Archive for the ‘Business’ Category

Is it “Goodbye” to Solution Selling and “Hello” to Insight Selling?

August 7th, 2012 Linda Mattacks

There are three real nuggets here that you can use in your business, so I’d stick with this post to the end or bookmark it and come back to it if you’re in a rush (or both, if you like :-) !)

As is often the case, it started with a not-overtly-enticing breadcrumb… that lead me to a trail of much tastier morsels… that enabled me to piece together the analysis of results of several different surveys/ studies (by the Corporate Executive Board at harvard Business School) from different angles and perspectives of those involved in the sales/ buying process of complex b2b purchases.

Now, don’t be put off by either “complex” or “b2b” if you think these don’t pply to your business – hang on in there and you’ll see why it’s worth it! :-) …

It started with an email from a colleague with link to a post in the Harvard Business Review about the best sales people avoiding “talkers”.

The first seemed to be little more than another labelling exercise of customer contact types based on analysis of over 700 b2b business purchases. Here are the types, so you can see what you make of them for yourself:

Customer contact types

  1. Go-Getters: Motivated by organizational improvement and constantly looking for good ideas, Go-Getters champion action around great insights wherever they find them
  2. Teachers: Passionate about sharing insights and ideas, teachers are sought out by colleagues for their input. They’re especially good at persuading others to take a specific course of action
  3. Skeptics: Wary of large complicated projects, Skeptics push back on almost everything. Even when championing a new idea, they’ll counsel careful, measured implementation
  4. Guides: Willing to share the organization’s latest gossip, Guides furnish information that is typically unavailable to outsiders
  5. Friends: Just as nice as the name suggests, Friends are readily accessible and happily help reps network with other stakeholders in the organization
  6. Climbers: Focused primarily on personal gain, Climbers back projects that will raise their own profiles, and they expect to be rewarded when those projects succeed
  7. Blockers: Perhaps better described as “anti-stakeholders,” Blockers are strongly oriented toward the status quo. They have little interest in speaking to outside vendors

Usefulness of this information?

I’ve seen research like this on several occasions and, in my opinion, the information is only as good as the ability of the individual sales person to spot these characteristics early enough in the game to minimise wasted time and concentrate on the players that will help move things forward… And if they’re that good, surely they don’t really need the labels to help them???

Just as I was about to move hastily on to more worthwhile pursuits I hit on the second – “The End of Solutions Sales” link to another article which claims that the top 20% elite and most successful b2b sales reps no longer use solution-based selling… Now, bearing in mind the small business owner is often his or her own chief rep, I figured we should share these findings here… and that leads us nicely onto the second nugget:

  • A key finding in one of the CEB’s studies that involved over 1,400 b2b companies was that nearly 60% of a typical purchasing decision was made before any initial conversation with a supplier
  • Customers are a lot more knowledgeable these days about their own needs and the various solutions available to them…

    • Now is it making a wild leap to suggest that in over half of cases the customer has gone through all the information gathering, long list, specifications, and so on and drawn up a short list of contenders before you’re even aware they’re in the market to buy? And by this stage the only influence you have may well be on price.

    Not ideal, huh? So what are the key considerations?

    Let’s look at the main differences between solution selling and what the CEB call Insight selling for some clues that make up the third nugget:

    Solution Selling V Insight Selling

    What kind of company to target?
    Solution selling: Organizations that have a clear vision and established demands
    Insight Selling: Agile organizations that have emerging demands or are in a state of flux

    What sort of initial information to gather?
    Solution selling: What need is the customer seeking to address?
    Insight Selling: What unrecognized need does the customer have?

    When to engage?
    Solution selling: After the customer has identified a problem the supplier can solve
    Insight Selling: Before the customer has pinpointed a problem

    How to begin the conversation?
    Solution selling: Ask questions about the customer’s need and look for a “hook” for your solution
    Insight Selling: Offer provocative insights about what the customer should do

    How to direct the flow of information?
    Solution selling: Ask questions so that the customer can steer you through its purchasing process
    Insight Selling: Coach the customer about how to buy, and support it throughout the process

    Usefulness of this information?

