1- 330-413-8552 Mark@NoSmokeAndMirrors.com

Market leadership

2009 Health Care Reform Initiative Lesson #3: Without a Clear Understanding of the Problems to be Solved, and Requirements, Development will Build Solutions Because They Can and Not Because They Should!

Where a number of entrepreneurs make a costly mistake is in jumping into a new product launch and making a product launch checklist  without spending an adequate amount of time gaining an intimate market knowledge and building strategy. When this occurs, developers and engineers (Representatives) build things because they can not because they should.

How do we end up with a 1,000 page bill? ( few have read, and fewer understand?) Or an ipod station and toilet paper holder? Or a laptop that smells?…. ( by design)

Without a clear understanding of the problem you want to solve, and clear requirements and not understanding who you are solving them for, you will build stuff.

Developers are creative problem solvers. They want to be given problems and requirements. They go nuts if you also tell them how to solve it. Just as salespeople hate it when accounting tries to tell them how to sell more.

The inherent problem though lays in the fact developers also see problems that are real to them, that may not be market problems. So they have their “wish list” of solutions they want to introduce.

If you lack a clear definition of the problems you want to solve and the requirements needed and just “throw a challenge over the wall” two things will happen;

1. Development will create a perceived list of problems and prioritize them themselves.

2. Without a clear direction, they will build what they always wanted to build and not necessarily what the market needs or wants.

What happens next is even more dangerous. So you have shared your “big hairy audacious goal” with your market: “A Health Care reform bill before the August break”.

Not having a connection to the problems your team will connect to something…so the August goal is clear, measureable and written so they rally to meet that goal.

The achievement of the goal date becomes more important than solving the unresolved market problem.

When this occurs your team tunes out the market and its needs and tunes into the leaders goal ( and often ego).

Teams aligned around the wrong goal “tell and sell” versus “teach and share the problems they solved” and markets often rebel.

Buyers like to buy; they do not like to be sold.

With the power of social media, and the lack of alignment to the correct goal, a solution can launch and die within hours.

Market leaders understand the value in spending the time upfront, clearly defining the problem(s) they want to solve and developing requirements that set their developers up to win, and ultimately add value to the bottom line of the organization.

Market Losers are so focused on a delivery goal they Haste, and they waste. Focus on the wrong goal results in their team members thrashing around, starting and stopping and not able to develop revolutionary solutions that the market willing buys.

 

How about your organization….

 

Does your team throw things over the wall?

 

Do your developers ask for more information and the prioritization of requirements, or do they assume they know.

 

Has your company launched something because you could and not because you should? ….How’s that working for you?

Technorati Tags: requirements,market leader,market loser,throwing things over the wall,marketing,product development,launch,new product launch,build products your market wants to buy

2009 Health Care Reform Initiative Lesson #2: Without a Clear Definition of the Problem You Want to Solve, you cannot write good requirements for your development team

 

Without a clear understanding of the problem(s) you want to solve, how can you write the requirements needed in the solution your development team creates? They will assume the problems and will try solve those with  assumed requirements as facts. The farther the requirements move from actual market problems that you have agreed you need solved, the farther the final product solution will be from something that resonates in your marketplace.

In this case congress was asked to create a Health Care Reform bill with the lack of a clear understanding of problems they were to solve and my guess is they therefore did not have prioritized requirements that clearly explain what the final solution must do, and for whom. Couple this with being given an aggressive product launch date for your solution and you will experience what my father used to call: Haste makes waste. ( sound familiar, I have faced this many times)

Like congress, business owners use their gut and intuition at a time they should be gaining an intimate knowledge of their market, their buyers, buying process and buying criteria.

I am confident everyone “worked hard”, but I am also convinced without a clear understanding of problems to be solved they could not have “worked smart”.

What we are now experiencing with the 2009 Health Care Reform Initiative is symptomatic of leaders lacking market intelligence and a clear understanding of the problem(s) they are to solve. We see entrepreneurs with a vision boldly launching their solution into their markets only to find what they “thought” was a brilliant idea( their wife and golf buddies thought so) does not resonate with their customers and potential buyers. As I wrote in my post: Nail it before you scale it, you must completely solve the identified problems before you scale them. Scaling products that are not complete solutions only results in a lack of understanding among your customers and is often perceived as self serving, and an inside-out focused Market Loser, versus a market serving , Market Leader.. When this occurs you break trust.

