Dave Stein's Blog for Sales Leaders

I just received a copy of Improving Corporate Negotiation Performance, a new study published by UK-based Huthwaite International and Connecticut-based IACCM—International Association for Contract and Commercial Management.  Huthwaite, along with other leaders in the area of negotiation like Think Inc! and The Bay Group,  vigilantly drive the critical point that negotiation shouldn’t begin when a company has been selected in a customer buying process.  Unfortunately few companies on the sell-side see things the same way.

Huthwaite and IACCM have a set forth a 5-phase Negotiation Maturity Model along with the percentages of respondent companies at each phase.  If you haven’t seen studies on this topic, the results will be sobering:  80% of the companies surveyed have no formal negotiation process.  The project team looked at companies’ negotiation processes, cross-organizational collaboration, data collection and analysis, preparation and planning, approval and escalation systems, training, success measurement, and other factors.  If you’re getting dizzy right about now, you should probably consider yourself among the 80%.

It’s my job to be skeptical when vendors publish research reports covering areas where they have something to sell.  However, during the past 10 years, ESR has seen procurement, sourcing and buyer departments get considerably more strategic when it comes to negotiating with suppliers.  Selling organizations are being overpowered, out-strategized, and often just plain beat up by their customers.  Not enough selling organizations are doing much about it.  At least not in any way that has significant, measurable impact.

ESR has done sales effectiveness audits and assessments for companies that have taken a strategic approach to negotiation on the sell-side.  There is no question in our mind that many of these companies are not giving up millions, or in many cases tens of millions and more per year in revenues and costs.

If you’ve just slammed your hand down on the desk and said, “I’ve had enough.  We’re going forward with a strategic approach to negotiation, starting tomorrow,” hold on a second.  I appreciate your intent, but it’s not so simple.

The best implementations of strategic negotiation ESR has seen is when it is integrated with the company’s sales methodology.  If you don’t have a sales methodology, build that first.

Note: ESR has not formally evaluated Huthwaite’s negotiation approach, content, or delivery.  At this point we’re only recommending you get your hands on the study from Huthwaite International’s website.

Photo credit: © Pat Lalli – Fotolia.com

Filed under: Book Recommendation, Measurement, Research, Sales Training Companies | No Comments »

I’m on the road all this week.  (In fact, I’m writing this on a plane from Minneapolis to Kansas City.)  There’s not enough time to for me to write a long, thoughtful blog post.  But I don’t have to.  I’ve written enough of them here on this subject already—two year’s worth—just in case you’re interested.

I’ve been saying again and again that sales performance is continuing to decline.  CSO Insights just published their 2009 Sales Performance Optimization report and the results validate my position. I’m not happy I was right.  Not at all.

It’s not that I’m so smart.  Anyone who thought about it could see it coming.  You take what in many companies is an organization short of strategy, discipline, process, measurement, leadership and productivity, give them insufficient and ineffective marketing and other support, layer in a significant recession, and there you have it.

It doesn’t have to be this way.  I can prove that.  I just came from attending the annual sales awards dinner held by a major client who simply blew away their 2009 targets, recession and all. We’ve got lots of other examples of companies that wouldn’t stand for the situation they were in, took appropriate action, and never looked back.

OK, I can’t help it.  I have to give you my opinion on the biggest single thing that can be done to fix this situation:

MEMO

To: CEOs, COOs, GMs, COOs, Boards of Directors, Investors, Presidents, and Business Owners

From: Dave Stein, CEO, ES Research Group, Inc.

Date: February 3, 2010

Subject: Declining Sales Performance

Filed under: Uncategorized | 4 Comments »

Imparta Ltd. is a Tier 1 global sales effectiveness organization based in the U.K. with presence in 32 countries including the U.S.  They have many strengths, especially in the areas of creating customer value and methodology.  Imparta’s sales training programs encompass sales, marketing, and leadership training. ESR commenced formal coverage of Imparta last year.  They are serious about taking a leadership position as a global player.

