connect2innovation: sales- are you selling comfortable?
TRANSCRIPT
WELCOME
Are you comfortable selling?Breakfast Briefing
H G Wells4th December 2014
© C2I Ltd November 2014
HOUSE KEEPING
Future Events with
Next Years Programme ?
Some ideas?
• Intellectual property – how to protect your brand
• E-marketing trends – does email marketing work
• Innovation – how to innovate a service business
• Technology trends - including digital banking
Survey to follow – your feedback will be appreciated
Register at [email protected] to be kept updated
© C2I Ltd November 2014
Our speakers today
Andrew Parker
Tim Lowe
Chris Bryan
Mentoring SalesSales & Marketing expert advice
© C2I Ltd November 2014
• How can you help each other?
– who you are?
– what do you sell?
– what markets?
– Your strengths?
– what do you need?
– ALSO, hand out your business cards
It’s your turn now!
© C2I Ltd September 2014
Assistance?
“Growth through Innovation” & “Growth Accelerator” are both subsidised government schemes to assist SME business which can help realise IP and business potential
Our Speaker can help you – take the opportunity. Discuss your business issues with them today
© C2I Ltd November 2014
Are you comfortable selling?• What makes a good sales proposition?
• Are there different selling styles
• What does a professional buyer expect from you?
• Larger organisations
• Lead Generation – is your process robust enough?
Your Challenge!
1. Do you really have a sales process in place?
2. Is your lead generation robust and continuously working for you?
3. Do you know what you want from every sales conversation?
Aim Ready Fire
Ready Fire Aim
Where to start
Marketing is all about raising awareness – about creating Perception!
Sales is all about defining a need – creating a Reality!
.............................Peter Drucker
Tim Lowe
Selling to Woking Borough Council
C2I Event: Sales – Are you selling comfortable?
4th December 2014
Tim Lowe – Senior Policy Officer
Scope
•Policy and Regulatory Context
•What the Council Buys
•How the Council Buys
•Constraints
•Opportunities
•Review of Sales Techniques
•Identifying opportunities
•Further information
Policy and Regulatory Context
National / European
•Public Contracts Regulations
•EU Procurement Regulations
•Local Government Act
Local
•Procurement Strategy
•Economic Development Strategy
•Constitution and Contract
Standing Orders.
What the Council BuysBuilding Services
Business & Professional Services
Communication Services
Construction & Demolition
Environmental Services
Food and Catering
Information Management/Systems
Information and Communications
Technology
Leisure Services
Market Research & Intelligence
Market Research & Intelligence
Office Equipment
Plant and Equipment
Property Management
Public Relations and Marketing
Recruitment Services
Security Services
Training
Vehicles
Waste Management
How the Council Buys
•Decentralised Purchasing
responsibility
•Centralised Commercial and
Procurement advice
•Direct Purchasing
•Restricted Quotations
•Open Tendering
•Use of Frameworks
•Use of ‘E-Procurement’
Constraints
•Outsourced Arrangements
•Frameworks with named suppliers
•Embedded Suppliers
•Unclear points of contact
•Range of purchasing methods
•New Regs: EU Procurement
•Procurement Strategy
•Visibility of opportunities
Opportunities
•Sub Contracting
•Framework direct call-off provisions
•Need to Challenge existing supply
•Engage with Commercial Unit
•Advantage to suppliers who understand
purchasing methods
•New Regs: Social Value
•Economic Development and Climate
Change Strategies
•Transparency code: improved visibility.
Review of Sales Techniques 1
•Not preferred:
•General company introductions
•Requests for meetings
•Attempts to build rapport
•Lack of specific offering
•Prolonged calls and emails
•Repeat calls and emails
•Obliviousness to Council situation
•Causing additional work / overheads
•False claims
Review of Sales Techniques 2•Welcomed:
•Specific goods or services offerings
•Succinct sales pitch
•Offers to provide Free of Charge
diagnostic / business case / trials
•Understanding of purchasing options
•Credible references
•Discounts for referrals
•Contact using preferred methods at
agreed frequencies
•Demonstrable Value for Money
•Delivery of Council priorities.
