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Nimble Social Sales and Marketing with Jon Ferrara #238

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Nimble Social Sales and Marketing with Jon Ferrara #238

Jon Ferrara believes the more people you can help grow, the more you grow. It’s one of the reasons he pioneered contact management and CRM with GoldMine in the 90’s, a company he sold for $125 million, and then he came back to invent the Nimble social CRM for nimble social sales and marketing.

Jon’s core values include building products that help others achieve their

  • passion,
  • plan,
  • purpose

to drive success. Don’t rely on your company to build your network. You own that. In this episode we learn how.

Sustainable Garden

Establish an identity in places where your prospects congregate. Share content often and talk about how they can personally grow. People buy a better version of themselves. Be that version and they will see you as an expert.  Don’t talk about you, talk about them. People are going to hire you based on your network. So, make sure and take good care of your personal CRM.

How To Stand Out

The more digital we get, the more human we need to be. You can get past traditional social sales and marketing by picking up the phone and sending handwritten notes.

5 Fs of Life

This list shows how you get connected and stay connect. Talk about these topics to find the softer side and deeper connection with others.

  • Family
  • Friends
  • Food
  • Fun
  • Fellowship

5 Es of Social Selling

Use this list to build your brand and stand out from the crowd:

  • Educate
  • Enchant
  • Engage
  • Embrace
  • Empower

The more people you grow, the more you grow  – Zig Ziglar

Take Action Today

Sales is the new Service. Service is the new sales.

How To Find Jon Ferrara

To connect with Jon here are the links for nimble social sales and marketing mentioned in the podcast.
This is Jon on LinkedIn and on Twitter 

The CRM we spoke about is Nimble.com  and you can email Jon at jon @ nimble.com

After the Two Week free trial use the discount code  jon40 (40% off)

We are both fans of Hardcore History with Dan Carlin

Social Selling

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How To Scale Sales With a Customer Service Mindset with Sean Tierney #237

Sean Tierney Sales Babble

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How To Scale Sales With a Customer Service Mindset with Sean Tierney #237

Sean Tierney Sales BabbleIn this episode we meet Sean Tierney, Director of Sales for Pagely, a premier managed WordPress hosting provider. Sean has over twenty years of experience in tech, marketing and sales roles and specializes in automation and sales systematization. Sean lives and works in Lisbon, Portugal where he mentors startups in the Startup Lisboa incubator. We talk about his 7 step process on how to scale sales organizations and do so with a customer service mindset.

7 Step Scale Sales Process and Philosophy

Sean’s sales philosophy has a mindset that sales is just customer service before they are a customer. He breaks it down into 7 steps.

  1. Map out the flows of the current reality. This is broken into two parts:
    1.  How information is moving through the system:
      • Where does it live?
      • How does it get there?
      • What are the forms on your site?
      • What systems does it flow to?
      • What’s done with the data?
    2. Understand the buyer journey:
      • How do people go from not knowing your service to knowing your service?
      • How do they get onto your website?
      • How do they buy?
      • How are they onboarded?
      • How do they receive support?
      • How are they upsold?
  2. Track KPIs – Key Performance Indicators. Metrics are tactical, KPIS are strategic eg. MRR Monthly Recurring Revenue, ARR Annual Recurring Revenue and Sales cycle time. Have a spreadsheet but just track the metrics that matter.
  3. Establish a Process – use a CRM or a Kanban style with a pipeline and method for following up.
  4. Flintstone It – Do things manually to start and then automate over time.
  5. Delegate – Map out your org chart when starting and note the roles you’re playing. He found the SDR role was bottlenecking him. AE Account Executive role and Onboarding role he could still own. To grow staff he had one intern listen to calls recorded and placed in knowledge based.
  6. Automate – tools are a set of scaffolding for doing tedious stuff. The goal is to make each person more efficient.
  7. Scaling Personal Attention – a philosophy on automation. Despite size, highly personalize and create powerful experiences that scale with a boutique feel. e.g. pagely.com/explore took the consultative sale process with interactive videos.

Take Action Now

If you can’t explain what you’re doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing. Don’t be shooting from the hip. Map it out, understand your sales process and you’ll understand it at a very deep level.

