Selling Power Blog

The Anatomy of a Setback and a Comeback

Rick McDaniel is an expert in helping people make a comeback in their lives and is the author of the new book Comeback: Overcoming the Setbacks in Your Life (WestBowPress, 2012).  Rick has earned three degrees, including an advanced degree from Duke University.  He has traveled and spoken on five continents and authored three previous books.  If you have experienced a setback and are ready for a comeback, find out more about Rick at www.comeback-thebook.com.

 

Life is full of setbacks.  You cannot avoid them, no matter who you are.  The good news is that comebacks are possible; in fact, they happen all the time.  The challenge: how do you overcome your setback and have an incredible comeback?

Walt Disney is a personal hero of mine.  He fascinates me because of his creative energy and visionary leadership.  What you might not know is that he experienced seven very disappointing setbacks in his life.  He had several comebacks, and now the Disney name is the gold standard for creativity and excellence.

Warren Buffet is another person who has experienced setbacks. His latest setback is prostate cancer.  Early in his life, he had a setback when he was not accepted to Harvard.  Yet Buffet has had such a comeback that he is one of the richest people in the world. I have no doubt that he will tackle his latest setback with the same energy he has used throughout his life.

There are steps you can take to turn a setback into a comeback.     

Learn the Lesson

Too many try to push the setback behind them as quickly as possible, which is precisely why so many go from setback to setback.  If you want to have a comeback, you must look for the lessons in the setback to avoid making the same mistake again.  

Not every setback is the result of a direct action on your part; you can do all the right things for your health, for instance, and still end up sick.  But if you look deep enough, there are possibly decisions that you made that could have resulted in the setback.  Even if you discover something that seems to have had very little impact on the setback, this discovery will help you in the future from having a setback.    

Make the Change

A comeback will always begin with change.  If you want a comeback, you are going to have to change.  Unless you change what you presently are doing or not doing, things are going to remain the same; there will be no comeback.  You have to be willing to do things differently from how you’ve done them up to this point.

Change happens when you receive new information or gain new knowledge.  Change happens when you get a new attitude.  Change happens when you choose to be committed to your comeback.  

Exit Survival Mode
 
Some have been in survival mode for far too long.  It can be hard to decide to actually do it – to exit survival mode.  But there comes a time when you have to get past licking your wounds and get your bearings.

Believe it or not, many people become comfortable in survival mode because it can be quite a pity party, where they dwell on how they’ve been wronged, how things are not fair, or how things haven’t gone their way.  For your comeback to begin, you can’t be in survival mode.  There is no growth, progress, impact, or comeback in survival mode. 

Restart Your Dream Engine 

Setbacks do not control your life; you control your life.  You decide you are going to dream again. Think back to when you were a kid, and you thought, “One day I’m going to be a professional baseball player,” or “When I grow up, I’m going to go to the moon.”  Kids have the wildest imaginations and very vivid dreams.  Don’t let those old dreams fade away; turn them into reality.  

No matter what has happened, don’t allow your setbacks to define you anymore.  Become determined to move forward into your dream.  Ask yourself what it is you want more than anything.  Then ask yourself how you’re going to make it happen.  To make the dream a reality, the desire must match the discipline.  

Develop Momentum 

Momentum is your best friend because it makes you better than you are.  Slowly begin capturing the momentum by regaining control of one thing at a time.  A little momentum turns into a lot of momentum, which produces emerging energy and limitless passion that positively fuel a comeback.

It can be hard to get going if you don’t know where you need to begin.  Figure out the first step and start doing it; that will put you back on the road to success.  Each hurdle you successfully get over will build the momentum that will lead you to your comeback.  

A comeback takes work; however, it is possible, and everyone from ordinary people to celebrities to professional sports teams have proven that it’s possible.  You, too, have the potential to write a great comeback story.  

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Here's How to Expand Your Selling AREA

Today I received a letter from Paul Pease, president of the Pease Group. He shared a letter his father wrote to his sister when she entered the sales field on November 25, 1988. What makes this letter so special is that it contains time-tested sales wisdom that hasn't changed to this day.