On top of the research we perform on Imparta as a component of our vendor coverage, ESR had an opportunity to see Imparta in action twice:  First, we were an active participant, along with about 15 other people, in a half-day seminar on coaching salespeople.  In addition, as a task related to our work with a large client where we were guiding them through a sales training vendor evaluation, we sat in on a presentation in response to the client’s RFP.  We were able to view their learning and reinforcement technologies first-hand.  In both instances we were impressed.

I thought that it would be interesting for you hear what Richard Barkey, Imparta’s CEO, thinks about a number of subjects related to sales effectiveness.

Dave Stein: What buying trends are your clients experiencing with their customers as we slowly escape from the recent global recession?

Richard Barkey: For most of our clients, this recession was very different from the last downturn in 2001.  Business customers were more careful in the way they cut costs, ring-fencing areas where clear value was being delivered, and then working to increase that value as far as possible.  This focus on value has continued as the economy has started to pick up, but we have started to see a slight relaxation in the way it’s measured.  During 2009 we were often helping clients to quantify the benefits of their offerings for buyers wanting a 3-6 month payback period, and that is beginning to return to a more normal timeframe.

In particular, strong companies see significant opportunities as the world staggers away from recession, so they are looking at longer-term investments again, but risk management is still very much the order of the day.  What does this mean for business developers?  The good news is that they can start rebuilding their longer-term pipelines if they focus on companies with a strong forward-planning culture, but they will have to be ready to demonstrate tangible value, and bring professional risk-alleviation skills to the table.

DS: Imparta has proven capabilities in a number of areas that ESR sees as critical for sales performance improvement going into 2010.  Those include technology-enabled learning, and coaching.  Can you take me through them one at a time with respect to your philosophy and an example of how you’ve helped a client? Read more »

Filed under: CRM, Economy, Interview, Marketing, Methodology, RFP, Sales Training Companies, coaching | No Comments »

After a webinar I did in December with The TAS Group, I got an angry email from someone who attended.  He wrote, “Instead of all the negatives how about offering some sales help for those of us that still have a job??”

I understood his perspective right away.  The messages I delivered during the webinar were for sales leaders.  I stated some statistics about the state of selling and some recommended courses of action.   But if you’re a salesperson struggling to make your numbers, you don’t want to hear about the pain your managers are dealing with from some industry analyst.

I got back to this guy right away. I wrote, “Send me your address. I’ll send you the best possible help I can.”  Last week I sent him one of my few remaining copies of the original first edition of How Winners Sell.  (It’s out of print.)  He was very, very appreciative and wrote, “… thanks so much Dave! A partner in sales forever…”  I love it!

So for this committed sales professional and the rest of you wind up reading this post, here are some of the best things that salespeople can do—by and for themselves if necessary—to assure long-term sales success.  This list is not the results of a research study.  It’s what we observe the most successful salespeople doing every day: Read more »

Filed under: Book Recommendation, Competition | 7 Comments »

For those of you new to this blog, my firm, ES Research Group, evaluates sales training companies.  We deliver our findings in the form of reports, which we sell on our website, and through consultations with companies evaluating sales training providers.

First a bit of background.

For us, gathering data about sales training companies falls into seven categories.  As you can imagine, the quality and quantity of the data varies significantly among each.

1. We speak with sales training company executives directly through formal briefings, informal discussions (of which I have many), and podcasts.
2. We read through trainers’ marketing materials, articles, blog posts, press releases, white papers, and other publicly available sources of information.  We use this subjective information more to understand how the provider positions themselves than what their strengths and weaknesses are.
3. We have a network of sales training buyers, successful salespeople and executives, consultants, former sales training company employees, journalists, and other experts whom we speak with regarding the real capabilities of a training company or trainer.
4. We speak with other trainers to get their perspectives.  We focus on separating fact versus opinion, since competitive emotions run very high in this business.
5. We speak with references training companies provide us.  Again, we seek facts rather than opinions.
6. We provide advice to some sales trainers (individuals to the largest firms).  Although we would never disclose anything proprietary, we do get a very deep understanding of those trainers’ businesses and offerings.
7. We are the recipient of responses to RFPs that we write and distribute to long lists of vendors for our clients.  We read every response completely and assess a vendor’s capabilities against our client’s specific requirements.  From those responses we can also see how a vendor positions their strengths, minimizes their weaknesses, and generally positions themselves.

