Selling in the Red Zone Building a High Performing Sales Organization for the 21st Century - by Ron L. Coverson Executive boardrooms are ancient, timeless corridors where decisions are made that effect worlds. Just ask Richard "Red" Cashen, executive director of sales for a Fortune 500 company. There was very little solace in the fact that Cashen had finally found a moment to himself. Even the silence of oak-pannelled walls seemed a bit unnearving. Slowly and methodically, Cashen's eyes searched the room for answers he did not find during the meeting. Gazing past his reflection and through the filtered light of a late afternoon haze, tired and bleary eyed, Richard notices the banner draped across a neighboring building. "Come and get a big piece of the pie. Let us help you make your dreams come true. It's never to late to become a winner, all you have to do is-- Go For It!" sponsored by the state lottery commission. "Bumper sticker motivation, if it were only that simple," Richard lamented, his eyes turning to a Stock Exchange Journal article that demanded his attention. There it was in big bold type. For the third straight quarter Richard's firm-a former industry giant-- had lost both money and market share. Even though the article failed to tell the entire story, in his heart Cashen knew that something was seriously wrong with his sales organization. And this time, the problem would not fade with the passing of time. As frustrating as the year had been for Cashen and his sales force, what was even more frustrating was that nothing seemed to make sense. The company's prices were competitive with the best in class competition. The business centers were strategically located throughout the state. Sales people had been working long, hard hours and seemed to have met with more customers face to face than ever before. During the past 18 months Cashen spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on hiring and training the best sales people he could find. Half of the management staff were replaced with seasoned sales managers whose singular mission was to haul in new business. Marketing research indicated that it was vitally important for the company to not only retain its present customer base, but to capture even more business from this core group of clients. Three quarter's of a million dollars was spent on radio and television ads aimed at the customer segment that the "experts" believed would buy the high end products. Still nothing seemed to work. Six weeks ago out of desperation, Cashen commissioned an independent consulting firm to hold focus groups in the company's key business centers state wide. The goal was to ask present and former customers questions aimed at finding out what obstacles existed that prevented them from doing business with Cashen's company. The results were startling. Here is a list of some of the comments that came out of the focus groups: 1. "Your sales people never seem to listen to my perspective on the matter of my business needs. They seem to think that they know what I want before I tell them." 2. "I believe that your sales people in general are knowledgeable, but they don't seem to be able to offer me something that I really believe would make a valued difference for me." 3. "I'm tired of the same old song and dance sales person. What I want is someone who understands precisely what I need and is able to customize a product or service that will work for my unique situation." 4. "The sales person never took notes so I got the impression that he did not really care about what I had to say. In fact, every time we tried to talk,the phone rang and after that I just felt ignored." 5. "It's important that a sales person attempts to build a relationship with me in order to for me to really trust him. That just wasn't happening for me. She did not seem to understand that this kind of investment is very important to me and it's not a decision I will make lightly." 6. "I need a sales person who goes beyond the surface conversation of products and is interested in helping provide solutions to problems that don't yet exist. I need a proactive approach to keep my business ahead of the competition." 7. "There are times when I'm not sure how to diagnose a problem that I am having. Sometimes I need different expertise to figure this thing out. I need someone to help me to think out of the box; to anticipate challenges I or my family face in the future. What had become abundantly clear to Cashen after the focus groups was that customers were looking for a different kind of sales experience. The old way of offering the product of the month and promising service was just not working. People were looking for value beyond the standard features and benefits statements. Customers were clearly looking for a salesperson who could not only talk about their products or services but who also possessed a working knowledge of the customer's industry. Someone who could help them gain a competitive advantage or help them secure investments that would provide peace of mind about the future. A sales person was expected to consult with the customer in a way that made him feel not only listened to but confident that a viable solution was immanent-and that Cashen's company would be able to provide that solution or recommended someone who could! Following the focus groups, Cashen distilled the customer responses into a set of sales skills, business acumen and core competencies that customers expect sales reps to demonstrate during each encounter: • An ability to establish rapport and build trust and credibility with the client. • An understanding of the client's business and the challenges they face. • An ability to view the business challenges from the perspective of the prospect or client • An ability to intelligently engage in a conversation in a way that leaves the client feeling listened to and understood. • An ability to communicate ideas that address customer's needs and that introduces a plan of action (proposal). • An ability to build on the ideas of clients by suggesting additional ways to maximize investment dollars. • An ability to ask questions that redefine needs and helps the clients explore other issues facing their business or personal situation. • An ability to position products and services in a way that enables the clients to see the value or benefit of a certain solution • An ability to be responsive and to follow up with strategies that will serve the clients now and in the future. A Brave New World of Clients The challenges that face Richard Cashen in his quest to transform his sales reps into a high performing