Inside Sales Telesales Tips Blog

Increase sales by using your enthusiasm to get prospects motivated to want to buy from you

One of my mantras when I teach my sales training courses is that you've got to quickly determine how your solution is either going to make your prospects money, or stop them from losing money. Then tell them. That's all about ROI. But pumping up the enthusiasm is really important as well, and I witnessed this concept first hand recently when someone sold me a whole bunch of stuff I never intended to buy when I walked in the door. I was happy with my purchase too, and follow-on sales resulted. We can all learn a lot from this story, so here's what happened:

There's a company called Rosenblum Cellars that makes Zinfandel wines, and they're located way at the northern tip of Alameda, across the bay from San Francisco. I'm not a big zin drinker, but Alameda's a great town, and I was curious about this winery that's located on an old naval air base, so one Sunday a friend and I drove out there. We paid a small tasting fee, and began sampling. And that's when we ran into Kenny Goodman. He asked immediately what we thought of the first glass, and I told him it didn't have enough "pop" for me, because typically I like cabernets. Then he really went into action. "Look," he said, "I'm not supposed to do this, but I'm gonna pour one of best zins that usually I'm supposed to charge for, but I won't charge you. This stuff is really fantastic!" And it was pretty good! "I knew you'd love it, I just bought a whole case last week myself. And if you think that was great, getta load of this one!" He poured another glass from another hidden bottle, and in an animated fashion jumped all over the place, raving about those two new bottles.

We weren't his only customers, but he treated us like we were the only ones in the place. We walked around the tasting room a bit, and I noticed he was going into his performance with all the other customers, too. He wasn't pouring from the same bottles, but made everyone feel like they were special, and he was going to do something special for them. I just loved Kenny's enthusiasm for his product, and it was infectious. My friend and I loaded our trunk with bottles we hadn't intended to buy, and joined the wine club, too. My friend standardized on one of their zins, and serves it as her wine of choice at home. Kenny made a lot of money for the winery that day, and pumped follow-on sales for months to come, too.

My sister Vickie works in the wine industry in the Napa Valley, and I told her the story. She said everyone in the industry knows Kenny, and his enthusiasm is legendary.

So what can we in inside sales learn from Kenny? Two important things:
1) Enthusiasm. We deal with the same products every day, and to us they're old hat. But they're new to the prospect. Try to talk about your solution the same way you did when you found out how great it was. Rave about how it's helping other customers, and tell each prospect about how you just can't wait for him or her to get it on board so you can hear about their success stories, too. And don't be afraid to put yourself in the story, either. Kenny was a such a big fan of his product that it made us want to try everything, and we felt that if he liked it so much, we would, too.
2) Treat each prospect as if he or she is special. We talk to sometimes dozens of prospects every day, and it's easy to go into the same old rap. Take a look at your prospects' websites. Get really enthusiastic about what they're making, and talk about their products. Change your conversation to reflect what's going on at your prospect's company. Ask how their own products are making their customers' lives better. If you're one of their customers yourself, talk about how much you love their product or solution. Make each prospect feel as though he or she is the most important person you've talked to that month.

If you take Kenny Goodman's approach, prospects will want to buy from you, and sometimes that's what will drive the business to you, and not to a comparable competitor. Selling over the phone is a tough job, and some days are tougher than others. I'm sure it's like that in the wine room, too. But if you pump up the enthusiasm and make each prospect feel unique and special, you'll have more fun, your day will go faster, and you'll write more business. Sales managers and execs ask me every week how to better motivate their teams. Self-motivation is the best answer, and if we all think of our prospects as being unique people working in fascinating environments, the enthusiasm can be infectious. While you're on your way to work tomorrow, seriously think about how you'll go about re-crafting your rap to add more "pop" to your conversation.  And consider adding Kenny's techniques to your Best Practices playbook.

How to shine when giving an in-house product presentation

Particularly if you're selling a technically sophisticated solution, you may, as an inside salesperson, be called on to make a product/solution presentation to your own in-house sales or engineering team, as proof that you know your product. Such a presentation can be fraught with pitfalls, as more than occasionally you'll be expected to provide a product feature dump, particularly if your engineers are the intended audience. While we touch on presentation skills as part of our telesales training courses, it's worth reading this blog post if this presentation task is coming up for you.