Once trust is broken with buyers in your marketplace they are never won back 100%, and it will cost you dearly.

When you lack a clear definition of the problems you wish to solve you can not write requirements that are of value to the development team.

Without clear requirements, your development team will work very hard to solve the assumed problems they think you want solved and the perceived needs you “throw over the wall”. We not only need a list of the problems and defined requirements but development would also value the prioritization of those requirements.

Without open and clear communication development will decide the prioritization, again further drifting form market problems and solutions to urgent and pervasive needs.

One symptom of this is development spending more time defending what they built versus building new solutions your market wants to buy.

How about your organization….

 

Are you asking your development and or engineering to develop solutions without a clear understanding of the problem they are setting out to solve?

 

Does your development team have requirements or are they left to guess and assume?

 

Do you find your development team working “hard” or “smart”? Why or why not?

 

Do you find the quality of problem definition and the prioritization of requirements has an inverse relationship to the amount of time given for the solution to be launch?

Technorati Tags: requirements,problems,market problems,solve market rpoblems,launch,new product launch,development,market leader,market loser

2009 Health Care Reform Initiative Lesson #1: Without a Clear Definition of the Problem You Want to Solve, You Will Experience “Scope Creep” and Your Launch Plan Will Fail

Without a clear definition of the problem(s) you solve with your new product or service you will experience scope creep and your team will thrash around. When you thrash around you have a number of starts and stops without completely solving each individual initiative. Not only is this behavior ineffective but it is costly and often dangerous.

Fundamentally I agree, if what the news media tells us is true regarding; the number of uninsured Americans, the rising costs of care, the rising costs of caring for uninsured Americans,… that there is a problem that needs to be solved. However I do not understand the problem, or problems we are trying to solve with the 2009 Health Care Reform Initiative, nor how the over 1,000 page proposal solves them.

I see this frequently with entrepreneurs. They discover what they perceive to be an unresolved market problem and the solution is crystal clear (to them) so they launch. They take out 2nd mortgages, they cash in their 401k, and they ask family and friends for support. (Money) They share their brilliant idea with their buddies on the golf course to validate their idea and everyone says… ”brilliant idea”. However very quickly they learn an expensive lesson when they expect (and have created the support) to sell 60,000 units and only sell 2.

Without a clear definition of the Problem you solve your New Product Launch Plan will fail.

Instead of clearly defining the problem, quantifying the need, making sure people want and will pay money to solve that problem they broaden their scope. Now they have a number of messages floating in their market that are Luke warm at best and none clearly articulate how you solve any problems for buyers in your marketplace. None are connecting with anyone.

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What All Leaders Can Learn About Designing and Launching New Products and Services …From the 2009 Health Care Reform?

Watching the current Health Care reform Initiative we can learn valuable lessons for all leaders throughout the world if we just take time to pay attention. I think it was Einstein who said “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Over my next 12 posts I will share lessons we can learn by watching the 2009 Health Care Reform launch.

I was sitting in the Austin airport after participating in PCamp Austin  (something else I need to blog about as it was the future of executive education and I was blessed to have lived it) killing time watching CNN as I waited on my flight. The reporter was discussing how President Obama was “repositioning” (re-launching) the 2009 Health Care Reform initiative given the poor overall acceptability by the American Public.

As I watched the clips of our President rolling up his sleeves in a town hall meeting (as I would have coached him to do as well) it struck me how we have an incredible living lesson for all leaders to observe and learn from. Some of the best life lessons are those that have an emotional element and the strongest emotion is pain. Studies were conducted where college students were asked to study and their arm was placed in a tub of ice and water and they were asked to keep their arm in this until they could no longer stand the pain. The other group just studied and had no pain. The group that experienced pain significantly remembered more than the group who just studied.