Dear Daughter,

Now that you are firmly entrenched in the sales profession, I am submitting the following for you to chew on and digest. I was fortunate enough to work for a man (John A. Sexauer) who was tough, demanding, commanding, and sincere. I worked for him – straight commission – from 1947 to 1979. He had a formula for hiring people, and the formula was reduced to an acronym: AREA.

"A" is for Adaptability – using your talent to rectify errors that occur to the customer through no fault of your own (wrong merchandise shipped, poor quality, or a billing error). The ability to cope personally with the situation, without help from your superiors, is adaptability. While you must be consistent in your selling discipline, you must adapt your selling tactics as times change; experience molds you, and you learn from others. Adaptability on the call and over your career is a prime selling fundamental.

"R" is for responsibility – to yourself, to your company, and to your clientele. "To yourself" is probably the most difficult, since it requires self-discipline. Get up and get out every day. Make commitments (appointments), honor them (show up on time), and offer the customer something of value (to them) that is profitable to your business (sell). "To your company" simply means giving a productive effort for your wages. "To your clientele" is usually reflected by the results of the "to yourself" discipline, because it proves that you are reliable; hence, customer rapport that challenges the competition is established. You can serve a client without being subservient. There is a great distinction between the two: stand 10 feet tall, but remember, you are there to serve and not to surrender.

"E" is for enthusiasm – for which there is no substitute! Without this element, life is an abyss. No salesperson can afford to ignore it. It is the spark that ignites attention faster than any other medium of salesmanship. You cannot expect to sell something unless you are sold on it yourself, hence the reason for genuine sincerity in your presentation. When you have convinced the client that you are providing value, then price becomes secondary.

Like a good cook, add ingredients to boost the flavor, such as consideration and integrity. Consideration is necessary when you are about to close the deal and the client suddenly has an emergency that delays the order. You have to be considerate of the circumstances. Integrity can come only with time – time for the client to judge your character for honesty. Integrity is a priceless ingredient for any transaction. Your word is your bond, and never forget it.

"A" is for ambition – not only for the money, but it certainly does not discount it. Ambition seems to be inherent; either you have it or you don't. It cannot be taught. If it must be taught, then it is no longer ambition but simply obedience to the teacher. Salespeople who lack ambition are merely order takers because they have no spark.

Hope this helps you out. Nothing moves in the entire world until a sale is made. And if the day comes that you think you know it all, shoot yourself.

Love you,

Dad 

 

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Beyond Listening: Integrative Conversations

Salespeople today know that listening is a vanishing art in a world where knowledge is exploding all around us. Top salespeople know that buyers can be liars. Sometimes, they're confused as to what they want, and they often need a guide who helps them clearly define what they really need. Like psychiatrists are trained to listen to facts, feelings, and fantasies, top salespeople tune in to the customer's psyche, probing for needs, wants, hopes, desires. They always make sure there's a pause after the customer has finished talking; they know that the most important clues to the customer's real concerns often come as an afterthought.

Listen to More Than What Is Said

Great salespeople also listen to their own streams of thought that are triggered by their customer’s words, sounds, and images; this is also known as following our instincts. These salespeople go a step beyond rephrasing the customer's problems to demonstrate understanding. They do more than ask probing questions that allow them to sharpen their understanding. These superstar salespeople follow a highly effective process that good psychiatrists use: integrative conversations.

Summarizing Your Understanding Is Not Enough

Average salespeople are too preoccupied with reducing the customer's comments to a Reader's Digest version of the conversation: "What I hear you saying is…" Great salespeople kick it up a notch by weaving what they've heard the customer say with what bubbled up inside their own mind while they listened.

An integrative conversation is an authentic exchange of ideas, concepts, opinions, and feelings, with both parties developing a new narrative that reflects a synergistic whole that's co-created by both partners. Integrative conversations happen naturally between non-neurotic people who are willing to give up their preconceived notions when a better idea comes along. For integration to occur, there must be freedom from emotional obstacles or ego-related issues. Integrative salespeople don't push ideas into a prospect's mind; they tease them out instead. They are not preoccupied with the outcome of the conversation; they focus on the quality of the conversation, the flow of ideas, and the depth of understanding that leads to fresh insight. An integrative conversation gets both people to focus on co-creating an optimized outcome.

