Building Your Platform To Make Selling Easy(ier)

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Last week, I got called by a CPA firm who wanted training for their people. This you must know: CPAs are not very good at selling. It’s not that they don’t have the expertise. That’s not it at all.

It’s that selling spooks them. It’s not in their comfort zone.

So, when I get a call from a professional services firm (or any company), I always start with one simple question: Do you have a platform?

Platform

After the weird looks they give me, I go on to educate them to what a “Platform” is.

Platform: definition, A position in the market that you occupy where people look to you for expertise.

Physical Platform

Just as you would speak at a conference from a podium (platform) the same thing applies here. In the physical world, it is you speaking from the stage, on a topic that you have some degree of expertise in, where all eyes are on you.

There, you don’t have to fight for attention. You ARE the show.

In the sales & marketing world, your platform could be a variety of things. LinkedIN is a platform. Any kind of social media could be a platform (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram). Your email list is a platform. A podcast is a platform.

Simply, it is a place where you command attention of the people you’re trying to reach.

Your platform is a positioning tool that raises you above the din of competition and market confusion.

You Have One Right Now, But You May Not Know It Read more

The One Thing That Will Change Your Sales World

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Apologies to the person who created the “flower and the bee” concept but I think that epitomizes perfectly the problem with most sales processes today.

The-Flower-Does-Not

And do we ever have a problem.

The ‘flower and the bee’ phenomena goes like this: in nature the flower must pollinate itself. It sits there waiting for the bee (one of the many ways pollination happens) to pollinate it. The flower does not labor, nor does it stress about bees showing up. Bees, on the other hand, are scurrying about trying to find food, and pollinating the flower.

In business, sales people are typically the bees and the customer is the flower. Sales people scurry around the country looking for food.

Why does it have to be that way? Why shouldn’t the sales professional be sitting – allowing the prospect to show up for them? Why?

It’s because we don’t plan it out that way. (We actually might, secretly, like the scurrying about looking for plants -err prospects.)

We have bought into the flower/bee process so heavily in sales that we refuse to even admit that it’s all wrong. (We also do this when job searching…wrong again.) Read more

How To Make A Sound, Effective and Compelling Argument

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Well, the election cycle has begun. And with it, comes my constant frustration (you might recall my blogs from 2 years ago) at how our politicians make their arguments, or, more accurately, how they DON’T make their arguments.

But since I’m staying away from politics in this blog, I’m left with a thought on how any of us make an argument for something we believe in.

As sales people, company leaders, and business executives, we must constantly be in argument-making mode. Not “argument” in the sense of aggressiveness, caustic language or a verbal battle. But “argument” in the sense of how we make our point, and bring others around to our way of thinking. Read more

3 Things You Can Do To Challenge The Sales Status Quo

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Status quo is a Latin phrase meaning the “existing state of affairs.”

Sales Training - Challenge The Status Quo

In my sales training practice, I watch sales teams continue to do the same things, over and over, and expect results to be different. I hear them say, “Well, if I could just do more…” But the correct way to challenge it is not to do more. It is to do different.

Here are three things you can begin doing immediately, that cost you NO MONEY, but that begins to challenge existing paradigms. Read more

How Do I Stay In Front of My Clients Without Pestering Them?

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This is from a Question & Answer call our team recently did in our program called The Accidental Salesperson. We thought we’d give you a peak inside our thinking when we answer client questions.  (This is a transcription of spoken audio so forgive some of the clunkiness).

Q: What I know is that clients give me referrals and therefore I need to be in front of my clients, but I don’t make time to do it. How do I do so?

A: Well there are two things here. One is the making time and two is what I do with that time that I make.

I’m going to give you a couple of ideas.

If you really believe that you have something of enormous value for your clients and let’s say it’s July and tax season is over and as a CPA, you’re kind of back in the swing of things because you’ve taken the month of May off to just recharge. I think it’s OK to call people up and say,

“Look, we don’t really have any kind of imminent issue here but I was wondering if you would mind if I stop by sometime. I’ve got something I would like to show you.”

I think you should make a call where you’re actually going to be giving value.

You’re not giving a sales pitch. There’s no value in that. You’re stopping by. You’re either writing an article and this is where it gets to number two. You’re either writing content of some kind:

  • An article
  • A white paper
  • A case study
  • Or something where I, as the client, am interested in knowing it.

It could be how somebody does something. It could be new ways to save money on taxes. It could be updates from the IRS on things that I should be concerned about as a business owner or as a taxpayer.

You Must Think About An Expert Strategy

This gets back to being an expert and positioning yourself as an expert. In your profession, there are tons of things that you can do so you have a reason to go meet with them. The issue in a lot of this stuff is, “Do you have a good, compelling reason?” Stopping by to say, “Hey!” is probably not a good, compelling reason and that’s why we don’t do it. It’s also why we can’t make a phone call to bring ourselves to do it.

So the question is: “How are you going to bring value when you show up?”

That’s why I suggest some kind of an article, a white paper, a document. It could be something as simple as a website article that you print off and then you interpret in some way or you add your perspective to it. Don’t just send them a link to an “interesting article” you saw. That’s the coward’s way out. Add to it. Enhance it. Offer your perspective on it. That will differentiate you. Read more

Are You An Accidental Salesperson?