    In my opinion, now we’re getting somewhere! :-) We can see that the Super Star Elite are cleverly positioning themselves as a trusted authority – even before the customer realises there’s a need for one by:

    • Evaluating prospects according to different criteria from those used by other reps, targeting agile organizations in a state of instability, change or transmission rather than ones with a clear understanding of their needs
    • Seeking out a very different set of stakeholders: Now this is where that first research I virtually pooh-poohed comes into its own! It turns out that the average rep hooks up with Guides, Friends and Climbers – aka Talkers – whereas our elite and most successful top 20% cultivate Go-Getters, Teachers, and Skeptics – aka Change Agents – in their customer dealings
    • Concentrating on coaching those chosen customer contacts how to buy, not about their company’s purchasing process

    How about this approach for you?

    Is it sound? Yes.
    Is it new? Quite frankly, not particularly – I remember using it it in exploratory complex sales situations back in the ’90s and I’m sure I wasn’t the first! So, to my mind it just has a fancy new label :-)
    Who’s it for? If you’re in any kind of value service/ industry where your knowledge and expertise are a strong part of your offer
    Can you use it easily? Yes. In fact if you’re not trained in sales you’ll probably find it a more natural way to sell than many others
    Should you use it? Absolutely if you don’t want to be reduced to a commodity where your offer will be bought on price.

    So, a quick recap

    Types of potential customers
    Types of contacts
    Approach
    Timing

    I’d love to know: How useful has this been to you and what would you like to add? :-)

    photo credit: schnaars via photo pin cc

Posted in Business, Market/Marketing Research, Sales Tags: No Comments »

Innovation? Forget Silicone Valley USA: Think Sheffield, UK!

July 18th, 2012 Linda Mattacks

Anyone who’s been in sales going back a number of years will be familiar with the oft used scenario of selling widgets in training videos. And we trainee sales people always thought: “How boring!”

Imagine then how intrigued I was to read recently about how a Yorkshire man’s widget has become a (somewhat sexy, even) global brand!

How it started

The man in question is Hugh Facey who, as the story goes, was a successful salesman for a wire company back in the 1980s. A farmer challenged him that surely there was a quicker and more efficient way to attach two bits of wire together than was currently practised – grappling around with a pair of pliers and knots? Now I haven’t spoken to the entrepreneur so I don’t know whether it was a genuine desire to solve a perennial and time consuming task that faced many of his customers that spurred him
on to invent the simple yet brilliant Gripple (the size of a matchbox), but by 1989 he’d come up with the idea and set up his own company to make it.

Now think a bit wider about the applications: Wine and fruit industries rely on trellises to hold up their crops and the Gripple offered a way to repair and even construct wire fencing in a fraction of the time, saving thousands of labour hours. Gripple won the Grand Prix du President (highest accolade of France’s design contest, the Concours Lepine), in 1990. And joined the elite ranks of inventions such as the contact lens, and the ballpoint pen… The Prince of Wales Award for Innovation came the following year.

Gripple Europe was established in 2000 and Gripple Inc the following year

And the (not-so-humble) widget was just the start!

Hugh realised there were so far untapped applications for the Gripple in the construction industry – and his systems of wires and Gripples are now used for lighting for example instead of beams for buildings in earthquake zones. Loadhog, a sister company has been established to provide better distribution solutions… And now, at a time when many business owners would love to be taking things a bit easier, Hugh’s company has expanded to three factories and he is insistent that at least a quarter of sales come from products less than four years old.

Innovation, innovation, innovation!

The company has won the Queen’s Award for Eneterprise in every category at least once.

There is an Ideas and Innovation Centre in the newest factory, and the company employs a dozen engineers to use their imagination and push the boundaries. They have twelve police forces looking at an new system for taking forensic moulds of footprints – it takes 5 minutes instead of half an hour and is more accurate…

Forget PC: Think Commonsense and Community!

No accountants run Mr F’s business and there is no personnel department. All staff currently have to buy at least a £1,000 of shares by the end of their first year of employment and the long term plan is to make the business employee-owned, limited by guarantee.