Identifying Opportunities & Further
Information
•WBC ‘Review it’ site: www.woking.gov.uk/review
•Contracts Finder: https://online.contractsfinder.businesslink.gov.uk/
•Supply 2 Surrey:
www.supplytosurrey.co.uk
•Coming up:
Insurance, Telephony Carrier services,
Environmental Health services, Energy
buying, Housing Asset Improvement
Programme, Corporate Property Asset
Improvement Programme, Temporary
staffing.
Woking Borough Council• Commercial Unit:
• 01483 743491
• www.woking.gov.uk/business/sellingtothecouncil
Andy Parker
Developing greatSales Propositions
Andrew Parker
Mentoring Sales Ltd
Agenda
• Sales – nothing to fear
• Features, Advantages, Benefits
• Small sales – the Sales Proposition
• Larger sales – the Value Proposition
• Your next steps
Marketing & Sales
• Marketing
– generates your sales leads and opportunities
• Sales
– Closes the right opportunities for your business
Sales is an Art, right?
Life & Soul
Born salesman
Gift of the gab
Sales as a Science
• Huthwaite International
• SPIN® is a successful sales methodology validated against over 40,000 sales visits
• Sell on value, not on price
• My 25 year sales success founded on this approach
“FAB, Virgil”
• Features – facts or information about your products/services. They do little to help you sell
• Advantages – show how a product/service can help potential customers
• Benefits – show how a product/service meets a specific customer’s expressed need
Small Sales
• Small sales – normally completed in 1 or 2 visits, relatively low monetary value
• Traditional sales techniques work best for small sales e.g. – Open and closed questions
– Objection handling
– Negotiating
– Closing
• You must develop a Sales Proposition
Sales Proposition
• An Advantage (or several) you can offer potential customers above and beyond your competitors’ offerings
• Your USP sits here
• It’s the Selling company’s viewpoint
Larger sales characteristics
• Longer sales cycles, requiring several visits over several weeks or months
• On-going relationship, where salesperson becomes a decision factor
• Risk of making a mistake becomes greater
• Traditional sales techniques can work against you (=> consultative selling)
• Building value is critical to success
Sales Call Stages
• Preliminaries
• Investigating
• Demonstrating Capability
• Obtaining Commitment
Needs in the Larger Sales
• Take longer to develop, involve several people, more rational, more personal risk
• 2 types of “need”
• Implied Need: customer statements of problems or dissatisfactions with current situation
• Explicit Need: specific statements of customer wants or desires
SPIN Questions Sequence
• Situation Questions
• Problem Questions
• Implication Questions
• Need-Payoff Questions
• A questioning sequence that taps directly into the psychology of the buyer and the buying process
Situation Questions
• Collect facts and background data about customer’s existing situation
• Essential part of questioning but must be used sparingly to avoid boredom or irritation
• Easiest questions to ask, hence why inexperienced salespeople concentrate on this type of question
• Not positively related to sales success
Problem Questions
• Your role in the call is a “problem solver”
• Probe for issues, dissatisfactions or difficulties
• Necessary – if you can’t solve a problem for the customer, there’s no basis for a sale
• Invites the customer to state Implied Needs
• Not positively related to sales success
Implication Questions
• Effects, consequences or implications of the customer’s problems
• Purpose is to take a perceived small problem and build it up into one requiring action
• Strongly linked to success in larger sales
• Are “sad” because they identify the real problems
Need-Payoff Questions
• Get the customer to tell you benefits that your solution could offer
• Ask about the value or usefulness of solving a problem
• Focus customer’s attention on the solution, rather than the problem, creating a positive, problem-solving atmosphere
• Very strong correlation to sales success• Coupled with Implication Questions, allow seller
to develop Explicit Needs as stated by the buyer
Value Proposition
• Clear statement(s) on how your products or services will satisfy customers’ specific needs and provide value
• It’s the Buying company’s viewpoint
• You are putting yourself into the Buyer’s shoes to consider your offering
Theory into Practice
• Practice one behaviour at a time (3 times)
• Quantity before quality
• Develop a stock of questions, in the SPIN sequence
• Analyse products/services by the problems that they solve, not features/advantages
• Plan, Do, Review
Looking for help?