In the broadest sense, we compare trainers by looking at two top-level criteria:  (1) Breadth and Depth of Solution and (2) Solution Effectiveness.  You can see that the first measurement applies only to what we refer to as “full-service” sales trainers—those who provide consulting, training, and reinforcement across many different skill sets—from negotiation to strategic account management to financial acumen.  Niche players (see below) can’t be ranked in this category.  Solution Effectiveness, on the other hand, applies to every training company and trainer we either formally cover or informally watch. Read more »

Filed under: Account Management, Buyers, Industry Analyst, Methodology, RFP, Sales Training Companies | No Comments »

My blog and website stats during 2009 showed that interviews with sales thought leaders and experts were especially popular in both blog post and podcast formats. I’ve learned a lot from these interviews while providing an opportunity for the interviewees to get broader exposure.

In the past, I’ve generally limited my interviews to CEOs and senior executives representing the larger providers.  But anyone on the buy-side of sales training knows that there are individuals and small firms that deliver significant value to their clients.  I’ll be featuring more of those during this year.

My first interview for 2010 is with Steve Waterhouse, president of Predictive Results, a sales performance improvement provider based in Jacksonville, Florida.  In this interview with Steve, I focused on his business—what has made him successful.

Dave Stein: Would you provide us with an overview of your sales performance improvement practice?

Steve Waterhouse: Three years ago, my business was 80% training, 15% speaking, and 5% product sales with the majority of my work in one- and two-day engagements. We often trained only the sales team. Today my business mix is 70% training, 20% consulting, 5% speaking and 5% product sales with the majority of our clients renewing for multi-year agreements. Our training now covers virtually every manager in the company. Ninety-percent of our business is related to Predictive Index® and Customer-Focused Selling™.

DS: What about your background do you believe has contributed to your success?

SW: I started my career as an engineer on the Patriot Missile and then moved into technical sales. I think the discipline of engineering and the high level of professionalism in the technical companies I represented set the standard for all aspects of my business. Once I started consulting and training, having a wide diversity of clients gave me the insight I needed to solve problems in nearly any situation.

DS: Steve, you and I first met at a National Speakers Association conference in 2000.  At that point you were very much into technology.  How have you used technology in your business and what benefits do you believe it has delivered? Read more »

Filed under: Hiring, Interview, Sales Training Companies | 4 Comments »

Happy New Year.

You know how, at this time of year, all the media review the past year (or in this case, decade) and talk about advancing into the next one?  Here’s one for you:  I may have the attribution wrong, but I believe it was Confucius who said,

The best time to plant a tree was ten years ago.  The second best time is now.

What makes that resounding message relevant is ESR’s business outlook for 2010.  I’m certain that the increase in upcoming projects is partially a result of ESR’s brand getting broader and wider recognition—we’ve been in business now for four years.  And I know that some of that uptick can be attributed to an apparent dose of business optimism here in the U.S. and in some other parts of the world.  Companies are willing to spend money on sales performance improvement.

What is really encouraging is what the sales stakeholders in our current and new client companies are telling us.  They’ve had it with the recurring cycle of missing sales targets, getting some tactical training, and seeing no improvement.  They are taking action.  They’re planting the tree now.  Who cares about what they didn’t do ten years ago.

I don’t think you want to see another list of excuses that sales leaders use to justify not taking the right action.  (For those of you who are new to this blog and are curious, you can look here.)  So on the positive side, for many of you, changing your approach to selling—even in what might be relatively minor ways—can have an impact on performance this year.  As long as you do the right things in the right order.