The company has managed to maximise its energy efficiency, decrease electricity use, reduce landfill/incinerated waste, increase recycling, conserve our use of raw materials, and minimise packaging.

Each year it donates a percentage of its profits to charity as well as dreaming up and participating in fundraising events. Take a look at their 2011 newsletter for inspiration, though I personally think the two jailbreak winners – who blagged their way from Sheffield to Marmaris in Turkey within 48 hours and without spending a bean get my vote!

This isn’t an advertisement for a company. It’s an inspirational story that shows an example of manufacturing that’s alive and well in a corner of Sheffield and can be profitable and sexy when approached with an open and enquiring mind and not attached to a “that’s the way it’s always been done” attitude!

What could you learn from this guy and how could you apply it to your thinking and your company?

Sources:
The Gripple and Loadhog web sites
Robert Hardman’s great article in the Daily Mail

Posted in Business, Development, Sales No Comments »

Business start ups need this and so do business Neanderthals!

June 14th, 2012 Linda Mattacks

Regulars here will know that I rarely refer to or get involved with business start ups. In my experience they have so much on their plates with the day-to-day hassles of survival that it’s a little while before they come up for air, look around, and see what else is happening that they should maybe know about.

Well, to my mind, this is something that business start ups should get savvy on sooner rather than later.

I happen to believe it’s also really good for owners of small businesses that have been around for a while but still not really got their heads round how to handle the whole on line business presence.

These days, to ignore an effective on line presence is a potential, probable and, okay, I’ll stick my neck out ever so slightly, almost “written-in-the-stars” contribution to the route of said business ultimately disappearing down the drain…

What to do then, smarty-pants, Linda?

So glad you asked! :-)

As you’ll have gathered, this isn’t an area I work on – it’s not my experience or expertise. And my partner (who rarely gets mentioned in my posts here, and then only by oblique reference) works with small, but clearly focused, high value business owners and entrepreneurs.

However, a speciality of a friend of mine (whom I’ve known for several years) is helping new-to-the-web entrepreneurs and small businesses establish a presence that they can get to work for them. And it eases them gently and cost effectively into the process.

So, what do you need to do?

You may not need to do anything other than tell those of your mates who you recognise in my description above who might benefit from a free “session” with the Blogmistress.

Oh, down boys and girls, for heaven’s sake! :-)

Babs Saul is offering a free Blogmistress“>webinar on Wednesday 20th June at noon UK time. Now, it’s probable that all but the swiftest to respond will be too late to participate live on the day, but Babs is talking about making a recording available down the line a bit. So follow the link I’ve given you and get over there is my advice!

What’s it about?

I think it’s going to be fiendishly revealing… Well, I hope so!

Babs is great on how to get the best out of your website on a shoestring budget and optimising WordPress in ways most of us wouldn’t realise we could.

This isn’t part of an affiliate scheme

I don’t have anything against them and I’d probably happily join in with one I thought would be helpful to you to know about. With this it’s just that Babs mentioned what she was doing and I decided it could be useful either to you or people you know.

There is, I understand, an option to join a paying course that Babs is running: That’s up to you to decide about – you’ll have had the value of the freebie before you take that decision anyway… And Babs is no smooth-talking-sales hustler – Anything but! :-)

Hope this has been useful to you, and, as always, let me have your comments…

Thank you!

Linda

Posted in Business, Marketing Tags: , , 2 Comments »

Is it really any tougher for women in business?

June 6th, 2012 Linda Mattacks

I hadn’t really thought much about challenges, issues or problems that might be specific to women setting up in business. I thought we were light years past all that “We’ll need your husband’s signature to guarantee your loan” malarky… yet a recent post on Birds made me ponder that well, maybe there are the odd things that we gels have to take into account and cope with that our male counterparts don’t…

I’ve already added some of my own points over there on a separate post that you can go and have a read of if you fancy, so I won’t repeat them here. Instead I’m just going to select and put my perspective on three of Ola’s 10 things ‘they’ didn’t tell you about being a woman in business…

Sisterhood?

No: Women aren’t always your best allies.