The worst mistake you can make is trying to make sense out of a 400 page technical manual, then trying to craft the data into a presentation. This happened to me one time, and I made a really great presentation because I distilled three concepts before I started to craft my presentation to the brain trust. These three concepts are:

1) What customer problem does my solution solve?
2) What do I need to know about my solution in order to sell it?
3) What do I not need to know in order to sell it?

Presenting these three concepts will not only provide a "wow" factor for your in-house folks, but it provides a distillation that you can use effectively on the phone with prospects. It will also help you to avoid "feature dumping," or reading a list of features, a practice that bores colleagues and prospects alike.

Example: a software debugger

In an example from my own sales world, I sold a product called an Atron AT Probe, which was a hardware-based software debugger, a really techie product. Here's how I used the model.

1) The problem it solved was engineers spending long hours debugging software problems by manually debugging. Our solution saved dozens, occasionally hundreds of hours of engineering time. With the debugging time reduced, engineers could be put on new projects, reducing design and development schedules all over the company. The ROI could be put in engineering hours multiplied by the hourly engineering rate, or in getting the prospect's product to market faster.

2) What I needed to know: I needed to know that my debugger worked each time, every time. And I needed a pre-sales tech support person if there were technical specs I couldn't fathom. I needed to know what product my prospect was building, so I could talk about increased time-to-market, and how my solution could accelerate that, so my prospects could make money faster. I also wanted to know my prospect's anticipated release date of the finished product. This way I could use a "fear of loss" closing approach. I needed to know the decision process, because I might have to call others on the team (often, my engineer contacts would encourage me to "call high" to a director or VP to make a case). And I needed to know the meaning of commonly used technical acronyms and jargon.

3) I didn't need to know exactly how the solution worked, or go deep into the technology. Concepts like "sticky breakpoints" were commonly brought up. I knew we did that, but didn't know exactly how we did it. That's what pre-sales tech support was all about. We had a great pre-sales engineer that loved to talk tech. My technical expertise was limited to about ½ page of tech specs. The term I used to describe my approach was to be "intelligently ignorant."

Bottom line, my job was to make lots of good calls and move product. By having a clear understanding of how much I didn't need to know, I could flood my market with calls and make my company profitable.

So circling back to you, try using this technique next time you're asked to make an in-house presentation. You can even use something that, in the education biz, is called an "advance organizer," developed by an educator named David Ausubel. You begin your presentation by saying: "I'm going to tell you the major problem this product solves. Then I'm going to tell you what I need to know to sell it. Then I'm going to tell you what I don't need to know to sell it." Add this presentation skill to your Best Practices playbook, and I'll bet your presentations will be a lot more fun, effective and to the point.

When you become too old to work in Inside Sales… or is it just ageism?

One of the inherent beauties of selling or qualifying over the phone is that since no one can see us, hiring practices have been egalitarian, for the most part. In my telesales training courses diverse workforces have been the norm, and the resulting cross-pollination of ideas and experiences has resulted in smarter workforces. But in the past six months, I've been made aware of several outstanding inside sales candidates that were told they weren't hired because they "didn't fit in." And that was the sole reason given that they weren't hired. It had nothing to do with lack of professionalism or poor work stats. But these individuals were all over 40 years old, and the postings ran the gamut from Rep to Director.

In every case, the individual was interviewed at a company with a predominantly younger inside sales force, and came away with the feeling that management at these companies was more concerned that the new hire could party and socialize at the same level with younger workers than with what it takes to get the job done and over-perform in quota-oriented activities.

We're getting a good reputation in this blog for dealing with issues no one wants to discuss, and age discrimination is an uncomfortable topic for many. Human Resources departments are well aware of discrimination laws, but companies work around them with the "not fitting in" clause, which is not falsifiable. I'm going to give you two stories that underscore my point, but before I do, let's set up the argument.

Here are some reasons not to practice age discrimination in hiring:

1) If you're a younger manager or exec enforcing age discrimination at your company, it will eventually affect you as well. You may get succeeded by a younger person, or laid off because of your age. And you won't be able to prove it, because your company has a process in place for successfully removing older people without overtly violating discrimination laws.

2) We're not talking about the palliative crowd here. People over 35 have generally acquired great work habits, are intelligent conversationalists, and are focused on making themselves (and the company) money. They tend to be less "entitled" and accept authority more readily than many younger people.

3) Your younger inside sales reps can learn a lot from them. If they have a sales concern, they may readily go to a more experienced rep for advice than a manager, as they may feel they want to fix the problem before management becomes aware of it. This additional level of expertise provides for quicker inculcation of Best Practices, and can open up intelligent dialogue throughout the entire inside sales team.