I’d love to have you join me in a virtual toast on December 31^st, 2010 and share with me what you did during 2010 to change your team’s situation—what trees you planted during 2010.

My wish for you is health and success in 2010—however you define it.

Filed under: Methodology, sales process | 4 Comments »

Since this will be my last post for 2009 I wanted to cover a few subjects and provide you with a list of my most often-read posts for the year.

First, on a personal note, my heart reaches out to those in need.  I’m very fortunate.  Life has dealt me as perfect a hand as one could ever ever expect.  The same goes for my family.  So, in lieu of sending holiday cards and gifts, ESR has made a special contribution to Save the Children.  I’m happy about saving the paper and even happier that some kids will have a slightly better life than what they were dealt.  If you have the means, we hope you’ll make a contribution as well.

Second, I want to thank ESR’s clients for their business, and for being true partners with us.  In 2009 we had the opportunity to work with some of the smartest, committed, and successful people in the business community in the U.S., Australia, and Europe (especially Ireland)—from sales reps to account executives to VPs of sales to senior executives running divisions of large companies to CEOs.  I’ve learned a lot from each of them.  I know the feeling is mutual and that makes me feel like I’ve accomplished a lot.

Third, a thumbs up to the sales training community.  It’s my job to point out the challenges training companies face, how they are faring, and to educate the buying community about vendor evaluation and selection.  I’m often critical.  On the other hand, I’ve had the opportunity to get to know the CEOs of many of the larger training companies, owners of mid-size firms, and many wonderful, individual sales trainers.  Most of those I’ve met are hardworking and strive to help their clients improve the sales performance of their teams.  Those of you who know me understand that elevating the profession of selling in the eyes of the overall business community has been a driving force behind my career for the past two decades.  I’m delighted to have numbers of sales trainers and consultants working with me or in parallel toward the same goal.  I look forward to further collaboration in 2010.  Stay tuned for some exciting announcements from ESR in January.

Finally, according to the blog stats, here are the top eleven posts for 2009.  Many have insightful comments.  You might want to read those as well.

1. Selling Through the Customer’s Organization (Chart) This was the most popular blog post of the year.
   

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2. We Live in a World That Requires Revenue A video.  An oldie, but a goodie. Catch the note at the bottom of the post.
   

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3. What Salespeople Need To Know, But Don’t. This is an important post.  There is also a link to an important podcast.
   

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4. Predictive Testing For Salespeople. No Reason Not to Do It. A favorite subject of ours at ESR.
   

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5. Come On, Dave. Which Is The Best Sales Training Company? I get asked this question all the time.  Read my answer.
   

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6. Sales Meetings. Is There A Nap On Your Agenda? This topic has been coming up more frequently recently.  The blog stats bear this out.
   

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7. Sales Kick-off Meetings: Are Results on The Agenda? Another favorite of mine, having spoken at hundreds of sales kick-off meetings all over the world.
   

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8. GE’s CIO on Reverse Auctions Some interesting points to ponder made by GE’s CIO—a powerful person who lives on both the buying and selling sides.
   

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9. More Excuses For Not Doing The Right Thing About Sales Effectiveness I was pretty frustrated when I wrote this one, as you’ll see.
   

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10. Inside The Sales Training Industry (Part 1) The widely-discussed interview I did with Tom Martin.
    

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11. Sales Performance Measurement.  ESR will be driving the importance of measurement in 2010.  I’ve written a feature article on the subject for ASTD’s magazine.  It will be out early in 2010.
    

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Please, have a healthy and successful 2010.

Filed under: Sales Training Companies | 3 Comments »

Back in October I delivered the keynote at SMT’s conference.  I shared with the audience ESR’s list of 12 obstacles that must be overcome for sales training to begin to have the degree of impact that a few the leading sales training companies are having with every client.