customer focused unit are not unique. Since the rise of the information age some 25 years ago, sales encounters with would-be clients have evolved quite dramatically. Today's clientel are smarter, much more well informed, and they understand-for the most part-what they are facing in terms of their own business or financial challenges. Therefore, today's sales person must be able to consult with customers, discover the nature of the challenges they face, offer ideas, and facilitate a sales conversation that results in an effective plan of action. Products and services are useful only to the extent that they are perceived as a value added resource to the customer's business or financial goals. Organizations that hope to compete effectively for shrinking market share must transform their sales force into a group of high quality, high performing professionals who possesses the skill and expertise that discriminating customers demand in their sales consultants. Organizations must also be willing to do whatever it takes to change the culture of their sales organization so that sales people are rewarded for engaging in the process of building long lasting relationships---a hallmark characteristic of today's best in class sales organizations. It is becoming the chief job of the senior management team in today's high performing organizations to assess, and if necessary, reconfigure the present organizational structure to streamline operations, marketing, customer service, and sales into a focused interdependent unit that enables the company to provide a quick point-of-sale response to its customers. Companies who expect to compete aggressively in today's markets must also create an environment that rewards those who participate in continous learning activities. Consultative selling requires that sales people grow in their knowledge of the latest communication techniques so that they can be prepared to consult effectively with their clients. Finally, the new sales organization must equip sales managers with the knowledge and skills to effectively coach his or her sales team in a way that increases the probability that each sales person will be more effective every time they meet with a customer. A New and Dynamic Resource For Today's Sales Organizations Over the past several years, Quantum Performance Systems, a San Francisco based leader in training and consulting, has worked closely with some of the bay area's top corporations in helping them transform their sales organizations into dynamic, customer focused teams of professionals who understand the art of consulting and are willing to step up and meet new challenges head on. By introducing a concept known as "The Fifth Element,"Quantum Performance Systems has been instrumental in integrating processes that are helping Fortune 500 companies to reconfigure their sales organizations and dramatically shift the cultural mindset of their sales people from that of "order takers" to sales consultants. • "The Fifth Element" consists of these four elements. • Design • Vital Information (Knowledge) • Attitude • Skills & Practices (Wisdom) The sum of these four elements comprise the 'fifth element" or the people who emody these four dynamics of busines life. Design considers the way a sales organization is constructed. It asks the tough questions that enables senior leaders to evaluate whether or not they are positioned as an organization to effectively serve the customer. Design also enables an organization to determine the principles that govern its mission, vision and business strategy and to articulate the best practices that represent a high performing organization. Vital Information takes a look at the experience and expertise of an organization and determines how these elements translate into effectiveness with customers. A professional who possesses this expertise is known as a vital information provider or a V.I.P. Knowledge is defined as the important information that an organization possesses or has access to that will enable them to better understand what is important to the customer. This component is critical in helping organizations determine the most effective way to conduct business. Attitude focuses on the mindset within a division, work group or individual. Research on high performing sales people suggests that these folk possess mindsets or attitudes that are positive and future oriented. This attitude enables sales people to experience failure as a springboard to success. Highly effective sales people sees problems as opportunities, and they demonstrate a willingness to step up to the challenges they face on a day-to-day basis. Quantum Performance Systems has been instrumental in using training to help shift the attitudes of sales people so that they show up with the "right" intention and approach when working with customers. Skills & Practices are the dynamic tools, techniques and behaviors that sales people need to learn and apply to be effective consultants. These tools are provided by Quantum Performance Systems through a variety of training options. Wisdom is defined as skill and discipline. This Wisdom is the bi-product of the applied knowledge and expertise that an organization develops as a result of its successes and failures. Focus on the sales conversation According to the most reliable research data, effective conversations that result in customer satisfaction happen in four stages: • The Trust Dialogue • The Insightful Dialogue • The Value Add Dialogue • The Solutions Dialogue Quantum Performance Systems teaches sales concepts and techniques that are used within each of these four critical stages of a customer interactionand that dramatically increases the probability that customers will agree to do business. The role of the sales manager as coach Over the past 10 years, the role of the sales manager has changed dramatically from a jack-of-all trades supervisor to that of a coach. The essential responsibility of a coach/sales manager is to provide ongoing developmental feedback to the sales person and to influence them along a path of improvement that is measured by business results. QPS is committed to providing the finest in sales management coaching workshops that are designed to quickly build the skill and ability of sales managers to enable them to effectively coach their sales team toward the achieving of corporate goals. QPS has resources available to serve the needs of your organization. Our goal is to help you to become the finest sales organization in the world. With our help-we believe that you will get there! Give us a call or write us on the internet.