It does not surprise me as we are living this lesson and we see the anger and pain in the faces of those at town halls. There is nothing more painful than to feel you have a voice and your voice is not heard as I discussed in my post:  How do Buyer’s Feel, when Salespeople fail to Listen? Shelia Jackson Lee helps us all understand… « No Smoke and Mirrors to Listen? Shelia Jackson Lee helps us all understand….

What can all leaders learn about designing and launching new products and services by watching the 2009 US Health Care Imitative?

Over my next 12 posts I will be sharing lessons, some painful, to help us learn.

I want to say early on this is not about Republicans versus Democrats as I discussed in my post about how teams must tear down silos as they are only good for shooting missiles. The United States is the World leader. We can get better but we must never forget we are all “Americans” first, and then we have our segmented communities and groups.

None of us are as smart as all of us.

Together as one team we can solve any issue when we drop our self serving objectives and seek first to understand, and then focus on the problem(s)

What the following posts will be about is specific lessons for us to observe and make our own so we do not repeat them in the organizations we serve.

What lessons do you see?

Have you learned lessons you will never forget because there was some discomfort and or pain?

Do you believe we are one team; Americans first?

What silos do you see and why do you think they exist today? How do we tear them down?

How can we all be a part of the solution?.as leaders that is always our mission.

Technorati Tags: health care reform,obama,president obama,new product launch,marketing,leader lessons

“Dumb and Dumber, FOX and Warner and how they are Planning on Delaying Deliveries to Red Box

Lloyd and Harry reach Aspen on Scooter in Dumb and Dumber

FOX and Warner Bros delaying new movie releases to Red Box and other kiosk vendors is like watching a new release of Dumb and Dumber.

In the Wall Street Journal article: Warner Bros. aims to lift DVD sales, will delay arrival at rental kiosks. They discuss how they plan to delay new releases to DVD rental kiosks.

The movie studios are concerned about their DVD revenues.

The market is not only speaking, but screaming how they are raving fans of DVD rentals Kiosks like Red Box.

The current big customers like Blockbuster and others are posting over 22% losses in revenues when kiosks like Red Box are showing consistent and impressive gains. Call me crazy… but your market is speaking guys…can you hear me now? Red Box Kiosks are described as; “The hottest thing in movie rentals is as old as the Coke machine — and just as red.”Their CEO Gregg Kaplan said “We are incredibly proud to achieve 200 million rentals and 10,000 locations nationwide.”

The studios have a choice, they can try to “control” the market, the buyers, or they need to intimately understand the market, buyers and needs and not only embrace the new ways consumers wish to consume content but enable it.

Thirteen years of my work experience was serving the movie distribution, rental and mass retail. How Warner and Fox are behaving is no different than how they all were behaving worried that this new thing called “movie rental stores “would erode their box office revenues in the mid 1980”s.

Market losers try to control the market and they protected their current cash cows while ignoring the consumer’s voice. They ignore the bright lights of growth and change trying to tightly hold on to past business models their markets no longer value.

Market leaders spend time getting to know their market and they quickly understand consumers who rent movies also go to movie theaters and some even buy movies and collect them.

When we rent content it is about wanting entertainment in a convenient and cost effective way for me as a consumer. You can try to control us, however when you do we find other ways to solve our needs and often they are much more severe to your bottom line. Besides, how long will it be before one of your competing studios blinks? Didn’t we live this same scenario “back in the day” And what happened…aggressive smaller studios emerged understanding the needs of consumers and and one of you big guys blinked. Some of you held your ground (more stubborn and stupid, driven by your own needs and egos instead of being strategic marketers) and how did that work for you back then? I remember, do you?

I can remember the 28,000 independent video stores and large movie distributors placing pressure on the studios to not ship new video releases directly to this 14 store chain in Texas called Blockbuster. At the time they were buying through distributors like Big State, Commtron, Ingram, and others. Well that little chain of 14 video rental stores quickly became a market leader.

I am a huge fan of Red Box.