• www.mentoringsales.co.uk
• GrowthAccelerator service
– For businesses looking for high growth
– L&M grant of £2,000 matched funding per senior manager; can be used for Sales training
– Coaching help, typically majority funded, over 3 –6 month period
– 6 workshops included (Strategy, Sales…)
Two issues collide todayCourtesy of Internet & social media potential customers have access to a plethoraof information. That means:
A potential buyer will likely preselect without meeting all the suppliers Sales people need to be much savvier about any prospects business issues Engagement earlier in the sales cycle and forming a relationship becomes imperative
for larger, or long decision time, sales.
It’s a buyers, not sellers, market : Which means:
The true professional salesperson will need demonstrable skills and knowledge and use both when courting a discerning buyer
A robust sales process
Proposition&
Differentiation
Enquiry conversionLead
GenerationSales
Meeting(s)
Closingthe Sale
Paperwork
“Land &
Spawn”
Close&Deliver
Qualification
FormalProposal
MarketingProposition
MarketingCommunications
Qualify
Negotiation
© C2I Ltd November 2014
Recruiting Yourself?
Skills:
Listening
Pose Questions coherently
Speak clearly
Knowledge:
Industry sector
Subject knowledge
PersonalMotivated
Proactive
Appearance
Voice
© C2I Ltd November 2014
Do we prepare adequately?
What are you going to sell?
Who are you selling to?
What will be your initial Value message?
How will you physically present your message
How will you dress
What differentiates you in this situation?
What OUTCOMES do you want© C2I Ltd November 2014
Different types of Organisations
Charity - CEO responsible to trusteesmay need to apply for a Grant or Trust Fund to buymay have limited “unrestricted” funds available
International – may not be headquartered within the UKthere may be a central purchasing groupa process of due diligence needs to be followeda preferred supplier list, based on capability and other criteriaunderstanding sign-off levels are critical
Public sector – transparency requiredtender process may existguarantees and references may be required
SME limited company – spending own moneyvery discerning and concerned about monetary risk
The VALUE equation
Establish NEEDS
© C2I Ltd November 2014
What affects decisions........and therefore the questions /
objections you receive?
Value vs. Need
The Buyer Buying Behaviour
Competitors
© C2I Ltd November 2014
Decision Influences
Bad day syndrome
Political pressures from “above”
Budget sign off
Values match
Not in the objectives for this year
Don’t understand the market or the issues involved
Keep asking Qualifying by asking questions
“I keep six honest serving-men(They taught me all I knew);Their names are What and Why and WhenAnd How and Where and Who.I send them over land and sea,I send them east and west;But after they have worked for me,I give them all a rest. “
..........................(Rudyard Kipling – The Elephants Child)
I Keep Six Honest Serving Men
Fundamentals of successful sales meetings
- Sales person talks about products, services and solutions later in the call
- Buyer talks more than the seller
- Sales person asks more questions
What is a successful outcome?
An order
“a pilot” or demonstration
Sample left
Proposal
CONTINUANCE
Suspects
Prospects
Qualified Lead
SalesMeetings
InboundEnquires
Outbound“Cold “ activity – Telephone, database
Qualification Qualification
Always be Qualifying
Formal Proposal & Paperwork
Keep developing your sales skills
Set yourself LIMITED OBJECTIVES…• It’s better to focus on one sales aspect than to half-focus on two!
Plan your APPROACH in advance…• Do your research•What do you want as an outcome
SLOW down…• Don’t be afraid of silence: take time to listen, think and ask OPEN questions
IMPROVE through repetition• The only way to learn is to practice and try, try and try again.
QUESTIONS & FEEDBACK
Questions ?
Can we assist you in your thinking?
Feedback about this Briefing session?
What other business topics would you like us to cover?
Thank You
Email: [email protected]
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Join our Linked In group: Connect 2 Innovation
Telephone: 01483 743024