Startup Selling: How to sell if you really, really have to and don't know how by Scott Sambucci

STARTUP SELLING:
How to sell if you
really, really have
to and don’t know
how…

Scott J. Sambucci
Published by:

Copyright © 2012 Scott Sambucci

All rights reserved.

ISBN-13: 978-1468159240

DEDICATION

To the Entrepreneur – Despite statistical probabilities, you keep going.

To Lena – Thank you. For everything.

Buy a copy on Amazon! http://amzn.to/Nib6eX

Both Kindle & Paperback available

CONTENTS



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you to the authors, mentors, and speakers that helped me develop a
sales acumen and self-belief – including Brian Tracy, Zig Ziglar, Neil
Rackham, Michael Pedone, Sean Murphy, Peter Cohen, James Altucher, Tony
Robbins, and many others. Thank you to those that helped me during key
moments of my career – Tom Injaychock for my first internship in college;
Rich Gridley for showing me that one can have a career in sales; Butch Porter
for many late night strategy calls during my first year; Gary June for telling me
that I can be a real pain in the rear; Steve Helba for teaching me the craft of
publishing; David Kornacker, Paul Romer, and Sally Elliott for pulling me to
Silicon Valley; and Altos Research for one heck of a ride. Thank you to all of
my customers throughout the years and for those to come. Thank you to my
parents for the lists of chores every day. Now I understand. Lastly, and most
importantly, thank you to my wife who supports and endures my quest for
everything.

0.5 – WHY THIS BOOK & WHAT TO EXPECT

Why read this book?

 In the next 20 minutes, you might get an inbound phone call or
"request for information" email from your website. How are you
going to capitalize on that opportunity?
 You have an industry conference in a week that you'd like to attend
but you don't have $2500 for the registration fee, and you don't want
to stand around talking to other less capable CEOs about their
problems. You want real meetings with real outcomes. How will you
make this happen?
 You have an attendee list from a previous industry event, many of
whom you know should be using your product. What do you do with
it? How do you turn these leads into prospects?
 You’re an entrepreneur with a few beta testers and a little bit of
revenue (or not), but before you can hire a full-time salesperson, you
need to land 3-4 real clients paying you real money. How do you get
these deals closed?
 You have very happy beta testers, but they're are delaying the part
where they actually pay you money. They're really nice engineers but
they keep telling you that the business managers aren't ready to pull
the trigger. Closing even one or two of these will be a huge boost to
your company, your revenues, and your confidence. How do you get
them from “users” to “buyers”?

As I pecked away each morning, I wrote for a technical founder (or team)
or a CEO of a young company – someone in alpha or beta stage with a
demonstrable product and an idea dripping with potential. While you’re

sitting at your desk coding or productizing, the phone might ring every so
often or you receive an occasional "request for information" email from your
website. Perhaps you’re lucky enough to gain an introduction from your
venture capital partner or friends in the industry.

Your press on TechCrunch isn’t bringing in the sales by the thousands
like you thought and you've been to a few industry events where potential
customers have told you - "Hey this is interesting, I'd like to know more…" –
but you can’t seem to pull them into any real sales process. Now you're
developing your sales channel.

You might be an engineer turned founder or a product manager that's
great at product development or solving really hard technical problems, but
selling remains a mystery that you absolutely need to solve. You might have
had some customer interactions in the past as a product manager, sales
engineer, or marketing person, but you've never really had to sell. You need
to add a few clients before you can really go after that big Series A round of
funding. Your angels are a little restless, or worse, you don't have angels and
your spouse is a little restless.

This book gives you clear and practical advice that you can start using
right now. Today. In the next 20 minutes. Take the time to read every
chapter. Every chapter. Every single one. As you read each chapter, begin
integrating these ideas right away. I promise they will make a difference in
your business. You will immediately see how inbound calls respond
differently, how you're able to decode the decision process, and how to find
the complacent and discontented people in your industry that you set up shop
to help in the first place. (“This sure seemed like a good idea…” right?)

This book assumes that you know very little about the structural aspects
of sales and the selling process, and provides everyday sales strategies and
tactics you can utilize immediately in your business. In fact, words like “sales”
and “selling” usually give you the creeps.

