Category Archives: Sales & Marketing

How Do You Hire and Retain Good Salespeople? Ten Points

Situation: Many companies struggle to find good salespeople. They find that few of those they hire last very long. Some individuals don’t have the skills to sell, others find the job more difficult than they anticipated, and some leave for better pay at another company. How do you hire and retain good sales people?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • Hiring salespeople is most important job a company or owner has, yet it often receives the least attention.
  • Determine what the company needs the person to do.
    • What skills do they need? Is past experience aligned with the company’s needs?
    • Do they have experience in the company’s market.
    • How much can the company afford to pay?
    • Is the pay offered market competitive?
    • What is the pay scheme: salary, salary plus commission, commission only or commission only following a learning period?
  • Advertise
    • Use internet portals, referrals, ads in the local paper or recruiters.
  • Review resumes for basic qualifications and weed out all that do not meet those qualifications or who lack experience in sales.
  • Test or screen applicants using an instrument such as: Identity Compass, Sales Skill Assessment Scorecard, The Caliper Profile, Sales DNA, DriveTest, SalesGenomix, DISC, Myers-Briggs, Grit or Objective Management Group (OMG).
  • Bring interesting applicants in for interviews.
    • Are they relaxed and comfortable with those who interview them?
    • How do they react to pressure?
    • Do they seem to be a good match with the company culture?
    • Are they comfortable with the company’s philosophy, size, reputation, and products or services?
  • Check references – not just those provided, but talk to companies where they’ve worked in the past.
  • Call customers with whom they’ve worked.
  • Remember that past performance does not guarantee future results

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Should You Combine Sales and Marketing? Five Points

Situation: A company is considering combining its marketing and sales teams. The company’s overall objective is to expand their marketing presence and to bring on new customers. Some team members believe that these two functions are distinct, while others believe that they should work in tandem or even be combined. What do others think about these options? Should you combine sales and marketing?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • The skill sets required to create and operate an effective marketing effort are different from those required to create and operate an effective sales organization.
  • Sales and Marketing are two different sides of the same coin – they complement each other but are distinct.
  • Direction begins with the CEO; however it is imperative to make certain that everyone in the organization buys into both this direction and the organization to achieve it.
  • Some feel that it is not a good idea to have one person covering the role of Sales and Marketing. Sales is tactical while Marketing is strategic. It is Sales’ job to implement the Marketing Strategy and report back what is working and what is not. Marketing’s job is to take the feedback from Sales into account and revise the strategy accordingly.
  • Challenges which can create a constant battle between marketing and sales are due to:
    • Lack of common direction, and
    • Poor or inconsistent communication between Sales and customer on one side and Sales and Marketing on the other.
    • These challenges need to be resolved to have an effective Sales + Marketing organization.

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How Do You Target CIOs of Large Companies? Six Suggestions

Situation: A company’s target customers are Fortune 1000 companies, some of whom are simultaneously clients and competitors. The key target is the VP/CIO. A prime concern of that individual is assuring that their IT systems never go down. What could the company do better to approach these target customers and reach the right decision-maker? How do you target CIOs of large companies?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • The approach must be tailored to reach corporate level decision-makers:
    • Conduct a direct marketing campaign strategically as opposed to using a high-volume mailing with a low cost-per-piece.
    • Mail relatively expensive dimensional mailers to a small number of highly qualified prospects. Look for high impact to the best targets.
  • Research and identify the key targets within prospect companies.
    • The best success will come from prospects who have tried other options from the large competitors but are unsatisfied with the results.
  • Consider and research prospects within the large consulting firms. They may have tried IBM or similar options, but weren’t happy with what was provided, either because of cost, time or quality.
  • Also look at next-tier players. Success with these customers can become valuable references to the larger firms.
  • Position the offering as the “safe choice.”
  • Closely monitor customers and their experience with the offering – both pre-installation, during installation and post-installation. The key variables will be quality and ease of installation and adoption of the company’s offering.

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How Do You Create Buzz? Six Suggestions

Situation: A company wants to quickly create high profile buzz around a new offering. What have other companies done or seen that could help the company quickly create this type of market presence? How do you create buzz?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • Buzz is hard to measure. It is also difficult to link buzz directly to sales.
  • Getting press, assuming that it is positive, is often called “free advertising.”
    • If a company is paying a professional public relations (PR) consultant, positive press is not free. When PR is successful and sustained, however, it arguably has a better ROI than advertising.
    • Published articles, particularly those by authors not associated with the company, are viewed by the customer as more legitimate than advertising. Additionally, with the Internet, the longevity of these articles can be quite long. The reach extends far beyond publications’ off-line circulation, and search engines make the articles easy to access.
  • Successful companies want to do business with other successful companies. What can the company highlight to show prospective clients that it is successful?
    • Substantiation is critical to getting positive coverage – assure that there is no “vaporware.” Given the power of social media vaporware can quickly destroy an offering.
  • One member of the group suggested that the ownership of patents might generate positive press and social media coverage.
  • Leverage in-house thought leaders.
  • Seek help from celebrities – “Hollywood” investors and individuals with substantial social media followings.

