Do you know your metrics?

How do you compare? 
 

Every lead that is not qualified distracts from your available time to find and sell IT, software and professional service prospects that are in the buying cycle now. 
 

Speed is an IT business success tool.

When your sales pipeline is small, your sales forecast accuracy and lead quality diminishes.

To increase the size of your sales pipelines and time management success, focus on making your targeted prospects take action steps with you during your sales cycle to prove that they are qualified. The world is full of professional lookers that will waste your time . . . and ultimately reduce your revenue capture success. The faster you qualify an IT prospect based on the action steps they take . . . the more you will sell.

“There are a lot of things that go into creating success. I don’t like to do just the things I like to do. I like to do things that cause the company to succeed. I don’t spend a lot of time doing my favorite activities.” –Michael Dell

To be more successful, do what you don’t like doing first. 
 

What kind of action steps should IT prospects take to prove that they are qualified?

1. Have your prospects confirm their targeted date of purchase and when they want to be operational – to make sure it is within your normal selling cycle time. 
    
2. Have them tell you who will be signing the contract. 
    
3. Get them to verbalize how your offering will fix their business issues. If they can’t, then you may have incorrectly communicated your business value. 
    
4. Get your IT prospects to talk to your existing customers earlier in your sales cycle. Customer referrals communicate your value three dimensionally through the eyes of others.

In IT sales, you work for yourself and you are an entrepreneur. You own your business. Accelerate your speed, improve prospect lead qualification and apply perseverance and you can sell more even in today’s crazed economy.

“I’m convinced that about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.“ –Steve Jobs

I welcome your comments. 

To your IT success!

Paul DiModica
Value Forward Group
770-632-7647

Note: All research was provided to Paul DiModica under contract with eMarketer.

As salespeople . . . we need to eat more Wheaties!

So often, you hear marketing and salespeople talk to prospects about their business value and how great their firm is by saying:

“We are the largest provider in the world!”

“We have the greatest support!”

“Our service is the best!”

This all comes across as white noise to management prospects who hear the same thing over and over again.

Due to companies’ efforts to become more “customer centric” sales organizations, many have become too accommodating and predictable in their sales approaches and are now being trampled by prospects who manage their sales cycles (and your sales commissions) for you.

To sell more, you must become a strategic advisor to management. The key words here are “strategic advisor.” Strategic advisors help prospects fix business problems. As you know, prospects are not always well-informed. So sometimes the prospect does not know what the problem is, or worse, they “think” they know how the problem should be fixed. If you are trying to be a strategic advisor, speak-up, be heard, and stop being so passive in your value demonstration.

Use a “Reverse Value” sales approach to sell more.

“Reverse Value” communication is a sales methodology of proving your value to management by not talking about your product or service, but instead proving you are a knowledge center that can help them by challenging their own current thought process.

By disagreeing with management prospects (when they are wrong) and informing them (by proving your value) how their observations can be modified by your firm to help them reach their business objectives, you are proving you have value greater than your competitors who all speak in lockstep.

If you sound like the competitors (for all practical purposes),
you are the same as your competitors (a commodity).

How do you know if you have enough business confidence to use “Reverse Value” techniques with management prospects? Take the following test.

“Do I Need More Wheaties” Test

1. During the last six months, have you told management prospects that their business or assumptions were wrong (in a professional way)?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
2. During the last six months, have you verbally explained in detail to a management prospect the business risks of not making decisions or what could happen if they buy from the wrong vendor?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
3. During the last six months, have you submitted in writing to a management prospect the business risks of not making decisions or what could happen if they buy from the wrong vendor?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
4. During the last six months have you told a middle-level manager that you cannot move forward (give them a presentation, give them proposal, etc.) in the current sales cycle unless you meet the executive who signs the contract?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
5. Have you ever asked a prospect to explain your value to you and why they want to buy from you?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
6. Do you focus on three or less business industry verticals when trying to sell your offerings?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
7. Can you describe how your product or service increases income or decreases expenses to your prospect?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
8. Do you feel more comfortable talking business strategy than features or functions?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
9. Do you feel more comfortable talking to prospects at the level of VP or above?
   ___ Yes ___No 
    
