Always ask how you can assist so you can make this as easy as possible
for them to execute. Our you're listening to the audible Ready Podcast, the
show that helps you and your teams sell more faster. We'll feature sales leaders
sharing their best insights on how to create a sales engine that helps you fuel
repeatable revenue growth, presented by the team Enforce Management, a leader in B
to B sales effectiveness. Let's get started. Hello and welcome to the Audible
Ready Sales Podcast. I'm Rachel Clapp Miller. Today joining me is Antonella O
Day, Hi Antonella, Hi Rachel. So today we're going to talk about
gaining commitments. Gaining commitments throughout the sales process is an important component to moving
a deal forward, and we call them micro commitments, these little agreements you
need from your buyer in order to advance the sales process. So today we're
going to talk about some best practices for you to get buy in get these
micro commitments on critical parts of the deal. So we often talk about them
when you're trying to book that first discovery call, right you need somebody to
say yes and the phone. But they're also good things to remember good commitments
to gain as you move through a company, talk to new decision makers,
etc. Things you need to get if you want to move the conversation forward
with anybody. So let's talk about the first commitment. That's the one we
call time. You can't get commitment on time if you don't earn the right
to engage the conversation. So Antonella, let's bring you in. How do
I get the time commitment from the person I'm talking to? Thanks for having
me again, Rachel. So this is a good question, and I think
it's one that comes up pretty often when I'm talking to sellers. And there's
a number of things that can be done here, but I'm going to focus
on three that I feel have the greatest impact. Compelling opening statements, providing
a genuine purpose us to the caller the email, and establishing credibility. And
let me provide some additional context around those three. Let's start without compelling opening
statements. I know it's super cliche, but I still find it to be
very valid. You get one shot at making a first impression, and if
that's the case, then what you have to say better stand out. So
where I find some people sometimes fall into a trap here is delivering a boring,
vanilla cookie cutter statement that your buyer knows you're using on every quality email.
And I get it from a seller perspective, sometimes we feel quantity is
more important than quality, But I'm here to say that I don't agree with
that. I don't think it is at all. If you want to get
that time commitment, give your buyers what they don't expect, a statement that
shows you did some research on them, on their company, on their role,
and tie it to something like a challenge if they may be facing.
That will be relevant to the person that you're connecting with, even if you
don't get it one hundred percent right. In terms of making a statement that
fully resonates, a buyer will appreciate the effort, and that means you increase
your chances of getting time on their schedule. I was just going to say
that a lot of the people you're calling are also selling, so they can
appreciate the effort that you put in by personalizing or finding something about them.
That's such a great point, and you know a lot of them are trying
to accomplish the same things, either within their own companies or externally. So
think about it from their perspective as well, what they're seeing, and those
that are successful, what they're probably doing as well. The second point I
wanted to make was around providing a genuine purpose to the call or the email.
I don't know about you, Rachel, but have you ever gotten a
call or an email where you weren't sure who was calling, why they were
calling, exactly what they were trying to get out of the phone call or
the email they were sending to you? Yes, every day, and I
roll my eyes every time. Yeah, And for those of us who have
and still do, like, the word that comes to mind in those moments
is annoyed. Annoying that you're speaking to someone who's not clear about why they're
calling you and what the intent of the call is. And as sellers,
we are trying to create genuine relationships with our buyers and our clients, right,
So if you want someone to be genuine with you, you need to
be genuine with them from the start. It helps create a really good relationship
there, and that means being open and transparent about your purpose, whether it's
hi, I'm calling, I'm calling specifically the schedule a meeting, or you
know, I want a schedule some time to learn more about you to see
if there's a match. Be clear about it. It shows you value your
time and that you respect their time as well. The last item I want
to talk about in terms of being able to get that time on the calendar
is establishing credibility. And I know it's a broad term and you know it's
used often to capture a lot of things. But how do we as sellers
do this? And I've seen a couple of ways that work really well.
The first one is really demonstrating your knowledge of the industry and their company.
It's really tough to compel someone to give you time if you don't demonstrate that
you've put some time in on the front end to show that you're worth doing
business way. So do your due diligence. Understand you know what's going on
with that company. Tie it to what you know is going on in the
industry. It's so helpful in terms of moving things forward. The second thing
is sharing success stories of similar companies that you work with. Buyers don't buy
into what we very often say we can deliver just based on words, but
they will buy into the outcomes others have achieved. So give them what they're
looking for there. And the last piece you may consider sharing is relevant experience
that you personally have, or specific experience that your company has, whether it's
companies you personally work with, thought leadership within your organization, maybe awards your
company has won. All that helps create a compelling reason to spend some time
with you. Yeah, those are great. They catch somebody's attention and earn
you the right right to get some of their time. Just to get somebody
to talk to you is a great commitment to have, And the next commitment
is for them to also engage and collaborate in a conversation with you. You
want to make sure you have their buy into engage. And you know,
I've been on the phone where somebody's like, oh, can we continue this
conversation? I'm like, well, okay, I guess, but I'm sure
there's a more nuanced way to do that. What tips do you have to
try and test for this commitment and how do you earn the right to get
them to engage further? I would think the first thing to do is to
ask good questions, good discovery questions, and pay attention to how they're answering
the questions. Are they open. Are they elaborating on their answers or are
they being very like short with you, not giving you a lot of information.
Have they given you insight into something that's challenging and maybe some goals they
want to achieve or do they not want to show their true situation? Are
they asking questions of you throughout the discovery session. Those types of clues they
definitely give you a sense of whether or not they want to engage any further.