Here’s your first lesson
Good salespeople are not "salesy" - they are masters at taking the right
actions, listening to customers, asking questions, and implementing a clear
strategy. Most of all, good salespeople are usually the nicest people you'll ever
meet because they are genuinely interested in helping other people.

Sales strategies are real. They are not underhanded or deceptive. Just
like a Java developer finds and installs Java libraries or how a QA engineer
learns specific skills to locate bugs, the salesperson must internalize a set of

skills that focus on communication and problem-solving. That's what you’ll
learn from this book.

You started your company because you thought the current set of
products and services underserved the market. You saw market complacency
and discontent, and now you're risking everything to solve that problem. You
want to make people's lives better. That’s exactly what an excellent
salesperson does. Being an excellent salesperson is simply an extension of
your embedded character trait as an entrepreneur. It's just a matter of
developing and refining the daily practices that will enable you to reach your
market and your customers - to solve the problem you set out to solve.

As the Founder and CEO of your company, you may not be deploying
these advanced skills yourself every day. However, to evaluate your sales
team over time, it is imperative that you hold them accountable for knowing
the fundamental enterprise sales techniques.

I'll help you get there.

Why me? Meaning - Why did Scott, of all people, write this book?

1. We've met before. Over the last few years, I've attended all kinds of
technology events - Silicon Valley Association of Start-up
Entrepreneurs Start-up Pitches, VC Taskforce Angel Funding
Pitches, Startup Weekend, presentations with the Silicon Valley
Product Managers Association, and Meetup groups like Startup
Grind, Founders & Funders, Hackers & Founders, and 106 Miles.
At every event, without exception, I meet a really smart founder with
a very good idea. I KNOW that if this founder can pull in a few
customers they'd be off and running.

But...

When I begin asking about sales and customer development, the
founder admits that they're either not very good at sales or haven't
thought through how to actually sell the product. Or worse, their
perception of how to sell doesn't jive with reality. A few examples:

 They have people calling them. When I ask what they do with
these inbound calls, they tell me - "I usually just tell them
about the product and why I started the company..." without
asking any questions about WHY the person called.

 Not understanding that an enterprise sale is a 6-18 month sales
cycle through a myriad of decision-makers and definitive
steps.
 They tell me they have a few people interested, but after a
couple of calls, the trail goes dead.
 I hear the dreaded - "As soon I get some funding I'll be able to
hire a sales team..." It's the opposite - it's sales first, then
funding. Which means that the founder is the salesperson to
make that happen.

2. I've trained, taught, and managed. Going back to my days as a
publishing representative with Pearson, I led sales training for our
sales district and region. I've built and managed sales teams at two
separate start-ups in two completely different industries - Aplia in the
educational software business and Altos Research the housing
market.

I've also taught classes in Economics, Finance, Strategic
Management, Entrepreneurship, and Labor Relations at various
universities. This experience developing a learning framework around
new concepts is just as important as knowing the concepts
themselves. When I wrote this book, I imagined developing a simple
lecture series on "Start-up Selling."

3. I think I'm pretty good at what I do. I've worked with three start-ups.
Aplia was venture-backed where went from alpha product to $2
million annualized in less than two years. Then the company sold to
a really big company in the industry. The second was my own
consulting firm. It was awful. I never want to do consulting on my
own again. I ignored the fact that the same sales techniques applied
to consulting, so I failed miserably and squandered $250,000 in
funding. I know what its like to fail. It really, really sucks, and it
sticks with you for a really, really long time. Then I took Altos
Research from thousands in revenue to millions in revenue in four
years. We never took outside funding, which means our growth was
entirely based on new revenue growth. Gulp. No pressure there... :--)

I figure that all of this experience has to be worth something to someone.
Ergo, this book.

Two final notes:

 The sales conversations and case studies described in this book are
very, very real. I’ve changed the names of individuals and companies
for privacy and confidentiality purposes.
 Throughout this book, I recommend a number of websites, products,
writers, and resources. I receive absolutely no compensation for
recommending these resources. Most of the people and companies I
suggest don’t even know who I am.