They solve problems for me;

· I want to rent a DVD fast, I like the experience

· I want to rent a DVD and do my grocery shopping in one trip, in one location, one stop ( I am already late for dinner)

· I do not want to pay what Blockbuster charges , no late fees …but still a lot more than $1.00

· I only want the movie for one night

· I don’t want to have to join Net flicks or others and pre plan my month of movie viewing

· At a $1.00 rental, I feel like I receive a value , if I like it I go to Wal Mart and buy it

· I do not want to have to “shop” at a movie rental store only to find out they have all the new releases checked out

· I do not want to pay more for a new release than an older movie

· I do not want to buy movies through my cable provider as they are already raping me with what they charge

· The box office theaters are increasing their prices ( again, feels like they are thinking about their own needs and not mine)

So what are you going to do Dumb and Dumber? Are you going to repeat the past and focus on your needs or are you going to understand the market, it’s consumers and our changing needs and not only enable us to enjoy movie entertainment, but who knows you may even find new products and serves that solve our unresolved problems that Red Box fails to solve?

When I wrote my post : Attention leaders: Don’t look now but your lack of market knowledge is showing… I was talking about companies like you that have lost touch with their markets and they guess , assume, and use their gut and intuitions as their way of hitting their goals. They make inside-out versus market -in decisions and their shareholder values decline rapidly.

Your choice…focus on your internal needs and try to control the market… Or gain an intimate knowledge of your market today and it’s consumers like me and build products and service delivery systems that serve me and solve my unresolved problems.

Oh I can hear the movie exec’s now…”easy for you to say, we have billions at stake here.” Well you are right, you do. But you will eventually supply the kiosk companies with new releases at the same time as others. While you figure it out, Red Box will go to a mass retail store on the day of the new release and buy them. While you figure this out you will remove profit from your movie distributors.

So the question is how long do you want to be a “buggy whip” manufacturer saying this horseless carriage is a fad? Or, do you embrace your market, its changes and evolve into a new company that meets our needs today and into the future?

Maybe you develop a “imovies” since my kids seem to download their favorite DVD’s onto Apple laptops? The only hassle is the download from the disc. Not a big deal, but maybe you take the time to understand why they are doing this, the problem it solves for them and solve it brillantly?

We are all watching…

How about your company….

Are you trying to control your market? How’s that working for you?

Are you trying to control your vendors trying to slow down a new service model in your industry?

Are you the buggy whip manufacturer saying this new horseless carriage is a fad and will never last?

Or are you studying your market, your consumers and intimately understanding what and why they do what they do?

All is not lost by the way as some forward thinking buggy whip manufactures found as they learned to make leather seating for these horseless carriages.

Trying to control a market is foolish and expensive. Understand and embrace your market and become a market leader, not a market loser.

Technorati Tags: FOX,Warner Bros.,Red Box,Market leadership,Market leader,market loser,Blockbuster Video,Marketing,market change

Market leaders know that Goals should not be a “Shell Game”

 

Market leading teams understand the importance of clear, measureable goals.

Market losers set loose goals and objectives that change like a shell game, as their mood and business climate changes…this is the quickest way to demoralize a team, lose shareholder value and key contributors.

Market leading teams understand the importance of clear, measureable goals.

Market losers set loose goals and objectives that change like a shell game, as their mood and business climate changes…this is the quickest way to demoralize a team, lose shareholder value and key contributors.

Goals that are not written down are just dreams.

So how do we set goals that motivate, drive growth, but do not feel unrealistic?

What I have always done is build goals from the market up as opposed to from the ivory tower down.

I recommend you segment your market into regions, and then keep peeling the onion until you are down to current and targeted new customers and then products and services.

You must spend time living in your market gaining current information to set achievable goals that drive profitable growth and add value.

From real market knowledge I then recommend building sales playbooks by team member. This is a collaborative effort with the team members who will execute the plan and are closest to the market. We identify sales goals for specific current customers and products .We spend time developing strategy upfront with tactics and key initiatives to achieve our goals.

Where market losers consistently fail is spending too much time deep in the weeds of tactics with little if any time upfront in strategy.

Then we identify new accounts we would like to sell and again assign a goal and develop strategies and tactics to open the targeted new accounts. Next we take the data and goals by product, by customer, and targeted new customer, and new products, and we now build a goal as well as a stretch goal.

