Sales are also professional skills - 10 tactics for successful sales
Sales are also professional skills - 10 tactics for successful sales
Matt Bell , the author of this guest article , is vice president of sales planning at Azaleos . Azaleos provides a service to cloud application management of large enterprises. Matt is a strong man with a proven track record of extending company sales during the previous two recessions, so the way of thinking is unique and appealing. This article is a so-called sequel of so-called sequel of It's All About Selling for Survival in order to survive written by Vivek Wadhwa last month .
On the technology field blog, there are many advices for startups: how to make a company, how to procure funds, how to build a company image, how to acquire talent, and so on. But what you rarely see is an article that tells you how to make a meaningful business strategy, leading to sales.
If the sales are good, you can naturally develop a good corporate image, hire excellent talent, and spend time with various projects. Without sales, nothing starts.
Thousands of books have been published so far how to sell how-to books. There are even books that identify items, such as secondhand cars and siding of aluminum. However, none of these books deals with a special business format called startup. ... How can we get things and services bought from an unknown young company that may go bankrupt during the year?
The sales force I commanded so far ranges from what I sold for as much as one day to what I achieved annual sales of 20 million dollars. What I learned from failure and success is that no matter how good a product it will die unless it strives to acquire the first customer who is too dead to fail.
1. Flexibility Be stupid : The biggest strength of startup compared to established companies is that they can provide what they want. Even with orders that seem to be impossible, we will accept it. And even if you quarrel with the president it will be completed. Engineers are racial desires, but they are also willing to work hard for customers who pay money. Large enterprises are bound by various rules and practices and have little flexibility. But the strength of startup is not "Hertz doing everything right" Hertz, but being able to be "do anything" Avis. Hertz and Avis are famous rental car companies. Both companies' advertising battle is famous for a long time. ]
2. Utilize sales incentives : To obtain excellent salesmen, make incentive fee thicker than minimum guaranteed amount. An expensive base salary is an ordered one from IBM, but a real professional salesman is a genuine hunter who has days of prey and sometimes makes big deer. If you increase the reward for success, will the company go bankrupt when you sell too much? But that is not it. Jim Flatley from Verdiem told me the following when I was at Plumtree : He promised the company 15% of sales as a sales payment fee. And then, when sales were on track, there was none of the executives calling out to lower that rate. Even when the bubble burst and many technology companies were in a state of dying, Jim 's results did not fall.
3. Everything is important Speed : No matter how much technology you excel , it alone does not make the company's achievement go up. Respond promptly and promptly to inquiries and inquiries. Do follow-up after doing a presentation somewhere surely and quickly. Regardless of how big your competitors are, keep in mind that customers - prospective customers are enthusiastic about companies that respond quickly and quickly (not big companies).
4. Fill a landmine in the customer's mind : When presenting multiple companies, do it the most at the very beginning and make the next round of debate for your own advantage. Prepare a list of questions for customers. In the first place, the customer says the seller 's argument with spitting on his eyebrows, but believes what he convinced himself. So, even if the seller speaks ill of competitors, it is counterproductive. If you consent yourself with the faults of your competitors, your mind leans to your company. When I sold a $ 3 million system to Boeing , I included a list of questions for other companies in the document (so that customers can check them on their own). There is no evidence that the material was useful, but as a result my company who participated in the sales battle considerably later won.
5. Make the first customer a friend : The first customer is the best salesman. So, if you succeed in the first sales, you should stop a lone wolf and start two-person leg with a customer. Customers risking to buy from your minor company have to justify their actions even if they do not. Increasing your company's customers in the future will be the greatest reason for justification. That's why I will try to help you. Startups generally have limited proof of concepts of products and services, but their oral and experiences from existing customers can sufficiently compensate for their thinness (that is, the customer will perform demonstration on their behalf). If an existing customer tells prospective customers, "That is pretty good", you can concentrate on dealing with more specific concerns of that prospect. One of the customers of Azaleos recommends our product to prospective customers in the way that we do not have to worry about sitting in the server room where we all go out for drinks as the system starts up It is.
6. Sell yourselves sophisticatedly : Even if you do not have any particular grounds, when you work anyway, doing business as if you are a customer as you need a customer. Products and services that I can not confidently do not sell. Half of what sales are going to sell into startup is frustrating. But if you are not an unpleasant person, customers want to buy from a confident company. Besides, the purchasing manager of the company is trained to sever weaknesses and disadvantages. In the elevator heading for negotiations with the big bank, I decided to raise the lower limit price (the price which does not stop below this) by 1 million dollars. There are many people who say low prices because they do not want to break business talks, but at this time large numbers gave better results. Eventually, the negotiations were formed at a price 30% higher than the lower price.
7. First sell to partner : There is no purchasing manager who buys from IBM and becomes fired. Then, let's put on the side of IBM. Think somewhere where you earn with the success of your company or where you suffer a disadvantage with failure. Before you sell to the customer, first sell it there. When you sell to a company with more than 5000 employees, you find a partner that reduces the concern that your company has about your company (eg "It's safe if introduced over there"). Your victory is almost always a victory for big companies like Google , Amazon , Microsoft , SAP , IBM [= = they often use their products]. When I began to sell to a major shipping company, I tried to convince him that it would take nearly a month to leave a project of several million dollars on startup. But the customer naturally said no. Since it was a project using Microsoft products, when asked for Microsoft's cooperation, the business negotiations were settled quickly.
8. Involve everyone : Include as many people as possible in the sales process such as executive, manager, founders, technicians, product managers, customer service people, etc. Then you will become familiar with the nature of the negotiation. A customer may not speak with you in sales nicely, but a horse may fit with a technician. And you will feel your company bigger than it actually is. The customer (prospective customer) has knowledge of various people at your company and has the recognition that it is not only a salesperson who was hijacked. You have the impression that you are not trying to care for that customer, not your company. If the company is likable, the fact that the company is small is rather a positive factor. This tactic is effective for customers in both small and large companies. Especially when you make a personal phone call to one of the CEO and executive at the final stage of stuffing, the impression that your company is committed in good faith is strongly conveyed to the success of that customer company. That's my recommended tactic.
9. Slowly hire, quick dismissal : When hiring useless people, the company loses money if he is hesitant to dismiss, the employee's morale is lost (damaged) and the company's credibility is also damaged. Three months after I hired a man to work, I told him: "How long can you be fine without selling anything?" His answer is: "Do not worry Matt, if I can not sell anything in the coming quarters, I will look for another job." The next day, the company fired him.
10. Honor sales talk : In the beginning of the technical startup, there are often only engineers at the beginning. That he hired you is expecting you to cold-call all of the phone books (call-in). So you have to like Cold Cole. I have been doing business for many years but still enjoying cold calls. But what was the only reason why Dutch (hero who plays Arnold Schwarzenegger) won last in the movie "Predator"? That is to know exactly where the target is in advance. If you do not know exactly in advance what kind of department (or person in charge) you are calling the person in charge of the department (or in charge), it will be a very cold call with poor yield. And then the sales talk that you talk on the phone at that time must be understandable to the 10 year old child.