Got questions? Call or email anytime. Really. I love talking about this stuff
and maybe I can help with another idea or two.

scott@salesqualia.com
(415) 596-0804

Enjoy. And happy selling.

About the Cover Image

Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fractal_heptahedron.png

By Prokofiev (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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1 - HANDLING INBOUND CALLS & LEADs

Sales Tenet #1: For inbound calls and leads, find out why the
prospect is inquiring about your products and services.

Sales Tenet #2: Jumping right into a sales demo on the first call
is the kiss of death.

Whether you’re a start-up or working for an established company, you’re
promoting your company at various events and through your network. You
might have a private beta program established for prospective customers, or
fielding a few introductions from your investors. The result is an occasional
phone call or email. How do you handle these inbound leads?

Inbound callers will usually start off the conversation with one of these
openers:

“I was on your website – can you tell me a more about what you do?”

“I didn’t see any pricing on your website – how much is it?”

“I heard about your company and wanted to take a look at your
product.”

“I was wondering - do you guys have a product that does such-and-
such?”

First, before you do anything, resist the temptation to answer their
specific question right away. If it's an inbound phone call, immediately get
the person’s name and ask them to repeat it if you didn't get it this first time.
Write it down. People talk fast on the phone and often skip telling you their
name. They’re not being rude, it’s just the way we communicate.

Your first objective is to create a conversation between two people instead
of some guy from one company calling some guy at another company to
request information. More importantly, you need to take control of the
conversation by asking the questions, instead of getting peppered by a
stranger. This is very, very important. It slows down the pace of the call and
allows you to direct the conversation to the customer’s needs based on your
product, instead of the other way around. The customer has a very specific
problem that they are trying to solve. In fact, it’s such a specific problem that
they’ve taken the action of calling you directly. Wow – they must really need
help!

Sometimes your specific product or service solves their exact problem, but
here's the thing - even if you have the exact solution that they ask about, you
don't know why they are looking for your thing-a-ma-bob or whatchamacallit.
Even if your product solves 90% of that problem and you puke on them with
everything about your product, how it’s built, and your inspiration for starting
the company, it doesn’t matter because 90% isn’t enough. The caller will
almost always object and say - "Yeah, that's almost what I need but I'm
looking for such-and-such. Thanks anyway." Now you’re dead. You have to
wrestle control of the conversation to help this person discover the answer to
their problem.

Think about those old detective shows when there’s an interrogation. The
perpetrator tries to take control of the conversation and the cop rebuts with –
“I’ll ask the questions here...” That’s because he who asks the questions
controls the conversation.

1

Why do you ask questions? So that you can determine their specific needs
and establish decision criteria. As the conversation develops, you can even
begin differentiating your product and company (more advanced sales
techniques that we’ll cover later). You have to begin by giving your caller
something though, and that's where your conversation and transition skills are
vital. A good response might be:

"We sure do. We have a number of different products that can help
with that. Tell me a little bit more about [why you're asking/what you're
doing] so we can direct you to the right thing-a-ma-bob. Also, I didn't
catch your name - what was it?"

99% of the time, they'll open up and say something like:

"Oh, yeah. I'm Bob Smith calling from XYZ Technology. We're
thinking about implementing a new enterprise management system and I
read about your company so I figured I’d give you a call.”

Now you're in. While he's talking, listen to what he's saying. If you can
quickly, and I mean, quickly, pull up their company in your web browser, then
do it so have it in front of you. If you cannot do this quickly, don't worry
about it. It's waaaaaay more important to listen so you can ask intelligent
questions than it is to fumble around with whether his company is XYZ.com
or XYZTechnology.com.

1
Peter Falk as “Columbo.”
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bc/Peter_Falk_Richard_Kiley_Colombo_1974.JP
G

After you let him tell you everything and you take control of the
conversation by asking questions, be sure to restate your name - he didn't
catch it when you answered the phone. Trust me – he didn’t. For example -

"Okay, that makes sense. Thanks for the background. By the way, if you
didn't catch it, my name is Scott. [Pause] So I had a question about what
you just shared – what’s prompting the look at a new enterprise
management system [or whatever need they have]?” Now you’re in a
conversation assessing the person’s needs.