The goal becomes our mission; it is what we will be talking about for the next year. The goal aligns us as well as other cross functional team members helping us clearly understand what we are setting out to accomplish.

A stretch goal is always developed to insure the goal is achieved. You are paid on the goal, and if you achieve stretch goal objectives above and beyond your goal you realize a compensation multiplier. Stretch goals become your contingency plan. Stretch goals give you the wiggle room for when things go bump in the night.

What do they say…? “Colonel Custer had a plan”…or “the best laid plans of mice and men”….and they are right. No matter how well we gather market data, “things” happen. Markets change, accounts get acquired, planned product launches are often late, and competitors also are executing their plans.

Having a stretch goal helps us” shoot for the moon and worst case we still end up a star”.

When a change occurs we go back to the original goal and review the specific strategies and tactics. If a key account was acquired or closed, we go back to our stretch goals and change the weighting of those stretch objectives. We ask ourselves…” OK, based on what we now know, we need to make up the shortfall . Of our stretch goals, which have the highest probability to make up the delta to goal? What do we need to do? What do we need to ask of others?

In Market leading teams everyone is a member of “the team” and everyone rallies around the goal, and are aligned with a singular purpose of the team’s definition of a win.

Market leaders know cross functional goals tear down dysfunctional silos and make mighty market leading teams.

Market losers play a shell game with their goals.

They have a “goal of the day” and their teams set out to take the hill. Their teams work diligently against difficult odds and often achieve the goal only to find out the goal changed. In this environment, you must be more skilled at watching the shell game masters hands and follow the goal more than the strategy and tactics to achieve the goal itself.

Market losers observe the goal building process (if they allow you to build it from the market up) and “bet the farm” on the stretch goals.

They need all the stars to align perfectly and although your team will achieve the 20% growth goal, and the corresponding increase in shareholder value, your CEO makes you feel like losers because you failed to hit the stretch goal he told the board ( and often the bank to justify additional capital) we would achieve.

Market losers build goals based on the ROI to justify the investment.

They create a number to make the board and investors happy then they slice this home grown goal and distribute the unrealistic slices to each team member. When team members challenge these goals from mount high they are disciplined and told to “make it happen”. If you challenge how the goals were developed you are often left feeling like you are not being a “team guy” and your questions are signs of disloyalty.

Market losers change the goal when they are not achieving it.

For example I hear some entrepreneurs bragging they are not;” losing as much business as others in their market” versus reporting their performance to plan.

Market leaders set aggressive goals and establish stretch goals as contingencies to insure they: do what they say they would do.

Boards, investors, and owners respect teams that do what they say they will do. Investors gain confidence and are more willing to make additional investments in the future.

How about your organization…..

Is your organization a Market Leader?

Is your organization a Market Loser? Why?

Who sets goals in your organization?

Are the goals fixed or are they a shell game?

Do you know your goals? If you are not sure…how does that make you feel?

What kind of company would you prefer to serve…one that sets aggressive market built goals or one that promises the bank and board numbers and then throws goal slices over the wall and tell you to “Make it Happen”?

Technorati Tags: goals,set goals,achieve goals,add value,increase shareholder value,cross functional team,tear down silos

More Big-Money-Wasted by BMW in new ad campaign? We will have to wait and see…

I read an article on BrandWeek today by Anthony Crupi titled: BMW Pumps Diesel and Anthony did a particularly good job in grasping BMW’s objectives behind what we are about to see in a new BMW ad;

“For us, it’s about changing the perception that diesel is still that noisy and smelly [technology] many people remember from the ‘70s.” “For us, it’s about changing the perception that diesel is still that noisy and smelly [technology] many people remember from the ‘70s.”

The trouble is, as a potential consumer of one of your driving machines…I really do not care Patrick (the guy in charge at BMW) what it is about “for you”.

What problem are you solving for me?

“Affluent Americans don’t want to sacrifice performance for fuel efficiency,” McKenna said. “The 335d can go from 0-60 [mph] in 6 seconds flat …That’s immediate power.”

Now you are talking!

