joe zente,z3,zthree,tab,tab austin,the alternative board,grow your sales,sales performance,double your profit

In a few moments, I will share a secret that will allow you to grow your sales and double your profit in less than one year. I am consistently amazed at the incredibly small percentage of people that know this secret. The secret is simple to execute, requires no financial investment and will save you tons of time. 

For most people, the easiest (and most comfortable) parts of selling are:

• Giving Presentations

• Creating Proposals

• Offering Product Demos

• Talking about your Company Benefits and Advantages

• Attempting to Demonstrate Value

• Providing References

• Lunches, Happy-hours and Golfing with Prospects

• Research, email and other electronic communication

• Visiting with Peers

Some salespeople also love to hang out at networking, aka: not working, events.

Although these comfortable activities are preferred and enjoyable for most people, they are also the least important, differentiated and effective part of selling. In the minds of Buyers, these activities are also the most boring. They are commodities.

In order to talk, present, and demonstrate, one requires knowledge - knowledge of your company, product, industry, competition and more. Companies invest billions every year training their salespeople to become experts on their products, benefits, and industry.  Training takes time. Talking takes time. Demos take time. Creating proposals takes time. 

Time = Money. Expensive money. Goodbye Profit.

I’m not disparaging training. In fact, I’m a huge fan of training, the right kind of training.  I’m simply sharing some obvious observations regarding proportionality. Product training, client training, demos and presentations are highly over-rated; they create ineffective behavior and cost companies dearly.

If you could create the same volume of sales in half the time, what would happen to your margins? Also, how much additional (high margin) revenue could you create with the additional time you saved?

Over the course of my career, I’ve managed, trained and coached many thousands of salespeople and business owners, and I meet many new ones each week. When we meet and discuss their selling approach, I quickly learn that some use a selling process, but most don’t. I also quickly learn that just about every one spends 2 to 5 times as much time and money on generating a sale than is necessary. By focusing on the activities they know and like, versus the effective activities that create trust, credibility, differentiation and results, they dramatically diminish their sales growth and profit.

I promised to share the profit secret, so here goes…

When it comes to selling: Stop Being the Expert and Shut-Up.  

If you want to grow your sales and keep more profit, focus on this Effective Selling List:

• Stop being the expert. Start making the prospect the expert.

• Stop talking. Start listening.

• Stop convincing. Start learning.

• Stop visiting with peers. Start visiting with decision makers.

• Stop presenting. Start understanding.

Great salespeople and owners understand that these are key activities that lead to effective selling and superior performance.

Please notice that nothing on this list requires product knowledge or experience. Every one of these activities requires less time, less training, and fewer resources than the previous, comfortable list of ineffective activities.

Challenge each person on your team to place their fears and ego aside and to replace expertise and convincing with child-like curiosity, integrity and sincerity. Start today!

Less time, more sales, increased profit.

Happy Hunting,

Joe 

Copyright ©   Joe Zente  2014.   All Rights Reserved.

sales performance,joe zente,z3,zthree,tab,tab austin,the alternative board,differentiation,business owner,big talk

Media research has shown the average American is bombarded with more than 16,000 bids for their attention each and every day. It also shows that within 3 seconds, we either tune in or tune out.

In most cases, we tune out.

Much has been written about methods to cut through the clutter using clever marketing, social media, and electronic techniques. However, few people know how to keep someone’s attention once they actually get someone to tune in.

The answer lies in Big Talk.

As businesspeople, most of us believe that our product or service is great. Furthermore, many of us believe that prospects are actually interested to learn more from us about it.  Unfortunately, this could not be further from the truth.

A recent survey of C-Level executive buyers indicated that only 14% of conversations with salespeople resulted in any useful learning or created any significant impact. In the remaining 86% of conversations, the company representative was perceived to be creating no value or differentiation. To make things worse, the closer you get to the decision maker, the tougher it is for most salespeople to differentiate.

In today’s environment of sound bites and short attention spans, small talk simply doesn’t work. Additionally, differentiation will not be achieved by virtue of comparisons, presentations, benefit statements, product knowledge, testimonials, manipulations and demos. It will certainly not be achieved by virtue of scripts, leading questions and clever closing techniques. By using these antiquated approaches, you will actually commoditize yourself, likely doing more harm than good.

In order to differentiate yourself and your company from your competitors and be perceived as valuable in the eyes of potential buyers, you must become proficient at the science of Big Talk. Big Talk results from a comprehensive understanding of the psychology of decision making, an understanding of effective communication principles, empathic listening, emotional intelligence, sincere interest, and integrity. 

Implement a Culture of Big Talk in your organization. Make sure that your salespeople master it. Doing so will bring millions to your bottom line. 

 Copyright ©   Joe Zente  2014.   All Rights Reserved.

business owner,joe zente,z3,zthree,entrepreneur,CEO,tab,tab austin,the alternative board,proposals,quotes,premature satisfaction

Many years ago, I was recruited to lead a company that had flat sales despite a relatively large and experienced sales team.  The firm’s CEO was a brilliant scientist and a very analytical guy.  He was beaming as he handed me a huge binder stuffed with copies of over two hundred unfulfilled proposals the company had delivered during the previous several months.   These proposals were complex.  The cost to create each one was large.  In addition to sales and administrative costs associated with preparing the nicely packaged quotes, each one also involved significant design & engineering time.  The CEO excitedly proclaimed that these proposals were “just dying to be closed”.  