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How Do You Plan for Geographic Expansion? Nine Points

Situation: A service company wants to expand its geographic base. It promises a 30-minute in-person response time to clients. It has established deep penetration in its existing market and sees opportunity in neighboring areas outside of its current market. How do you plan for geographic expansion?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • In many respects, the company’s situation is similar to a franchise model. It has established a successful business model. The company has also optimized its model for staff, technology, procedures, accounting and service provision. This creates the opportunity to clone the current model in a new geographic market.
  • It is important to study the competitive landscape in adjoining or more distant markets.
  • Leverage current customer references. Create a client referral incentive program among current and new customers.
  • Target initial clients within the target geography as reference clients.
  • Use direct mail to potential customers.
  • Recalibrate the company’s search engine optimization to reach the new target geography.
  • Communicate the company’s points of differentiation. Highlight customer results in the existing market to potential customers in the new market.
  • Target companies that want and need the service that the company provides. These will most likely be similar to existing clients. Experience with existing clients will serve as reference points.
  • Successfully selling function, as opposed to brand, depends on a business model that matches business volume with capacity to provide reliable service. It also assumes that market dynamics in new markets will be similar to the existing market.

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How Do You Build a New Channel? Four Cases

Situation: A company wants to increase business by building a new channel. The new business is different from the company’s base business, but won’t change the company’s focus on its base business. What lessons have been learned by other CEOs who have accomplished this? How do you build a new channel?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • One company created a new channel without changing the base business.
    • They responded slowly to the opportunity before deciding to change.
    • They needed to change infrastructure by adding more people.
    • They also needed to redefine the offering to meet the needs of new clients.
    • This involved adding additional data which had been accessible previously but hadn’t been presented.
    • At first the hand off wasn’t smooth. Hiccups that could have been foreseen with more planning were extra data fields and rough hand-offs. Future new releases will focus on improved process review and more challenging of assumptions, and more patience in the scoping stage.
  • The second company created a new branch with different products and operations, but maintained one financial and inventory management system.
    • The initial produce was sold and installed, utilizing union labor. The new product is sold wholesale business to businesses and is non-union.
    • After struggling with attempts to house both operations under one roof the new operation was moved to a separate location.
    • This enabled company to set up separate operations and to fully understand the financials of both operations. It also makes it easier to assess the viability of each business and to implement changes in one without disrupting the other.
  • The third company created a new offering to sell to the same customer base, with no change in the back-end systems.
    • The new business created an insurance model for the company’s services as an alternative to the original break-fix model.
    • The two systems use a common sales team, network engineers, and back-end system. Customers choose either insurance or break-fix.
    • The challenge was that the two models need completely different monitoring and incentive systems for the engineers. This took time for development and training.
  • The fourth company created two production operations: turnkey and component.
    • This called for different sales and contracting processes and separate production areas on the plant floor, with clear delineation but using the same back end, financial, and engineering support systems.
    • The component process is short-run, high value, high margin; the turnkey is high volume runs, lower value, low margin.
    • The challenge has been in setting up a new set of contract agreements and monitoring systems to monitor the financial success of the turnkey operation.
  • What is the common thread?
    • Put sufficient time into planning and evaluating options and challenges so that there is a solid understanding of the new channel before starting.

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How Do You Address the Compensation Side of an Employee Development Plan? Four Points

Situation: A CEO has an employee who consistently performs above expectations. The employee has asked whether they could be rewarded for over-performance on customer retention and for gaining new business from existing customers. How can this be structured? How do you address the compensation side of an employee development plan?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • This is the type of employee that every CEO wants to see. Responding positively to the employee’s request is essential, and an opportunity to assure the employee’s loyalty and retention by the company.
  • One structure is bonus multipliers based on under or over performance. An example of the structure could be to assign and have the employee agree to a target for customer retention or new business acquisition from existing customers. Bonus is then impacted by their performance against this objective as follows:
    • Hit <85% of the target – no bonus;
    • Hit 85-100% of target – receive your standard bonus;
    • Hit 110% of target – get bonus times 10%
    • Hit 120% of target – get bonus times 20%
    • And so on.
  • This is just an example for the purpose of illustration. Variations on the original bonus plan can be negotiated with the employee, and adjusted over time to further encourage continued outstanding performance.
  • The multipliers do not necessarily have to be large, but are there to show that a certain level of performance is expected to receive this portion of the bonus. In addition, the employee can increase the bonus by overachieving their objectives.