10. Do you read five or more industry trade publications a month like Restaurant News, Manufacturing News, etc.?
    ___ Yes ___No 
     

Correct Answers

1. Yes | 2. Yes | 3. Yes | 4. Yes | 5. Yes | 6. Yes | 7. Yes | 8. Yes | 9. Yes | 10. Yes

To feel comfortable using the “Reverse Value” selling concept, you need to score 70% or more on the above test. Reverse Value methods require confidence, professionalism, industry knowledge, and the ability to intellectually discuss with management prospects business issues that position you as a thought leader.

Be a seen as a thought leader, and sell more.

Through our advisement programs, we assess their current financial position and compare their P and L’s (profit and loss reports) against their competitors from our proprietary database of financials submitted by over 50,000 CPAs. Using this analytical methodology, we have identified six specific business benchmarks that we use to chart our client’s current position as compared to their unique industry and that is used as a CEO success scorecard.

If you are looking to grow your business — metrics is a key business driver. If you are trying to succeed in a down economy — then your action steps must be proactive, not reactive.

Are you managing your company by business and financial metrics? Is your management team knowledgeable about your industry or are they just ambivalent?

6 Scorecard Areas You Should Manage Monthly 

Financial LIQUIDITY

Measures your ability to meet daily financial obligations and includes:

• Inventory (or staff bench unitization rate) in stock in days
• Account Receivable in days
• Accounts Payables in days

PROFITS & PROFIT MARGIN

Are profitability trends favorable in the company?

• Gross Profit Margin
• Net Profit Margin
• Advertising Cost to Sales
• Rent to Sales
• Payroll Percent to Sales
• Operating Cash Flow Margin

SALES

Are sales growing?

• Sales Year Over Year Growth
• Sales by Product Year to Year
• Sales by Services Year to Year

BORROWING Capacity 

Is the company borrowing profitably?

• Interest Coverage Ratio
• Debt to Equity Ratio
• Debt Leverage Ratio

Corporate ASSETS Usage

Is the company using gross fixed assets effectively?

• Return on equity
• Return on assets
• Fixed asset turnover

Employees Performance

Is the company hiring effectively?

• Revenue per employee
• Employee turnover by department
• Profit per employee

Each one of these assessment areas should be placed into a monthly scorecard that gives you month to month and year to year comparisons. If your CFO or accountant does not do it, find someone who will.

Growth can be attained for those who manage metrically — those who don’t will get the same results that they got last year . . . and may not be around next year.

So what is a complex selling environment? A complex sale happens when there are multiple participants, sometimes located in different geographies all directly or indirectly actively involved in the decision process to buy a product or service.

4 Mistakes Most Salespeople Make In Complex Sales

Today, most companies incorrectly define complex sales and this affects their ability close business and increase corporate revenue.

Mistake #1:  Salespeople assume that if they are interacting with lower level managers who like or approve of their offering, then the prospect is qualified and in an active buying mode.

This mistake complicates a sale because lower level contacts are professional lookers who will meet with vendors just to look busy. To be qualified, prospects must have management buy-in with funding approved and the prospect must take action steps during the sales cycle to prove they are qualified buyers.

Mistake #2:  The best way to sell companies is through lower level managers because they are more accessible than senior management.

This is a mistake because your first entry point into a company dictates how the prospect sees you. If your first contact is a lower level manager below the title of Vice President (in the U.S), you are perceived to be a commodity before your sales cycle starts.

Mistake #3:  Salespeople give equal weight to working with lower level managers as they do with senior management and hope lower level contacts will induce senior management to buy.

This is a mistake because lower level associates may suggest, recommend or approve . . . but they normally don’t buy.  Giving equal time and sales cycle support to lower level prospects implies that you do not know how to get to senior management. The result is that you lose control of your sales cycle. Often, without a proven sales process, sales teams in complex sales just take the least path of resistance to show their management team they are doing something by talking to anybody who will listen.