Here's one story about an experienced inside sales rep I'd like to share with you. I trained an inside sales team in Florida that had one rep who was noticeably older than her colleagues. I would guess she was in her sixties. I always ask my participants what their passion in life is. When it was this woman's turn, she said it was flying Stearman aerobatic aircraft. She was a stunt pilot who still was doing air shows, and was probably the most focused rep in the room. In coaching sessions, she was far and away the best of the group. In follow-up discussions with management, we had serious discussions about how to find more people like her, and I would have recommended her to any of my client companies in a second.

The second story is perhaps a bit more poignant, but goes to the heart of the issue. In the early 1980s, I was putting myself through college driving a taxi in Boston. We had a number of black drivers in our company (probably half of whom were African).  There were also a number of steady customers calling for cabs that specified they didn't want a black driver. So the argument went one way that the company should send white drivers in those situations, because if they didn't, the customers would refuse to ride with the black driver, call the competition, and we'd lose the business forever. The contrary argument ran that by refusing to send black drivers, we were perpetuating discrimination, and it would never end if we didn't draw the line somewhere and say "no more." The second argument won. None of us wanted to live in a discriminatory world.

This post is primarily directed to sales managers and executives that can change the policy of age discrimination by recognizing that having experienced reps on the team makes the whole team better, then  showing leadership by taking the position that neither you nor the company will stand for it.  Discrimination in any form is odious, and pre-selecting out great reps because they may not join in on the Friday afternoon paintball tournament is just plain silly. Building a great inside sales team is all about talent and ability, and not about homogeneity. So please strongly consider adding real personnel diversity to your Best Management Playbook. You'll have a more effective and powerful company if you do.

Use KPIs during your telesales job interview to put yourself above competitive candidates.

We don't just create and deliver world-class telesales training courses here. We also help great telesales reps who've excelled in our classes and at work to find jobs. We know reps that have never been under quota that were laid off this year. The other day, veteran inside sales executive Alicia Assefa interviewed a candidate we sent her, and she gave the candidate some outstanding advice on how to make a presentation in the interview that would be compelling to any sales executive. It's all about describing how you use KPI (key performance indicators) to increase your numbers and overshoot quota. I asked Alicia to share her perspective with my blog, and she did. I'll let her put it in her own worlds. Here's what Alicia says:

Everyone knows how difficult it is to find work.  It's tough out there.  Although job opportunities are more prevalent than they were say, six months ago, it is still a very competitive market.   A few months ago, you could expect hundreds of applicants for one open position.  Now, the number may be in the tens of applicants.  In any case, the odds are still against job seekers.  In order to get noticed, your resume must stand out.   To get to the next level of the interview process, you must stand out, during each interview.

If you are looking for a sales position, there is a sure fire way to stand out from the crowd and position yourself as the "right "person for the job.  Know your numbers. 

Your numbers are metrics that Sales Managers call Key Performance Indicators or KPIs.   A manager's performance rating is, in most cases, tied to KPIs such as pipeline growth and quota achievement. 

What are the KPIs for an Inside Sales Professional?   KPIs will vary, based on whether you do Teleprospecting or have a sales quota. 

KPIs for Teleprospecting Reps: If you are a Teleprospecting Representative and your primary focus is on generating leads for a Field or Inside Sales team, your KPIs might include the following:

• Average Daily Dials: You should know, on average, the number of dials you make, each day. If the product is a high ticket complex solution that requires that you speak to a Senior IT professional, you may make 40-50 dials per day, as you must get past gate keepers, etc., to reach the required high-level IT professional. If, however, your product is a lower-priced commoditized solution, you may be able to make 60-100 dials per day.
• Raw Lead (RL) to Qualified Lead (QL) Conversion: Raw leads are the leads that marketing provides you, each day. Depending on the type of solution and contact level you need to reach, your RL to QL conversion should be in the range of 15%-20%. If you have a position, currently, check out the RL-to-QL conversion statistics for your team, for a 2 week period. See what the average is and where you rank. If you are looking for work and don't know this particular KPI, try to remember the total number of leads you received and how many of those turned to a qualified lead.
• Cold Call Ratio: Cold calls are calls that you make to contacts that you uncover without the aid of marketing support. Sales Managers are, typically, very interested in Sales Representatives who are not afraid to make cold calls. In general 20% of your dials should be cold calls into your accounts or territory. Managers will want to know where you got the contact names and how you pitched your Company's value proposition.
• Contact Ratios: Dials and lead conversion are interesting to Sales Managers because Sales is a numbers game. The more dials you make and the more leads you qualify, the greater your chances are of successfully meeting sales targets. A very important KPI is the contact ratio number. For example, if your daily dial average is 50, you should expect to connect with a minimum of 5 important contacts, or 10% of your dials. Ten to fifteen percent of your dials should be with important contacts that can help you move your sales activity to the next levels.
• Pipeline Growth: Pipeline is not just for quota bearing reps. Teleprospecting Reps, who generate leads for a Sales team, will have a pipeline of Qualified Leads (QL). Know the Average Sales Price (ASP) of your solution. Know your team's quota. Once you have this information, you can start to build your qualified leads pipeline. Typically 33 percent of deals will roll off the sales forecast, 33 percent will close and 33 percent will stall. If you are supporting a Sales Team, in general, you will need a qualified leads pipeline of 3X your teams' quota targets.
• Emails: Emails are another touch point that connects you to prospects. Although the phone is the primary way to connect with prospects, it is often necessary to stay in touch through an email. Know how many emails you send out, daily. Emails, when added to your average daily dials, increases the total number of prospect touches you have, each day. On average you should send out 15-20 emails to key contacts, daily.

KPIs for TeleSales Reps: If you are a quota bearing Sales Professional, your KPIs will include most of the items above, including:

• Average Daily Dials
• Cold Call Ratio
• Contact Ratios
• Average Sales Price
• Emails

In addition, as a quota bearing representative, you have a quota (monthly, quarterly, semi-annual, etc.).  In order to achieve your quota, it is important to build your pipeline to ensure that you will meet sales targets. 

• Pipeline Growth: Depending on the type of solution you are selling (complex, high-priced or commoditized, low-priced) you will need to build a pipeline of 3X to 6X your revenue objective. If you are currently working in a sales position, ask your manager how large your pipeline should be to meet sales targets. Start building to that level, to ensure your success.
• Quota Achievement: Every Sales Manager is going ask you if you made your sales targets. If you did, you should know how (pipeline growth of X times of Sales Targets, X Cold Calls made per day, 50-60 Daily Dials, etc.). If you didn't, you should know why. If you didn't, make your numbers, were you within 85+ % (an acceptable range). If you didn't, how did you rank against your peers?

After you've derived your numbers: Now that you know your numbers, the next step is to ensure that your résumé lists your numbers (KPIs).  List your achievements, by company.  For example you might list:

• At ABC Company I achieved 92% of my quarterly objectives for 6 consecutive quarters. I was ranked number 2 amongst my peer group. I achieved my numbers based on:
• 1) Average Daily Dials: 65
• 2) Cold Call Ratio: 20% of all dials
• 3) Pipeline: 2.5X quarterly sales objective
• 4) Contact Ratio: 20% of my daily contacts were with senior level IT Executives

Once your resume is completed and lists your KPIs, your next and final step is to complete a one-page overview of your accomplishments.  This overview should list your major accomplishments, with the most important accomplishment listed at the top. 

Your overview should list the following:

Sales Highlights and Accomplishments

Company XYZ:

• 2009 Presidents Club
• Achieved 120% of Quota
• Pipeline 5X revenue objective
• ASP: $50,000
• Contact Ratio: 20%
• Cold Call Ratio: 15%

When you have an onsite interview, make sure that you give your Sales Highlights and Accomplishments document to the hiring manager.  Keep a copy in front of you, for the entire interview.  You have a lot of numbers to discuss and you don't want to forget your most important KPIs.

Knowing your numbers and communicating your numbers, during the interview process, will put you way ahead of the competition.  When you know your numbers, Sales Managers will feel very comfortable that they won't be hiring a junior person.  Rather, they will see you as a seasoned and serious Sales Professional who is goal oriented and highly motivated.  Start building your list of KPIs.  Know your numbers and communicate them in your resume, Sales Highlights and Accomplishments overview and during the interview process.

It's Geoff here again. So there's some important advice from an inside sales executive whose job entails determining who to hire and who to discard. One day while I was a juror, a judge told me after the case was finished that he was frustrated because he'd told the prosecutor exactly how he wanted the case presented, and the prosecutor went and did it his own way anyway. And lost the case. Here, we have an inside sales exec who's telling you how to get hired. Add Alicia Assefa's advice on presenting your KPIs to your Best Practices Playbook.