Sales Advice Archives - Page 2 of 2

Sales Incentives: Love The Game, Not The Trophy

Many parents, including yours truly, have made the same mistake. Let’s call it the Ice Cream Effect. “Score a goal junior, and we buy you an ice cream cone!”, we might say. Score two and you get a hot-fudges sundae! Sooner or later, we find our child needs an ever-increasing supply of ice cream (or trophies, or other incentives) just to play the sport.

Why does this happen? Isn’t generous pay for a hard day’s work, an effective tradition? In the short term, yes. When our sales numbers are good and we’re getting praised, we love sales. Can we blame our leaders for dangling trips, bonuses, and other rewards in front of us?

But, hurry and enjoy your sales incentives quick, before they melt away! Soon, a new fiscal year arrives and we’re back to square one. Impossible objections, indecisive customers, and service issues, they’re all part of life in sales. All of a sudden, we not in love anymore. Instead, we’re the kid who hates baseball until he hits a home run. Here’s the problem: to our employers, our job is to sell. To our customers (you know, the people who pay for everything), it’s to solve problems. They don’t care how many rewards we rack up.

And, it’s solving problems that gets us the sales we want. We need to take the leap of faith required to focus on the job itself, not sales incentives, or even job security. Soldiers, who risk much more than a pink slip, want to see live battle. ER doctors, who can easily handle patients with sinus infections, want to treat traumatic injuries. These people want to do the hardest parts of their job.

Perhaps we in sales can learn from them.

Sincerely,
Meaning2work.com

Outsiders Change Companies, the Rest of Us do What We’re Told

“When I’m in charge, things will be different.”

We’ve all thought it at some point. Either we forget or ignore the truth: it takes a hefty dose of conformity to obtain power within most sales organizations. This diminishes anyone’s ability to enact change, unless they get to the top of the pyramid. By then, few understand the challenges of the front line. In your last sales meeting, did the sales managers question policy or promote it? Yes, there are people paid to offer innovative ideas. They’re called consultants.

Even the noblest among us, when setting out to cure a company’s ills, can become infected. The status quo is the conscious choice of your current leadership. Chances are, they’re not inviting you to question it.

Instead, try changing what’s in your power to change: yourself. Want your boss to be less critical? Be less critical of yourself. Want to have more money? Spend less of it. Want to help others?

You get the idea.

Sincerely,
Meaning2work.com

Pharma Rep Confessions – What the Job’s Really Like

Dear Pharma Sales Reps,

Here are my observations from 14 years in the business. Do you agree?

Six confessions of a long-time pharmaceutical sales rep:

Achievement is highly overrated. I’ve been both in the bottom 15% of rankings and at the top. I’ve earned bonuses as high as $47k and as low as zero. Every success felt like a lucky break. I was almost never present when a prescription was being written. Plenty of doctors told me they were excited to prescribe but never followed through. Others, who I thought hated my product (or even me) became my biggest supporters. The money is nice, but quickly spent.
Doctors don’t care nearly as much as we want them to. I’ve sold lifestyle medicines, chronic medicines, and life-saving rescue medicines and it’s been mostly the same. Doctors typically DO care about their patients. The drugs they use, however, are like tools in a carpenters hand. Unless they cause trouble or fail to work, they’re largely an afterthought.
Out of sight, Out of mind. For many physicians and their staff, their responsibility is to TELL the patient the right thing to do – not to ensure it gets done. They may prescribe the medicine you sell but give little care to whether or not the patient fills the script.
For the patient and the office, money trumps all. We reps know this. Our managers know it too but are sometimes too afraid to say it. Patients don’t see medication as being a matter of life and death until they are in pain or are dying. Medicines that make them prettier, better in bed, or (sadly) give them a buzz, are worth cold, hard cash.
The only thing that makes you an expert, to management, is your numbers. Therefore, never get too full of yourself. We’re all a couple bad quarters from some kind of probationary status.
If you judge yourself using sales acheivement, you will never fully like your job, or yourself. Whether or not you’ve finally become an expert is a question only you can answer!

Congratulations! You win the Ritalin award for reading the whole article!

Feel free to comment below or send me a note at Meaning2work@gmail.com with your thoughts. And, don’t forget to subscribe if you want to hear more!

Sincerely,

Meaning2work.com

Sales Words: The Performance Effect

Jealous of the Top Performers on Your Sales Team? Here’s a Reason to Reconsider.

In addition to recognition and accolades, top performing sales people enjoy a hidden side benefit that helps them retain there status for ever longer. What I call the Performance Effect is the added motivation gained from simply being a top sales person. Whereas before, you might have identified yourself as a mediocre performer, now you have the extrinsic reinforcement that say you’re a top gun. To you, it makes sense to spend that extra hour or two making an extra call or answering an extra RFP.

All the while, everyone else on the sales force wonders how you do it. For reps with steadily growing territories and stable performance metrics, the performance effect may sustain itself for months, if not years. For sales reps who experience significant and frequent changes, the effect may be fleeting.