Mistake #4:  Salespeople believe that lower level management can communicate their business value for them to senior management.

This is a major mistake. Selling professionally is complicated. Assuming that lower level management contacts who have operations, engineering or professional service backgrounds will succinctly communicate your business value and manage all of your sales objections correctly when they go to a steering committee, decision team or short-list committee is totally wrong. They are not you. If they were you, they would be in professional sales.

5 Reasons Why Management Teams Make These Complex Selling Mistakes

1. When a company’s revenue is down, the senior management team incorrectly thinks that meeting with lower level contacts is better than having no prospects at all in their sales pipeline.
2. When a senior management team’s emotions and ego are driving the company leadership rather than logical and strategic analysis of the company’s business revenue capture problems, the management team believes it knows everything and its sales team needs to follow their direction. (This is common in privately held companies and is called the King in the Kingdom syndrome.)
3. When the company does not align marketing, sales process, and corporate strategy into one defined revenue capture approach, they just attempt to contact any level of entry and hope someone buys.
4. Senior management prospects buy based on the value your product or service brings to their department or company. Lower level contacts buy based on the features, functions or price of your product or service. Often, companies focus on the wrong value, which ends up pushing away senior management buyers and enticing lower level contacts.
5. Salespeople often hold on to lower level contacts hoping that if they hold on long enough, they may ultimately sell someone. That is not a sales process — it is a waiting process and most salespeople today don’t have two year sales quotas.

How Should You Manage a Complex Selling Environment?

In a large complicated sale that involves multiple contacts with different titles who are located in different locations, you should learn how to penetrate the “no talk zone” of senior management and start in the “value selling zone” at the VP level and above. Contacting lower level prospects as your first entry point is a reflection of your inability to correctly communicate value to senior management.

You should use prospect engagement outlines to manage lower level prospects. This will help manage your time with the lower level contact, prevent you from wasting your valuable selling time, and force the prospect to take action steps with you during the sales cycle.

When working with senior management prospects, understand why they buy and why they will not buy from you. By having the prospect take actions steps with you during your sales process,  they will prove to you that they are qualified buyers.

When selling in a complex selling environment, create marketing material and business proposals that communicate value based on how senior management sees your value . . . not how you see it. Use the marketing material and proposals as “invisible salespeople” when you are not there.

Often complex sales are not really complex because of what the customer expects you to do — but because of the way your firm sells. Complex sales became complex because companies allowed prospects to manage their sales cycle for them — so don’t allow prospects to manage your sales cycle.  If your marketing, proposals or sales methodologies communicate commodity, you force your sale into a defensible position and are passed to lower level managers.

The key to complex selling is to sell senior management by proving you have a right to sell at their level . . . and then manage lower level prospects through the authority that senior executive gives you. If you can’t do this, then you have created a complex sale that should not have been complex to begin with.

Who Want To Work For Themselves

and Earn Like a CEO!

I want more information now!

• Are you tired of working for others?
• Do you have professional communications skills?
• Do you want to own a business asset that you can sell?
• Do you want to work part-time or full-time?

If so, we are looking for experienced senior salespeople who want to be Value Forward business coaches using our copyrighted methods and strategies — full training and unlimited support provided.

Yes, I want to learn more now!

Sincerely,

Conversely, when incorrectly used, it embarrasses your sales account managers, produces poor sales/management interaction, diminishes lead generation quality and hides sales training requirements from your executive staff.

It is estimated that only 21% of sales teams actually role play sales issues and objections during the sales year.

So, how should role playing be used?

Role playing is a business tool to manage sales stress when communicating to prospects.

As sales stress increases during prospect interaction, salespeople lose control of their verbal responses, shoot from the hip and simultaneously lose control of the sales cycle. Sales stress develops when salespeople are not prepared to respond to the weaves and bobs of prospect questioning. Managing prospect questioning through a trained process will reduce sales stress and increase sales success.