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In October, we plan to release an online course called The Accidental Salesperson which presumes that many people who are drafted into sales today really didn’t set out with sales at their goal. This can include engineers, subject matter experts, accountants, lawyers and even a lot of salespeople.

And yet, most of the training that teaches those people how to sell is old and antiquated and actually takes away the very power that a technical subject matter expert has.

For example…

One of the keys to a successful salesperson − which the accidental sales person has an enormous amount of − is expertise. Accidental salespeople who grew up in the technical world know how to solve problems and they probably know how to find problems, too. That’s not necessarily the case with a salesperson who might not have worked on a widget − built it, designed it or engineered it.

These accidental salespeople are being asked to either head up the sales process or be a vital cog in the wheel of the sales process. And if the accidental salesperson doesn’t know how to communicate the value to a prospect, they will be lost.

So if you’re an accidental salesperson, don’t look to the sales team to train you on how to sell. The last thing you want to look like is them, especially if they are using antiquated and old manipulative tactics to do their job.

Instead, seek out training that helps you understand:

  • How people make decisions
  • Why people buy
  • What are the typical problems that a customer has
  • How do they equate the problem they have with the money that you’re asking them for to fix it?

Figure out the answers to those questions and every sales person on your team will be asking you to go on calls with them because most of them cannot do that.

Is It Mindset Or Skillset That’s The ‘Difference Maker’ Today?

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I had a long, tedious discussion with a family member this week end about the difference between COMPETENCIES and SKILLS. As someone who is ‘in the business,’ I suppose I should have been able to rip off a definition of each, but I couldn’t.

What  did occur to me as we were having the conversation is how little either of them really matter in sales success.

For over 12 years, we at Caskey have been preaching that it’s your “inner game” that makes all the difference in your success. And that if you want to significantly change your outcomes, change your thinking.

Afterall, situations change rapidly and scenarios change from one customer to the next. So, how can you possible have a skillset for each and every nuance of customer situation?

You can’t.

It’s why we’ve been trumpeting the message of “it’s about mindset, not skillset” for years.

Mindset Has Four Components

As we see it, if you can master the mindset of selling (and of yourself), you are unstoppable. Here the four that we teach.

1. Abundance.

This is the perspective that suggests there is more than enough to go around. There is an abundance of sales opportunities, prospects and pain to solve. Any shortcoming you feel right now is a function of how you think. Period. Look at your sales funnel to gauge how you were thinking ‘yesterday.’ Because that’s all a sales funnel is – an indication of old thinking. Read more

This One Idea Distinguishes You from All Others

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I wrote a couple of weeks ago about an encounter I had with a client who had asked us to critique a formal presentation he was making to a prospect.  As we were going through it, I realized that nowhere in there did he inform and educate his prospect to the “secrets of success” of this project.

My Advice To You

As you position yourself as an expert in your industry (and you should be doing that all the time) some sort of a “secrets of success” cornerstone report will help you help them.

So…What’s The Bottom Line Question?

If someone came to you and said, “John, what are the secrets to success in the implementation of this phone system?” you should be able to pull out the document that says, “Here, if you follow these steps, step-by-step, you will succeed enormously in solving your problems and getting the solution implemented.”

If you don’t have that, then write it.

If you don’t want to write it, then continue to be hoisted into the commodity heap with all other people who sell on price (and good luck with that).

 

 

 

 

3 Tips On Selling A Premium Product in a Commodity Market

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A few years ago, I did a Webinar called “How to Sell A Premium Product in a Commodity Market.” It was one of our best attended webinars we’ve ever done.

Lots of interest in the topic – and I believe I know why.

In this article, I want to update some of the content and give you a couple more ideas.  I picked this topic because it is an ongoing area of concern for sales people – how to sell a premium product into a market that sees price as THE main driver.

Why it’s so tough.

Think about it. We live in a “price leads” society. Advertisers have led us on a race to the bottom by the constant drumbeat of, “Lowest Prices In The Industry!” Or, “We’ll Beat ANY Price!” I know you’ll say, “But I’m not in the retail game.” No, you aren’t. But do you see the attitude that they’ve placed in the minds of buyers?

So the context is that even though your buyer might not jump to “What’s your price?” they certainly have it on their radar.

Here are four notions that I suggest you consider as you extract yourself form the “commodity dungeon” where the only important issue is price:

1. Position Your Self Properly.

Interesting thing about positioning is that it’s not just about what you say – it’s about how you say it. Sales people spend so much time concerned with the “what” and ignore the “how.”

And that’s wrong.

Regardless of your word choice (you’ll have to decide that), the essence of your message should be centered around ‘the types of problems that you solve.’ That’s right – no enthusiastic sales pitches about how great you are – or how smart your team is. None of that.

Frame your ‘premium value’ around the pains and problems that prospects face. Some of those problems they know they have. Some they’re oblivious to. But either way, begin the conversation there.

Be a problem solver not a product seller. There is a trap waiting for you. The prospect sets it and you fall right into it. It happens when the prospect shows interest and you default to “the pitch.”

Instead, when your prospect shows interest in the types of problems you solve, refrain from pitching the product and spend more time diagnosing what that problem means to him. This one thing can do more to change your position (in the prospect’s mind) and help them see that your premium fee is worth it.

Read more