We took a few weeks to follow up on every proposal.  You can probably guess what we discovered.  Not one of these “hot sales prospects” had any intention of buying.   In fact, nearly half of the recipients couldn’t even recall receiving a proposal.  Every “prospect” had other priorities that had nothing to do with purchasing our company’s product.  Many of these folks had absolutely no decision authority whatsoever.  Some prospects requested a proposal simply to placate and/or blow off the aggressive “expert” salesperson.

We were soon able to turn things around and fuel sales growth through effective sales management.  We focused the attention of the sales team on some real business opportunities, talked with some real decision makers, and focused their sales conversations upon asking questions, listening and understanding versus talking and giving unqualified presentations.  However, I’ll never forget the lunacy this company demonstrated by wasting all of those precious resources chasing ghosts.

Over the last 15 years, I have had the opportunity to help hundreds of company owners upgrade their sales.  Through this process, I have learned that the vast majority of companies squander tons of profit by virtue of a rampant and popular dysfunction we refer to as Premature Satisfaction™.

Is your company wasting money with unqualified sales prospects?  If so, how much?  Most companies dramatically underestimate these costs.

Many Business Owners and Sales Managers place a highly disproportionate emphasis on the importance of sending lots of proposals.  The (incorrect) assumption here is:

More Proposals    =   More Sales    =    More Profit

Nothing can be further from the truth.  In fact, the equation should read:

Better Qualification   =   Fewer Proposals   =   More Profit

For the majority of salespeople, the size of their “hot prospect pipeline” and the volume of profit they return to the bottom line are inversely proportional.  Many don’t have a clue about time management or the value of an hour of their own (or your company’s) time.

A high level of sales activity is crucial, but please don’t confuse activity with productivity.  Generating and launching unqualified proposals is a costly example of one aspect of Premature Satisfaction™ (aka: The Destroyer of Profit).  There is a simple cure for this organizational disorder.  It only requires some simple tools, some simple rules, and a little discipline.

For starters, every opportunity should always be thoroughly qualified before company resources are invested in creating proposals.  A Qualifier Checklist is a great way to begin this process.

Secondly, all sales activities should be singularly focused upon either moving the sales process forward or closing the file.  Anything in between is pure wheel-spinning — useless activity disguised as “work”.

A “yes” is fine and so is a “no”.  It is the “maybes” that tear into both your revenue and profit lines.

Some other popular wheel-spinning activities include:

• Excessive internet research (and other busywork) to avoid making phone calls

• Sending literature, letters, and emails to avoid making prospecting calls.  

• Allowing the buyer to control the sales process.

• Accepting prospect meetings without a clear, mutually acceptable agenda.

• Talking, presenting and giving demos when you should be listening & understanding.

If you are looking to build more predictability, consistency, visibility, scalability and profitability into your sales effort, take a hard look at the quality of your Sales Pipeline and begin eliminating Premature Satisfaction™ today.

Copyright ©   Joe Zente  2014.   All Rights Reserved.

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business owner,joe zente,z3,zthree,entrepreneur,CEO,tab,tab austin,the alternative board,comfort zone,success,strategy

Every one of us has preferences. There are activities we enjoy doing, and ones we do not.  Some activities are comfortable for us. Others are not.

Within any particular job or role, there are aspects that energize us, and aspects that don’t.  Some activities, like public speaking or cold calling, may even scare us. 

And we are all different. Just because a particular activity lives inside my Comfort Zone, does not mean that it lives inside yours.

As business owners, most of us would prefer to work ON, versus IN, our businesses. 

Most owners understand that they should spend significant time in areas like strategy, planning, identifying new opportunities, innovating, and leadership, yet find themselves getting pulled into crisis management, fire-fighting, financial details, and legal matters. While many owners enjoy working on their business, other owners actually have a preference for the more tactical parts of their business, like baking a cake or developing software.

Organizations have a Comfort Zone. Some companies attempt to hire employees with a diverse range of Comfort Zones in order to cover the varied aspects of their business. Others have a culture that attracts courageous employees and continually inspires them to leave their personal Comfort Zones.   Some owners don’t give much thought to their organizational Comfort Zone. This can be a very costly mistake. 

Independent of industry or size, every great company is effective in executing the key activities critical to their success of their business, whether these activities lie inside their Comfort Zone or not. 

Many individuals hate to leave their Comfort Zone. Highly successful people know that the majority of growth and performance happens outside of their Zone.

As business owners, we would like to think that our employees will do their jobs effectively and efficiently. We want to believe that our people will prioritize their time and activities in order of importance, with an eye on accomplishing the key results they are being paid to accomplish. While we want our employees to love their jobs, we would also like them to consistently grow and leave their comfort zones whenever necessary in order to do the things that they should do, versus staying inside their happy-place doing the things that feel most comfortable. When your entire team is working on activities that they should do, your company will produce great results.  Alternatively, if your employees choose to do the things they could do or want to do in lieu of the things they should do, results will suffer, sometimes badly.