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How Do You Balance Scalable Growth with Quality Service? Five Thoughts

Situation: A CEO wants to determine whether and to what extent his company’s service model is scalable. He wants to determine whether it is possible to add additional clients by adjusting the ratio of clients to staff. The tricky part is determining whether the company can increase the client to staff ratio while minimizing the impact on client service. This is critical because client service is the company’s “secret sauce”. How do you balance scalable growth with quality service?

  • Start by profiling the current client base from high to low maintenance. For example, set up a grid with axes of sophistication and frequency of desired contact as follows:
    • A – unsophisticated and desire frequent contact
    • B – sophisticated and desire frequent contact
    • C – unsophisticated and desire infrequent contact
    • D – sophisticated and desire infrequent contact
  • Analyze the client base and assign each current or new client to category A, B, C or D.
  • Distribute client relationships so that no member of the team has too many A’s. This may make it possible to assign more clients to each staff member.
  • Also consider matching staff to client type. Some staff may be better working with unsophisticated clients, while others are more adept with sophisticated clients.
  • As this model is developed and built, try different alternatives for matching staff to clients. This can help to identify additional alternatives for achieving the company’s objective.

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How Do You Move from Informal to Formal Processes? Five Keys

Situation: A company is growing its sales capabilities and adding staff. The CEO wants to improve the company’s ability to generate new business. To date they have relied on informal channels to generate referrals. How do move from informal to formal processes?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • Establish as standard practice that all personnel ask for referrals in normal communications with:
    • Clients
    • Sales associates of partner firms
    • Individuals who are trusted advisors of potential clients – lawyers, CPAs, financial advisors.
  • Different groups – CPAs, lawyers, financial advisors, etc. – have different interests and potential fears about making referrals. In conversations with individuals from each group, ask why they make referrals, how they are serving their own clients, and what potentially concerns them the most about making a referral.
    • Once this data has been collected, develop proof statements for each audience that address their needs and concerns. These may be different between different audiences.
  • Do the same with new clients, as they become clients. Ask why they chose your firm, and what most appealed to them about the firm. Make this part of the initial client services interview. Collect this data and create proof statements about company performance that will appeal to other potential clients.
    • Note that the responses from brand new clients may be significantly different from those of clients who have been with the company for a year or more. The latter group knows the company, and this will color their vision. Responses of new clients will be more germane to the needs of prospects.
  • Create a system to track frequency of contact with key referral sources. This system will identify, among other things:
    • Contact name, contact information
    • Contact history (contacts to the individual by the firm)
    • Referrals received from the contact
  • After contacting an individual who has been referred, always communicate promptly back to the referrer that the company has made the contact and the results. Always say thanks. Provide the referrer comfort that they will not be shut out.

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How Do You Train Others to Fill Your Shoes? Four Points

Situation: A CEO of a small but rapidly growing company needs to transfer her knowledge and experience to current employees and new hires. This includes project management, IT management and engineering. To support the company’s growth, she needs to focus on business development and closing sales to important clients. How do you train others to fill your shoes?

Advice of the CEOs:

  • Quash any skepticism associated with the release of control of areas that were previously overseen to grow the company to its current state.
    • Selected individuals with the capacity oversee these operations. As the working relationship develops trust will replace any existing skepticism about these individuals’ ability to take on these roles.
  • Focus on your strengths, not your weaknesses. Focus on team management.
    • Hire sales people who will be tolerant of the odds and ends of prospective client behavior. Focus on effectively managing the sales team.
    • Train them to bring the CEO into key points in the sales process where that input can assist – after they have completed initial client development and know that a potential client relationship exists.
  • From time to time, it will be necessary to refocus the efforts of others. What can be done to facilitate this?
    • Ask questions. Try to refocus the conversation.
    • Seek clarification of what is said – “Let me summarize what I heard” – then refocus the conversation.
    • Adjust perspective. When an individual starts to ramble, they may divulge important information without considering the implications. Make mental or written notes and look for opportunities. Their talking can become a gold mine of information.
    • Use the conversation to make a personal connection. People love others who will listen patiently to them and infer trust and connection from this.
  • As CEO, the job is to help others succeed. The result is the success of the whole enterprise.
    • Remember that there are different levels of sophistication. Adjust the mindset and exercise tolerance over these differences.
    • Focus on passions and strengths. Get others to assist in areas which are not your strengths, but which may be strengths for them.

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