Sales role playing, like any other training tool, needs to be a structured process with guidelines in order for your sales team to get the most out of it. The sales program should have specific goals based on written objectives. Pulling a salesperson into a corner office and grilling them as a CEO buyer may be as effective as focusing on targeted sales skill improvement based on increasing sales efficiency on sales techniques like prospect questioning, cold calling, demos, etc.

Provided to Paul DiModica under contract.

8 Role Playing Tips To Increase Your Success!

1. Never make role playing easy.
   IT salespeople must learn to be able to handle pressure (and stress) in the form of difficult inbound questions from prospects based on the prospect’s probing need to know about your value, price, competitive positioning and feature/function offers. Being tough in role playing makes salespeople ready for any outcome.
2. Role play by title of buyers.
   Salespeople need to adapt to their sales verbal communication skills by buyer title. The way you sell a CFO of a Fortune 1000 firm is diametrically different than a president of a small private firm. If you are selling a VP of Marketing, than role play with someone who will act like a VP of Marketing.
3. Create a Prospect Buyer Dictionary.  Catalogue the words that your targeted prospect buyer will use during your sales cycle and use them during your role playing practice. The more you sound like the buyer, the faster they will see you like themselves and as a peer.
4. Split role playing between sales peers and sales management.
   Sales role playing should be carried out by both sales management and sales team members to allow for diversity of approach and experience. Have each team member take turns being the buyer or the seller.
5. Make a list of your top ten sales objections and use them during your role playing sessions.
   Selling management is just managing their understanding of your value. Value is communicated based on your ability to show the prospect how you can help fix their business pain. Always role play your 10 toughest sales objections so salespeople can see how to manage value expectations with their most common objections and questions.
6. When role playing with salespeople, redirect all conversation away from the sales process.
   Prospects (even qualified prospects) at times will change subjects and “steer” salespeople away from sales cycle conversation. To sell senior management, salespeople need to chit chat less and stay on the targeted goals of the appointment or conversation by qualifying the prospect and moving forward in the sales cycle. Role play with sales team members to see how quickly and succinctly they bring back the conversation to the discussion about relevant business issues.
7. Tape record all role playing sessions.
   Role playing is a reusable, educational tool that should be listened to over and over again. By recording your sales role playing session, you can later document great sales objection responses and disseminate them in written form to your sales team.
8. Document each salesperson’s role playing strengths and weaknesses.
   Role playing is a replicable, scalable sales tool. Understanding and managing your sales team’s skill sets will help them hit their sales quota faster. If a salesperson crumbles under the pressure of sales role playing with their peers or their direct sales manager, how will they perform in person? And how many qualified prospects are they burning through by saying the wrong thing? Through role playing, you can help individual salespeople increase sales quota success.

Provided to Paul DiModica under contract.

To Increase Your Sales Income and marketing lead quality – Role Play More!

Often senior management and sales teams assume that this is a big deal and they must submit. This approach is called the “rainbow” affect and makes many companies chase RFPs they should otherwise ignore. Yet time and time again, companies chase the RFP rainbow, spending hundreds (or maybe thousands if it’s a government RFP) of man-hours trying to sell the impossible.

These experiences coupled with working with clients on RFPs have given the Value Forward Group insight into some best practices you may be interested in considering if you want to increase your RFP capture success.

The following best practices are recommended for companies that have annual revenues less than $500 million per year or where the sales team is required to put together the RFP themselves. Often companies with annual revenues greater than $500 million have an RFP department to manage the submittals.

5 Best Practices for RFP Success

1. Deals valued over $1,000,000 in the 1st year.  Bid ONLY if you have at least 3 of the following variables in your favor:

   You have worked with the client before

   The deal’s location is within a 2-hour plane ride or less of your office

   You know for a fact you will automatically be placed on the short list by submitting

   You have won this type of business before

   You help write the RFP

2. Deals valued under $1,000,000 in the 1st year.  Bid ONLY if you have at least 3 of the following variables in your favor:

   The deal’s location is within a 4-hour car ride or less of your office

   You know for a fact you will automatically be placed on the short list by submitting

