Brave New Sales

Selling By Influencing: Where Today's Politicians Get It Wrong

I'm just back from the States, where the politics have gotten stupidly ugly.

No, this is not a political post, and I'm not taking a position here, but I do like to relate everyday events to the art and science of selling.  Today's politicians offer a smorgasbord of how not to do it.

 

Uncivil Town Halls

Last night, first-term Congressman Allen West was holding a "Town Hall" in his district, in Fort Lauderdale Florida.  A handful of voters interrupted him early on and started shouting questions.

West went right on the defensive.

"You're not going to intimidate me!" West declared from the stage.  To no surprise, his supporters burst into loud applause.

But a funny thing happened after the applause died down.  The opposition only got louder.

The town meeting turned into a shouting match, and the guards were lightning quick to arrest the protestors.  An immediate victory?  Or a longer-term loss? 

The incident has gained a lot of media attention.  Now, West and his party are on the defensive for something that, a week ago, had strong momentum in their favor.

And West is not alone.  Politicians on both sides of the American aisle are losing support by trying to win every battle, even with members of the vocal public.

 

A Classic Sales Mistake

West did what a lot of junior salespeople do when handling objections.  He got defensive.

As animals with tens of thousands of years of conditioning, we're emotionally programmed to get defensive when anything threatens us.  A lion jumps out of the brush, it's "fight or flight."  Even if we flee in the modern-day sense, we insult the lion as we run.

But we have to overcome this when attempting to persuade the mental side of the human psyche, because your buyer -- or your voter -- is an emotional creature, too.  The "I'm right, you're wrong" approach never works... not in personal relationships, public speaking, persuading or selling.

It's the antithesis of consensus-building.  It's counter-productive to influencing, and influencing is essentially where you want to be in sales and... I once thought... politics.

Getting defensive only makes your counter-part more defensive.  Unseasoned sales people make this mistake unwittingly, if not in the spoken word, then in body language and tone:  "I know this product is great.  Why aren't you getting it?"

 

A Better Way

Imagine if, instead of saying, "You're not going to intimidate me," Congressman West would have said, "I know some of you here have concerns.  In fact, I did too when I first looked at this, so I think I understand where you're coming from.  I have a perspective that should interest you, if you can give me a few minutes to point it out.  Can you give me that?"

As salespeople, we need to use consensus-building approaches like this all the time.  When a buyer shows some concern for some portion of your pitch, you must make it safe for the buyer.  You must demonstrate that you know where the buyer's coming from, and that the concern is legitimate.

"If I were in your seat, Joe, I'd probably be asking the same question."

Then will you have an open mind facing you, ready to listen to your perspective.

I'm pretty sure that last night's Town Hall would have stayed civil if Congressman West would have used Tactical Selling 101: Handling Objections.

And I'd bet that West wouldn't be the subject of headlines suggesting that he and his party are "up against the ropes" from angry constituents, at least not to the degree that they are this morning.

So when you're face-to-face with customers, don't try to win the battles.  You'll only lose influence.

Handling objections and persuasion is not about hammering your point home.  It's about building consensus and influencing.

 

Photo by AllenWestFL  http://www.flickr.com/photos/allenwestfl/ 

 

Sales & Your "Short Game"

"I'm sorry for the long letter, my dear, but I did not have time to make it short."

- Winston Churchill

 

This quote is catchy... because it's paradoxical.  It's counter-intuitive, yet so true.

And it applies to sales in a big-time way.

 

Firstly, we're often so eager to tell our prospect everything that we just spew information like a volcano spews lava... during a sales call, while putting together a presentation, or in handling a question.

 

Secondly, we can be lazy.  As we build a pitch document, a PowerPoint presentation, a proposal, we just let it flow.  Then we fall in love with our own material, and we can't imagine cutting anything out.

Editors, however, know that it takes discipline to be short, concise and snappy... that it actually takes time to keep things short, or to shorten them.  And they know that the end product is always better for the reader, listener, viewer.

The best sales people know this, too, especially early in the sales cycle.  Short and snappy is almost always better for the prospect than long and detailed.

 

So take the time to edit down, to select the real valuable and compelling information.  Chances are, you'll then write/speak/present it in a more compelling way.