Become an Integrative Leader

Sales leaders can maximize their potential by becoming integrative leaders. Management guru Warren Bennis once said that becoming a leader is much the same thing as becoming an integrated human being. Integrative leaders are continuously exploring their inner life while passionately pursuing their business goals. 

Key takeaway: Next time, try to be open to what the customer communicates, and observe how the customer's facts and feelings resonate with you. Instead of focusing on the logical content as the sole source for your response, integrate your own associations into your response; it will greatly enrich your conversation. You will become a better collaborator and feel better about your personal and professional achievements. 

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Taking a Lifetime View of Customers

This guest blog post is by Eli Jones, Ph.D. and Co-Author, Selling ASAP: Art, Science, Agility, Performance. Visit www.sellingasap.com to learn more. 

Salespeople face the task of keeping customers satisfied while increasing the value of customers to the sales organization. In recent years, customer lifetime value (CLV) has become a handy method for achieving those goals. Using mathematical equations to determine CLV is now part of the science of selling. At some point, salespeople may require a sophisticated set of analytical capabilities in order to predict customer needs accurately and interact with customers more profitably. Essentially, however, professional selling today requires taking a long-term view of customer relationships. Here are the four facets of lifetime customer relationships:

1. Product holdings – the products a customer has purchased and the products the customer currently has on hand.
2. Product use – how the customer uses the product and what value the customer derives from using it.
3. Contacts – the nature of the sales organization and the salesperson's contacts with the decision-making unit of a client company over time.
4. Events – occurrences in the life of the customer (e.g., birth of a child, new business opportunities, change in competitive activity, etc.).

When salespeople collect and use information about these four facets of customer lifetime relationships, they are able to answer questions such as the following: How many customers have purchased product A? How many customers have purchased it more than once? What is the frequency of contact with customers? Which customers are most profitable? What events occurred prior to losing a customer? What customers purchase which products? What events typically precede purchases?

When salespeople can answer questions such as these, they put themselves in a better position to create, maintain, and grow lifetime relationships with customers. A key part of building customer relationships is, simply stated, truly knowing your customers. You must think of customers as partners in collaborative relationships designed for maximizing value to both the customer and you and your organization over the long term. Thus, you must develop "thoughtware" about your customers. Thoughtware represents the thinking process salespeople use as they continuously learn about their customers. For example, customers are often grouped by types of relationships, which provides the following advantages:

• Identification of significant events in the life of the customer.
• Avoidance of unneeded duplication of effort.
• Knowledge of loyalty patterns based on the type of relationship established with individual customers.
• Identification of cross-sell opportunities (i.e., finding additional products or services that can provide added value to current customers).
• Identification of up-sell opportunities (i.e., working with customers to upgrade existing products or services for the purpose of providing added customer value and solidifying relationships).

Customer lifetime value is not just a forecasting technique or a software package, but a way of thinking about and doing business with customers that emphasizes up-front preparation and profitable long-term relationships. Such long-term relationships are less costly than those formed under the traditional model, which emphasizes single transactions with customers and closing sales.

Learn more about customer lifetime value. Join SellingASAP.com.

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Pricing Optimization in a B2B World: Value-Based Pricing Comes of Age for Sales

Today's blog post is by Steven Forth, CEO of LeveragePoint, the leading SaaS platform for value-based pricing and sales.

 

 

The economic climate is tough: financial uncertainty, wild fluctuations in commodity prices, global competition, and rapid commoditization of products that we all thought were safe. Business buyers are paying a lot more attention to the economic variables in a purchase decision, and this is putting new pressure on sales to execute with an emphasis on value-based selling. This is something with which most of us have little experience. We know how to build relationships, uncover customers' needs and pain points, and translate features and benefits into solutions. But most of us are not very familiar with translating those solutions into economic impacts. And yet, that is precisely what we need to do today to capture an unfair advantage in the market.

One approach is to estimate the return on investment (ROI) for the customer. Many buyers, especially financial buyers, insist that the sales team provides ROI calculations as part of their proposal. In fact, though, ROI is not a very useful tool for sales. It is an important approach for the chief financial officer (CFO), who often needs to make decisions between very different options – apples-to-oranges kinds of decisions.