Maybe partly because I came from a commercial background as opposed to the public sector, I was perhaps more used to the “dog-eat-dog” attitude of some women in business – it isn’t nice (or necessary, in my opinion) but it certainly wasn’t the shock to me that it seems to have been to Ola… I don’t know about anyone else but I’ve come across enough not just single minded but hard bitten ladies from infant school onwards!

I think too nowadays maybe it’s less about long term formal partnerships and instead being on the lookout for and open to strategic and/ or tactical alliances that may be relatively brief yet nevertheless mutually beneficial and provide benefits for customers that would otherwise have been difficult (if not impossible) to achieve.

I think the issue here is more the importance of hanging out with the kind of people, male and female, who share similar values, ethics, interests and ideals.

Sexism isn’t dead!

Well there’s a surprise, yet I don’t believe I’m conscious of any more or less sexism as a female entrepreneur than as a female employee. Prior to the 1975 Sex Discrimination Act virtually all telesales staff in classified advertising were females and virtually all the reps were males. I suspect that the act probably didn’t so much wipe out the practice of sex discrimination so much as nudge it underground and force it to be less blatant.

Many years later when I was seeking to put together a team to carry out telephone marketing research for a client I was determined to be an equal opportunities employer. I recruited five men and five women to work part time. By the end of 2 weeks I’d sacked the guys and the women worked full time. Because they were better at getting that particular job done.

There are pluses and minuses regarding the looks department (none helped by that rather peculiar lady who made a name for herself recently in the UK press purely from having such a high opinion of her own looks…) and yes, I suppose there always will be the odd Neanderthal bloke who’ll behave like a pillock in the presence of a good looking woman. But if we’re going to bleat every time we come up against something that “isn’t fair” maybe we need to learn that’s just part of life…

Trying to be a man doesn’t work

Yes, it’s time to question the (mainly male-designed) business model that’s been followed by and large in the west for so long. But at the same time I believe we need to take care that the pendulum doesn’t swing too far in the opposite direction.

I am in entire agreement that there’s not only room but a need for both masculine and feminine qualities in business – from both men and women: it’s about balance more than anything else.

In my opinion there are way too many “bleeding hearts” who want to do good yet are hardly making enough money to survive – what good does that do the world? As I understand it, Mother Teresa wasn’t independently wealthy… yet do we really think she hadn’t got herself into a position of power and influence to drum up whatever backing she needed for her projects? And, whether or not you or I am a fan of hers, I wonder how many people were helped by her making the most of herself?

I don’t think there’s a nobility about choosing to be touchy-feely to the detriment of making a profit in business – to me that’s no better than its polar opposite: the old style entrepreneur-turned-corporate who’d use you and fleece you as soon as look at you!

I’ve always found the way around all three of these issues is to provide value that would be hard to match and well nigh impossible to beat! 😉

What are your views?

Posted in Business, Development Tags: , , 8 Comments »

Not getting the results you want?

May 18th, 2012 Linda Mattacks

The world is changing at, some say, an alarming pace… What worked yesterday might no longer work today and what works today might suddenly not work tomorrow.

Is this cause for hand wringing and despair? :-(

Not necessarily if we’re
a) Keeping our eyes open to what’s going on around us and
b) Prepared to change the way we do things and, maybe even what we do

So let’s have a quick look at the basics. In cases where you’re not getting the results/ outcomes you want, here are a couple of tips.

3 questions to ask yourself:

1: “What is it I really want from this business?”

There are always underlying ‘why’s to wanting material results, such as:

  • A great way of life for me/ and my family
  • Financial freedom
  • Pay for the kids education
  • Pay off the mortgage with enough over for a decent lifestyle
  • Something I look forward to doing each day – that gives me a buzz – that I can never imagine retiring from

And then you need to be able to describe what each of the above would look like)

Whatever your answers, they needs to be strong enough and mean enough for you to shift from wherever you are to somewhere better or you just won’t bother… If they do, you can ask yourself:

2: “What is it I need to do differently to create different and better results?”

Now the answer to this little beauty could include all sorts of areas to test:

  • Strategy
  • Product/ service
  • Message/ pitch
  • Target audience
  • Positioning and pricing
  • Focus/ concentration of effort

This can be a bit tricky as it’s unlikely to be just one thing. And so it’s imperative to bring in the old direct marketing adage here which is to change only one thing at a time and measure pre- and post change results before implementing and testing any other changes.