 

Photo, Wikipedia

Prospecting In New Markets: Fish Where The (Fat) Fish Are

Full disclosure...

My idea for this post came while reading Chris Brogan's post of yesterday, Fishing Off The Back Porch.

The driving theme of Chris' post:  We often get lazy in our lead generation efforts.

Chris painted a great picture of fishing off your own "back porch" when you should grab your gear and walk down to the stream.  Throwing a baited hook into the swimming pool, from our comfortable patio chair, isn't good enough.

This mental illustration made me think of another such picture, from my first real job in sales.

 

Fish Where The Fish Are

I stepped right in to deep water in a sales management job -- New York State Manager for a major California winery, Sebastiani Vineyards.  From journalism to sales management, without any experience in sales!  Whoa!  Somehow it worked out.

In light conversation, here's how we often prioritized accounts at Sebastiani:

"Fish where the fish are."

This expression painted a simple picture.  It was memorable.  It was easy to recall.  Not a lot of sophisticated metrics, but intuitive.

And intuition works:  "Hmmm, nothing but minnows in this pond."  Or, "Oooh yeah!  There's gotta' be a fat bass lurkin' around this lake!"

 

But Don't Fish Amongst A Feeding Frenzy

A few years later, I found myself working in sports marketing.

I loved going to the big sports marketing conferences.  Easy to understand why.  I was making all sorts of industry contacts, especially my first year.  I was learning a lot.

In my second year, I liked it even more.  Also easy to understand why.  I was in my comfort zone.  I was busy chatting in the corridors, building a relationship with a keynote speaker, having a beer at the bar, and learning a little bit more in the process.

But I wasn't selling.  I wasn't meeting buyers with appetites.  Buyers weren't even looking at my bait... or anyone's bait for that matter.

These sports marketing conferences were filled with sports marketing agents... and sports brokers, consultants, branding gurus, project managers, you-name-it... but don't name "qualified buyers."

The only buyers at these conferences were the ones invited to speak.  Sure, as speakers, they were high-profile and worked for organizations that had big budgets.

But it wasn't long before I noticed two things:

1. There were only a few qualified buyers at any given conference, and they would be among the conference speakers.  The rest stayed away.
2. These few qualified buyers were swarmed by other agents, brokers, consultants... and they weren't very pleased about being swarmed.  They were the "feed" in a piranha "feeding frenzy," and they felt sharp teeth all around them.

 

Fish Where The Fat Fish Are

I used to work with Rob Prazmark, a rain maker in the sponsorship sales world.  Rob's done billions of dollars in sponsorship deals around the Olympic Games and other blue-chip properties.

Sure, Rob attends most of the big sports marketing conferences.  He has to.  He's one of the industry's top guns.  But he doesn't stop there.

Rob and I shared a cab back to Atlanta airport once, and we got talking about the scant opportunities at the Olympic-related conference we had just left.

Rob cut right to the chase.  "You leave a conference like this?  Maybe you have two business cards worth following up on."

He paused.  I knew his big point was coming.

"You want qualified leads?" he asked rhetorically.  "Go to other industry conferences.  Right now?  Telecom is hot.  You'll get two dozen leads in one day.  A lot of them are fat, and a lot of them are hungry."

 

Stray Into Uncharted Waters

So, you want to develop new leads?  Pick an industry where you think your offering has a good fit... and not your industry.

Your fit is within a lot of industries, you say?  Good for you.  So get a sense of what's popping.  What industries are going through a lot of growth, innovation -- perhaps even downsizing if your offering has a fit related to cost efficiency or change management.

I use the example of conferences only to illustrate the bigger point.

Identify a new industry.  Market yourself there by exhibiting at a conference... or by cold-calling, warm-calling, networking, tweeting, blogging, whatever is appropriate to that industry.  Just don't stay in familiar waters, in markets where you've been.

It's comfortable but, by definition, it's limited.

Stray into uncharted waters.  Fish where the fish are.

Fish where fatter and hungrier fish might be waiting for your cast.

 

- What kind of opportune waters might fit your offering?
- Where might you find fatter and hungrier fish?

 

 Photo of Mike Halstead, from whom I also learned a lot in my good ol' days of sports marketing.