But what about starting my diesel car at the Cleveland airport in the winters…did you solve this?

Although not as focused on the environment and fuel efficiency as I should be, I do follow the cost per gallon of fuel, and if I am not mistaken, one of the historical advantages of why consumers chose diesel vehicles was the lower cost per gallon.

On the one side you have Mercedes, who did a great job of connecting their product to; Luxury, power and torch, and longevity (they run forever)

On the other side you have VW who have raving fans of their economical diesel vehicles that are fun to drive and last forever as well. VW too is tapping consumers on the shoulder today with a message of ““Better performance AND higher gas mileage than a Prius”.

From my days in international sales I still have relationships with past JV partners in Germany that are now friends and they openly share how fun their BMW 3 series are to drive.

GO TALK WITH CURRENT RAVING FANS NOW; CONNECT TO THEIR VOICE, THEIR PASSION, CLEARLY UNDERSTAND, IN THEIR VOICE THE PROBLEMS YOU SOLVE.

What this “feels” like is you are trying to win the hearts and pocket books of “potentials” those people who are not current customers, and are not currently shopping, but thinking about diesel vehicles? So you are actively attacking their perceived problems with your solution. Your current raving fans in the US who own M5’s will pass on your new offering.

So who is your targeted buyer persona?

New buyers of diesel vehicles are more likely to swing into VW’s camp as their position is clearly defined if their need is; fun to drive, economical, and longevity. If what they want is performance and Luxury, they will swing to Mercedes who currently owns this position.

Is this Product Launch (re launch really as you are one of the leaders in diesel vehicles in Europe) an example of “Right idea but late?” We will see…

I am looking forward to see this ad, as I am a huge fan of your vehicles, engineering, fit and finish, just not a fan of your execution of marketing “messaging” as of late as I discussed in my blog post : The Expression of Joy Ad campaign by BMW; May be an Expression of Big Money Wasted http://nosmokeandmirrors.wordpress.com/2009/07/28/the-expression-of-joy-ad-campaign-by-bmw-may-be-an-expression-of-big-money-wasted/ . Business leaders follow you “Big Guys” and I would hate to see smaller businesses clouding their messaging with “creative that requires an interpreter”. (But there I go again being a ROI driven Neanderthal)

Again Patrick, you make amazing vehicles, but because of that my expectation is your messaging will also be amazing. To be amazing I want to “get it” when I see it, and not be like everyone else in a packed movie theater and groan when your ad is played.

I want you to clearly state the problem you solve for me. I do not want some “foo foo marketing creative” that requires an interpreter, because then BMW means Big – Money- Wasted to me.

 

How about your business….

 

Does a big expensive ad add value in your business?

 

Or do they send a message you are disconnected to the market’s true needs?

 

Or worst, do these big budget ads and media buys make you, as a loyal customer feel you must have over paid for their product if they can afford such Big Money Wasted?

 

I predict this campaign will be a flop if I need an art director to explain it to me and they do not explain their distinctive competence clearly with an emotional attachment  that resonates with me.

 

Technorati Tags: BMW Z4,BMW,Ads,Advertising,message,messaging,problems you solve,marketing

Mentor Moment #12: Dance with the Date who Brought you to the Dance

There are a number of ways to grow a business; sell current products to current customers, current product to new customers, new products to current customers and new products to new customers.

However far too often companies spend a disproportionate amount of time and energy is spent on new customers and not building relationships with current clients. You must insure you focus on serving current customers.

Current customers have given you their vote, their trust when they placed an order with you

. Market leaders understand the importance of including current client development programs in their growth objectives. Market losers forget who brought them to the dance, and give all their energy to chasing new dates …and often go home alone broke. Market losers are unaware of the interruptions for current clients and often turn customers into shoppers again.

How about your company….

Do you have current account growth plans in place?

Do you have a KPI for retaining and growing current customers?

Once you lose a current customer how hard and expensive is it to win their love again?

Technorati Tags: sales,sales growth,grow current customers

Are You a Sales “Stallion” or an “Order Taking Gelding” Headed For the Glue Factory?

