WEBVTT

1
00:00:00.800 --> 00:00:06.120
Most sellers come from the school of
thought where they're focused on themselves and well

2
00:00:06.200 --> 00:00:09.720
they can get out of their deal
and their products and their services. The

3
00:00:09.839 --> 00:00:18.480
focus should never deviate from the buyer. You're listening to the audible Ready Podcast,

4
00:00:18.679 --> 00:00:23.039
the show that helps you and your
teams sell more faster. We'll feature

5
00:00:23.079 --> 00:00:26.719
sales leaders sharing their best insights on
how to create a sales engine that helps

6
00:00:26.760 --> 00:00:31.679
you fuel repeatable revenue growth. Presented
by the team Aforce Management, a leader

7
00:00:31.719 --> 00:00:37.439
in B to B sales effectiveness.
Let's get started. Hello and welcome to

8
00:00:37.479 --> 00:00:41.759
the Audible Ready Sales Podcast. I'm
Rachel Clep Miller. I'm joined today by

9
00:00:41.759 --> 00:00:45.840
Antonello O Day. Hi Antonella,
Hi Rachel, Good to see you again.

10
00:00:46.320 --> 00:00:51.280
Good happy to have you on to
talk through this topic today. And

11
00:00:51.479 --> 00:00:56.399
this topic actually comes from one of
our Ascender subscribers. As Sender is our

12
00:00:56.560 --> 00:01:03.079
online platform that has courses, content
and a community is available to individual sellers.

13
00:01:03.120 --> 00:01:07.159
Anybody can subscribe. It's also has
some plans for small teams. So

14
00:01:07.200 --> 00:01:14.040
if you are a small prese series
A company and you don't have enablement centers,

15
00:01:14.040 --> 00:01:18.560
a great solution for you. In
that community, sellers are asking their

16
00:01:18.640 --> 00:01:22.760
questions all the time, just challenges
they're having, and people like Antonella are

17
00:01:22.840 --> 00:01:26.640
responding and answering their questions, and
I wanted to lift up one of the

18
00:01:26.719 --> 00:01:30.760
questions was recently asked in the community
because it has to do with competitors,

19
00:01:30.760 --> 00:01:34.200
and I feel like some of you
out there might have the same question.

20
00:01:34.280 --> 00:01:38.560
So I wanted to bring Antonella on
the Audible Ready Sales podcast to talk through

21
00:01:38.200 --> 00:01:42.359
this topic. So Antonella, I'm
just going to start. I'm going to

22
00:01:42.439 --> 00:01:44.959
read the question and we can go
from there. If that's good with you,

23
00:01:45.519 --> 00:01:49.719
that's great, awesome, Okay,
So here's what this person asks.

24
00:01:49.840 --> 00:01:53.920
Says, we run into the same
five to six companies over and over,

25
00:01:53.439 --> 00:01:59.680
also starting to see more of these
smaller startups pop up in their competitive space

26
00:02:00.280 --> 00:02:04.680
or a smaller organization. So I'll
send stuff over to marketing for competitor research,

27
00:02:04.760 --> 00:02:08.400
but don't get the most insightful stuff
back. He says. I'm newer,

28
00:02:08.479 --> 00:02:13.159
so I'm not sure exactly how everyone
keeps track of all the competitors.

29
00:02:13.520 --> 00:02:19.159
If you're working at a smaller company, how do you organize the researcher competitors?

30
00:02:19.159 --> 00:02:23.199
Do you just track their unique selling
props? And maybe the main question

31
00:02:23.240 --> 00:02:29.120
here is he says, is this
something I should even really be worrying about?

32
00:02:29.240 --> 00:02:32.919
So there's a lot to unpack their
Auntsonella, Let's just start broadly.

33
00:02:34.080 --> 00:02:38.439
I know we talk a lot about
understanding your differentiation. Understanding your competitors is

34
00:02:38.439 --> 00:02:45.680
sort of a basic foundation to determining
how you align your own differentiation to your

35
00:02:45.680 --> 00:02:49.759
customers. Let's start with talking just
about the very basics that you need to

36
00:02:49.800 --> 00:02:53.919
start learning about your competitors when you're
new to selling a solution. That's a

37
00:02:53.960 --> 00:02:58.719
really good starting point. So understanding
your competition it's really important. It's one

38
00:02:58.719 --> 00:03:02.360
of the areas that can really be
helpful in qualifying your deal. There's some

39
00:03:02.400 --> 00:03:07.439
things that I consider more must have
or I highly recommend finding out, and

40
00:03:07.520 --> 00:03:12.240
some things that are more nice to
have for us to know as a seller.

41
00:03:12.319 --> 00:03:15.120
One of the things that I feel
like we need to get a good

42
00:03:15.159 --> 00:03:21.080
handle on are things like strengths,
weaknesses, and differentiators for the competition.

43
00:03:22.000 --> 00:03:25.520
Not so that I can provide air
time for the competitor, because I come

44
00:03:25.560 --> 00:03:30.120
from that school of thought that you
should never speak their name or give them

45
00:03:30.120 --> 00:03:35.560
a platform when I'm meeting with a
customer, but more from the perspective that

46
00:03:36.000 --> 00:03:42.560
if I know that my competitor provides
maybe weak customer support and we excel there

47
00:03:42.840 --> 00:03:46.599
and my customer has articulated that's a
great importance to them, then I'm going

48
00:03:46.639 --> 00:03:52.360
to lean into that really heavily in
our conversation when we talk about support.

49
00:03:52.719 --> 00:03:57.840
So it leads the foundation for the
areas of focus in my conversation in relation

50
00:03:57.919 --> 00:04:01.560
to the needs of my customer.
Second thing that I consider, something that

51
00:04:01.680 --> 00:04:06.439
I would strongly like to have is
who is their champion. I need to

52
00:04:06.520 --> 00:04:11.520
uncover this so that I can start
to determine who may have the upper hand

53
00:04:11.560 --> 00:04:15.960
in that deal. I will leverage
my own champion, maybe some allies,

54
00:04:15.000 --> 00:04:19.199
maybe a coach, to get some
insight of who they are, who maybe

55
00:04:19.240 --> 00:04:24.360
brought them in, and if possible, what was the why in bringing them

56
00:04:24.399 --> 00:04:29.240
into the deal. I might ask
questions around who else might be leaning in

57
00:04:29.279 --> 00:04:33.959
their direction, so that I can
get a sense of what's my next step?

58
00:04:34.560 --> 00:04:38.920
You know, how does this all
play out politically within the account?

59
00:04:39.319 --> 00:04:43.639
Does my champion have more cloud or
does theirs? What are my next steps

60
00:04:43.639 --> 00:04:46.920
and potentially getting the upper hand,
And I use this as the basis for

61
00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:49.680
my strategy, some of the nice
to have if I can get them,

62
00:04:49.759 --> 00:04:55.639
or things like target markets so that
I can determine where I typically might come

63
00:04:55.720 --> 00:05:00.839
up against them again in the future, and maybe pricing so that I can

64
00:05:00.879 --> 00:05:05.519
really spend some time thinking about how
to position our value in the eyes of

65
00:05:05.519 --> 00:05:10.680
the customer, so that even if
we're in a situation where we're priced hire,

66
00:05:11.120 --> 00:05:14.279
we're likely to still come out on
top of that. Feel great.

67
00:05:14.360 --> 00:05:17.519
Top of mind things to keep in
there. It's about your competitors, right,

68
00:05:17.639 --> 00:05:21.639
but it's also about your buyer.
It's about you and your aligning to

69
00:05:21.680 --> 00:05:25.839
your buyers. You mentioned like not
to get too focused to your competitors in

70
00:05:25.879 --> 00:05:29.759
those conversations. Don't give them the
air time if they don't deserve it.

71
00:05:30.120 --> 00:05:35.319
We also said talked about using your
competitors disadvantages and maybe lift those up,

72
00:05:35.680 --> 00:05:41.279
but you only really want to do
that if it's going to be meaningful for

73
00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:46.240
your buyers. So we often frame
it as understanding your differentiators as it relates

74
00:05:46.279 --> 00:05:50.480
to your buyers, your advantages as
it relates to your buyers. Talk about

75
00:05:50.560 --> 00:05:56.680
the basics of that, understanding your
differentiation as it relates to your solution and

76
00:05:56.720 --> 00:06:00.480
your buyer value. I think this
is an opportunity for us to really distinguish

77
00:06:00.480 --> 00:06:05.519
ourselves Rachel. We need to make
it all about the buyer, understanding them,

78
00:06:06.040 --> 00:06:12.639
listening to them, building and strengthening
our relationships with them. That potentially

79
00:06:12.720 --> 00:06:16.399
sets up the basis for differentiating us
in the eyes of the buyer. I

80
00:06:16.480 --> 00:06:21.399
say that because most sellers come from
the school of thought where they're focused on

81
00:06:21.439 --> 00:06:26.279
themselves and what they can get out
of their deal and their products and their

82
00:06:26.319 --> 00:06:30.199
services, and the focus should never
deviate from the buyer. Now, as

83
00:06:30.199 --> 00:06:33.720
sellers, to best serve the buyer, we need to understand our differentiators.

84
00:06:33.759 --> 00:06:38.240
We need to have a clear line
of sight of the reasons why we win

85
00:06:38.839 --> 00:06:44.000
and why customers would buy from us. Because buyers who engage with us typically

86
00:06:44.000 --> 00:06:48.040
are looking for products or service that
can resolve their problems and deliver great outcomes

87
00:06:48.079 --> 00:06:51.439
for them. It's the knowledge of
what we bring to the table that allows

88
00:06:51.480 --> 00:06:57.439
us to connect our differentiators to the
things that the customers articulated could solve their

89
00:06:57.480 --> 00:07:00.600
problems. And this potentially puts us
in a position of being the best choice

90
00:07:00.680 --> 00:07:05.160
if we're able to tailor our message
by connecting what we offer specifically to what

91
00:07:05.279 --> 00:07:10.000
they require, and if we do
this right, the icing on the cake

92
00:07:10.199 --> 00:07:15.120
really becomes being able to back it
up with tangible proof of where we solved

93
00:07:15.160 --> 00:07:19.160
similar problems and delivered similar outcomes.
All of this coming together is what helps

94
00:07:19.160 --> 00:07:24.079
those deals get over the finish line. Yeah, and that's the ultimate goal,

95
00:07:24.160 --> 00:07:27.040
right. In terms of the question
asking a center that I sort of

96
00:07:27.079 --> 00:07:30.480
paraphrase at the top of the podcast, how deep do you need to get

97
00:07:30.600 --> 00:07:35.720
to understand the competitive landscape? It's
a really good question, and I think

98
00:07:35.720 --> 00:07:40.879
as sellers we need to find a
balance here, and there is such a

99
00:07:40.920 --> 00:07:44.240
thing as too much. I had
a seller on one of my teams several

100
00:07:44.360 --> 00:07:48.160
years back who was super diligent and
always wanted to know everything that was going

101
00:07:48.160 --> 00:07:53.519
on with a competition. Her reasoning
was that if she knew her competition really

102
00:07:53.519 --> 00:07:57.879
well, she would be better at
selling her services. The challenge for this

103
00:07:58.000 --> 00:08:01.800
seller was it became the center of
all her account planning. She ran industry

104
00:08:01.800 --> 00:08:05.920
report, She analyzed the competitor's websites, what was happening in the marketplace with

105
00:08:07.040 --> 00:08:11.399
them, and as a result,
her conversation started to ship. It wasn't

106
00:08:11.399 --> 00:08:16.120
about the customer. It really revolved
around the competition quite a bit because she

107
00:08:16.240 --> 00:08:20.399
wanted to share her knowledge, and
she wanted to share who had the advantage

108
00:08:20.399 --> 00:08:24.240
and who didn't have the advantage,
And she took that focus off the customer

109
00:08:24.480 --> 00:08:30.600
and the whole idea of building strong
relationships there and what started to happen over

110
00:08:30.680 --> 00:08:35.879
time as her results started to slide. So what's my point? We need

111
00:08:35.879 --> 00:08:41.000
to have an understanding of our competition, the strengths, weaknesses, differentiators,

112
00:08:41.000 --> 00:08:43.639
who their champion may be in an
account, but not at the expense of

113
00:08:43.759 --> 00:08:50.639
being focused on them over the customer
needs, building relationships, putting together great

114
00:08:50.679 --> 00:08:54.639
sales strategies. Those things should always
come first. Yeah, you don't want

115
00:08:54.639 --> 00:09:00.120
to be penny smart in dollar dom
as you're talking, I wrote paralys this

116
00:09:00.200 --> 00:09:03.679
by analysis, Right, you may
know everything about the competition, you still

117
00:09:03.679 --> 00:09:07.639
got to sell your value aligned to
the buyer. So makes some great points

118
00:09:07.679 --> 00:09:11.080
there. And the next thing I
want to ask the subscriber mentioned running into

119
00:09:11.120 --> 00:09:16.000
the same five or six people,
What about if you are frequently facing incumbents

120
00:09:16.159 --> 00:09:22.039
or bigger companies that have bigger marketing
budgets that can tackle the market in a

121
00:09:22.120 --> 00:09:28.080
more effective way. How do you
tackle that? I think The starting point

122
00:09:28.240 --> 00:09:33.240
is really to focus on developing strong
relationships within your accounts, going deep,

123
00:09:33.679 --> 00:09:39.200
going wide. The value of a
relationship is very much alive today. Getting

124
00:09:39.200 --> 00:09:43.559
to know what's important to each of
those stakeholders, making sure messaging is relevant

125
00:09:43.559 --> 00:09:48.759
to each person that you connect with, Trust, incredibility, and the last

126
00:09:48.879 --> 00:09:52.639
art of listening really goes a long
way in terms of helping to strengthen relationships

127
00:09:52.639 --> 00:09:58.960
within an account. The other thing
I would mention regarding this is leaning into

128
00:09:58.200 --> 00:10:03.279
the differenti that often comes with working
with a smaller company. Just because you're

129
00:10:03.279 --> 00:10:07.919
small doesn't mean you don't have a
lot of advantages you bring to the table.

130
00:10:07.360 --> 00:10:11.039
My experience has been that the beauty
of a smaller company very often is

131
00:10:11.080 --> 00:10:16.039
that they're more flexible, They were
agile, They focus on things that often

132
00:10:16.120 --> 00:10:20.840
bigger companies have lost sight of,
like customer support and being able to evolve

133
00:10:20.919 --> 00:10:26.240
quickly. So identify those things that
really allow you to stand out and lean

134
00:10:26.399 --> 00:10:31.879
into them as appropriate, and then
add always be about the customer and delivering

135
00:10:31.919 --> 00:10:35.519
customer value. And I know we
say this a lot, but you can't

136
00:10:35.519 --> 00:10:39.120
emphasize it enough. Most large companies
depend heavily on their brand to drive the

137
00:10:39.200 --> 00:10:45.600
business. Today's buyers want more than
that. By focusing on customer problems,

138
00:10:45.639 --> 00:10:50.840
their outcomes requirements needed to get them
there, you really have an opportunity to

139
00:10:50.879 --> 00:10:54.679
engage your customers in a way they
want to engage with sellers. It demonstrates

140
00:10:54.679 --> 00:10:58.519
that you're committed to them long term, and very often this increases the chance

141
00:10:58.519 --> 00:11:05.240
of winning the deal. You mentioned
earlier a repune who's really focused on the

142
00:11:05.240 --> 00:11:09.120
competition, And I know, in
terms of positioning our value, particularly our

143
00:11:09.200 --> 00:11:15.840
differentiation, we need to understand who
else the customer is talking to. So

144
00:11:15.879 --> 00:11:20.720
how do you ask your buyers about
the competition of what they're talking to other

145
00:11:20.759 --> 00:11:26.000
people about without seeming sleazy or self
promoting. What are those some ways you

146
00:11:26.080 --> 00:11:31.080
can frame that question or getting that
information. That's a good question. It's

147
00:11:31.120 --> 00:11:37.720
probably an area where I tend to
tread lightly. I would highly recommend to

148
00:11:37.759 --> 00:11:41.159
be thoughtful here. And what I
mean by that is I try to leverage

149
00:11:41.200 --> 00:11:46.440
strong relationships here to gather my intel. If I have a champion or really

150
00:11:46.480 --> 00:11:50.639
strong coach, maybe a really strong
ally, I may go to those people.

151
00:11:52.200 --> 00:11:56.639
I won't just ask for info from
anyone because it could reflect poorly on

152
00:11:56.720 --> 00:12:01.360
me and my professionalism, and I'm
very thoughtful of the questions that I ask.

153
00:12:01.480 --> 00:12:05.679
I don't ask questions that I can
uncover in an Internet search. If

154
00:12:05.679 --> 00:12:09.000
I'm striving to get intel, I'm
going to ask some questions that matter.

155
00:12:09.159 --> 00:12:13.039
For example, I may ask my
champion something to the effect of, I

156
00:12:13.159 --> 00:12:18.480
know the organization is looking at other
options, what do we bring that you

157
00:12:18.559 --> 00:12:22.399
feel gives us an advantage? Followed
by what does the competition bring that you

158
00:12:22.480 --> 00:12:28.000
feel puts us at a disadvantage.
The responses to these questions are powerful because

159
00:12:28.039 --> 00:12:31.919
they can impact my strategy going forward, as well as prepare me for what

160
00:12:31.000 --> 00:12:35.120
I might come up against in the
future with that competitor. I never talk

161
00:12:35.240 --> 00:12:39.320
poorly about the competition when I'm seeking
info. I don't think you should ever

162
00:12:39.360 --> 00:12:43.000
speak poorly, but definitely not when
you're seeking to get some additional information.

163
00:12:43.480 --> 00:12:48.240
I approach it as more of a
curiosity that I'm looking to satisfy. That's

164
00:12:48.279 --> 00:12:52.919
a good way to think about it, curiosity that you're looking to satisfy.

165
00:12:52.279 --> 00:12:56.080
I know you sold for a long
time and snella and now you help people

166
00:12:56.200 --> 00:13:00.000
sell all over the world. I
know you just got back from Europe.

167
00:13:00.440 --> 00:13:05.799
What are the tips that you have
on developing competitive intel. Developing competitive intel,

168
00:13:05.799 --> 00:13:09.159
I think is a team sport.
If you have a person or team

169
00:13:09.240 --> 00:13:13.519
dedicated to this, great leverage them. If you don't, and you work

170
00:13:13.559 --> 00:13:18.480
for a smaller company as a sales
team developing yourself, just establish parameters on

171
00:13:18.480 --> 00:13:24.200
what type of intel is most valuable
to gather, and determine a centralized location

172
00:13:24.240 --> 00:13:28.919
where your contributions could be made.
I like the idea of doing a swat

173
00:13:28.919 --> 00:13:33.360
analysis strength week instans, opportunities,
threats for competitors, especially if the sales

174
00:13:33.399 --> 00:13:37.679
team is building it themselves. It's
easy, it's repeatable, it's scalable.

175
00:13:39.200 --> 00:13:41.399
But where can you get this intel? Obviously, the Internet has a ton

176
00:13:41.440 --> 00:13:46.399
of information, whether it's website,
social media, blogs, business news,

177
00:13:46.440 --> 00:13:52.440
they're all great starting points to potentially
pull some intel. The other place,

178
00:13:52.519 --> 00:13:54.879
obviously we just talked about it is
your customers. You're going to hear things

179
00:13:54.960 --> 00:14:01.399
inevitably that you deem might be valuable
to know. I think they're also a

180
00:14:01.399 --> 00:14:05.360
great source for info, especially after
the deal is done. You've signed them,

181
00:14:05.399 --> 00:14:09.600
they're on board that you've won,
and now you can kind of go

182
00:14:09.679 --> 00:14:13.120
back and get some of that information. The one thing that I caution here

183
00:14:13.279 --> 00:14:20.519
and want to emphasize is you have
to validate with other sources before you deem

184
00:14:20.559 --> 00:14:24.759
the information you're getting as valid.
I've seen people take hearsay is truth and

185
00:14:24.840 --> 00:14:28.799
it comes back to bite them.
Industry events are also another great place because

186
00:14:28.879 --> 00:14:33.919
what's happening in the industry is top
of mind and inevitably there's going to be

187
00:14:33.000 --> 00:14:39.759
competitive names being thrown around. Having
really good questions prepared for such opportunities so

188
00:14:39.799 --> 00:14:43.639
that you can come across as professional
while gathering that intel is great. Once

189
00:14:43.679 --> 00:14:48.159
again, just make sure you validate
what you're hearing out there. That's true

190
00:14:48.200 --> 00:14:54.559
because rumors spread fast for a number
of areas. This has been a great

191
00:14:54.559 --> 00:14:58.559
conversation, Antoniny. You've given a
lot of actionable takeaways. I hope that

192
00:14:58.600 --> 00:15:03.600
those of listening have found value in
this conversation. As always like to wrap

193
00:15:03.679 --> 00:15:05.679
up with a little bottom line or
one did two takeaways? What do you

194
00:15:05.679 --> 00:15:11.120
want to make sure the people listening
to this episode takeaway from this conversation.

195
00:15:11.799 --> 00:15:16.080
Competition is a constant right, It's
going to continue to be and as seller,

196
00:15:16.720 --> 00:15:22.799
I would highly recommend that your strategy
doesn't change based on what your competition

197
00:15:22.919 --> 00:15:28.000
is doing or how they're interacting with
the customer, try to uncover what you

198
00:15:28.039 --> 00:15:31.879
may need, but always stay professional. Never lose sight of the power of

199
00:15:31.919 --> 00:15:37.080
being customer focused in everything that you
do. If you keep the customer at

200
00:15:37.080 --> 00:15:43.279
the forefront of every conversation, you
always have advantage over the competition who may

201
00:15:43.320 --> 00:15:46.960
not put them at the center of
every conversation. Yep, there's as much

202
00:15:46.960 --> 00:15:50.559
differentiation as how you sell as there
is in what you sell. Just remember

203
00:15:50.720 --> 00:15:54.559
the customer. Thank you so much, Antonella, Thanks so much, Rachel.

204
00:15:56.039 --> 00:15:58.600
All right, thank you to all
of you for listening to the Audible

205
00:15:58.600 --> 00:16:03.720
Already Sales podcast out ascender my dot
asunder dot com. At Force Management,

206
00:16:03.720 --> 00:16:08.679
we're focused on transforming sales organizations into
elite teams. Are proven methodologies, deliver

207
00:16:08.799 --> 00:16:15.440
programs that build company alignment and fuel
repeatable revenue growth. Give your teams the

208
00:16:15.480 --> 00:16:19.039
ability to execute the growth strategy at
the point of sale. Our strength is

209
00:16:19.080 --> 00:16:23.799
our experience. The proof is in
our results. Let's get started. Visit

210
00:16:23.879 --> 00:16:29.720
us at force management dot com.
You've been listening to the Audible Ready podcast.

211
00:16:30.000 --> 00:16:33.679
To not miss an episode, subscribe
to the show in your favorite podcast

212
00:16:33.720 --> 00:16:34.039
player. Until next time,