But in sales, we are more often comparing apples to apples – the buyer is trying to decide between two similar solutions from competing vendors. Or, in some cases, it is apples versus going without ("I haven't been eating apples, so why should I start now?"). How does one make the economic sale in this case? 

Over the past two decades, pricing experts have been developing an approach called value-based pricing, which depends on the creation and subsequent use of value models to set price ranges for different segments and hone value message. (There are many articles on this available on the Resources section of the LeveragePoint Website.) Value-based pricing is based on a few key principles:

1. The customer always has an alternative (known as the Next Best Competitive Alternative), and the price of this alternative sets the market price.
2. Your solution will have some positive economic impact for the customer that your competitor’s does not. By working with the customer, the scope of these can be estimated.
3. Your solution will have some unique costs or shortcomings compared to the competitive alternative, and it is important to acknowledge these.

These three principles are combined to create a value model. A value model is a collection of value drivers for a specific customer or segment relative to a competitor. A value driver is a mathematical equation that shows how a customer derives value from your solution.

One common objection to value models is, "We can't get data for the value driver functions." Our experience is that, as long as the value driver makes sense and the initial numbers are reasonable, customers are willing to discuss them and share information in the sales conversation, especially if the salesperson understands value and acknowledges the competitor and the positive and negative value of his or her company's own solution.

Like sales, pricing is a conversation, and it needs to be collaborative. In the current economic environment, we need to be able to sell the economic value of our solutions as part of an honest conversation with our customers.

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Setting Sales Goals and Targets: Step 1 to Creating a Winning Sales Plan

Today's blog post is by Dan Hudson, President and Co-Founder of 3FORWARD. He has a B2B sales and sales leadership background of more than 30 years.

  

 

Sales planning for 2012 is well under way, and most sales teams are facing quota increases for the coming year. The fact is, every sales leader will have to do more in 2012, often with limited additional resources. Even best-of-class sales programs (with average win rates of greater than 30 percent) need to continue improving their year-over-year performance. It's one of those indisputable laws, like paying taxes and getting older.

This reality is what makes formal sales planning so important. It's main the difference between making it happen and hoping it happens. The fundamental goal of the sales plan is to put on paper specifically how the sales team will make next year's revenue target. We recommend your sales plan cover (at least) the following areas to make sure the fundamentals are addressed:

1. setting goals and targets,
2. building the revenue model,
3. filling the sales funnel,
4. building a dynamic sales process,
5. executing and measuring.

By focusing on these five core areas, you can build a sales plan that is reasonable, measurable and, most important, achievable. Each section is vital, but let's take a closer look at section one, since it sets the strategic direction for the tactical elements that come later in the plan.

Setting Sales Goals and Targets: Section 1 of the Sales Plan

Whereas the B2B sales plan establishes the playbook for a successful sales year, the initial section of the sales plan, "Goals and Targets," is the foundation of the written plan itself. Following are the three main topics for this section, with examples of where to focus.

1.  Making Goals and Targets Specific and Measurable

Too often, sales goals and targets have a case of the "warm and fuzzies" – a feel-good tone that is vague and undefined. To be clear and actionable, goals and targets must be specific (numbers and dates are best) so that you can measure your progress throughout the year. 

Example of "fuzzy and feel good" targets:
"Establish new relationships for our outsourcing practice."

Example of specific and measurable targets:
"Establish two new relationships per quarter in the US Financial and Accounting Outsourcing practice. The targeted annual contract value of each new relationship is $2 million."

When setting your goals and targets, try to strike the sweet spot between "go big or go home" and the reality of your market situation. Every company faces its unique challenges, but if you are prepared, then it's easier to overcome them.

2. Prioritizing Challenges and Creating Defensive Strategies

Consider your last couple of sales years, and list those challenges that kept you from achieving your sales targets. Think in terms of the key areas of the selling process:

• lead management
• account management
• opportunity management
• territory/area management
• pipeline process
• metrics and reporting
• team skills development
• rep and manager recruiting
• compensation

Prioritize your list of challenges and identify your strategy to minimizing these sales barriers. Use a template, such as the following, to identify, rank, and address your challenges.