• How big is the Comfort Zone inside your company?

• Do you have a strategy to continually expand it?

• What percentage of time do your employees spend working on things they should do, versus working on things they could do or want to do?

• When hiring, do you evaluate a potential employee’s willingness to leave his or her Zone?

• Does your company culture incentivize and reward Courage (or Comfort)?

Remember, the magic happens outside of your Comfort Zone. I hope you leave it often.

Enjoy the journey!

Copyright ©   Joe Zente  2013.   All Rights Reserved.

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sales,habits,Joe Zente,TAB Austin,Z3,process,success

The majority of Salespeople are simply not good.   Most private business owners and sales managers would agree.   A huge percentage of salespeople do not consistently achieve desired results, and most consistently fall far short of their goals. 

Despite the fact that most owners tend to tolerate sales mediocrity and hang on to weak salespeople way too long, over 50% of sales representatives hired today will not last one year in their company.  

The statistics are overwhelming.  Mediocrity in sales is rampant.  And there is good reason.  Most salespeople wound up in sales by default.  They did not study Sales in high school or pursue a degree in Sales in college.  Most employees in the profession of sales are there because they attempted other professions that didn’t work well for them, or because they couldn’t earn the type of income they desired doing what they originally intended to do.  As a consequence, good salespeople are difficult to find and ineffective ones are everywhere. 

Those rare, excellent salespeople are effective not due to their intellect or fancy techniques.   They simply have good habits, while the ineffective majority of salespeople have poor habits.  Here are seven of the most popular habits of highly ineffective salespeople:

1.   They are Reactive:  Effective salespeople are proactive.  Ineffective ones are not.  Good salespeople have a Sales Plan, a Success Recipe, and a tracking system to monitor their daily activities.  Poor salespeople spend most of their time reacting to urgencies and just about any distraction that happens to come along.

2.    They Don’t Respect Time:  There is no such thing as Time Management.  There is only Self-Management.  Ineffective salespeople lack self-discipline.  They do not effectively manage their activities and the way they spend their time.  As a result, most of the activities that are absolutely critical to their success (such as prospecting for new business) fall to the bottom of their priority list and often do not get accomplished. 

3.    They Don’t Enjoy Selling:  Effective salespeople understand that sales activities are highly varied.  Some aspects of selling, like preparing proposals, giving demos, leading presentations, and following up on hot leads or referrals might be considered to be fun.  Other aspects, such as cold calling, new business development, and other rejection-laden activities might be uncomfortable.   Great salespeople always do the uncomfortable activities, and they do them FIRST.  Ineffective salespeople choose to do the fun activities first.  Next, they do everything else (like customer service, “researching” the internet, taking any incoming call, processing emails during the selling day, talking with friends…).   At the end of the day (or week), they notice that there was “no time” to do the vital work of prospecting and new business development.   This habit is epidemic among weak salespeople. 

4.   They Don’t Listen:  Most people, including most sales executives, would agree that great salespeople spend the majority of their time listening, and listening carefully.  Unfortunately, theory and practice do not align here.  In reality, most salespeople (the weak majority) do not listen carefully.  In fact, many don’t listen at all!  Ineffective salespeople cannot wait to talk about themselves, their company, their industry knowledge, and how great they think they are.  They talk way too much and way too soon.  Another profit killer…

5.   They Don’t employ a Process:  A Process (a series of steps that leads to a result) is efficient, measurable, improvable, and effective.  Every great salesperson uses a Sales Process.  Ineffective ones do not use a process.  Weak sales reps go into every new call or conversation winging it–hoping for the best and expecting the worst.   

6.   They Don’t have Control:  In the absence of a process, the ineffective sales rep grants control of his/her time, money and conversation to the buyer.  This results in a wide variety of time-wasters, including multiple proposals, plenty of worthless tap-dancing, and lots of wasted energy and resources.  Even if the rep happens to luck into a sale, their lack of effectiveness will cut deeply into their profit.

7.  They Choose Ineffectiveness:  This habit may be tricky to detect, because it often lies hidden from view.  Desire and Commitment are choices, and both are directly related to Trainability and Coachability.  Believe it or not, a very large percentage of ineffective salespeople are neither coachable nor trainable.  Many weak reps prefer to avoid, rather than embrace, training and coaching.  In other words, they do not treat their profession as a profession.  Again, there is probably good reason for this.  Despite the fact that effective salespeople often earn 10 times more money than weak ones, we are dealing with human beings here, many with large egos and very small comfort zones. 

Do your salespeople possess any of these ineffective habits?

If so, how much do you think it may be costing you, and what do you intend to do about it?

The majority of effectiveness in sales is not a result of intelligence, tactics, or tools, but is primarily a result of choices, attitudes, and habits.  Effective salespeople are simply willing to choose and commit to do the things that ineffective salespeople are not willing to do.

Continued Success,

Joe   

Copyright ©   Joe Zente  2013.   All Rights Reserved.

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