Tools Mentioned

How To Find Sean Tierney

This is his company Pagely

This is Sean’s  personal blog

This is his podcast for digital nomads.

How to Manage Sales Teams

Let’s keep the conversation going. Listen here today!

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Win Deals At Your Price with Sales Differentiation with Lee Salz #236

Lee Salz Sales Babble

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Win Deals At Your Price with Sales Differentiation with Lee Salz #236

Lee Salz Sales BabbleOur guest is Lee Salz a leading sales management strategist, bestselling author and CEO of Sales  Architects.  Lee is a returning guest, visiting nearly three years ago in Episode 88 How to Differentiate when Selling a Commodity with Lee Salz #88   Lee has a new new book out titled Sales Differentiation – 19 powerful strategies to win more deals at the price you want.  In this episode  we talk about things that you can do to stand out, show value, work around price concerns and actually charge a premium. Stop selling on price and boost your sales today. 

How to Differentiate when Selling a Commodity

Sales people too often complain “If we don’t drop our price, we will lose the deal.”   It’s too easy drop the price and cut into the companies margins. Profits matter!  To win deals at the prices you want, Lee believes your needed strategy is differentiation.

During the interview Lee walked us through a few of his 19 easy-to-implement concepts to help salespeople win deals while protecting margin. He believes these concepts are applicable to any salesperson in any industry and are based on the foundation that how you sell, not just what you sell, differentiates you.

Some highlights mentioned:

  • Focus on what you sell, and how you sell.
  • References – don’t treat it like chore, but opportunity to connect like minded buyers.
  • Price – you can’t be too early but you can be too late. Explain meaningful difference early on.
  • Your greatest competitor is not the status quo, but other sellers competing for your prospects time
  • Author a RFP for your industry and give to prospects as an example to tip the focus to your favor.
  • Your personality is the number one differentiator – especially those with internal company relationships.

Take Action

If you haven’t taken to the time to define how you’re differentiated, spend a moment and reflect on value that you bring to the market. Next build that definition so you can win more deals at the prices you want.

How To Find Lee Salz

Website: www.SalesArchitects.com

Twitter: @salesarchitects

LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leesalz

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SalesManagementMinute

Lee’s New Book – Published October 2, 2018

Sales Differentiation – 19 powerful strategies to win more deals at the price you want.

Get the bonus opportunity at www.SalesDifferentiation.com

NOTE!

As I mentioned, Sales Babble was selected by Feedspot as one of the Top 15 Sales Podcasts on the web. Check this out!

Sales Differentiation for Closing Sales

Here are past episodes to keep the babble up. Listen now!

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The Introverts Super Selling Powers with Beth Beulow #235

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The Introverts Super Selling Powers with Beth Beulow #235

In this episode we meet Beth Beulow, author, business coach, speaker and host of the Introvert Entrepreneur Podcast. Beth is a avid proponent of the introverts super selling powers. She believes when introverts can leverage their natural gifts of listening, preparation, making people feel safe, and see selling as an educational process, they can be highly successful in sales.

Introverts, Extraverts and Ambiverts

We discussed the book To Sell Is Human by Dan Pink on the success of various personality types in the selling role. According to the book:
  • Extraverts – performed the least, too pushy, too aggressive
  • Introverts – performed better, good listeners, yet too meek
  • Ambiverts – converted sales best, a bit of both extraverts and introverts, most successful
lf you’re not connecting with the buyer it could be a lack of balance in the conversation. When you have resonance, that’s powerful selling. Not all great conversations close sales. The timing maybe wrong.  But remember, it’s a marathon not a sprint. At the very least you might get a referral.

Introvert Super Duper Sales Powers

Introverts commonly have the following characteristics. They can be powerfully leveraged for selling:
  • Sales is education. It’s only a story that sales is icky. Share what you have to offer with a focus to make their lives better (whether or not they buy).
  • Connecting one on one. Introverts commonly say they are NOT good in groups, but good one-on-one.  This is actually a super power. Sales is P2P,  person to person. If you can connect with a person, you can make a sale.
  • Listen with curiosity. Many introverts are very good at sitting back and asking questions. This is how you discover what the client needs.
  • Create safety – create an environment where people can open up. You can do this by being real and allowing people the ability to be vulnerable.
  • Preference for preparation – There is power in doing homework and researching to make sure the meeting is more productive. For many, preparation calms the nerves.
Know how you’re going to start. Know how you’re going to close and be open to how you get there. Trust yourself.

