WEBVTT

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So let's work together to make sure
that every time you and I talk and

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everybody else we talked to in your
organization, together, everything we're talking about

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attaches back to the business outcomes.
Otherwise you will have wasted a lot of

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time, and your CFO or was
ever making that decision, is going to

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push back hard. You're listening to
the Audible Ready Podcast, the show that

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helps you and your teams sell more
faster. We'll feature sales leaders sharing their

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best insights on how to create a
sales engine that helps you fuel repeatable revenue

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growth. Presented by the team Enforce
Management, a leader in B to B

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sales effectiveness. Let's get started.
Hello, I'm Rachel clap Miller. Welcome

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to the Audible Ready Sales Podcast.
I'm joined today by the Brian Walsh.

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Hi Brian, Hello, Rachel,
so Brian. Today we are going to

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tackle three common sales challenges as I
love this topic. Yes, this is

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a good one. I was really
excited when you sent me this one.

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This was good. Good, good
those of you listening. As you can

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imagine, we get a lot of
sales execution questions. They come in through

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social Brian will get him on LinkedIn. He gets them when he's doing his

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trainings, and often there's some repetition
in what people are asking. So I

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thought we would tackle three common sales
challenges right now and have Brian kind of

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run through his best practices for dealing
with them. And as you can see,

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he's very excited, and we're going
to get started all right now.

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You've always decided to do podcasts with
you. I didn't want you to think

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I'm not right. No, I
know, I know the excitement is real,

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it's there, But today I know
we like this topic. So let's

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get started. The first one.
We've all been in this situation. You're

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late to an opportunity, the buyer
is farther along in their decision process,

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and you would like you've got to
back it up. You've got to reassess

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the situation. Brian, let's start
with this one. How do you get

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your buyer to rethink the way they're
attempting to solve their problems? And then

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you know, consider you okay,
great question. I think the first thing

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you do, and you know our
friend day Day, it's his line,

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make yourself equal before you make trying
to make yourself better. So I think

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the most you have to do is
be comfortable acknowledging where the customer already is.

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There's nothing wrong with that that I
think at least then puts you on

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some even ground where you can start
to then maybe get them to think a

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little bit differently about things. And
the first thing you've got to do to

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do that is be able to present
a perspective on either the problem they're trying

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to solve or outcomes that maybe they
haven't thought about yet, or from the

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problem or outcome side, at least
taking where they are to another level.

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Right, Maybe they haven't thought about
those problems deeply enough. Maybe they haven't

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thought about who else is impacted by
those problems, or what are the consequences

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of those problems? Right, there's
pain associated with what's happening, or otherwise

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they wouldn't be bothering to look at
it. But there are probably additional consequences

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or implications if they don't solve for
those things really effectively. There's outcomes the

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same way. Have we thought about
those outcomes from multiple perspectives, not just

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maybe you who's looking at technology,
but the business buyers, right, the

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economic buying one. It is going
to care more about, you know,

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what's this going to do for the
business in terms of revenue or cost or

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risk and those kinds of things.
So I think that's the first thing you're

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going to do. And if your
company, well, I believe your company's

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on the hook to give you that
kind of content. Right, If he

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has given you that content, you
have a responsibility to think and use it.

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If your company hasn't given you that
content, then you've got some work

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to do, because, like it's
hard enough to learn how to use content

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like that and tee it up when
it has been given to you. If

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it hasn't been created by the company, that's the first question I'd be asking,

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where's our content that helps us expand
these conversations about where the customer is

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and where they're trying to go or
why would they do something and why would

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they do it? Now? I
think that's part one. Part two is

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then you get into acquired capabilities,
right, And I know you asked me

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to think about this, so you
know, if you can do those two

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things, well, now you're in
a better position to start to get them

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to think a little bit more deeply
and widely about what they're going to require

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in a solution, not just the
features. Buying features and capabilities are part

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of it, But what are all
of the things that they need to think

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about from a requirement standpoint, the
product and its capabilities, the contract,

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effective implementation, you know, customer
success, all those kinds of things.

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Because if you can do that,
now you're in a position to really get

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them thinking about why required capabilities really
matter. Because there's three or four things

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here. One is, every required
capability has to attach to solving the problem

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or achieving the outcome. Otherwise it's
i material, it doesn't matter, and

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the customers shouldn't want, shouldn't have
to or want to pay for that right.

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The second thing is you've got to
help customers think about a clear definition

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of the required capability. When somebody
says something it has to be secure,

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well what does that mean. If
you don't define it, it's really easy

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for people to say, oh,
yeah, my product is secure, my

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technology is secure. And then you've
got to have clear metrics around that that

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says, okay, we've defined what
security means. Now what's the proof when

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somebody says they actually can do security
in the way that we've defined it.

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And all of that is attached back
to the outcome. Right, this requirement

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for security as defined in the following
way with the following test that I'm going

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to hold all potential vendors to,
Well, why is that important? It's

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important because it helps solve for an
outcome, because that's the only reason somebody

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would pay for it. And then, last, but not least, you've

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got to be really good at using
questioning. Right. We like to use

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the phrase trap setting questions, questions
that help the customer think through what matters

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and potentially trap the competition, because
if you can do those four things that

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I just watch you through, you're
in a much better chance to look the

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customers say, Okay, well we
started by helping you expand where you are

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and where you're trying to go at
least the mindset of why that matters and

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who else has impacted. That's led
to a conversation that does a better job

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of identifying and defining the requirements to
get there. So now I'm in a

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position to say, so, now, let's stack rank which of these required

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capabilities are most critically important to getting
you to those outcomes. Now, you

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may not like the answer, right, especially if you've entered late. I

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think this is important but if you
get good at this, you can do

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what I just talked about in one
really good conversation with somebody to start to

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answer the question do we even belong
in this deal? Right? I'm not

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saying you'll get all the answers in
one meeting, but you'll start to be

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able to answer two questions, do
we belong this deal potentially? And am

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I in front of someone who's going
to allow me to truly participate or are

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they using me as you know,
column fodder for their spreadsheet. Yeah.

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The power in that lies back at
looking at those solution requirements, required capabilities,

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figuring out if you got a shot
doing the little discovery having a conversation,

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then you've got your roadmap to move
forward. And that roadmap might be

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say goodbye, yeah, or that
road might be see if you can get

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this person to take you to somebody
else, Or that roadmap might be this

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person is just getting in our way. If we're going to go after this,

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we have to go around them.
I don't love doing that, but

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there are times where that's the right
answer. At least having that conversation the

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way we just talked about should start
to give you some data points about the

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opportunity and about the person you're sitting
in front of. Yeah, okay,

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so before we move to the second
sales challenge, this one also comes up.

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And so before we move to the
next topic, I want to ask,

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is there a play here to try
and get in with a smaller solution

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if you come late to an opportunity. Yeah, I mean it's a good,

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great question. You're talking classic competitive
strategy here, right, which is

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go direct my army against your army. Last person standing wins. Direct strategies

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typically only are affected when you have
superiority at both the capabilities and the relationship

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front. And I'm talking significant like
a three to one advantage. Most deals

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are actually one on flanking strategies,
which is a lot of what we were

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just talking about. Right, We're
flanking the deal with additional differentiation and different

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points of view. Right. What
you're talking about is your next best option.

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Direct is first, if you can
flanking a second, fragmenting is third.

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Hey, I'm showed up late to
this party. But here's the deal,

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Rachel. This big thing you're looking
at, twenty five percent of that

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thing we are best at, and
we can attach to the other seventy five

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assuming you're going to choose the following
leader or the following potential options. I'm

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a better fit for that twenty five
percent. And again I'm going to have

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to do what we were just talking
about in terms of pain and outcomes and

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require capabilities to prove that out.
But fragmenting. This is often where a

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fragment strategy makes perfect sense, because
if you can't fragment, then you either

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delay or you got to walk away. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's

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a great question. All right,
good, great tips tips there. I

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hope some of you out there who
are late to an opportunity or taking notes.

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And here's another one that's big one. You don't have access to the

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economic buyer. Many of us know
that if we're in it a fire.

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But the point is how do we
get the access? So talk through your

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steps for gaining this access. We
talk a lot about well you've got to

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talk economic language, but how do
you get noticed? How do you get

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access in order to have that conversation. So I think this is a real

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point in question with what's happened in
the marketplace right now. Right things have

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tightened up, they still are a
little still tight. There's more people scrutinizing

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every deal, and it's they're going
to higher levels. I have confirmed that

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with every CEO and CFO that I've
been talking with over the last six months,

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and in every engagement we do,
they're in the room and I'm purposefully

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having that conversation and they are confirming
everything that we all know, and that

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creates something else. And I'm not
sure a lot of people have thought about

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it's not just the fact that deals
are getting more scrutiny. The CFO is

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starting to get involved at much lower
level sized deals than they ever did before.

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But because of that, now their
plates are fuller, and so they're

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struggling to keep up. So what
do people do when they're struggling to keep

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up? They find any way they
can to move from one thing to the

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next. And I recently asked the
CFO this question. I said, Hey,

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now that you're looking at more and
more than you ever did before,

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what percentage of those solution proposals,
whether they're in paper format or digital,

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when you are alone in your office, are jumping off the table and grabbing

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you by the throat and saying you
can't afford to do this. Now,

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you can't afford not to do this
now. You need to do this now,

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and he said zero. So there's
my first piece of advice. It

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sounds academic or maybe try. You
have got to ensure that every conversation you

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have in your deals, I don't
care who you're talking to. In the

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end, every conversation has got to
attach back to the business conversation. And

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I think you also have to be
overt and say to people, listen,

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here's what we're seeing in the market
over the last nine months. Every deal

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we do is going to the cfo's
desk. So lets you and I and

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Rachel work together to make sure that
every time you and I talk and everybody

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else we talked to in your organization
together, everything we're talking about attaches back

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to the business outcomes. Otherwise you
will have wasted a lot of time,

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and your cfo's ever making that decision
is going to push back hard at best.

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So I think that's the first thing. The second thing that I would

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think about is it's attached a little
bit to what I was just talking about,

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is ensuring that every step of the
way everything that you communicate back to

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the customer is attached to the business
outcomes. Right, Because now what you're

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doing is you will not in every
case, but you will collectively start to

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be seen more as someone who cares
more about our outcomes and our business than

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selling me something. And again,
I fully understand that that could come across

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as like a mindset or just well
that's a nice to do thing. I'm

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telling you it's a separation thing.
It's the kind of thing that will separate

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you from others. Again, you
may not always like the answer, but

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I'd much rather get out of a
deal early because what I do for living

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is not going to be impactful enough
for your business, then spend six months

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on the deal, put it in
my forecast, only to find out that

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your organization was never going to pull
the trigger on it because it just wasn't

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important enough. And if it's not
important enough, we can talk about,

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Okay, what will make it important
enough? And when does that make more

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sense? Right? Because look at
right now, the other thing that's happening

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is fewer deals are getting over the
line because there's fewer resources. So let's

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just be honest about where we are
in that opportunity. And then back to

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the previous conversation, maybe we fragment
some of it out and go get the

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smaller deal now and set up metrics
for the larger deal later. But at

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least we're doing that eyes wide open. And then I think the last thing

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I would say in terms of getting
access to the economic buyers. Some people

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aren't gonna like this. This is
going to sound like heresy, but I'm

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gonna say it anyhow. Stop expecting
to get taken to the economic buyer.

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Yeah, yeah, they're busy.
They have people who do their jobs for

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a living. If you just have
to be honest with yourself, if your

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title is account executive, CFOs aren't
sitting around saying, oh my god,

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I can't wait to see that account
exect're just not. Yeah, that's why

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everything you do with the people on
their team has got to match, and

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it's got to speak on your behalf
when you're not in the room to the

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business the end. Yes, that's
great, really good final point there.

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So I think, you know,
we also say one way to get access

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to the economic buyers to leverage your
champion, because the champion, as Dave

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Davies was just in my office talking
about before recording this podcast, how a

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champion is the force multiplier with medic
because you get a champion. It helps

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with every other letter in that acronym. And that's also a big topic that

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comes up with the reps that we
work with. Okay, I'm an economic

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buyer, but I don't have a
champion either. How do I go about

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finding a champion? How do I
demonstrate the value of somebody championing my solution?

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What are your best tips for kind
of identifying a potential champion and then

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nurturing that relationship. Okay, so
let's start with this. Economic buyers are

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kind of like this probably gonna be
a bad analogy, grizzly bears. If

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you go into the forest, you
know, there's a grizzly bear. There's

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always a grizzly bear in the forest. I'm trying to do this on the

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fly. Champions are kind of like
unicorns. Every deal has a grizzly bear,

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every deal, every forest has a
grizzly bear, Every deal has an

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economic bier. Not every forest or
every deal has a champion or a unicorn.

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That's the first thing I think we
have to be honest with ourselves about.

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I think the second thing we have
to be honest with ourselves about is

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people have one good meeting with somebody
and they come running back to their team

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going, I've got a champion.
Now you don't. At best, you've

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got somebody who's a nice person who
might be a coach. Right, So

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that's the other thing. I think. You've got to be honest about the

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person you're in front of. And
if you think you've got somebody who's who

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might become a champion, you've got
to be honest with yourself about where you

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are. Have I identified somebody whose
potential champion material and what am I doing

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to develop that relationship. So here's
a few tips. First and foremost,

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don't make the mistake of seeing you
thinking you've got a champion after one or

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two good meetings. What you should
be doing early when you think you've found

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somebody that might be able to play
the role is look for people who other

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people listen to. Right, the
classic champion definition, stuff is still in

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play, right invested when invested,
interest in awesome. But that's like after

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we've developed a relationship. What I
want you looking for are people that other

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people listen to, people who have
a track record of getting things done,

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people who are skeptical. Now skeptics
and cynics look a lot alike, and

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they make us uncomfortable as sellers because
they ask us tough questions and we're sometimes

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like, where does that question come
from? That feels like a negative question?

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Why is that person asking me that
I thought they liked me? Right,

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But skeptics are actually very powerful potential
champions. Now you have to separate

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them from the cynics. And here's
how you do that. Because they look

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a lot alike. The difference is
when a skeptic asks you a question and

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you reply, either verbally or through
action, in a way that's credible,

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the skeptic will start to con hurt. Cynics won't. So you'll start to

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see different actions. A skeptic starts
to have a deeper conversation with you,

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A skeptic starts to maybe do things
that help you because you are helping them.

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A cynic is using you, right, So look for skeptics. And

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here's why. When skeptics speak internally
for other people, listen because the organization

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knows that they're skeptic, not a
cynic. And the organization knows that well.

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When that person speaks, they only
speak because they've done the work and

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they know that what they're about to
say makes sense and is valuable, So

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look for skeptics. I'd also say
look for people who are either directly attached

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to or at least indirectly impacted by
the problem right or set a different way.

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Look for people who have a lot
of authority around the technical buying decision

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or have heavy influence in it.
Look for people who have heavy influence in

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the economic buying decision. I mean, look, the end all be all

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would be to have a champion who's
the ultimate economic buyer. But that's asking

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a lot, right, because that'd
be the fourth person to Look, that's

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your unicorn. There's a really good
that's the kayuny unicorns, right, So

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I think I think there's that.
So there's some tips on identifying the right

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kind of person. Let me give
you some thoughts on developing that relationship,

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because that's the next thing you've got
to do, right. I think one

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of the things people forget is it's
okay to be honest with someone. So,

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like, if we're starting to build
this relationship and I view you as

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someone that's got some of what I
was just talking about, there's nothing wrong

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with saying you, Look, there's
some serious importance for us in knowing how

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you feel about this engagement, this
project, and the role that you can

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and want to play. Like,
there comes a point in building this relationship

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right where I have to find a
way in a way stylistically that works for

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me and is comfortable for you.
In having this conversation, it says,

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Rachel, what role do you want
to play in this? What role can

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you play in this? Because I
want this to be a great experience for

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you, not just for your company, and I don't ever want to put

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you in a position that you're not
comfortable being in. That's part of this.

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I think there's there's a lot to
be said for being really reliable and

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really credible in everything you do and
doing that in a way that's you know,

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got a customer first kind of mindset. But when someone asks you to

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do something, the way you follow
up, not just the timeliness, but

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with the you know, with the
credibility that you follow up, you're much

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better off saying to someone in the
moment, you know what, I don't

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have the right answer for the question
that you just asked me, but I

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promise you I will get you an
answer by and you know it'll be confirmed

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by the you know an smme those
kinds of things, the way you respond

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and act on a day to day
basis, in terms of credibility and reliability.

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Like I'm having a flashback right now
to when I left my twenty seven

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year career to come here. There
was a customer at the going away party

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who took the microphone at one point
and said, like, I don't even

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love because this is highly complimentary to
myself, which sounds I don't like talking

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about. But he said, Hey, we're gonna have to reevaluate our relationship

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with your company. And I was
like, what are you talking about?

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And he said, because you know
our business and that's what you cared about,

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and I've never forgotten that. And
I think that's what I mean when

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I say credibility and reliability. And
then everything you do for them is focused

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on them getting smarter and be more
prepared to help their company, whether you're

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in the room or not. Like
there's some ideas on how you develop these

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folks. And then, last,
but not least, I'd say the earlier

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you can look for these people and
start building these relationships, the better.

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In a perfect world, you'd rather
do it when there's not even a deal

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on the table. And the reason
I say that is the moment of sales

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cycle or a buying cycle kicks off
in an organization, and the deeper they

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get into it, the more the
walls start to naturally go up in terms

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of building these relationships with people.
And it's both a natural defense mechanism for

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some people. It's also along sometimes
a customer mandate that Hey, as we

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get into these buying cycles, we
start to cut off communication or information a

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little bit because they, for whatever
reason they feel that's the best way to

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deal with a potential vendor. That's
that. And then last, by not

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least, you've got to make sure
they get the credit. Like do you

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develop a champion or even a really
good coach, You've got to make sure

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that they get the credit in in
a way that's appropriate and genuine and all

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of that. So there's some thoughts
on that, Yes, just just a

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light question there to end. Yeah, but no, that's it's such a

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big topic and there's so many nuances
there. But I think you know with

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this last topic, you don't have
a champion. The earlier one, you

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don't have an acondemic buyer or the
first one that you're laid to the opportunity.

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Kind of the overarching theme that you
weave through that is it's never about

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you. It's about the customer and
their outcomes. It's about your champion and

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what's in it for them. It's
about the economic buyer and what's in it

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for the business. And having that
mindset always, I don't want to say,

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will prevent these challenges, because they're
always going to be there, but

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they will give you the framework of
which to address them. Yeah, and

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imagine this if the tips around these
street topics gave you a ten percent lift.

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Because there's no silver bullet, right, life, right, But imagine

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if you could get a ten percent
lift in your business or a fifteen percent

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lift in your business just by taking
these kinds of ideas and just going to

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a level of depth and breadth that
most people don't. That's the kind of

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outcomes you can get. Yeah,
maybe that should be my new audible Ready

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00:22:41.799 --> 00:22:45.799
Sales podcast marketing campaign. If you
listen to these podcasts and you get a

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00:22:45.839 --> 00:22:51.559
ten percent lift, extreme value here, Yeah, there is. And you

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know we've all gotten the anecdotal feedback
from people who listen to these Yeah,

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every time we go to an event, now somebody will say I'll start to

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talk about the audible podcasts and revenue
builders our other podcast series, and somebody

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00:23:03.920 --> 00:23:06.319
the room who's already a listener,
we'll pipe up and say, let me

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00:23:06.359 --> 00:23:08.559
just tell you how good that stuff
is. So that's great. We love

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to hear it. Thank you Brian
for walking through those with me today.

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00:23:12.000 --> 00:23:15.599
Thanks Rachel all right, and thank
you to all of you for continuing to

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00:23:15.640 --> 00:23:22.640
listen to the Autobattle Audible Ready Sales
podcast. At Force Management, we're focused

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00:23:22.640 --> 00:23:29.720
on transforming sales organizations into elite teams. Are proven methodologies, deliver programs that

337
00:23:29.799 --> 00:23:34.319
build company alignment and fuel repeatable revenue
growth. Give your teams the ability to

338
00:23:34.359 --> 00:23:40.279
execute the growth strategy at the point
of sale. Our strength is our experience.

339
00:23:40.519 --> 00:23:44.440
The proof is in our results.
Let's get started. Visit us at

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00:23:44.440 --> 00:23:48.359
Force management dot com. You've been
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