Why? Because otherwise you’ll never know which of your changes caused the different results you get! 😉

Another helpful question is:

3: “Where am I currently and how does that compare to where I want to be?”

You can then identify the gap between the two, do a gap analysis, define what’s missing and, finally, decide what actions are required to bridge the gap.

You may find you have all the skills and tools you need to work it all out for yourself or you may need help in some areas but at least you’re addressing the problem and not burying your head in the sand or running away from it! :-)

By the way, I’m asking these questions with the intention of applying them to business. When I step back and think from a different angle they can in fact be applied to all sorts of things, can’t they? Health/ fitness/ exercise/ diet, relationships… 😉

Have you tried any of these when you’ve been “up against it” and, if so with what outcomes? Or maybe you have your own favourite questions you’d like to share with us?

Posted in Business, Marketing, Sales 9 Comments »

What drives YOU?

April 25th, 2012 Linda Mattacks

I don’t know about you, but I feel as though the personal development brigade have hijacked the word passion – so much so that it’s become overused and, I don’t know, somehow demeaned. It’s got to the stage where I often feel you can’t use it without people either silently groaning and rolling their eyes or saying, knowingly, “woo-woo” behind their hands :-(

So I’m going for the word “drive” – you substitute it with whatever works for you but, whatever you call it, this is a worthwhile exercise doing not just once but every now and again – especially when you feel deflated, low and lacking vim or vigour, your mojo’s deserted you – see, I’m even steering clear of un-motivated and un-inspired 😉

Your business in context

Your business isn’t your life (at least, I hope it isn’t!) but it should be contributing to the best life you can envision for yourself, after all, as far as we know this isn’t a rehearsal, is it? Because, whatever your beliefs about life, death, reincarnation and eternity, we only get one chance at this life.

In a small business – whether it’s just you or you have a team of employees supporting you, you by and large are the business so, if you’re not out there in front being and projecting the business you want it to be, it will suffer

… I’m not saying it’s always easy because we all have good days and bad, days where the world seems to be our oyster and days where nothing goes right. But if we behave as though we don’t see the point in our business why should anybody else give two hoots?

How many times for example have we been to a networking meeting where at least half of those there:

  • Aren’t even mildly enthusiastic about what they do
  • Can’t easily and adequately explain the purpose of their business
  • Can’t differentiate their business in a way that makes us want to engage with them?

How does this sound?

If you want to be treated as more than just a commodity – how can you continuously ensure that you are more than a commodity to your clients/ customers?

What do you do for your clients or customers that they’d find it really difficult to get elsewhere?

To give you a laugh on me, when I was much more into the sales training focus of helping small businesses, one of my very good clients once told me he could get that aspect from any one of several different places and delivery routes. He already had a business coach and yet, get this: he would struggle to figure out where he could get the kind of help I provided… excuse me while I go and slap my hand against my forehead… :-(

In many ways I was his external human potential consultant: I made him stop and think when I believed he was about to louse up relationships with employees and suppliers. I told him to go home – I know, bossy boots 😉 – and see his young kids before his long suffering wife gave up yet again on them seeing their Dad… I told him off when what he was instructing the employee he’s hired me to train on sales to do something that got in the way of I was helping them achieve…

What I’m saying here is not how wonderful I am, it’s:

  • How does our inner compelling drive feed into our perceived value to others and
  • What/ where is our real value?

Because once we know the answers to those two questions, surely we can build on that precious information, can’t we?

Your thoughts?

Posted in Business, Development 14 Comments »

My biggest business mistake?

April 18th, 2012 Linda Mattacks

Well, it may not turn out to be my biggest ever in the fullness of time, but it’s certainly the most expensive to date in terms of time invested and lack of earnings. And I see entrepreneurs making their own version of it all the time, day in, day out…

As many of you know, my background is in sales & marketing communications in the broadest sense: telephone sales and face to face sales, sales training, market and marketing research, brand, product and service positioning and development, and so on.