1. Sales training is most often reactive. We ask VP of sales what their sales training strategy is.  The answers we get would indicate that many either don’t understand what the word strategy means or they do, but it doesn’t apply to training and developing their own people.  A tactical approach to sales performance improvement is as much a contradiction in terms as I can imagine.  It doesn’t work.
   

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2. Wrong people in the sales and sales management positions. I’ve written about this before.  It’s a very, very serious problem.  ESR estimates that mis-hiring will continue to significantly hinder sales effectiveness in 2010 with only a single-digit increase in the number of companies employing a formal hiring methodology for sales people and managers.  We need to fix that.
   

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3. Selling requirements are not really understood. When ESR assesses our client’s sales effectiveness, we often uncover things that they themselves don’t see or understand.  If a company delivers sales training without an objective and comprehensive understanding of their sales-related challenges, it just won’t be effective.  And companies do that every day.
   

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4. No foundation methodology in place. I hope you’ve been reading what experts like Jonathan Farrington and Dave Brock have been posting about sales methodology and process.  Check out the leading industry experts’ research reports.  Is there any question at all that a sales methodology must be the backbone of a company’s sales approach?  I write about this subject often as well.  Let me ask a simple question.  If you don’t train sales reps on how to effectively and efficiently use your sales process, what do you train them on?  Some isolated tactics?  A few tricks and tips?  We’ll never get to real sales productivity that way.  If it was going to work, it would have worked by now, right?
   

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5. Flawed training company selection. Literally every day I speak with buyers of sales training who have, as a group, been through all the programs with all the leading trainers.  Yet they are still seeking the right trainer.  No sales trainer fits every training situation.  In fact, no sales trainer fits most situations.  The ones ESR covers are very good—industry leading, in fact—for specific situations.  When a company selects the wrong partner for their unique situation, it’s like going to an ear, nose and throat doctor when you’ve cracked a tooth.  Same general area, but oh, so wrong.
   

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6. No measurement. Al Case and I just completed a feature article for ASTD’s T+D magazine about how to measure sales performance improvement.  There is absolutely no reason why sales trainers and their clients can’t work together to specifically measure not only the financial impact of the training (and process) work, but also use a measurement system to assure that everyone is adhering to what they learned.  I’ll have a downloadable PDF for you on this subject when the article is published.  (Good reason to subscribe to this blog!)
   

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7. Having a traditional, live, instructor-led training approach only. If you are not leveraging technology to deliver learning, you’re behind the times.  If you insist that your salespeople can only learn sardine-canned into a conference room at an airport hotel, you’re wrong.  These days, technology-enabled learning has come a long way.  Companies like The Brooks Group, The TAS Group, Richardson, Miller Heiman, Imparta, SPI and others have developed some innovative learning (and in some cases, selling) applications.
   

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8. Sacrificing learning reinforcement and coaching. The importance of learning reinforcement (including coaching) is undisputed among researchers and impartial experts in the sales effectiveness industry.  Event-based training without reinforcement is a waste of time and money.
   

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9. Lack of investment in tools to support new selling requirements. Although there are wide variations depending on industry, salespeople need technology not only to learn more, but specifically to sell more effectively and efficiently as well.  They need tools to manage their pipelines, accounts, opportunities.  They need tools for research, networking, communication, collaboration, gaining knowledge, creating and finding leads.  Do we leave them to fend for themselves?  All of this must be integrated into a strategic approach to sales effectiveness, of which training, of course, is a critical component.
   

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10. The disconnect between corporate learning and sales. In many larger companies there is a long-lived disconnect between the training and sales departments.  There are numbers of reasons for this.  A team of us working with Brian Lambert at ASTD are tackling this issue head-on in 2010.  For now, so long as that disconnect exists, sales is disadvantaged.
    

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11. The continued hope that tips, tricks, and new toys will save the day. I can’t ever leave this point out.  Look here for more.
    