Develop some shorthand notation for your note-taking. A pattern of
common terms and situations will emerge very quickly. Some examples I use
for my notes in my business (housing data):

NF = New Fund
SF/MF = houses/condos
CS = Case-Shiller
INV = Investor
VAL = Valuation Company

Do the same for your business and industry.

A couple of rules for handing inbound calls

1. Be nice. Always, always, always be nice. If you can’t be nice at that
moment, don’t answer the phone.
2. Smile when you talk.
3. Listen to what the prospect is saying and ask for clarification if you’re
not sure. Ask them to repeat what they just said. It’s okay – you’re
allowed. This will assure you are getting your facts straight and you
will appear thoughtful because of your determination to understand
the prospect’s pain.
4. Ask questions - real questions about the person: how they heard
about your company and why they are calling. (More on questions in
Chapter 6 – “More Sales Process.”)
5. Be succinct – ask and answer questions clearly, but use not more
than three sentences in a row before flipping around the
conversation with a question to the prospect. Nobody is ever going
to call you because they want to hear a soliloquy. You aren’t nearly as
interesting as your prospect.

Answer your phone with a warm greeting – “Good afternoon – this is
Scott” Or “Good morning! Thanks for calling – this is Scott.” Remember, the
person on the other end thinks they’re calling a real company with a real
product. Just because you’re answering the call on your cell phone doesn’t
mean that grunts and garbled greetings are acceptable.

If you’re using your cell phone as your main company number or you’re
forwarding a land line or Skype number to your cell phone, keep a pen and a
notebook with you at all times. Personally, I like the top-open variety. Buy
ten of these at a time and keep a couple in your car, your sport coat pockets,
and next to your wallet and keys at home so that you always have one handy.
Keep a pen inserted into the spiral binding with each one too. Keep a decent
pen with you at all times – one that writes smoothly so you can jot notes as
quickly as the person is talking. Cheap ballpoints from the Days Inn in
Omaha, NE that you found at the post office are out of the question.

Example: Inbound call from Lakeland, FL
We had a real estate broker call into our main phone number. He
immediately launched into his reason for calling. He was on our website and
trying to find a market report for his local town, but his town wasn’t showing
up on the website. He had visited our website a couple of months ago but
now he wasn't seeing his town listed.

Wow - that's a TON of information that he shared without me asking a
single question. Here’s what I learned even before I said a single word:

1. He was a broker from Coldwell Banker in Lakeland, FL - because my
caller ID said so.2 Of course, he didn't know that I knew that and I
wasn’t going to play Big Brother and scare him away. But… he was
qualified now as a legitimate prospect.
2
Vonage is $25/month and includes caller ID, three-way calling, and *69. You will use all of these
features frequently.

2. He was darn interested based on what he told me - he was on our site
a month ago, remembered it and liked it enough to come back, and
was interested enough to pick up the phone, suffer through our
phone system, dial my extension and wait for it to ring a few times
just to find the market report he wanted.
3. I had an opportunity to engage in an action with him that will help us
develop rapport - he's on our website and something is not working
correctly. I can go into quick customer service mode and with him on
the line, see if I see what he's seeing. (See Chapter 7 – “Build with
Value” and Chapter 11 – “Be Nice & Eat Your Broccoli.”)

I could have used the Lakeland caller id info and said – “I'm showing an
863 area code - is that in Florida?” Then he would have said "Yes, we're in
Lakeland…" and been a little spooked. Instead, I went this direction:

Me: "Wow - thanks for calling! I can definitely help out with that. Tell
me about yourself - where are you based? Are you a broker, an agent, or
both?"

Him: "I'm an agent down in Lakeland, FL, well I'm actually in Winter
Haven. If you've never heard of it, it's between Tampa and Orlando."

Me: "Believe it or not, I know it very well. I used to live in Pinellas
County and went to high school in Palm Harbor. We used to drive
through Lakeland to get to Disney World when we were kids."

Then we talked for a few minutes about the old Boardwalk & Baseball
and Major League Baseball Spring Training facilities that used to be
there.