When I wrote my post: Are you enabling your Sales Force or emasculating them? I discussed comments made by salespeople selling in today’s economic climate. In addition I shared other leader’s comments about their view of salespeople and my preference to hire sales Stallions over order taking geldings.

I had a couple of salespeople contact me concerned if they were sales Stallions or order taking geldings. So I decided to share some of the questions I asked them on the telephone in hopes it helps others determine where they fall. But before you answer these questions please understand that teams require all types of people with varying degrees of gifts and experience. If you are an order taker, then be the best order taker with the greatest accuracy to detail in your company…just do not call yourself a salesman nor expect to be paid like a sales stallion.

1. In the last 6 months have you identified a change in your buyer’s buying process that requires a new sales tool?

2. In the last 6 months, have you challenged a corporate norm that is self serving to your organization and not customer serving?

3. Would you describe your role as “fighting for your clients?”

4. In the last 3 months have you experienced conflict with key influencers in other departments in your organization in your efforts to better serve your clients?

5. Has an account thanked you for your quick follow up in the last month?

6. In the last 30 days have you taken a bold action to serve your client without seeking your manager’s permission?

7. Are you in the top 10% of performance to goal in your sales team?

8. Are your accounts in the top 20% of most profitable accounts for your organization?

9. In the past week have you presented your management clients needs for approval?

10. In the last 24 hours have you asked for a clients oder?

 

If you said “No” 2-3 times be careful as you are on the verge of becoming an order taking gelding.

If you said “No” 4-6 times, don’t look now but you have become an order taking gelding. If that is who you want to be, then be the best you can.

If you said “No” to 7 or more of the above questions not only have you become a order taking gelding, but you are headed for the glue factory if you do not change quickly.

Sales Stallions spend 2/3 of their time listening and understanding the needs of their clients. Stallions understand the needs of their clients and solve those needs with the products and or services they represent. They become internal champions who fight for the needs of their clients. Sales Stallions consistently produce profitable sales revenue. Sales stallions are experts in their client’s buying process. Sales stallions are in the top 10% of sales to quota performance.

How about your company….

How well does your organization embrace client needs?

 

Does your company welcome your fighting for the needs of your clients? Or do your actions politically hurt you?

 

Have you been told to “sell through your client’s objections” when you share your clients’ needs?

 

Are your companies ‘policies and procedures written to better serve your clients, or your own organization?

 

If you have challenged one of those; “how we do things around here” rules how was it received?

 

The role of salespeople today is to help guide clients to a sale. Salespeople must become internal advocates for their clients and help their buyers buy, versus selling them. If you are a stallion in line to become a gelding to survive in your organization, you need to ask yourself if you will be happy making that compromise for a company that is disconnected to the needs of its market.

Technorati Tags: sales,buying process,sales process,sales stallion

It’s never too late to jump the fence before you get your… “Values”…. snipped.

Mentor Moment #10: “Nail it before you Scale it”

Entrepreneurs must insure they totally “nail” their product or service thoroughly before they “scale” it.

Like a number of these Mentor Moment nuggets, I do not claim to have written them, but I do whole heartily believe in them. I did a Google search and found this Mentor Moment can be attributed to Warren Packard. He was recently interviewed by Fox Business newsat the CES show concerning what his firm is investing in today.

Market leading entrepreneurs understand how critical it is to totally “Nail” your solution to an unresolved market problem before you “Scale” it. Where market losers fail is only incrementally providing a new solution and not totally solving it leaving themselves vulnerable to competitors who do their homework and thoroughly understand the unresolved market problem and solve it brilliantly. I know the rush of excitement…your new thing will be big and you can’t wait to launch it. When you feel this way, force yourself to to see all the “no-see-ums“. You must make sure you totally nailed it. What are users saying about your new product? Have you learned something new after launch? All of these are considerations you must reconcile BEFORE you scale it, or you will be very unhappy with the results.

Market leaders gain market knowledge and completely solve unresolved market problems.

How about your company…

Your last launch…did you nail it before you scaled it?

What prevents your team from totally nailing it first?

Did you nail it before you scaled it…if so share your results.

Technorati Tags: scale business,product solution,market leadership
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