As shocking as it may sound, the performance effect is something to avoid rather than envy. The reason? All good things come to an end – even for star sales people. One small change in performance measurement, product pricing, or territory geography is all that may be required. The longer a rep believes his own positive press, the more profound the fall from hero to zero can be. Salespeople experiencing this abrupt change may become bitter and experience a level of self-doubt. A rep feeling this way may feel she somehow “lost her mojo”.

Unlike other jobs, sales people experience a wiping clean of their performance slate every year. We start every year with $0 in sales and essentially need to prove the right to keep our job once again. Therefore, more so than in others professions, sales people need to be reinvigorated. Daniel Pink, author of “Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us”, believes we all need to see the power of intrinsic motivation. Having a strong sense of meaning or purpose in your job makes you resistant to the extrinsic ups and downs of things like quota attainment. According to Mr. Pink, other essential factors to motivation include autonomy and mastery.

Sincerely,

Meaning2work

Sales Words – Golden Oasis

Good numbers make everything better! Don’t they? In most companies, sales performance trumps all other metrics. What I call the Golden Oasis is a version of the Halo Effect that applies to sales people when they look excellent on paper. Their advice is sought by other sales people and management alike. They seemingly can do no wrong.

Experiencing this phenomenon can make you, the sales person, give yourself too much credit. You must be an expert because the results say so! Don’t they? To the dismay of many, this luxurious state of mind is temporary. The loss of a big customer, a change in market conditions, or a price hike are just some of the circumstances that may cause a sales rep’s golden oasis to evaporate.

Can you think of a time when you were fooled into believing your own greatness? I welcome your comments!

Sincerely,
Meaning2work

You’ll Find Me in Cell Block C4 – Spreadsheets and Sales

Yes, they’re an excellent tool for analyzing data. Yes, they give individuals and companies the ability to store large amounts of information, perform calculations, and even spot trends. Yes, our employers probabaly wouldn’t be able to pay our paychecks without them. I am, of course, referring to spreadsheets.

No, spreadsheets don’t hurt people. People do. At some point, we went from using them as tools to inform decision making, to tools that actually make decisions. “I’ll spend the majority of my time with my top 20% of customers”, we might say. “We’ll fire the bottom 10% of the salesforce,” management might say. Like a sophisticated Magic 8 Ball toy, a formula plugged into a spreadsheet spits out a course of action for us and we dutily follow it.

Like all computer programs, spreadsheets cannot function without input. That’s where you and I come in. We take one of the outputs of our work, (ie. net sales, market share, etc.) and feed to the spreadsheet so it can work it’s magic. Unfortunately, magic has yet to be proven to be anything more than artistic, entertaining, trickery. Here are some problems with the way we use spreadsheets in sales. Feel free to add more in the comments section of this post.

Spreadsheets Can De-humanize Sales people and Customers

We humans want to be treated as individuals. Considering only a few data points takes away any unique or relevant details regarding the individual. Intellectually, we all know this but, in practice, we forget it very quickly. According to Cal Newport in his book “Deep Work”, it is scientifically impossible for the human brain to truly multitask. Instead, our focus switches quickly between two or more tasks giving us the illusion of doing more than one thing at once. Therefore, when analyzing a sales report, it is impossible to scrutinize the data and consider the person attached to it at the same time.

To this day, I have my personal breakthroughs quickly reduced to rubble at the hands of a spreadsheet. In response to a record week of sales, I am rewarded with a report sharing how many reps around the country had the same or more sales than I did. Customers don’t fare much better either. We don’t throw reports in their faces. Instead, we treat them only as well as their business potential dictiates. Why? That’s what a formula on our spreadsheet tell us to do.

Spreadsheets Facilitate False Assumptions

Where does data come from? The past. According to Nicholas Nassim Taleb in his book, “Fooled By Randomness”, one of the biggest mistakes humans make when looking at history is assuming everything is due to cause and effect and not randomness. He skillfully points out that even major historical events are the result of random factors. For example, what if Adolph Hitler was born a girl? Given the restrictions on women in Germany at the time, is there any way she could have risen to power, let alone attempted to take over the world? In a more practical sense, managers often assume reps are either unskilled or lazy when sales are low.

Don’t get me started on charts either! I like the visual representation they provide in describing the past. It’s what lies beyond the trend line the spreadsheet never tells you. As someone who has won and lost on the stock market, I can tell you that no trendline EVER guarantees what will happen in the future. When your personal sales trend line is pointing down, you are looking at a picture of the past. You and I only have influence on the future.

Spreadsheets Can Hide Information

Anyone who has used Excel can show you how easy it is to hide rows or columns of data. Once the information is out of sight, it’s much easier to ignore. Often its the data that’s NOT recorded in the first place that is relevant. Try developing a list of key customers without looking at geography and you may miss many smaller targets who have high potential because of some geographic factor.

I had a friend who was a judge tell me once that he did not like video-taped testimony. He felt something could be happening off camera that could be influencing the witness. Spreadsheets, have the same effect. They shout, “Hey look at this information here!” All the while, our focus is potentially taken away from something else that could be more relevant.