Me: "It's great to talk to someone from down there! So let's get you fixed
up with the reports you need." (Note the psychology here - "we" "fixed"
"you" "need")

Me: "So you were at our company home page and typed 'Lakeland FL'
into the box and your market didn't show up there?"

Him: "Yep that's right."

Me: "Okay - I'm going to our website right now." (Then I typed in
Lakeland, Florida and same problem - our market didn't show up on our
website.)

Me: “Well, the good news is that I’m seeing what you’re seeing –
Lakeland, Florida isn’t showing up. No problem. Here's what we'll do -
I'm going to have one of my colleagues here - Katie Harris - help us with
this. She can email you a report for Lakeland and talk with you about
any questions you have. What's your email address?" I took that down,
and repeated it back to him to make sure I had it right.

Me: "Great - and Michael, what's your phone number?" I took that
down, and repeated it back to him to make sure I had it right." I'm going
to send you an email and copy Katie, explaining that you need a
report..."

Katie followed up with the report and we’re now in the sales process with
him. Done and done.

Example: Inbound call - Investment Fund
I received another inbound call via our 1-877—line. The call inquired if we
had data for the Rental Market.

Me: “Good morning! Altos Research, this is Scott.”

Him: “Hi – I was calling to see if you had data on the rental
market.”

See how he unintentionally laid a trap for me? Our rental data product
was brand new at the time – we just did a press release a month prior and this
new product surfaced in more than half of our sales calls now. I very, very
easily could have responded with an enthusiastic – “Yes we sure do!” – to
which he would have replied – “Okay great – tell me about it? How much is
it?”

Instead, I followed the prescription above – I answered his question
succinctly and then reversed the conversation.

Me: “We sure do – and lots of it (smiling into the phone so he
could hear my friendliness). Tell me a little more about your
question – what exactly are you looking for?”

He (I’ll call him “Jeff” here) was looking for local rental rates over time.
There are plenty of public sources where he was able to view individual rental
listings today, but not what rental rates were a year ago. He needed to develop
a time series of data to show rental rates over time for specific communities

and markets. He concluded his explanation with this question – “Do you
have anything like that?”

Me (with a smile into the phone): "That’s exactly what we do. Will that
be cash, check, or charge?" (Trial close to determine his seriousness.)

Jeff: "Charge probably…" (Bang – we’re in.)

Me: “Great - our rental data is exactly what you just described. We
watch the rental markets every week across the entire country, then
aggregate that rental listings and calculate local statistics by zip code.
Our data goes back several years – how much of a time series do you
need?” (Repeating the criteria so we’re both clear, then asking another
qualifying question.)

Jeff was new with this fund and has been in the housing industry for about
20 years. He was leading a prospective effort with the fund to examine rental
rate changes versus home price changes over same period of time. From
here, we engaged in a friendly banter about research ideas and further
qualification. He specifically asked – “I’d like to see rental price trends for
three bedroom rentals over the past year in Scottsdale, AZ.” He’s developing
an internal presentation, using several markets as case studies. If his
hypothesis appears confirmed, his fund will establish a new fund and require
housing data for regular surveillance of the fund’s assets.

Yes, these are a lot of grueling details about this particular set of needs and
applications of the rental data – and that’s exactly the point. By tip-toeing
around the unintentional trap that Jeff set by his innocuous question – “Do
you have rental data?” - we explored in detail his situation, his criteria, next
actions, how our products fit into his work, and most importantly, how the
rental data product is going to make Jeff look like a rock star at his internal
presentation. He’s brand new with the fund. Think that’s just a little bit of
pressure there? We’re helping him fire out of the gate with his new
colleagues.

Now that I had the a good picture of where Jeff needed to go with the
rental data, the final step is setting up our initial product demo.3 In this next
call, I would show our rental data for Scottsdale, AZ trended over the past
year with our housing market data.

3
For more on how to lead a killer product demo, see “Great Demo!” by Peter Cohen at
www.secondderivative.com/Reading.html

Remember Sales Tenet #2: Jumping right into a sales demo on the first
call is the kiss of death.