Preparing for Sales Plan Risks and Challenges

Challenge	Not enough qualified leads from marketing's lead generation program.
Impact	The sales pipeline and ability to make the annual revenue target.
Severity	High
Recommendation	Meet with marketing to jointly define what constitutes a qualified lead. Increase quantity of target accounts by X and identify Y key contacts in each target.
Assigned to	Joe King, Director, Marketing Lead Management
Complete by	March 1, 2012

3.  Define Investments Needed to Achieve Success

You are likely in the same boat as most sales leaders heading into a new year: you're getting a quota increase! In the old days, we might have grumbled a little, played around with territories and headcount, and then told the CEO we needed another seven sales reps to meet the new number.  

More Effective Approaches to Investing in Sales Success

Yes, headcount is still a critical success factor for a sales team; however, benchmarking of best-in-class sales teams demonstrates several process-level improvements that consistently improve win rates and increase a team's ability to hit its numbers. These enhancements allow both the current team to perform better and the improvement of new-hire success rates. Here are some areas to consider:  

1. Establishing a formalized sales process, including targeted account planning
2. Sales manager effectiveness training and industry-specific rep training
3. Lead management process and marketing automation
4. Sales leaders dashboard and sales knowledge management
5. Sales intelligence, prospect profiling, and industry monitoring

Additional Resources for Setting Sales Goals and Targets

There you have the outline of "Setting Sales Goals and Targets," the first section in creating your new sales plan. You can clearly see why getting this on paper creates the foundation for everything else in your plan. If you'd like some help getting started, 3FORWARD provides several complimentary templates to help sales leaders develop their 2012 sales plans. 

• Sales Revenue Forecasting
• Do I Have Enough Leads Calculator
• Do I Have Enough Pipeline Calculator
• Finding Your Best Prospects Success Kit
• Target Account Plan Success Kit

Give them a try and let us know if you have any questions. Remember, the most important takeaway is to realize that your team WILL have to sell more in 2012 than in 2011. Hope isn't a strategy! Having a plan is the only way it will happen.   

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5 Sales Management Questions We Answered in 2011

Every ending signals a new beginning. To make sure we build effectively on our experiences and avoid repeating our missteps, I asked Selling Power editors to compile this list of five important sales-management questions we addressed this year. Here are some of our most popular articles on topics that resonated with readers, including developing talent in your reps, adding value for customers, staying positive, and fostering loyal relationships.

Are You Selling Problems or Solutions?
Think about the news stories you heard or read today. Did you find information that you could use to improve your life? Did you read something that gave you a positive feeling? 

When Should Sales Managers Step in to Close the Deal?
The hardest part of sales management may be knowing when to step in and when to take a back seat as your reps learn the ropes, particularly in front of the customer. As tough as it is, it's often critical for the development of individual reps – and your team as a whole – to let them pave their own way. 

Are Your Sales Contacts Quality or Quantity?
With LinkedIn and Facebook making a public display of the numbers of "connections" or "friends" we have, it's tempting to equate numbers with success. But long-term sales success isn't about the quantity of your connections; it's about quality.

How Can Comparison Questions Help the Sale?
Sure, asking questions can lead to a sale. Asking the right questions, however, can win loyal business for years to come.

Where Can You Add Value?
What pushes business forward and paves the way for bigger sales? More value. One classic way to find opportunities to create value is to take a product or service and add something to it.

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4 Sales Management Resolutions for 2012

Many sales managers today are finding themselves leading teams that are not as effective as the
competition. Why is that? 

It all starts with the sales process. When the sales process is weighed down by outmoded methodologies, leadership, and people, your sales reps are more vulnerable to failure.

If you haven't already started, now is a perfect time to shake off the dust and get in gear for 2012. Here are my four New Year's resolutions for sales managers -- each one is based on changes I've seen in sales management in the past year. Use them to get your team on the path to sales success today. 

Resolution #1
I will create content that attracts customers.