Spreadsheets Often Oversimplify the Real World

As sophisticated as we think we are when we use them, spreadsheets force us to limit the way we see the world. Why? Our brains are not wired to take in massive amounts of information at once. Therefore we use spreadsheets to help find that one crucial piece of data or trend. Again, it’s the ‘Hey, look over here’ effect. The dumbing down of our approach makes us susceptible to confirmation bias. This is when we only notice data that confirms what we already think. Daniel Kahneman explores this and many other cognitive biases in his book “Thinking Fast and Slow”.

One mostly uh-helpful excercise I’ve had to perform many times in my career is the “Hot, Warm, and Cold” list. “Hot” customers are those we think are close to buying. “Warm” need a little more work and “Cold” are not interested at all in my product. These designations fit nicely into a spreadsheet where they can be sorted. Other than for time management, this information provides little value in advancing sales cycles. Calling someone a “Hot” prospect does not tell me what I need to do next to insure the sale gets closed. Calling someone a “Cold” prospect doesn’t guarantee that I’m not losing business by ignoring them either.

Spreadsheets are no more to blame for these problems than a baby is for a dirty diaper. The real problem is the power we give them – the power to make decisions for us and make us less accountable. Stop confining yourself, your employees, and your customers to numbers in a cell and you just may see your world open up!

I you like what you’re reading, please share this post with a friend and subscribe!

Regards,

Meaning2work

9.13.18 Update:
To date, this my-most viewed post. If you have a second, please leave a quick comment below and tell me just what drew you to read it. Was it the title? What did you think of the content? All opinions are welcome!

Ps. I’d like to put a plug in for Seth Godin’s “Akimbo” podcast. I love his thoughtful and straightforward tone. His thoughts often inspire mine. To check it out on iTunes click here or search for “Akimbo” in your podcast player.
To check out Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s “Fooled By Randomness” on Amazon, click here.
To check out Cal Newport’s “Deep Work” on Amazon, click here.
To check out Daniel Kaheneman’s “Thinking Fast and Slow” on Amazon, click here.

5 Popular Sales Tactics that are Manipulation in Disguise

The most important timeframe for sales people is NOW. The most important goal? GROWTH. Losing bids and losing customers is secondary. The problem? Think back to your best personal experience with a sales person. It’s doubtful he or she was forceful or deceiving in any way. Don’t your customers deserve the same treatment? You know not to lie to customers – even though it can bring short-term success. It’s time to reconsider any sales tactic in your arsenal that doesn’t directly help customers.

Here are five sales tactics that are manipulation in disguise:

1. Non-verbal Persuasion

Think mirroring, using facial expressions, how we dress, eyc contact, etc. These tactics are scientifically proven to make a good impression on a customer. They subconsciously make us more appealing. Is this such a bad thing? Maybe not, but imagine a salesperson dressing like you, posing like you, and smiling like you. Creepy!

2. Passive-Aggressive Pressuring

This is anything from showing up smiling at the same client every day to casually mentioning a tragedy experienced by a company similar to theirs. Whether or not your customer notices immediately is irrelevant. Although your words and actions are polite, what do your actions communicate? Is the insight you’re presenting really a cause for concern? Fear mongering and fake kindness waste your customer’s time and ruin relationships. Customer’s work on their own schedule, not yours.

3. Lying by Omission

This one should be obvious but sales people do it everyday. It’s the fine print that we omit from our presentations. It’s the discount card telling you your medicine is $15 when it ends up costing $150. It’s not alway our fault. Sometimes, corporate keeps us in the dark. What the customer doesn’t know, WILL, eventually hurt them. Getting the sale is never worth risking your credibility. Tell the whole truth.

4. Relationship Selling

Strong business relationships are paramount. Personal relationships can be very helpful, but only when they’re genuine. Don’t be the sales person who goes to family parties or sporting events with clients he can’t stand. Sooner or later your customer will know your a fake and so will you. Try hanging with your real friends a little more. They probably miss you!

5. Keeping Score (Quid Pro Quo)

This means using favors of any sort as leverage. John David Mann and Bob Burg’s book, “The Go Giver”, sums it up nicely. Among other sage advice, they implore us stop keeping score. Stop expecting something in return for the extra care and service you give to your customers. Instead, be generous because it’s the right thing to do. Aren’t you annoyed by sales people who think they can trade a free gift in exchange for a high-pressure sales presentation? To truly give something “free of charge” is to offer it without ANY strings attached.

The verdict:
Are you a horrible person because you’ve used one of these sales tactics I’ve mentioned? Not at all. What separates manipulation from skilled selling is sincerity. If you are having a good conversation, you probably automatically use non-verbal relating techniques. Put your time into answering objections instead of avoiding them. If your customer turns out to be a nice guy our gal, be their friend. Just be a real friend, not one that asks for something in return.

But these techniques work! Isn’t it my job to sell? Yes, manipulation techniques do work, but only until your customer figures them out. Then you’re screwed. Don’t risk losing next year’s customers by manipulating them today.

Regards,

Meaning2work

If you’d like to get out “The Go Giver” book on Amazon click here.