   You have won this type of business before

   You help write the RFP

3. Packaging. When packaging your RFP, make sure its presentation matches your value. Many companies work on their RFP up to the last day, then overnight it to the buyer to beat the deadline. Focus on the proposal structure (color, dividers, PDFs, etc.) even if you have to submit it through the Internet. When sitting in on RFP reviews, I noticed that the best looking physical presentations always seem to get more attention. Remember, RFPs (like all proposals) are invisible salespeople.
4. The Offer. When writing the financial offer to the prospect in your RFP, always give them 3 price options, not one . . . even when they tell you to give them only one. Why? Because once you submit an RFP — it’s the “don’t call us, we’ll call you” syndrome and you may not have the opportunity to resubmit alternatives they may not have considered or that your competitors have suggested. By supplying three options, you position your RFP differently than others who only offer one.
5. Over-Produce. When creating your RFP – the key to success is to over-produce, yet companies barely get the finished RFP out the door. To increase your RFP closing ratio, build a better presentation. Supply audio CD, DVD, or MP3 file testimonials of your clients. Add a 5 minute CD from your President explaining why the prospect should buy from you. Submit an audio Q and A of the questions they asked you to supply in writing.

NOTE: One business metric we see that seems constant is that companies that respond to too many RFPs, normally do so because the rest of their lead generation programs are weak, and they try to compensate for their lack of revenue growth and lead generation by incorrectly assessing their potential RFP success and responding to everything.

To close more RFPs . . . respond less, qualify more and over-produce when you submit!

In our family conversations, my grandfather often spoke about how many of his business peers just operated their businesses by the seat of their pants and never targeted specific segments of their customers. They didn’t think about what type of women buy “mink coats” or what type of “movies” are the most popular on Fridays.

Instead, many of his business peers developed their advertising programs and sales approaches based on how the owner thought, who they thought would be a good buyer, or what the competitor charged . . . not how the buyer thought.

This is a common problem. Often companies market and sell based on their own marketing inertia doing what they have always done or based on what their competitors are doing. In many ways, the Internet has had a negative effect on marketing analysis because it is easy to see what your competition is doing and companies just copy each other.

Provided to Paul DiModica by eMarketer.com under contract.

While working with of one my IT staffing and project work clients recently on a high tech 360 degree business success assessment and recommendation program, we identified market gaps in their marketing and sales approach that was an impediment to the revenue capture success.

To sell more technology and services in today’s economy, you need to tighten the demographic profile of your most likely buyer. You will find that this will result in increased sales, reduced marketing costs, and decreased prospect database size because you are zeroing in on your most likely buyer.

Often, in a slow economy, many companies do the reverse. They increase their marketing costs by trying to sell a larger field population of potential buyers.

In my client’s example, we actually reduced the sales team’s selling geography and changed the marketing which immediately shortened sales cycle selling times and increased revenue capture.

Why?

Provided to Paul DiModica by eMarketer.com under contract.

Because once you know who your most likely buyer is, you can refocus on the purchase trigger that makes people buy your IT offering.

The Technology Buyer Identification Audit

1. Do you know who your most logical buyers are by title?
2. Do you know who your most logical buyers are by business industry?
3. Do you know who your most logical buyers are by annual revenue size?
   
4. Do you know why your targeted prospects buy?
5. Do you know why your targeted prospects don’t buy?
6. Do you know the monthly buying pattern of your prospects?
7. Do you know the alternatives a prospect has to buying what you sell? (i.e., not buy at all, buy from competitor, etc.)
8. Do you know how to create value that your targeted prospects will believe?
9. Do you base your offering’s value solely on your competition’s offering?
10. Do you base all of these questions on documented market research?

These 10 questions help formulate the IT marketing strategy, sales process and corporate revenue capture approach you use to grow your technology, software or professional services company.

My grandfather knew these answers despite not having a formal education. Answer these questions correctly and change your success today.

To your IT revenue capture success,

Paul R. DiModica
CEO, Value Forward Group
(770) 632-7647
www.valueforward.com

Paul R. DiModica
CEO, Value Forward Group
(770) 632-7647
www.valueforward.com