The other thing I use as a good gauge is asking for feedback.
So as we talk about them, as I share some of my success stories,
as we maybe possibly explore new topics, one of my favorite things to
ask is what do you think about that? Or what are your thoughts around
that? If they're willing to share their point of view or if they have
suggestions, that's a really good sign. So I use that as a gauge
to say, hey, yeah, I think they want to continue to move
forward with me here. If those two are you not giving you clear signals
for whatever reason, you can ask for a follow up step, or you
might say something like typically the next step is to get you and maybe a
technical buyer and a business stakeholder to have a follow up meeting. Do you
know who would be involved in that session? If they give you some names
or titles, that's a good sign. If they say I'm not sure if
we're there yet, obviously that's not as good as a sign. And then
just to address that last question you had, like how do you earn the
rights to get them to engage? I would say one word, really,
I think encapsulates it best. Listen. It's so underrated yet so powerful.
I always say. The annal you need to continuously move the deal forward really
comes from what your buyers articulate. Listen to their challenges, Listen to their
pains, Listen to their initiatives, listen to their objectives, highlight them as
you hear things in the conversation, and explore them further. If you listen
and help them in better understanding some of the things that maybe they haven't thought
about as deeply, you get credit for that, and that are you the
right to move forward. Regardless of how the situation might play out and the
types of commitments you get to engage or collaborate. The good news is you'll
be able to determine if it's something to move forward with now or not.
And sometimes the best thing about these conversations and trying to get people to commit,
it's coming to the realization that you're not going to and then spending your
time to somewhere else. Right. That is almost as as valuable as getting
the yes right. If you get a no quick right, lose early.
They always say, so, we've got commitment, a time, commitment to
engage, collaborate. The other commitment that we like to talk about is the
commitment for access. And this is important in a lot of ways, but
also for your coach or your champion. Are they willing to help you with
access to other critical people in the deal? I would love for you to
talk a little bit about that. And then also, how do you test
for this? Is it just as simple as saying, hey, can you
get me a meeting with the technical buyer or the CFO or what's a more
nuanced way to manage this and get that commitment for access? I like this
question, Rachel, because commitment for access is one of the most critical parts
of the sales process because it provides a line of sight of who will way
in, but it also gives you confidence or lack thereof if you have a
champion, So how do I make that request for access. I may start
out not asking for the introduction right off the bat, but asking for maybe
a review of an organizational chart and time to discuss who the stakeholders involved maybe
and their level of influence. Think about the value of that. Now you
have names, you have roles, and their level of influence. If you
have a lot to go off of, and it gives you some confidence in
terms of, you know, maybe the coach champion that you may be having
that conversation with in terms of how strongly they're advocating on your behalf. If
I can get past that level, then I might ask for a meeting that
includes the coach or the champion with some of the other key stakeholders. And
the reason why I include them is I want them to feel how much I
value them in the process. So if I'm going to leverage them to continue
to get me front and center, it's got to be mutually beneficial. So
I want to do something that will help them their exposure and what they're trying
to get out of assisting me in the process. I could also ask for
introductions via email sometimes and that could help with initiating some conversations. If it's
not as simple as making a face to face introduction, I'm great with at
least starting with a email introduction and seeing where I can take it from there
on my own, and then asking for additional help as we move along.
And all of those are viable options whatever route you take. I think it's
important not to lose sight that coaches champions. They're essential to most deals.
So make sure your asks are mutually beneficial and always ask how you can assist
so you can make this as easy as possible for them to execute them.
Love them. You want to make it easy for them so they can help
you, help them help you. That's a great tip. I think you
know we often talk about medic I read a lot of content on medic Antonella.
I know you talk a lot about medic and we talk about it helping
to provide you that X ray, right, It kind of shows you where
the gaps in your deal. Those letters of medic represents components of your deal
that you need to have in order to say, hey, I have a
good deal. But I think this concept of commitments maybe takes it a step
back. Maybe earlier in the deal I think we've given the listeners some additional
points to think through in those initial meetings of the commitments that you need in
order to feel like you've got a good opening to advance the deal. I
would love for you to leave us with some final thoughts. Yeah, when
you talk about it, I think it's these early conversations Rachel, and whether
or not we're able to gain commitments that allows you to determine if there's even
a deal to be had a lot of the time think about it. Have
you identified pain? Is it big enough that they want to continue when moving
forward with you and as your solutions off for it. Have you gotten commitment
to providing you access to those in the decision making process and the people involve
like an economic buyer who can influence the final outcome. Have you gained commitment
to have a discussion around a formal lize decision pride to you so you can
tailor your value pack to the things that are most relevant to your buyers.
Have you gained commitments from your champion to advocate on your behalf. If your
answers to many of these questions is no, your time has probably better spend
somewhere else. But if Your answers to most of these questions is yes,
you've increased your chances of closing a deal successfully. That's great. And I
think sometimes for those of you out there who are selling deals that are large,
maybe you're new into a role where you're selling enterprise deals, you can
look at that sales process think gosh, this is going to take forever to
get something close. But wrapping your head around these smaller commitments can give you
motivation and some small successes along the way to move your deal forward. I
appreciate you joining me today, Antonella, Thanks so for having Rachel all right.
Thank you to all of you for listening to the Audible Ready Sales Podcast.
At Force Management, we're focused on transforming sales organizations into elite teams.
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