Take Action

Look at your website and ask the question, “is this differentiated from the rest? Or do I look like everyone else?”   Remember that a confused mind always says no.

How to Find Beth Beulow

You can  find Beth ALL over the internet! This is the free offer mentioned during the podcast:

Overcoming Sales Fears for Introverts

Selling For Introverts with Alen Mayer #61
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Consulting Coaching and Serving Your Ideal Client with Ben and Aiden Hoppe #234

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Consulting Coaching and Serving Your Ideal Client with Ben and Aiden Hoppe #234

In this episode we turn the tables around and have two budding young entrepreneurs interview me on the podcast.  Ben and Aiden Hoppe are my nephews and this past summer we shared an adrenaline rush riding roller coasters at Cedar Point Ohio.  Today Ben and AIden ask me about consulting coaching and serving your ideal client.

The Questions

Download the free checklist to discover Who Do You Serve.

1. Who is your ideal client?

2. What is the problem you solve?

3. What are the typical symptoms people experience with that problem?

4. What are the common mistakes people make when trying to solve that problem?

5. In your experience what can your prospects do to remove these problems and find success?

6. What is one resource that you can direct your prospects that will further help with that problem?

7. What one piece of advice you can give your prospects they could take action on immediately and find success?

For Pat’s answers on coaching consulting, helping sales managers, startups, and sales professionals go here!

Top Thrill Dragster

My favorite roller coaster was the Top Thrill Dragster a hydraulic launched accelerator coaster that goes from 0-120 miles per hour in less than 4 seconds. That’s almost 200 km per hour.  Just as you get to the top it plummets 120 meters (420 feet), then flattens out
to a stop in 17 seconds. The entire trip last 31 seconds. It’s frightening. It’s awesome.

Take Action Now

Don’t put off tomorrow what you can do today. Yes it’s a cliche, but we’re running out of time. Take action now. Be fearless!

Free Links Checklists and Selling Aids

How to build your pitch. Great way to know what to say BEFORE you’re tested in public. Prepare now.

The Trick to being a persuasive seller. It’s not about being outgoing, pushy or assertive. You can do it too!

How to Connect With You Ideal Client

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Telling Your Sales Story with Tom Jackobs #233

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Telling Your Sales Story with Tom Jackobs #233

In this episode we meet Tom Jackobs. Tom is a former fitness trainer, business owner and now story teller. Tom and I discuss the value and power of using stories when selling. Tom talks about ways to find stories that best represent you telling your sales story. Secondly Tom shares how to structure the story in a way that makes it memorable, insightful, and impactful.

The Hero Journey

Tom went from fat to fit. Through his fitness journey he discovered his ability to educate people. He started a personal training studio in 2008. Despite facing near bankruptcy, with the help of a family business loan, he learned how to Up his selling skills. When sharing his fitness story prospects identified with the tail and were persuaded to join. Tom’s business grew from in $100K to $500K revenue in less than a year. The rest is history.

How To Find a Good Business Story

Find impact moments in your life. Big or small, write them all down. Next, pick the top three that are the most emotionally charged. Write out the story as a hero’s journey. The story should contain:

  • Troubles you experienced
  • Insightful moments
  • What lead up to the challenges
  • Who helped
  • The villains
  • How it turned out
  • What your audience would learn from it

Get the audience to see themselves in your story. Add details, “it was a rainy gray Thursday and …. ” . Once the stories are written practice, practice, practice.

Take Action Now

Don’t be afraid to tell your emotionally charged story. This is how you make a connection. This how you make sales.

How To Find Tom Jackobs

Website – www.TomJackobs.com
Twitter @tomjackobs
Facebook tom.jackobs
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/trainertom/
youtube: youtube.com/c/tomjackobs

Stories That Sell Training: www.AlwaysBeSellingSystem.com/webinar
Impact Sales System: www.ImpactSalesSystem.com/training

Past Episodes on Storytelling Selling

Let’s keep the conversation going. Here are past episodes to take your selling skills to the next level. Listen now!