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12. Reduced budgets for sales training. The stats aren’t in but we expect the sales training spend in 2009 to be way, way down.  Buyers of sales training won’t really every be able to get the protected budgets they need until they track the results of training and can provide a credible, achievable ROI to executive management.
    

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Here they are again:

Those are the challenges that every sales trainer and every company looking to improve the effectiveness of their sales team must overcome.  Let me know how I can help.

Filed under: Hiring, Measurement, Methodology, Opportunity Management, Sales 2.0, Sales 2.0, Sales Training Companies, sales process | 5 Comments »

I’ve been down with Swine Flu.  First I thought it would just kind of breeze by… an  H¾ N¾  kind-of-thing.  But I did get the full rendition—H1N1 all the way. I’ve been in bed, taking care of minor things here and there, but can’t really focus my brain on a few challenging projects on my plate.  I’ll make up the time.  I always do.

In any case, as ¾ progressed to 1.0 I did manage to read a great book on my Kindle: What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures, my first recommendation in this post.

That Malcolm Gladwell is one smart guy.  Having read his other books, Outliers, Tipping Point, and Blink, I was a bit skeptical because this was a collection of essays that Gladwell did for New Yorker magazine.  I figured, quite cynically, that his publishers were packaging up some old stuff to make some money for the Christmas season.  That may have been their plan, but I wound up with having learned a whole lot.  Gladwell employs an interesting structure for these individual pieces.  He juxtaposes two perspectives—what you might initially believe are unrelated perspectives—to bring across his point. It is very effective.

Stories featuring Ron Popeil (the infomercial pitchman), Cesar Millan (the dog whisperer) and some other interesting people you wouldn’t know, were engaging.  His takes on Enron, McKinsey (their mentors and advisors), the Challenger disaster, criminal profiling, plagiarism, and the homeless situation captured my complete attention.

There was a big, big bonus for me in this book as well.  In one of the essays, The Talent Myth, Gladwell discusses how subjectivity impacts the interviewing of job candidates, he made as strong a case as I’ve heard for structured interviewing—the kind of interviewing I’ve been writing and talking about for years.  Here’s just an excerpt.  I love it!

This interviewing technique is known as structured interviewing, and in studies by industrial psychologists it has been shown to be the only kind of interviewing that has any success at all in predicting performance in the workplace. In the structured interviews, the format is fairly rigid. Each applicant is treated in precisely the same manner. The questions are scripted. The interviewers are carefully trained, and each applicant is rated on a series of predetermined scales. What is interesting about the structured interview is how narrow its objectives are.

Read this book.  It’s fun and you’ll learn a lot.

More than a year ago, my friend and colleague, Steve Bistritz sent me a draft of a book he and a colleague were writing.  He asked for some feedback and for an endorsement for the book for when it would be published.  It’s been out a few months now, but I do want to recommend to you Selling to the C-Suite: What Every Executive Wants You to Know About Successfully Selling to the Top.  Steve, who has been recognized as an expert in the discipline of executive-level selling for decades, partnered with Nicholas Read in the writing of this book.  They make a strong team.

Whoa… Decades?  Do I really want to buy a book co-authored by a guy who has been doing this for decades, you might ask.  Yes, you do.  Steve and Nicholas have experience, perspective, and most important, an understanding of what is relevant now with regard to this subject.

Most of what it takes to sell successfully in the C-suite is timeless.  Deep knowledge of the customer’s business from an operations and financial perspective and a strong value proposition are two cornerstones.  Bistritz and Read provide all the tools you’ll need, especially the Value Proposition Worksheet (in the Appendix).

Understand, this is not just another “book about selling high.”  I know.  I’ve read most of them.  This gives you the background, understanding, strategies, tactics, tools, incentive, motivation, case studies, and step-by-step instructions for how to gain and maintain access to the C-suite.  It’s all there for you and your team.  The question is are you willing to do what it takes?

Filed under: Book Recommendation, Hiring, Sales Strategy | 4 Comments »