Me: “Jeff, here’s what I recommend – I can put together an example of
our data for Scottsdale and share it with you. How about Wednesday
afternoon at the same time – 4pm Central – for us to hop back on a call
and view it together?”

Jeff: “Wednesday at 4pm – that works perfect. Will you send me a
meeting invite?”

Me: “Yep – It will include a link for screen sharing. I’ll call your office
line. What’s that number?”

Jeff: “It’s (555) XXX-XXXX”

Me: “Great – that’s (555) XXX-XXXX, correct?”

Jeff: “You got it.”

Me: “And what’s your email address?”

Jeff: “It’s Jeff Smith one word spelled G-E-O-F-F-S-M-I-T-H at
bighedgefund dot com.”

Me: “Got it – that’s G-E-O-F-F-S-M-I-T-H at bighedgefund dot com.”

(His name really wasn’t Geoff and he didn’t have an unusual spelling to
his name. I added this to this example to illustrate the point – always,
always, always confirm the information you are recording. It is too easy
to transpose numbers or misspell names. “Greg” vs. “Gregg” and
“Kristine” vs. “Christine.)

After the call, here are the immediate steps I took:

1. Sent the meeting invite. Google calendar rocks. I included a clear
explanation of the meeting and objective, and included a reminder
email. Remember – Geoff is a busy guy. He needs to see his
calendar every day and remember EXACTLY why he has this
time booked with you or you introduce the risk of a blow-off
regardless of how interested Geoff may seem on this inbound
call.

2. Searched for Geoff on LinkedIn. I want to know more about him
for the next call – his background, previous employers, where he
studied. All of this adds to my fundamental understanding of
Geoff and offers an opportunity to ask more questions about
him.

3. Added Geoff to my CRM, including all of his contact information,
his LinkedIn profile, and added him to our monthly marketing
drip.

Advanced Example: Inbound email & phone call - Investment Fund
We received this inbound email:

I’m interested to take a premium subscription for the counties San
Francisco, CA, Manhattan County, NY, Hudson County, NJ and
Suffolk County, MA. However before making any payments, I want to
be sure of exactly what information we will have access to.

We are looking to get hold of very in depth research in specific areas of
these counties. For example we want to be able to see what recent sales
there have been in downtown Manhattan for a particular condominium
size and what rent can be expected to be achieved for these condominium
sizes in the financial district.

I noticed you have price trends graphs for the whole county but do you
have data which would allow us to break this down to specific
neighbourhoods in the county? For example SOMA in San Francisco or
Jersey City in Hudson County?

If you could provide me with example data you provide or if we could have
a remote online run through that would be great.

This is an inbound lead from a fund located overseas (Southeast Asia). We
don't get too many international leads and the obvious time difference makes
a call back squirrelly. The email is very specific and a delightful one to receive.
The prospect has given us a huge amount of information. They:

 Spent time on our website.
 Gave us an idea of how much data they need – a specific number of
metros and markets instead of the entire country, plus telling us at
what geographic level they need data. In this case, it micro-market
data (i.e. the SOMA neighborhood in San Francisco).
 Asked about "recent sales" and rental rates. We have rental data but
not "recent sales."
 Were open to a phone call.

Here are the actions that would cause you to fall into the lazy man’s trap:

1. You could respond to his specific questions in an email. "We have
rental data, though we can't help you with the recent sales."
2. You reply back and say - "Great! Here are a few files to check out" -
then email a bunch of data files that won't make sense.
3. Set up a call and then jump right into a demo of the data and tools
that we have.

On the surface, this seems like an easy one, but as Butch Porter, my first
sales manager affectionately told me - "There's a million ways to f&*K up a
sale." Our rep went the email route. He acknowledged receipt and
immediately prompted for a phone call. (Looking back, I would have
preferred our sales rep respond with a phone call instead of an email. See
Chapter 2 – “Pick up the Phone.” Sometimes inbound emails do not include
phone numbers of the sender, so you’re stuck with no choice but to reply
electronically.) His reply:

I'd be more than happy to answer your questions regarding your real estate data needs. I
am located in California (Pacific Standard Time) so please let me know when you could
jump on a phone call!