As my story unfolds some of you will undoubtedly ask yourselves “Why didn’t she see that coming?” The short answer is that, left to our own devices and sometimes the input of well meaning but usually insufficiently qualified friends and loved ones (that’s if we even listen to anyone), our perspective is that we’re too close to see the wood for the trees and will not allow us to do what an eagle does: constantly switch from the panoramic ‘big picture’, zoom in to the detail and back again.

The Big Idea

What do most individuals do when they cut loose from corporate land and set up their own stall as a brand new entrepreneur? They do what they enjoy, they’re good at and what comes easily to them: their own Big Idea.

But, I reasoned, very few if any would have acquired the skills of the composite sales & marketing background that I had. So, unless they’d been planning and transitioning gradually from employment into doing their own thing – whether that’s setting themselves up in a job where they are the boss or starting a business that they intend to grow, franchise and/ or sell – this is where the cracks often start appearing: They’re open for business but where are the customers who should be beating down the door to get at them and their fabulous offerings?

Now I don’t claim to know loads about how to build a business into an empire – the idea had never occurred to me – but I do know that I’m very good at helping others get the clarity and necessary skills to communicate the value and uniqueness of what they have to offer, and build their own businesses, so what better than to create a course dedicated to that? One that would:

  • Teach them skills that would easily enable them to win business that would recoup their investment many times over in double quick time
  • That they could fit their learning in and around their business
  • That enabled pinpoint their specific needs
  • That allowed them to design their unique route through the course with their own coach/ trainer
  • That provided exercises that let them safely test out their new learnings…
  • And worksheets to complete that enabled me to measure their understanding and use of their new learnings

I even began to think that maybe I could could grow this into a business that could be franchised at some point… oh, heady stuff, indeed! 😉

A little aside

It’s not long ago, only beginning of the noughties, that the Internet was young, as was online social and business networking. The creation, hosting and optimization of websites was in the hands of a select few self styled experts – the first release of WordPress was not until May 2003… It happened to be in this era that I created the course so you could argue that the need was greater then for interactive sales & marketing communication skills because there were fewer affordable routes to market for start ups and small businesses. Yet to offset that, I’d venture that the economy was more buoyant and there wasn’t a trend of corporates ousting employees wholesale, effectively to make their own way any way they could…

Back to the main plot…

So I had a tremendous time designing the course: By the time it emerged many months later onto the unsuspecting world it was indeed my beloved, treasured, beautiful, clever baby.

What I discovered then was that I could find very few business owners who would commit themselves to doing the course. Did they not trust the course and me to deliver? Did they not trust themselves to step up?

I was chatting to a member of a business brainstorming group I ran and it was the first time he really understood the scope of what the course covered and helped businesses to achieve. His comments were along the lines of:

“Brilliant concept. Fantastic service. Utterly wrong market. They’ll never appreciate its true value or pay you what it’s worth.”

I was flattened

In hindsight he was absolute right, of course. For ages I went around muttering and bewailing the fact that most owners of small businesses – the very ones who most needed the help I was offering them – would rather complain about the ‘sad state of things’ (i.e. not enough profitable customers) than do something to alter that state.

So what could I do?

Two things.

The first was to take the sales skills parts of the course – telephone and face to face – and target owners of businesses that had a dedicated (or even semi dedicated) sales person or persons who were under performing. I found that they would pay the money for the employee to go through the training and learning far more happily than if they themselves had to do the work.

The second, and this came later, was to fully take on board the realization that you can’t sell what you think people need – especially when that seems to them to be so huge it’s everything strong>including the kitchen sink.

I just counted the Modules in the original business owners course – 29 of them (15 on soft skills training and 14 on sales training)! :-(

Understandably, people will only intend to buy what they believe is necessary to get the desired solution. I’ve discovered that can be either a bit more than they think or a lot less! So it took a while we now have a range of solution based offerings as opposed to “look-what-I-know-and-can-help-you-learn” process-based offerings…

To paraphrase something I heard recently:

“Concentrate on the destination not the method of transport”

What clangers of your own would you be prepared to share?

Linda

Posted in Business, Training Courses Tags: 13 Comments »
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