Our website is a constant topic of discussion for us – one of the subjects is how much information should we be publishing. I came across a post relating to this topic on the B2B Lead Generation Blog. There are a number of very good points made in this entry, but a couple really stand out.

People use the web for research; they are looking for fresh ideas, insight and actionable information. Intellectual property is difficult to protect and is quickly commoditized by the market. Why not leverage some of your IP to your advantage? Leverage it and demonstrate your thought leadership.

I have read numerous articles in the past couple of months that bring up similar points. In today’s market buyers are engaged much earlier in the selling process, sometimes even before a salesperson calls on them. I don’t know about you, but if something isn’t working right, I am on the web looking for solutions. After I have finished the research, I usually will make calls to a couple of the companies that have the most helpful websites.

There will undoubtedly be a few companies that look like they have great products/solutions, but the only way I can learn about them is to call the company. So why do I rarely call these companies? Because I am looking for some basic understanding of the problem I am encountering and I want to find that on their website. Instead, I figure that this company will want to start at the very beginning and try to troubleshoot the problem. After a long, tedious call, I expect that they will finally provide a solution. I also expect that I will be put on a call/email/follow-up list whether they solve my problem or not. Which leads me to the second point I wanted to share with you.

This is particularity important for companies engaged in a complex sale, where up to 70% of a customer€™s perception of your brand comes from their interactions with your sales people. I believe that the people and companies who succeed today are those who learn faster and teach others what they know more effectively.

And what better way is there to start building your brand then through your website, blog, white papers, etc. Start building your brand by sharing your expertise. The author of the B2B blog, Brian Carroll, uses this analogy:

I have a friend who is a NASCAR fan and what he loves is that it’s more about the driver than the car. All the cars are the same. It€™s the driver and the crew that make the difference. It’s kind of like that with business now. Most companies have the same basic car. It’s really about how well you drive it.

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From Dick Costolo’s Ask the Wizard blog:

Briefly, the “No False Positives” school of hiring says that bad hires are worse than no hire because bad employees infect the company with all sorts of issues. Better to march on with nobody filling an important slot than to bring in a sub-par performer.

The hire fast, fire fast approach basically can be boiled down to “it’s really almost impossible to understand whether a person is going to be a killer A+ match before they start working with you day to day, so best to find somebody that seems close enough, and then remove them quickly if they don’t work out.”

This topic resonates with us and becomes amplified when you read further into the post:

You can hire fast, fire fast with sales people. It’s very very hard to comprehend a priori who will be able to best sell your service/product in a particular region to a particular customer base. Since this is an area of the company where people generally are responsible for very straightforward, measurable and explicit individual goals (ie, sales targets), it’s much easier to communicate and implement a hire fast, fire fast kind of policy with this group. You have to ensure you really stick to it however, and understand when company processes and products are causing the sales ramp challenge(s).

That’s my emphasis above and I have to disagree, in part, with his conclusion. First off, yes, you can have a priori knowledge of a salesperson’s ability to sell your service/product – that is what we do for a living. We work with a wide range of companies in a wide range of markets, but we see distinct patterns in hiring salespeople.

Here are 3 of the most common pitfalls we encounter:

Entrepreneurs
The sales manager would prefer to have a team of entrepreneurs. Successful sales does require some independence, but often sales managers abdicate their responsibility to coach, train, debrief, motivate and hold their salespeople accountable. In effect, they hire a strong salesperson, provide minimal training and then expect them to perform with no management. This is the most significant pitfall we see in sales departments and one that is exasperated by a hire fast, fire fast mentality.

Savior
The sales manager knows the revenue stream is drying up fast so the solution is to hire a savior to double revenue in half the time. In this instance, every facet of a new hire is turbo-charged. The revenue quota, if attained, should lead to the salesperson owning the company since it hasn’t been attained in years (if ever). A typical approach here is to attempt to hire a salesperson from a competitor who will bring their own book of business. This approach rarely works and is the forerunner to a churn-and-burn sales department.