SB032 – How Sellers are the Plucky Sidekick an Interview with Aprille Janes

 

Image Message Story. An Interview with Heidi Thorne

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Why You Need a Killer Business Plan with Peter Mehit #232

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Why You Need a Killer Business Plan with Peter Mehit #232

My guest Peter Mehit delves into to the importance of having a business plan. We observe how the skills that make great entrepreneurs, are not the skills of a great CEO. Entrepreneurs and sales professionals are known for taking quick action. But too often they do so without a plan. This is the death of many companies. Peter is the author of the book  “Killer Business Plan” . In this episode we learn how a business plan is what’s needed to take your business to the next level.

Hope for the Best, Plan for the Worst

If you don’t visualize the destination, nor understand where you’re at, you’ll not know where to go. As business professionals we need to have a clear idea where we’re heading. Business plans are important to decide where you’re business is going.

Peter paraphrased former guest Geoffrey Moore and Adoption Curve guru stating the skills of an entrepreneur  are not the same ones to grow it. Entrepreneurs can make immediate decisions, but lack the skills for long term planning. We each need to be CEOs and see our business as a machine. Instead of living in a world of response, we need to move to a world of planning.

Any Plan is Better Than None

A simple business plan made with business cards and a poster board might be more than adequate to get started. You need to understand WHERE you want to go. You need to learn discipline and ask:

  • Who’s the customer?
  • Why would they buy?
  • Are they in your geographic area?
  • Is it about you, or the customer?
  • Is it about what the CUSTOMER wants?
  • If you’re selling to everyone, you’re selling to no one.

To earn raving fans you have to target them and their taste, values and the things they care about.

When Sales Are Flat

If sales are flat, look at your products. Ask….

  • Are they still relevant?
  • Where could they become relevant in another market?

You could be at saturation, or you’re no longer competitive. It could be time to move on. Or it could be time to find a different market for your product.  You may need a marketing plan which is a subset of a business plan, the biggest part of the plan. When complete, test! Take something from AGILE planning, trust but verify.

Thoughts on Business Model Canvas

Business Model Canvas  is a diagram taught in business schools for starting a business plan.   Peter believes it’s a good starting point, but only that, a starting point. You should be able to logically explain the steps described on the canvas. Otherwise an investor’s going to take a pass. Think beyond the creation and manufacturing of your product or service. Focus on how you’re going to sell it and grow revenue.

Take Action Plan

  • Visualize clearly who you’re selling to
  • Know what they’re about
  • Always ask am I talking to the right person
  • Always ask am I doing the right things

Unless you’re checking yourself, you’re wrecking yourself – Peter Mehit

How To Find Peter Mehit

You can find Peter and  Custom BPS here:

His “Killer Business Plan” 3 part book is available for you. Send an email to pmehit @ custombps.com and get a copy of the book for free!

Past episodes mentioned:

How To Grow Business

Here are past episodes to keep up the conversation. Listen today!

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You Can’t Challenge Your Way to a Sale with Meridith Elliot Powell

Meridith Elliott Powell Sales Babble

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You Can’t Challenge Your Way to a Sale with Meridith Elliott Powell #231

Meridith Elliott Powell Sales BabbleOur guest is Meridith Elliott Powell, an award-winning author, keynote speaker and business strategist. Meridith is the author of four books, including Winning In The Trust & Value Economy and her latest Own It: Redefining Responsibility – Stories of Power, Freedom & Purpose. Today we challenge the Challenger Sale and  discuss better ways to engage, qualify, and build client relationships that last.

The Challenger Sale

The Challenger Sale advices sellers to take control of the sale by taking on the role of teacher. This doesn’t work in all situations. The sales conversation is a dance where we learn about our prospects AND they learn about us. You can’t teach your way through most sales!

Sales is not a task to win according to Meridith. If a prospective  client is a fit, that’s great. If they’re not a fit, that’s OK too. We’re not a match for everyone. The goal is find those that DO see your value.  It’s a case of learn not teach!

