouble, and that you want me to call you again…and again…and again…yada, yada, yada, ad nauseam (See #2 above).
So there it is – a couple of rules of thumb that will help you be a better customer, and understand as a sales professional that everyone deals with bad customers.
Now quit reading this blog and let’s get to selling on a Friday!
Things I Hate on a Monday – Tasks Your Hunter Shouldn’t Do
Sales Professionals – I’d like to take a moment to get up on my soap box and talk to you about KILLING the effectiveness of your Sales-Hunters. Hate effectiveness? Here are a couple of things you can ask your sales reps to do to stop them from doing that whole “Selling” thing:
1. Data Entry – You ask your hunter to find deals and close them, however you apparently also ask her to sharpen her typing skills. Leads from your friends in the marketing department should be already entered into the CRM, with any supporting information related to that opportunity. Almost every marketing automation and e-mail marketing solution provide the ability to take a lead generated by Marketing and convert that information, along with all background data, and create that as a Lead within your CRM. And don’t get me started on Landing Page / Request More Information form on your website that creates an e-mail and sends it to your sales professional…There are a variety of marketing tools available which can capture form data and enter it into the Marketing or Sales CRM system without the rep having to copy / paste from an e-mail.
2. Composing and Sending E-mails – Marketers already have a message they are trying to convey about the organization’s products and services. Quickest way to water down this message – let the sales professional distill that information into an e-mail based upon her understanding. A couple of bullet points about e-mail:
- Templates are Key – Don’t hope that your sales team understands what needs to be said, provide them templates of the key components which can be customized to meet the needs of that particular customer. The positive effect is twofold: (1) The message is consistent and (2) the sales rep isn’t wasting time typing out the corporate message over and over and over and over…..
- Automate the Process – Marketing Automation (Prospect Nurturing, e-mail marketing) systems and most CRMs support the sending of automatic e-mails to prospects. Sending them automatically basically “sales proofs” the process, and utilization of the automatic features of many systems automatically enters the information into the CRM, preventing excessive copy / paste functions just to have a comprehensive customer history.
3. Calling Blind – Let me qualify that sometimes too much information leads to brain freeze where the sales professional overthinks things (reference “Sales Proofing” above), however Marketing Automation / E-mail Marketing solutions capture open rates, as well as clicking of tracked links within correspondence, and many solutions offer visitor tracking for your website / microsite. Using this information can differentiate between a customer who has responded to your message, and one who said “Send me an E-mail” just to get off the phone with you.
Keep your hunters productive by cutting out repetitive tasks and providing some clarity as to the customers who have an interest in your offerings.
A Father’s Wisdom – CRM Talk
Sales Professional – Where do you live? I mean, where do you spend the majority of your time each day? If you answered anything other than “My CRM”, then in the words of Donald Trump – “You’re Fired”.
So why is the CRM so important? Whether you utilize Salesforce, Upshot, Dynamics, or something else, there are a few life lessons that my Daddy told me that ring true, and no, not his classic “Don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”:
1. Use it, or Lose it – Retaining Important Information
Sure this rings true with things like your golf swing, your strength, and that jumpshot that had you 2nd Team All State, but it also rings true for CRM usage. Keep EVERYTHING inside the CRM. Names, Numbers, E-mails, Appointments, To Do’s and Customer Notes. Not using the CRM will directly effect your organization and productivity. You shouldn’t be searching for a scrap of paper that had a note on it, or having to look through Outlook to identify the last e-mail that was sent to this customer. Make the CRM your primary organizational tool, and you’ll be more effective in each communication with a customer.
NOTE – A recent post by Jim Berkowitz, CRM Mastery, indicates that 1/3 of new CRM implementations end in failure because Sales People aren’t using the technology. This is reflective of the attitude that many small companies have related to “My wallet is too full from all these 100’s, and my diamond shoes are a little too tight” – We’re already making money, so why should we care about process improvement or sales time optimization. Sad really………..
2. Shoot for Nothing and You’re Bound to Hit it – Opportunities
Your pipeline is your lifeline, so it is critical that you keep your opportunities entered, and more importantly, up to date. Having the opportunities to direct your activities will allow you to keep your focus while being bombarded by meeting requests, phone calls, e-mails and all the other things that attempt to take you away from the one thing that matters – Closing deals.
3. Focus on the Rim, two dribbles, elbow in, bend knees, shoot – Power of Process
As a washed-up, former basketball player, I often think back to days spent in the driveway learning to shoot free throws. Great free throw shooters, which I never was, shoot free throws the same way every time – it’s a process. Your sales process is defined, so reps can utilize the CRM to automate many of the common functions your sales representatives are expected to do. Most CRM Systems support the development of e-mail templates, many support rudimentary prospect scoring which can be augmented by third party products available onAppExchange (or other such sites), and most have the ability to automate the import of leads from a Marketing Automation System. Management can get into the act too, by implementing alerts when a lead is not acted upon in a specified amount of time, or receiving automated reports on a specific day.
In the end, get a CRM, use that CRM, and extend the power of that CRM by implementing processes and third party applications which provide advanced functionality. You’ll be glad you did.