Clones
The sales manager would prefer to have a salesforce comprised of clones. Typically, they would like to clone themselves. Any salesperson who varies in style, motivations or rewards is viewed marginal. The subtle truth here is that a sales department comprised of clones contains salespeople with the same strengths and the same weaknesses. One market change can render this team impotent.

The Wizard makes an important point at the end of his post – you have to understand what obstacles are affecting the sales ramp process. The first place I would look – the sales manager. Is he or she falling into any of the pitfalls above? What went wrong in the hiring process? What led he or she to believe this salesperson was the best candidate at the time and what changed (or was discovered after hiring)?

We do see companies hanging on to mediocre or worse salespeople when they should be upgrading the team. The belief that a warm body is better than no body rules the day in these organizations. But there has to be a happy medium – somewhere in between hire fast, fire fast and no false positive approach.

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Managesmarter.com offers a short article regarding Best Sales Practices of 2007 that contains a stellar piece of sales advice:

“The dictum of ‘No RFP shall go unanswered’ is not a good idea,” says Sam Reese, CEO of sales training firm Miller Heiman. Because of the time, energy and money involved in responding to an RFP, “If you didn’t spec it,” says Reese, “don’t bid it.”

Salespeople have a hard time walking away from any deal whether it be a good deal or not. RFP’s tend to be bad deals unless you helped author it. Main point – people can be qualified, RFP’s generally cannot.

We’ve seen many sales managers struggle with the concept of walking away from a bad opportunity. But it is the right thing to do. You can’t make a good deal with a bad prospect.

Go find a better prospect.

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Selling Power published How to Manage Customer Meetings Effectively which offers some sound advice for running an effective sales meeting. There are many salespeople who believe they can wing it through a sales call by simply talking loquaciously. Mistake. Here is some advice found within the article:

Hoffman suggests that you begin by clearly defining a personal goal for the outcome of the meeting. Don’t define a weak goal such as, “I want to establish next steps or action items.” Instead he suggests identifying a specific goal €“ is it an order? A trial for your software? Expansion into new markets? Referrals? And yes, says Hoffman, you can have more than one goal. Just don’t overcomplicate it. You will more likely achieve simple goals.

Next, says Hoffman, work backwards. What do you need to do in order to achieve that goal or goals? Are the people you’re meeting with the right people? Do you have the influencer and the decision maker attending? What’s the timeline?

Sounds like qualifying, doesn’t it? The kicker – if you cannot answer these questions, don’t schedule the meeting until you can answer them. There is an approach in selling where the salesperson believes being active is synonymous with success. Salespeople who employ this approach are the sames ones who create a furious cloud of dust, but at the end of the day, the wagon has barely moved an inch.

Finally:

“Some people are visual and will respond well to Power Point presentations. Some are auditory and respond well to literature and conversation. And others are kinesthetic or hands-on learners.” How do you tell what learning types you have before a meeting? Well, aside from giving them all a test, you can’t, so Hoffman suggests mixing up the presentation to include all types of learners.

People do have a preferred learning type – this is an area we have been exploring in more detail. It can be difficult to determine their preference, but you can get clues by paying attention to their word selection. I am auditory and tend to use pet sayings like “sounds good” or “talk to you later” or “that doesn’t sound good.” You get the idea. People broadcast their style frequently, you just have to be attentive to it. And if you don’t know, start with visual (65% of the population) just to play the odds.

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We posted on this topic last November and here it is popping up again. Abcnews.com offers No E-Mail Fridays Transform Office. An interesting stat:

The volume of e-mails has exploded in recent years with over 170 billion now being sent daily around the globe, according to technology market researcher Radacati Group. That’s two million every second.

I’m not surprised by that stat. But here is the piece of data that spawned the idea:

Two and a half years ago, Ellison was receiving an average of 200 e-mails a day, many of which went unopened. After getting cyber-indigestion, he sent out a memo to his 5,500 subordinates.