Sell From A Place Of Power vs a Place of Need

Our responsibility as sellers is to make people aware of our amazing product and its benefits. Meridith believes we are driven by the desire to love people and help them. Yet we can’t be a human specification sheet. Instead we need to build a relationship and explore the buyers needs and desires. For example:

  • slow down at the beginning
  • sell aggressively on the subsequent sales
  • sell an urgent need
  • remember it’s unlikely you are top of mind when first meeting a prospect
  • customers need to be heard
  • sales training doesn’t apply to everyone

Take Action Advice

Lastly, listen, learn and allow the buyer to talk.  If you do that they will tell you what you need to do

How To Find Meridith Elliot Powell

LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/meridithelliottpowell/
Website – www.valuespeaker.com
Twitter https://twitter.com/meridithpowell
Facebook –https://www.facebook.com/meridith.powell

This is the link to the FREE ebook 42 Rules to Turn Prospects Into Customers that Meridith mentioned in the podcast.

Sales Skills Training

Below are a number of past episodes that talk about mindset, rapport and generating genuine conversations that lead to closed sales. Enjoy!

 

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Bitcoin, Business and the International Blockchain Conference #230

International Blockchain Conference Sales Babble

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Bitcoin, Business and the International Blockchain Conference

International Blockchain Conference Sales BabbleI attended the 2nd International Blockchain Congress in Chicago. The Innovation and Development Foundation hosted the conference along with Microsoft. The day-long event took place in the heart of Chicago at a state-of-the-art AON Center conference facility. It was a great experience containing keynotes, panel discussions, lightning talks, fireside chats, ICO pitches, workshops and breakout group sessions. We talked Bitcoin Business Blockchain and all things crypto throughout the entire event.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Charles Kwon Sales Babble

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blockchain Business

This is the link to the conference www.ibcongress.io/ibc  They hosted a terrific event!

Shout Out for Bitcoin Business and Blockchain Help

I interviewed a number of people at the conference. I’d like to share a special shout out to the following contributors to this episode and my journey in the Cryptocurrency space.

To learn more on Bitcoin, Business and the International Blockchain Conference click the “Babble Me” button at www.salesbabble.com

 

 

 

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Valve Stem Sales Strategy with Corey Philip #229

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Valve Stem Sales Strategy

Corey Philip Sales Babble

In this episode we meet Corey Philip who founded Gulf Coast Aluminum, a patio and screen enclosure company. He attributes a large factor of the rapid growth of the company to earning referrals from happy customers and data-driven sales and marketing. It was there he invented the Valve Stem Sales Strategy.

Valve Stem Lets Out the Pressure

Corey’s goal was to build a presentation that didn’t sound salesy. He’s tried pushy sales techniques. He did not like them. Nor did he find that it helped his business in the long run. Corey arrived at the idea of the valve stem sales strategy. By placing the price of the product in the middle of the presentation, you let out all  the pressure. Typically the price is at the end. This moves the focus to the value. He wants people to feel like they are making a decision on their own.

Valve Stem Process

The strategy contains 6 steps to be completed in order:

  1. Introduction – ask if they’ve heard of you, share how you do things differently.
  2. Fact Finding – understand what they want, build value by explaining how you’ll do it in detail, step by step process.
  3. Calculate the Price – quote a price to the dollar e.g. $5020
  4. Show similar project – references build trust.
  5. Tell the company story – pictures of office, key people, trucks, equipment.
  6. Assumptive close – should we get this written up after all the story telling.

38% of the prospects are closed at step 6.  30% will come back with an objection that eventually close.

Take Action Today

Get a sales process that is comfortable, natural, with a story and trust. This will differentiate you from your competitors.

How to Find Corey Philip

  • Website: http://www.homeprosuccess.com
  • Infographic post: https://www.homeprosuccess.com/infographic-the-valve-stem-sales-strategy-close-more-sales-using-story-trust-without-sales-tactics/
  • Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/896216427196514/
  • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyphilip/

 

Closing Sales Tips

Coffee’s for closers, Sales Babblers too. Listen to these past episodes: