customer voice | No Smoke and Mirrors

Voice of Customer: Understanding the Entire Iceberg of Purchase Decisions Today

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Understanding the current voice of your customers and markets is critical to winning sales. Companies who take the time to capture the voice of their customers understand how buyers buy, what they need to buy, and the criteria they use to make buying decisions and leverage that information close more sales . In this post I will share how the voice of your customer ensures your sales proposals resonate with buyers and close sales quicker.

Why do buyers buyer from your team?

Why don’t buyers buy from your team?

If you can answer the above questions accurately you are well on your way to designing a sales and marketing plan to hit your number this year.

When I ask this question I usually get a very quick answer on why buyers don’t buy. As much as senior leaders want their sales teams selling value, I often hear “price” is why buyers don’t buy. I often hear many reasons why buyers do buy, and it usually accompanies stories of how they have won over the years. It is very rare however that I hear what I am looking for :why buyers buy and don’t buy today.

Think about all the changes we have seen in the last 15-10-5 years. We serve rapidly changing markets and it should not surprise any of us that market leadership positions change about every 10 years or so. Why?

“New market leaders emerge after identifying shifts in the buying process, buyer problems and or criteria and leveraging those changes.”

-Mark Allen Roberts

When sales says they lost a sale due to “price” or that buyers buy based on “price” this is what I hear…

You do not understand the value of your product or service to your buyer
You lack a strong current value proposition, or the one sales is using is dated
You do not clearly and completely understand the problem the buyer is seeking to solve
You do not completely understand how the buyer buyers and what they need to buy
Because you have not taken the effort to understand your buyer and their business, you have not earned the right to know all the buyer needs to buy today.

Earn the right to know?

Yes!

There was an excellent article recently in Brand Quarterly by Dave Tovey titled: Did Price Really Lose the Sale?

In this article Tovey shares that:

“Price is often blamed when we got something else wrong.”

Sales people are trained to sell; I think we can all agree on this. Salespeople have a very high utilitarian trait. If I do this …I get this reward quickly. That is why salespeople should not own the voice of your customer. ( but many leaders think they do) The voice of your customer, voice of your market work does not produce immediate reward. That is why salespeople should not own this information. It is their nature to sell, and buyers will feel their probing , open ended questions as a manipulation, a trick to win a sale and trust is broken. Marketing and or a senior executive in the organization must own deeply understanding the voice of your customer and markets no salespeople. Having been the VP of Sales and Marketing for a number of organizations I made it my job to own this information while my sales teams executed their sales development plans.

The author does an excellent job of describing what its like to meet with a new buyer. New buyers often act like Ernest Hemingway used to write…with the iceberg principle or often referred to as the theory of omission. Basically, they share just surface information and do not share the whole story until they trust you. What I like about the iceberg analogy is it’s not the 10% of the iceberg that you see that will sink your ship. (Your sale) It is the other 90% you do not see, or do not know. Most sales are lost because the buyer did not trust you completely understood the problem and therefore did not trust your proposal.

The author leaves us with this:

You earn the right to hear more than a client’s story of omission when:

You ask insightful questions
You listen for understanding
You avoid manipulation
You behaviors are congruent with your marketing messages
You are authentic; selling ethically and with integrity.
You are human – remembering that buying is rationalized emotion.

The voice of the customer, voice of the market follows the above.

Market leading teams take the time to understand the voice of their customers and markets…that other 90% of the purchase iceberg. They know how buyers buy, what they need to buy and the criteria they must have to buy today. They are constantly scanning the horizon and sensing for shifts in how buyers buy and the problems they are trying to solve today.

Why do buyers buy from you?

Why don’t buyers buy from you?

What do your buyers need to buy today?

What does the buying journey look like today for your buyers?

Who else is involved in the buying decision today? What do they need?

What new problems are your buyers searching to solve today?

When your team understands the voice of your buyers and voice of your markets you know the answers to the above. Understanding this information you will train your sales teams to serve your buyers with exactly what they must have to solve the problems they may not share with everyone. Your sales proposals stand out in a sea of RFP’s because they speak to real needs your buyers must have.( and that they failed to share with competitors who only scratched the surface) When your competition is just scratching the surface with price your team will be providing a complete solution your buyers must have.

Stop blaming price for why your teams fail to win the sale and understand all buyers need today and you will find price is not even high on the list.

When you understand the voice of your customer today and the entire buying iceberg, you will equip your sales teams with the big picture and they will build trust much faster with buyers because they will demonstrate they understand them. While competitors are scratching the surface and awkwardly trying to build trust, your sales team will be discussing meaningful solutions.

Voice of Customer Finds “Sales Secret Weapons”

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In my last series of posts I have been sharing how powerful capturing the voice of your customers (VoC) and voice of your market ( VoM) is in growing your business profitably. In this post I will share how to leverage customer voice into a “sales secret weapon“.

In my last post I shared how critical it is to understand the criteria your buyers use today as well as how those criteria rank in order of importance. You may be providing services and features that cost you margins that your customers no longer value. Or, you may be leading with a dated value proposition and not sharing the most important buying criteria your buyers are shopping for today and losing sales you could have won.

First we need to meet with our customers and prospects and understand how they shop, the buying journey they take, as well as the key criteria they must have to make a purchase. With out this information your sales team is playing what I refer to as: “feature and benefit BINGO”. They are calling out features and benefits in hoping the buyers jump up and say… yes, I need that one…BINGO! In this sales model you are relying on your buyers to figure out the problems you solve, or could solve for them. In todays market you must intentionally share the problems you solve for your customers.

Sales teams who have been trained to understand how buyers buy, what they need to buy, and are equipped with the right sales tool for each twist and turn in the buyer journey win sales.

I read an interesting article in Adweek this week concerning how sports teams use various give away items to increase ticket sales as well as encourage fans to arrive earlier to the ballpark. Fans who arrive early spend more money; it’s as simple as that.

What does ballpark giveaways have to do with your business?

Great Question!

Please answer the following questions:

What buying criteria must your buyers have today to buy?

What is the order of importance for these criteria?

How does your overall service offering compare to what buyers want and need today?

Some common giveaways I see companies offering include:

Time of shipment
Service level
Free freight or FOB freight
Payment terms
Packaging specifications
Quality specifications
Added value engineering
Marketing tools
On line order entry/ EDI
Customer sales force training
Technical support
Material recommendations
Discounted material costs based on your total buying power
Returnable freight packaging
Quality guarantees
Out going product inspection
Product testing

The list can go on and on based on your specific industry.

Based on your industry you have heard a number of requirements from buyers. Obviously the job of a buyer is to ask for as much as they can receive for the lowest price. The trouble occurs when your salespeople do not understand how they key buying criteria rank in order of importance for your buyers.

Market leading sales teams are trained to ask.

What I have observed more often than not is sales teams spill their candy in the lobby. They “show up and throw up” until the buyer agrees to buy. It is not your sales team’s fault. They are trying to use the tools they were given. My challenge is what if you could have sold the buyer with the ability to execute three key buying criteria and not all 12-15 your salesperson listed? If this occurs your team is incurring costs and performing features, benefits and services that are costing your team margins and are not of key value in the buying decision today.

For example I mentioned the recent AdWeek article. In this article it shares how major league baseball teams have taken the time to understand the voice of their customers, the fans, and in doing so identified a direct sales increase on the game nights they give away bobble heads. Bobble heads produce more results than any other giveaway.

Major league teams have given away all kinds of things (just like your business may be doing now) in the hopes of increasing ticket sales and getting consumers to arrive at the ballpark earlier. Things like tote bags, T-shirts, baseballs, baseball cards, towels and bobble heads.

When fans arrive earlier, they spend more money. It’s as simple as that.

The article shared the following:

Bobble head giveaways increase ticket sales 15%-30%
The Cubs realized a 71% increase in fans arriving more than an hour before the game

What I like about this information is it is simple, quantifiable and easy to execute.

What impact could your sales and profits see if you identified your one to three top “bobble heads” secret sales weapons your buyers need to buy today?

Do you agree how powerful this information would be to increase sales and profits?

With this kind of focus do you feel your team could execute in delivery? (I bet they can)

The trouble with most businesses today is they are providing a laundry list of features, benefits and services and are often not sure the top one or two that truly drives sales behavior. So what do most teams do? …. They offer them all. Just like giving away tote bags and baseballs fail to move ticket sales dials, your team may ( more than likely is) giving things away that buyers do not value today, or do not value as much as they did in prior years.

How can your team know what buyers value today?

Capture and leverage voice of the customer and voice of the market.

How about your company….

Do you know the key buying criteria your buyers must have today?

What are all the features, benefits, and services your team is offering to win sales today?

What impact would just offering what buyers need today have on your operations efficiency?

What impact could knowing and ranking buying criteria have on your teams’ sales close rate and gross profit margin?

What additional profits could you realize by eliminating things no longer high on your buyer’s key criteria list?

What is your team’s one or two bobble heads that really drive sales growth?

I have helped companies increase sales and profits for over 30 years. I wish it was some crazy technical secret process but it really is not. If you take the time to understand your customers, capture their voice and leverage what you learn you will see what I refer to as explosive growth.

Why?

Simply put, most companies you are competing with have salespeople showing up and throwing up. They are verbally vomiting all kinds of promises to win the sale. Some are important, some are industry standard performance requirements, and some are no longer a value, and some are dated based on how we have always done things around here.

If you have not captured the voice of your buyers and market in the last 12 months I promise you …

Your sales process is broken
Your team is giving away things buyers no longer value
Your team is losing sales you could have and should have won

Once you capture the voice of your customers you can leverage that knowledge into a repeatable sales process ,sales tools, and sales training that guides your sales team based on what your buyers value most today.

Customer voice helps you create your own repeatable sales process GPS for your sales team to close more sales profitably.

“Voice of the Customer” Increases Profits…Lesson from a Christmas Ham

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There is strong power market leaders leverage in understanding the current voice of the customer and voice of the market. As markets change the key buying criteria may change and or change its priority in the buying decision making process. In this post I will share how understanding the voice of your customer and market will help your team better understand and prioritize key buying criteria and how this will result in increased sales and profits.

I heard a fun story a few years ago. It seems this couple recently got married, bought a home and wanted to have everyone over for Christmas dinner at their new place. So they went out and bought a huge ham and all the fixings.

The guests arrived and everyone was seated around the dining room table for the holiday feast. Much to the husband’s surprise the wife brought out two Christmas hams, or to be more specific she had cut the ham they bought in half. As the dinner went on the husband had to ask: honey, why did you cut the ham in half then cook it? She quickly replied well that’s how my mom always cooked it, Her mother chimed in, yes and that’s how grandma always cooked it. Grandma smiled and said: I had to cut the ham in half because our oven was so small, but with that huge oven of yours there is no need…

When I work with teams it is not unusual to find “Christmas hams” being cut in half when they no longer need to be.

Does your team clearly understand the buying criteria your buyers must have today to make a buying decision?

Of the criteria buyers are asking for, do you know the most import to least important?

Sales teams often make the mistake of assuming they know, based on how buyers have always bought.

If that is the case in your company, one of two things is happening;

Sales leads with a dated value proposition and the buyer does not buy

The buyer buys and the rest of the team scrambles to execute on something that is no longer a key criteria costing your team frustration and margins.

I was asked by a private equity group to help one of the companies in their portfolio struggling with both sales and profitability.

The first step in my business development process is establishing market truth. So I joined this companies’ salespeople on four legged sales calls with key customers. For the most part I was pleased the customers were happy with the products’ performance and (being the new guy) I asked a lot of questions.

One common sales approach all their salespeople were using was promising two week delivery. In this market the competitors typically delivered orders in 8-10 weeks but the company I was helping was offering two weeks. So I had to ask the buyers:

When you decide what vendor to order from, how do you make that decision? Or put another way…what is important when you pick a supplier?

I heard things like;

Quality Products

Good service

Do what they say they will do

Ship products on time

Reports from our engineers the product solved the problems I bought it for

Competitive price

Service after the sale

Warrantee policy

Payment terms

So I asked: if you had to rank the top three, how would that look?

#1 Reports from our engineers the product solved the problems I bought it for

#2 Do what they say they will do, I trust them

#3 Ship products on time so we can meet our commitments on time

What I kept hearing was: “ship on time” but not ship in two weeks.

So being the new guy in the room I had to ask:

How important is it that we ship our products in two weeks?

The buyers all consistently replied that it used to be really important 8-10 years ago when they lacked the buying planning systems that they have today. “Back then we were kind of ordering blind based on the past, however today our systems give us buyers a look into what production plans in the future and we order appropriately.”

How far out of a view are you able to see?

I can see as far into the future as I want, but I typically look 4-6 weeks out.

So if we shipped you product in 4-5 weeks you would be happy?

Yes, as long as it shipped and arrived on time.

We learned other things like new products our competitors were about to launch, problems our competitors were having with one particular product line and so on. We learned the warehouse employees at a number of the OEM accounts did not like the pallets we were shipping on because they did not fit on the common rack designs.

After spending over 30 days on the road in front of customers we gathered how buyers were buying today and what they needed to buy today. We gathered very useful information calling on prospects about how they buy, the steps they go though and where and how they search. For example they shared the key words they used when searching for solutions like ours and none of them were on our web site.

I presented the findings of our (VoC) work to the private equity firm and the management team.

I had to ask: In each of the calls I went on, sales was promising two weeks delivery, but none of the customers were requiring that anymore? When did that start?

The previous owner identified our ability to ship quickly as how we could win business from the competitors and that is how we have done things for the last 12 years…. (a Christmas ham , cut in half!)

As you can image, operations and quality were thrilled to hear buyers no longer needed two-week delivery.

To execute two-week delivery this company had a large amount of inventory and whip in hand since most of their vendors for the electrical components required 6 weeks and the glass vendors were 8-10 weeks.

As we kept peeling this onion we discovered;

Over 40 % of orders required overtime at time and a half assembly labor
To meet two weeks we were expediting component parts from New Jersey and paying overnight freight charges
To make our deliveries in two weeks as promised we were paying for overnight delivery more often than anyone realized
Because we worked people overtime we saw a direct correlation to an increase in quality rejects during pre-shipment testing when our assembly workers worked overtime
Since we had to order and store the glass components, they were often damaged and thrown away from moving them around the plant
We had to buy a truckload of the pallets we were using and we paid a premium for them. It seems the original owner designed this unique configuration to maximize the number of master cartons we could ship per skid and then designed our bin rack system to accommodate them
We occupied a large warehouse with expensive rent based on our perceived need for so much inventory, and proximity to the previous owners home

As a team we ranked what our buyers valued most today, and we created a number of projects to better serve our customers while reducing costs (and often frustrations)

Over 12 months our quality failure occurrences dropped to almost zero and our on time vendor sore cards improved significantly at our two largest accounts. We moved to a much smaller warehouse and we started using standard pallets that fit our customers’ racks. Standard pallets were a much lower cost and we bought them just in time not tying up cash in slow moving pallet inventory. The result of our voice of the market work was sales increased by 125%, but profits increased over 20%.

When was the last time you captured the voice of your customers?

Could your team be cutting a Christmas ham in half for no reason today?

How would your buyers rank their buying criteria? Do you know?

Could your team be jumping through flaming hoops customers no longer value?

How excited would your owners and investors be to realize a 20% profit increase?

Capturing and leveraging the voice of your customer helps your team understand what is important to your buyers, how they buy, what they need to buy and how they shop…TODAY.

Sales teams that “assume” buyers are still buying like they have for 10-15-20 years are losing sales they could have won, and or losing margins they could have enjoyed.

Market leaders leverage voice of customer to increase sales and profits.

Why not understand the voice of your customers today and leverage that information to increase sales and profits?

I guess you can “assume” your team knows, but you know what they say assuming makes you and me…

Voice of the Market Identifies Key Buying Triggers

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Companies who understand the power in the voice of their markets today realize greater and more profitable sales growth. Understanding your market, buyers, and how they buy and what they need to buy is critical to hitting your sales numbers today. One outcome of understanding the voice of your customers and markets is identifying sales trigger events.

What triggers one of the buyers in your market to begin the buying journey?

The answer to that question becomes a key consideration when developing your business development plan to hit your sales numbers.

In a past post I shared the work I did in the accessible van market with VMI. We sold lowered floor mini vans that were adapted so consumers in wheelchairs could drive and or ride in comfort. I launched VMI’s first retail mobility dealership Arizona Mobility Products.

Our team spent a great deal of our time out conducting vehicle demonstrations at consumer’s homes and our sales grew quickly. We were constantly asking questions to better understand our customers, how they shop and what triggered them to make a new purchase.

Consumers in wheelchairs must have a vehicle they trust and is reliable. You might say: well Mark I need that too. The difference is if our vehicle dies on the road somewhere we can call a tow truck and they will tow our vehicle and give us a ride to a service garage. Tow trucks are not equipped to accommodate a consumer in a wheelchair. Should their vehicle experience a malfunction, they are left at the point where the vehicle failed until they make alternative arrangements to be transported. Reliability is an even higher buying criteria for consumers in wheelchairs. Based on this we should not have been so surprised as we were when we kept hearing how consumers with accessible lowered floor mini vans often start shopping for a new van within three months of their vehicle warrantee expiring. When we surveyed our customers this came out loud and clear in almost every interview.

Our team sorted our customer database based on when vehicles were purchased and each month proactively contacted customers whose vehicle was about to lose its warrantee. We established a four-touch campaign.

-The first touch was a simple letter notifying them their vehicle warrantee was about to expire, share any current promotions, remind them we sold extended warrantees and suggested we quote the trade in value of their current vehicle.

-The second touch was a phone call, ideally from the salesperson that sold them the vehicle reminding them as a service their warrantee was about to expire.

-The third touch shared specific dealer incentives, rebates and once again mentioned their warrantee was about to expire.

-The last touch was a request for us to book an appointment to have their vehicle inspected by one of our certified service experts at no charge.

Identifying this buying trigger and developing a strategic series of communications, a GPS to new sales for our salespeople, helped us increase sales and build customer loyalty. As a side benefit it also provided our dealership with a supply of used vehicles that were in huge demand in this community.

What triggers your buyers to start the buying journey?

Does someone on your team Know?

How has your team used this information?

What could your team do to serve buyers who triggered the need to buy?

What is your team doing to make lifetime customers for your products?

Understanding the voice of your customers and market has many benefits. One benefit is to intimately understand what triggers your buyers to shop, to search for a new purchase. Taking the time to understand your buyers, why they buy and what they need to buy is critical to consistently hitting your sales numbers.

Fix Sales Problems: Price Strategically

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If you had to pick one pricing method that consistently produces greater sales increases, increased market share and increased profits what would it be?Your sales team has done the heavy lifting… and they have made it though emails ,voicemails and finally met and presented a targeted buyer. Your team has used social selling and selling tools designed specifically to get to this phase of the sales process and build trust along the journey. The buyer feels your proposal could solve their problem and asks the big question: “how much? What is your price?” Would it shock you to learn most companies spend more time negotiating the lease agreements on their office copiers than they spend on price strategy? There are many ways you can price your product or service.

Price is one of McCarthy’s four P’s of marketing. Pricing is a critical part of any value exchange. Why is it price often receives the least amount of research and strategy?

Let’s start with a few definitions….

What is the definition of price?

Price is the value that is placed on a particular product or service as the result of a number of variables, research and understanding of risk.

What is the definition of pricing strategy?

A pricing strategy looks at market conditions, competitive pricing, industry margins, costs, the dollar value of the sale,the product life cycle, the products uniqueness, as well as other factors.

What are the most common forms of pricing?

Cost Plus Pricing- as the name implies you determine your cost to produce, overhead cost and mark the product up based on the profit you wish(need) to realize. The trouble with this model is it is internally focused and not market driven. With this model you run the risk of pricing your product to low or too high. You run the risk of loosing sales you could have (and should have ) won and not making the maximum profit your product could have realized. Companies who practice this method often ask for “another kick at the can” when they are informed their price was too high. (In my post discussing kick the can I share the reasons this strategy is dangerous.)

Low cost strategy– in this model you price your products low and you have structured your company to have low overhead and low marketing and selling costs. In this model you might hear someone say: “ the margin is low but we will make it up in volume” We often see this in commodity products where price is the only main differentiation .

Predatory pricing- you price your product low to “get your foot in the door” of an account or market. The intent is the price will rise after a specific period of time. Companies struggle in the price increase phase if they have not established a strong value proposition in the mind of their buyers before the price increase occurs.

Premium pricing- you price your product high. This is associated with a product or service that has little or no competition of similar quality and or performance. These kinds of products have clear distinction in the market place and buyers place a high value on them. These market driven, unique products are seen as the best of best and buyers are willing to pay for them.When you hear their names you think best in class; Gunner Kennels, TenPoint Cross Bows, Yeti coolers, InVue Security Products, and many more. Each of these companies have other substitute products in their markets and many competitors. What they all have in common is focus. The made it their job to understand their buyer, the problem the buyer wanted solved, and they solved it completely.

I have seen a number of companies try to be more strategic in their price methodology. Where I have seen some companies struggle is only talking to their current customers when doing market research. This is the most common mistake. The difficulty is, for most companies, your current customers only represent approximately 30% of your total market. If you only speak to your customers you are missing 70% of the market’s voice. Keep in mind that 70% is buying something similar to your product and they are not buying from you for a reason. You really need to know why some buyers buy from you and why some do not. Without this critical market data companies run the risk of becoming internally focused on what they want/ need to make. This one of the four P’s has more emotion tied to it than any other. One of the toughest sales I often have to make is not in the market with large customers, but internally to help companies want to be market driven.

There is an excellent article on the advantages of being market driven you can read here. A quote from the article shares;Your strategy should be driven by the needs of the market. Becoming market-driven is critical to intentional product success.

Some of the advantages of being market driven that i have experienced include, but not limited to:

Quickly deliver new and improved solutions that address the changing needs of your markets.
Quickly identify and understand the changes in your market.
Higher than industry average profits
Faster sales growth than competitors
Higher sales close %’s

The best method of pricing I have found is “strategic pricing”.

-Mark Allen Roberts

In strategic pricing you have done your market homework. You understand the value of your product to your customer and you can quantify it. It is a marketing decision (not an accounting exercise) that is the result of market knowledge, knowing your buyers and buyer personas, competitors, substitute products, buyer process and buying criteria. Strategy work is hard work and it is not done overnight.

As you can see pricing is not as easy as some people believe. It takes a great deal of strategic thought and that is why a number of companies price their products incorrectly.

As consumers we are all buyers. Buyers are wired to spend until we experience pain. This is based on the field of neuroeconomics. As a buyer you stop spending when the perceived pain of spending is greater than the perceived gain. Your marketing team must determine that tipping point in their research and apply it to your strategic pricing.

If you want to experience rapid sales growth,increase sales close rates, increased market share and higher profits you must start strategic pricing. The burden is on your team to clearly understand your market and how your buyers make decisions. You must understand your distinctive competence and share it in a value proposition that resonates with your buyers.

What kind of pricing method does your team use?

What are some examples where cost plus pricing may work?

Has your team used strategic pricing? Any stories you can share?

Would you say you are market driven or internally driven?

Increase Sales; Take a Snake Oil Salesman Test and Implement Corrective Action

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In my last post I asked the question if your team’s execution is turning your sales consultants into snake oil salesmen. What I found interesting is the calls I received from past teams I have served. They sounded something like; “Hey, what are you doing sharing our dirty laundry in your blog? Everyone here knows you are talking about us…” In this case I shared that I am writing about a common problem I have observed over the last 30 some odd years that I would say most companies have in some degree or another. This post is for the business owner, and or leadership team to quickly determine if your salespeople tasked with driving revenue are perceived as “snake oil salesmen” in your market and how to quickly fix this sales problem to insure your sales team hits your growth goals.

As I shared in the last post, snake oil salesmen in the Wild West would travel from town to town selling their snake oil. They would make a number of promises and few were actually true so they could never return to the same town twice. They were knowingly being deceptive to close the sale. What I have observed as a common problem that prevents sales teams from experiencing explosive growth is when salespeople are selling based on what they understand to be true, have been trained that is true, and often what was once true but no longer true. If your salesperson is knowingly lying to customers to close the sale and make his or her commissions you do not need a blog to advise you on what action to take.

How do we know if our salespeople are unknowingly perceived as snake oil salesmen today and what can we do to quickly repair this and build a foundation of trust required to serve your markets?

I look at each new team in three ways;

Observe and Listen

Unfiltered Data

Open Ended Questions with Buyers and Market Influencers

Observe and Listen

I live in the markets I serve. So go out and meet with 10-12 customers and observe what your salespeople say, promise, and listen to what your buyers say. These four legged sales calls are critical as nothing speaks the volumes as current market unfiltered comments.

What do your buyers have to say…?

Did your last order ship on time?

Did you last order ship complete?

Did your product solve the problem your salesperson said it would solve?

Was the problem solved completely?

Did the buyer receive timely follow up from your salesperson, customer service, others?

When the bill arrived was it correct at the promised sales price and terms?

In one industry buyers told me: “your salespeople are the used car salespeople of this industry”…ouch!

Unfiltered Data

What does the data say? This is where, particularly new teams struggle with my approach to seek truth. Seeking truth by the way is the first step in my next book as it is a critical step in serving any market and building a strategy on a strong foundation. In the seeking unfiltered truth step you may be labeled a Heretic as I have been,…but let it go as your critics will all love you down the road when their bonuses grow 2X.

What kind of truths do we need to look at?

What is your actual on time shipments?

What is your current order turnaround capability?

What % of your orders ship complete?

What is your quality problem occurrences as a % of total orders shipped and total parts shipped?

What do customers say? Specifically, did your product or service completely solve the problem it was promised to solve?

Does your product or service solve the problems your web site and sales literature says it solves?

Open Ended Questions with Buyers and Market Influencers

Last we gather open ended buyer feedback. Our goal is to capture our buyers and leading influencers’ perception, feeling, confidence in our brand promise. Are we living up to our brand or are we branding backwards? Have we successfully planted our brand and executed it….or are we branding by default and the frustrated market thinks we do one thing and its no wonder we are losing business because that is not what we do( anymore). To gather this information I highly recommend you ideally meet with customers and potential customers your team has called on without the salesperson in the room. Your goal is unfiltered feedback. If meetings are too difficult and or costly, then conduct phone win loss interviews.

Some questions that have served me well over the years include;

So tell me some of the challenges your business is facing today? ( I am listening for problems we solve and the buyer is unaware we have products and services to solve them)

When buying what are the top criteria and considerations you use in choosing a vendor partner?

How did our team do in meeting those important criteria and needs?

Have you and would you refer us to someone in your network as a great vendor? Why or why not?

There are many win loss questions I have used but the top three are at the core and will get the conversation started. If you want other open ended questions you can go here , as well as here. There are a number of excellent thought leaders in this space and their web sites are below if you prefer to hire an outside firm to conduct win loss.

http://www.zhivago.com/revenue-growth-services

http://www.healthtrendresearch.com/about-us

http://under10consulting.com/about/

* there are many more firms that help teams with win loss but the above individuals I know and are confident you would have a great experience with if you are looking for win loss analysis.

So you have determined your salespeople are in fact (like many) perceived as snake oil salesmen?

What do you do?

Determine what your capabilities actually are today.
Communicate those capabilities to your sales team, buyers, and market.
Do what you say you will do, consistently over and over again.

If you determine what you are currently doing and capable of doing does not meet the market criteria and requirements of today you must create a roadmap to quickly be able to serve your market as they now require.

So how about your company?

Do you do what you say you will do? Consistently?

Does your team consistently execute your brand promise?

Do your products and or services do what you promise on your web site and sales literature?

Are your salespeople told to “just make it happen” and they are promising things that were once true but are no longer true?

Do your salespeople know disconnects between what your brand promises and what you deliver but feel it’s “politically incorrect or safe” to share them?

Do you have a sales force sink hole brewing just below the surface of your sales team?

When you boil down why buyers buy and why buyers do not buy the root is always: Trust. The quickest way to establish or reestablish trust is do what you say you will do.

Improve Sales With A “Sales Requirements Summary”

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Improve Sales With A “Sales Requirements Summary”

In today’s market buyers have the power to find solutions to their problems. Sales people and their sales processes must adapt based on what we know about buyers today. Market leading sales organizations are adding the power of the “sales requirements summary” into their solutions presentations to win more sales, and increase sales velocity.

When we ask salespeople why a buyer chose an alternative product we often hear it was price, followed by a unique feature or benefit, and then relationship. However when we ask buyers why they did not buy, “price” was not on the list of reasons. So if price is not on the list, why is it buyers do not buy? The consistent and overwhelming answer was;

“I do not believe the salesperson clearly understands my problem, and therefore I do not trust the solutions he is presenting will adequately and completely solve my problem.”

To overcome this buyer concern and ultimately improve sales close percentages and increase sales velocity I coach salespeople to add a “requirements summary” in their proposal. So what is a requirements summary? If your industry demands long presentations there are a number of templates for requirement summaries. However I believe in the KISS principle so I have found a good requirements summary includes the following;

restate the problem to be solved as you understand it
restate buyer and all project influencers
provide details from your meeting notes about the specifics of the problem, corresponding products and or services your solution must work with
how to measure the success of your proposed solution
restate timing the buyer expressed for the solution to his problem to be delivered
state your delivery commitment with a call to action…if you need the product delivered by ______ we will require an order by ________.
speak to all buyer and influencer pain points discovered in the sales qualification process
state how your solution uniquely solves the requirement and pain
specific part number(s)
total cost summary
timeframe for quote, ideally 30 days

The requirements summary helps overcome the reason why buyers do not buy; Trust. In addition to showing you clearly understand the buyer’s requirements and pain, the summary also provides the opportunity for the buyer to share if requirements have changed.

Most salespeople are so focused on selling they are not truly listening. Knowing you must produce a requirements summary in your sales proposal insures your salespeople are asking questions to intimately understand the nature of the problem to be solved and how the buyer and his or her team will measure the results.

Does your sales team provide a requirements summary in each proposal?

Do you see any negatives in providing a requirements summary in your sales process?

A requirements summary is a simple and effective way to build trust with your buyer by illustrating you understand his problem and how you plan to fix it. Most competitors will be leading with price because they feel that is what wins orders. Be one of the top 10% of sales professionals by taking copious notes concerning the problem to be solved, all those who have input in the solution, and everyone’s pain points and you will win more sales faster regardless of how “cautiously optimistic” your buyers may be.

Are You Playing Russian Roulette With your Brand by Keeping Obsolete Products in your Mix?

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Our focus in business is to identify buyer problems and solve them in ways that create positive buying experiences. When we accomplish this we make the sale, and we build positive word of mouth. A poor buying experience and or an obsolete product that no longer reinforces your brand promise can quickly create negative word of mouth.

Keeping obsolete products in your mix is like playing Russian Roulette with your customers buying experience and ultimately your Brand.

As I have discussed I travel quite a bit. Some call it old school, but I need to be in the markets I serve. This requires air travel, rental cars, and a number of hotel stays. I was recently working with a customer in Indianapolis Indiana and needed a hotel room for the night. I booked a room with an airport hotel, however the Google maps instructions were not accurate and the person at the front desk of my hotel could not provide me directions. (Another post that needs to happen, but I will let it go for now). After two attempts to find my airport hotel I gave up, and pulled off the next exit to find a room. As I exited the highway I saw a number of hotels and one of which I recognized and had a good feeling about was the Ramada. I pulled into the Ramada as their brand has always meant; clean rooms at an affordable price. They often lack the frills of larger hotels but my understanding of their brand was clean, safe rooms at a completive price. Seeing as how I maybe was going to have seven hours of sleep, I thought the Ramada would be just fine.

What I experienced was the worst hotel stay I have experienced in the past 26 years of business travel.

It turns out a road rally was coming through town and they had a number of tired drivers checking in. Understaffed (although they had reservations) I waited over 20 minutes just to check in. I kept telling myself to lighten up, it’s just one night, and now for just 6 ½ hours. As I walked to my room I noticed the carpet in the hall was dirty and had little collections of food and dust in corners. Just as the restroom of a restaurant will tell you about the cleanliness of a food establishment, I have always found public areas of a hotel are a good indication of the cleanliness of your room.

I found my way to my room and as the door opened I was surprised how old and run down this room seemed. Again, self talk said…” it’s only one night and now only 6 hours…” I showered to calm down so I could fall asleep. I found the shower tub disgusting with stains. I found the towels were old and stained as well. As I brushed my teeth I was greeted with an old scratched sink with a rusted water stopper…” it’s only 5 ½ hours”…

As I walked to the bed my feet felt like they were sticking to the old dirty carpet. I turned down the covers and found the sheets too were stained and hopefully clean, but just stained. The pillow felt like someone bought a square piece of foam and cut pillow sized squares out of it. As I lay there, disgusted, my mind raced to the recent Animal planet I watched with my children about parasites and bed bugs.

I tried to relax but I could swear something was crawling on me. I turned on the light and could not find anything, .must just be in my mind. I tried to relax and eventually I must have fallen asleep. My alarm went off and still tired I quickly got ready and went to the lobby to check out.

What I found was a long line of people wanting to be checked in and checked out. I could tell one employee was experienced and one must have been new. Each time the new employee confirmed someone into a room, he would check with the experienced employee to see if it was a “good room”. Interesting, so they must have some old rooms like the one I slept in and others that were “good rooms”. Unfortunately you had to be an experienced employee to know which rooms were good or bad. New employees had no way of knowing with the tools provided what kind of a room they were checking guests into.

When it was my turn to check out, someone who checked in earlier returned to the desk demanding a better room. His room was quickly changed.

As I checked out the young lady did not ask how my stay was, but instead asked if I needed directions. Had she asked about my stayI would have said “disgusting and disappointing” but since they did not ask I felt they just did not care and were anxious to get me on my way.

So on to the next city and I checked into an amazing Comfort inn in Louisville KY that was clean, the person checking me in made me feel like I was his only guest. I went to my room that was very clean and Googled the Ramada to see if perhaps my understanding of their brand was wrong.

If you visit the Ramada web site, Mark F. Young promises;

You can rest easy knowing that we are expertly equipped to “create caring experiences for every person, every time.” We are committed to delivering excellent service. All of our properties feature modern amenities such as high speed Internet connectivity.

Tell ya what Mark F Young; I have a challenge for you. Visit your hotel on Thompson Ave in Indianapolis and stay in room 219 and tell me if you are living up to your brand promise…. NOT!

The more I thought about this the more convinced I became that businesses who keep products in their mix that are obsolete and do not reflect their brand promise are playing Russian Roulette with their customers’ buying experience, and their brand.

Bad products always seem to find their way to someone.

Your team members who have been around a while will know not to sell them, however new employees do not know any better. Negative word of mouth seems to travel much faster than positive feedback particularly with social media. Very quickly one bad customer experience can be heard by over 2,000 people.

In today’s competitive economic times can any of our businesses risk playing customer Russian Roulette with obsolete products?

Do you have any products in your mix you do not want customers to ever experience? If so, why are they still there?

Does your company have a formal process to audit the quality of your product and your customers’ overall buying experience? If so who reads this data?

Have you asked any of your people if there are products you have that should never be sold to customers?

When was the last time, as a leader in your organization you bought (shopped) what you sell?

When was the last time you inspected what you expected?

When was the last time you called someone who just purchased your product or service and asked them about their overall experience?

I know I was hard on my terrible experience with Ramada. I guess what bothered me most is I felt they broke my trust. So now I will avoid Ramada hotels even though I had great experiences in the past.

Are any of your current or new customers buying one of your “bad products” this week? You sure?

Here’s a Banana For Your Baby… (your business)

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One of the most difficult parts of serving entrepreneurial leaders is telling them a part or their entire baby (their business) is ugly. Some self proposed consulting experts say; “focus on the positives, build on successes” and not to risk their monthly retainers. I choose to ignore the obvious politically correct answers and add value by presenting market truths.

If your baby is ugly I prefer to tell you so we can develop a plan based on current truths to help lead you and your organization to a position of market leadership.

The quickest way for your baby to become ugly is to stop focusing on understanding your market, its buyers and their problems and start focusing on your growth objectives.

Last week I had dinner with my friend Graeme from the UK and he told me a joke that made me laugh, and also reflect on what it is often like to serve some organizations and their leaders.

So this guy is walking through the park and comes upon a woman with a baby stroller and she is crying. Trying to console her asks what is wrong… The young mother goes on to say that everyone says her baby is ugly and it really hurts her feelings. The stranger goes on to assure her that babies are cute and he was sure her baby was no different. The woman stopped crying and thanked him for his kind words. As he started to leave he said “Once again, I am sure your baby is not ugly…and oh, here’s a banana for your monkey”.

Having served a number of teams over the past 26 years I have experienced these integrity moments when I must share market driven truths with aggressive, entrepreneurial leaders. Often discovered truths are ugly. If the leader and his or her team is truly focused on authentically, passionately serving their market and increasing shareholder value they hear the market truths and ask me to guide them in developing a corrective roadmap.

If the leader and or their team however lack the emotional intelligence to hear constructive market driven feedback…I loose a client, and once again I am labeled a Heretic ( the person who stands up against group-think) as Art Petty discusses in his recent blog post.

I am curious…if your baby needs a banana do you want me to tell you?

Are you sure?

Do members of your team have the moral courage to give you a banana when they need to?

Have you fostered a culture that welcomes bananas?

What goal is more important to you…your ego or becoming a market leader and increasing shareholder value?

One of the first stages of a fall from market leadership that Jim Collins discusses in his book: How the Might fall is; Hubris born of success.

Does this describe your senior leadership team? Your owner?

When asked to serve a team that is struggling or just suck, I prefer to gather current market driven data and present the current reality. My clients pay me to help get them back on course and I must be a good steward of their investment and present market truths.

Would this approach work with your senior leadership team? Why or why not?

”V” is for “Velocity of Message In New Cadillac Commercial”…without any words

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The burden of clearly communicating your message is on you as the manufacturer and or supplier. Recognizing this you must develop a concise message that reflects the problems your product or service solves for your buyers. Given the amount of messages the average consumer receives each day, you have a “minute to win it” …their attention that is.

Messages that are clear based on a thorough understanding of your buyers, buyer unresolved problems, and buying criteria instantly connect.

Messages that require an interpreter result in: Big-Money-Wasted as I shared in my post about a BMW message that literally made a theater of consumers grown when it came on.

Below is a good example of understanding what your buyers want and communicating your message…even without words. Cadillac has “Velocity of Message” which will result in sales velocity. (Sales that have direction, growth, and create momentum)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nz0jCTJ2sys

What do you think Cadillac was trying to communicate in this ad?

As consumers do you miss the “feature and benefit BINGO” approach or do you value companies that have a clear message…even without words?

If your buyers were to view your creative, your message, without copy, would they understand your message?