“I’m announcing a ban on e-mail every Friday,” Ellison’s memo read. “Get out to meet your teams face-to-face. Pick up the phone and give someone a call. €¦ I look forward to not hearing from any of you, but stop by as often as you like.”

Ok, that is a serious quantity of email – you could spend your day just doing email at that rate (I think I have done that before). I am still an email junkie, but I can support Ellison’s approach especially since it led to this outcropping:

At U.S. Cellular, no-e-mail-Fridays have been such a success that the company recently instituted a new policy aimed at another corporate vice: no-meetings-Friday.

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It seems early this first Monday of daylight saving time so I thought we would start with some levity. From the email cover pile:

I am THE sales SUPERMAN

I am willing to relocate, I am your new Head Salesman.

I put up big numbers…

Really, what can I add to this cover letter?

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A quick note from a well-constructed sales ad I just read.  The company is a medical device manufacturer and contained a strong sentence for attracting salespeople:

A strong work ethic is required to meet sales quotas. You will be supported by solid marketing programs, support staff, and innovative products that are designed to continue our growth in the medical device industry.

Anyone who has been in sales more than a day has experienced selling for a company that does not fully support the sales team.  I once worked for a large company where I had to pull my own product information, find the right envelope, address it and put the postage on it.  Yes, that was the days before the Internet.  That task may not seem like much, but I had a 10 state territory and this task consumed 1 hour of my day every day.

Salespeople are fearful of companies that are going to install large quotas on them while not providing the ancillary support that is needed to reach those numbers.  This company’s ad implies a significant quota along with the 3 most important items for reaching that quota.  An intriguing statement to a strong sales candidate.

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We’ve been on the tattoo and piercing topic for a while and it has generated many discussions at our shop.  BusinessWeek.com offers A Pierced Tongue: Too Edgy for Sales? which is a Q&A article.  Here is the set-up:

There is a young woman in our office who has done a great job in sales support. We are considering her for an outside sales position, but some of the managers are concerned because the employee has a pierced tongue and a little silver barbell ornament in it.

Good question – one we have never faced before.  I would personally have reservations about the pierced tongue with an outside salesperson.  The article mentions that fashion moves quickly and I certainly see many pierced tongues out there (though they always give me pause).

It may be that the employee agrees to remove the barbell ornament during customer meetings (in which case it would be nearly impossible for anyone to spot the tiny holes in her tongue) or find a tongue-colored barbell that would be less obvious than the silver one. Or you may agree to send her on a few sales calls and get customer reactions afterward.

Really, as a sales manager I cannot imagine having to deal with this topic.  But, if she is a strong salesperson, I would have to consider these options.  The main issue is knowing your customers and their expectations.  If my customers consisted of many traditional baby boomers with conservative expectations, I don’t think I would put her out in the field with them.

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We are presently running multiple processes and I received an email in response to one of our ads. The respondent listed the job title in the subject line and this in the body:

Good morning:

If I could show you the following:

• How to generate more leads
• How to increase company revenue and referral business
• How to be one step up on your competition
• A marketing program that will separate you from your competition

Would you be open to look at information?

John Doe

123-456-7890

I admire him for trying to create interest in his services, but this approach is insulting. Who wouldn’t want to increase company revenue? The implication is either that I don’t want to or that I don’t know how. His problem – he has not built any credibility with me to believe that he can deliver on these statements. His approach reads like a cut and paste job from some trendy selling book.

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We have assembled a Squidoo Lens that you can visit by clicking here.  The focus of the lens is sales hiring and retention.  This version is our first pass at a lens so go easy on us.  We plan on developing it further and adding more topic-specific lenses soon.  We’ll keep you informed as we go.

In case you were wondering what a lens is:

SO, WHAT’S A LENS?

A lens is one person’s view on a topic that matters to her. It’s an easy-to-build, single web page that can point to blogs, favorite links, RSS feeds, Flickr photos, Google maps, eBay auctions, CafePress designs, Amazon books or music, and more. Then, when someone is looking for recommended information, fast, your lens gets him started and sends him off in the right direction. It’s a place for searchers to start, not finish.

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