Many sales teams are struggling because they work for companies that are failing to respond to the new ways that customers are buying. I routinely talk to sales leaders who do not see the need to optimize their B2B websites to capture and follow up on inbound leads. They don’t take advantage of marketing automation software. They have no online sales channel. They think social media is a waste of time and have little or no presence on Twitter. They’d rather have their reps out selling than blogging or connecting with new prospects on LinkedIn. Yet these are all steps that leading companies are taking to engage with an audience and turn prospects into loyal customers.

Keep this in mind: Good content stimulates curiosity, sparks online conversations, and encourages "likes" and online engagement. Seize the opportunity in 2012 to become the conversation leader and content leader in your field. In 2012, good content will pave the road to more closed sales.

Resolution #2 
I will create messaging that gets our customers to open their minds.

Right before a meeting, your reps should be able to pull up vital information about the prospect’s company and industry in order to set the stage for a relevant dialogue. Access to the right information is the first step. Translating this information into messages that engage and persuade customers is the second step -- that's an area where many salespeople come up short. 

Last month at the Sales Strategies in a Social & Mobile World Conference, I invited sales executives from sponsor companies to deliver a one-minute elevator pitch to the entire audience onstage. While we heard a number of creative and compelling messages, some of these pitches didn't have traction. 

In 2012 you want to make sure that your salespeople are able to deliver a message that opens their customers' minds. You also want to make sure they will follow up with a clear value proposition. If they don't, their clients won't open their wallets.  

Resolution #3
I will create top performing sales reps. 

A recent report on how successful companies are creating opportunities for new and better sales shows that leading organizations are opting for short and timely training programs that can be disseminated virtually and accessed at any time. If you create a winning sales culture – one that empowers reps to learn new skills through training, share collective knowledge, and tap internal resources that can help them sell more effectively – the top performers will come knocking.

Resolution #4
I will hold everyone responsible for the sale companywide. 

Another mental shift that many sales managers need to make is that sales is not an island. Because today’s customer has often completed up to 80% of the buying cycle before even coming into contact with a sales rep, it’s important that all departments be empowered to act as sales support. 

If finance and legal work in silos it will be impossible to create an effective sales negotiation strategy. If sales and marketing are not aligned, it will be hard to optimize your company's sales potential.

Today, sales management success is about being social and mobile. You can’t always control when and where customers find you, but you can control your social presence and your level of engagement. This is great news for sales managers who want to succeed in 2012. Sales success has always been an art, but it is now equally about science. As a sales manager, your job is not to get there before the competition or win the war on price. Your job is to equip your team to find and follow the right opportunities, engage with prospects early and with intelligence, and create an overall culture of success.  

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Image via Grant Cochrane/freedigitalphotos.net

Why B2B and B2C Sales are Different

Geoffrey James is an award-winning journalist and author who writes a daily column on selling for Inc.com. He previously wrote Sales Machine, the world's most-visited sales-oriented blog, and has written hundreds of articles for such publications as Technology Marketing and Selling Power. He can be reached at GeoffreyJames.com.

 I'm not a sales guru, and I don't do sales training. I'm a reporter who writes about sales techniques and technology. You've probably seen my feature article in SellingPower magazine, my erstwhile Sales Machine blog on CBS, or my daily column on Inc.com.

I've interviewed dozens of sales experts and trainers and discussed sales technique and sales management with hundreds of sales managers and professionals. The most important thing I've learned is that business-to-business (B2B) selling is fundamentally different from business-to-consumer (B2C) selling, and attempts to bundle the two into a single set of winning behaviors are doomed to failure.

As I point out in my newly published book, How to Say It: Business to Business Selling: Power Words and Strategies from the World's Top Sales Experts, there are several reasons why it's silly to treat B2B like B2C:

• The B2B buyer is vastly more sophisticated. Because the Internet makes comparative pricing information publicly available, it is not at all unusual for a buyer in a B2B transaction to know more about the product category and competition than the sales professionals who are trying to sell that type of product.
• The stakes are much higher. B2B buyers and decision makers are being paid high salaries to understand what they’re buying and how it will be used. They can lose career points and get fired if they make a wrong decision, something that never happens when a consumer purchases a lousy consumer product.
• B2B selling requires more knowledge. When you're selling to businesses, it's not enough to understand a product and be able to present it coherently. B2B selling generally involves diagnosing a customer's challenges and then coming up with a customized solution that may very well involve a long-term business partnership.
• B2B selling demands better people skills. When consumers buy a product, typically there is only one decision maker involved (or possibly two, like a husband and wife). Corporate buying decisions can involve dozens of decision makers, influences, stakeholders, and naysayers. It takes extraordinary abilities to work with many different types of people, all of whom have different agendas.
• B2B selling involves more patience. Even big-ticket consumer sales (such as homes and cars) can be completed in a day or week at most. By contrast, B2B deals can involve weeks and months of intermittent activity, meetings, phone calls, and back-and-forth documents as the deal moves through the customer bureaucracy.
• B2B selling is more sensitive to economic disruption. One of the first things to take place in an economic crisis is that firms lock down purchasing, add more layers of decision making, and demand concessions from their vendors. This happens even for deals that have already been signed, and such tactics derail even the best-designed sales campaign.
• B2B selling involves large sums of money. In consumer sales, million-dollar deals are unusual and limited primarily to luxury homes. In B2B selling, by contrast, deals that involve millions of dollars are so commonplace as to be unremarkable. Even billion-dollar deals are struck from time to time.

Why do so many people continue to treat B2B sales like B2C sales? I think it's a legacy from the days when B2B selling consisted mostly of providing information and taking orders. It was simpler back then, and so the simple techniques that worked in B2C environments still worked in B2B. 

Not any longer.

P.S.: My new book is dedicated to Gerhard Gschwandtner, who has taken the time, on several occasions, to coach me personally, advise my career, and encourage my writing. I can't thank him enough.

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Closing the Gaps in Lead Nurturing

This guest blog post is by Baxter Denney, principal of Marketologist, which provides strategic marketing consulting. Baxter is a marketing automation and demand management expert. 

 

 

Lead nurturing is a largely familiar term among the marketing automation software crowd, but in case you are new to the game, here is a great description from Eloqua: "At its core, lead nurturing is the process of cultivating leads that are not yet ready to buy."

The approach to setting up a lead-nurturing program is pretty straightforward:

• Identify who you will nurture.
• Identify how you will do it.
• Create content.
• Set things in motion.
• See what happens.

Many organizations new to the idea of marketing automation and lead nurturing will take this route; however, they will be doing themselves a disservice. Let's go back to the Eloqua definition and the concept of cultivating leads. The word "cultivate" implies a sort of building process. It is not a hit-and-run instant. For marketers to truly cultivate a lead, they need to influence the buying-decision process at every step throughout the customer's lifecycle. The most powerful way to influence the buying-decision process is to strategically provide targeted content to your prospects based on where they are in the process.

Baxter Denney of Marketologist works with companies every day, helping them set up quality lead-nurturing programs that do just this. Here is an outline of his method.

First, he says, you have to visualize every step in the buying-decision process. He suggests using the image of a funnel, something any of us in the sales and marketing world should be very familiar with. Below is an example.

The funnel and stages may vary by organization, but the point is to visualize each stage and identify points where marketing can add value and influence by nurturing. This is what Denney calls a gap analysis. He provides an example, using a fictitious company called Webert. He looked at the current content-nurturing program, comparing that to the number of leads that ended up converting. Here is a chart showing what he found.

Overall, this program looks pretty good; however, there is always room for improvement. In this next image, Denney illustrates the places where marketing is either completely absent or has the potential to modify the message to better reflect the buyer's stage in the buying process.

With this analysis done, Webert can now begin constructing a revised program that will nurture these identified gaps. The next step is to develop (or repurpose) content that has both a meaningful and appropriate message that will engage buyers.

Finally, it is vital that marketing keeps sales involved in this process. When doing the gap analysis, pull the sales team in so that it can provide real-time feedback. Perhaps there are additional gaps the team can identify. Additionally, sales can communicate to marketing where the most support is needed. Then marketing is able to create a nurturing program accordingly. With both sales and marketing on the same page, companies will be able to optimize their nurturing program in order to convert the most leads possible.

For Denney's full post, see the Marketing Automation Software Guide blog.

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