The prospect replied back quickly to our returned email and we
established a call time and sent a meeting invite. We DID NOT include web
meeting or screen-sharing information in the meeting invite – this was
intentionally going to be a phone call only so that we could ask questions to
identify specific prospects needs and develop an organized sales process.

To do so in this case, or any case, you must implement a questioning
framework. A questioning framework creates a structure around your
communication and interaction with your prospect, enabling you to control
the conversation and identify opportunities for your product to solve the
prospect’s core business issue. I recommend using the “SPIN”4 framework -
Situation, Problem, Implication, Need-Payoff:

 Situation questions gather background information and develop
understanding of the context of the sale. Examples:
o “What enterprise software solution do you use currently?”
o “How many users of your existing platform are in your
company?”
o “When was the last time that you integrated a new enterprise
software solution?”
o “Do you host your current product locally, or is it cloud-
based?”
 Problem questions prod at customer problems, dissatisfactions, or
short-comings with their existing process. Example:
o “If your current enterprise software only enables you to enter
data into the system but not export it, how does that affect
the work flow of you team?”
o “Because you’re hosting your current product in use locally,
what sort of headaches does that cause for your IT team?”
 Implication questions identify and isolate specific problems with
their current process, products, and vendors. These questions set up
the Need-Payoff questions where your product solves the problems
you’ve help the prospect identify. Examples:
o “If your IT team is pushing back on requests that you make to
upgrade the system or export the data, what sort of time
costs does that create for your sales team?”

4
“SPIN Selling” by Neil Rackham. (McGraw-Hill, 1988)

o “If you’re not able to export your data, are there situations
where you feel that your team is missing key information
for their daily work decisions?”
 Need-Payoff questions uncover the value and ability of your product
to solve the implied need you’ve now established with the prospect.
Example:
o “By making your data exportable from your enterprise
software solutions, how much would that increase
productivity and avoid poor decisions for your team?”

→ IMPORTANT NOTE: It is unlikely that you will be able to walk
through this entire questioning framework in a single call. You’ll
find that your questions will be more oriented around “Situation”
and “Problem” at first, only later in subsequent calls will you be
able to decipher what “Implication” and “Need-Payoff” questions
to ask.

Your goal in using this framework to develop a clear structure
around your interaction with your prospects. By using SPIN, you
will both identify yourself as a professional to your prospect, while
uncovering the precise reasons for their interest in your product.

Now back to our Hong Kong fund…. In this case, we set up a phone call
to discuss their data needs. Then, we prepared a series of “Situation”
questions that will be crucial to learn about their business needs and how our
products will fill those needs:

1. Is this fund is currently investing in properties, or are they a research
team that feeds data and intelligence to other parts of the company?
2. Do they have an active fund now, or are they starting a fund?
3. Why did they ask specifically for "recent sales" and rental data? 90%
of our inbound leads ask for a specific product, but they really just
need a solution to their problem.

On the call, we asked them:

1. "What type of analysis are you doing?" - and they told us that what
they were up to.
2. “How are you going about your research and analysis now?”

It turned out that they were currently using a consumer website to look at
rental data, and the Case-Shiller Home Price Index for housing data. They
asked as they closed their explanation – “So how are you guys different?”

Bingo. Now that I knew the Situation (in part that is, because you will
never know the entire customer situation out of the gate - there will
ALWAYS be more that you will discover as you spend more time with
prospects. See Chapter 6 – “More Sales Process.”), we now had a place to
begin our Problem, Implication, and Need-Payoff questions while
establishing differentiation of our product compared to their current
resources (referring again to the SPIN Selling formula).

Me: "Here's where we're different – the consumer website you
mentioned is just that – a consumer website which makes access to the
underlying data difficult for analytical purposes like you described. If
you're doing any sort of heavy spreadsheet analysis or modeling, the data
becomes unusable because they only display the data in online charts and
graphs. Case-Shiller is an excellent indicator of the housing market,
however we often hear the frustration with the fact that it lags the
market by two months and is only available at the metropolitan level.
You can’t get micro-level data, say by zip code or community, like that
type you need for your local analysis.”

(Admission - I jumped in a little quick and made the assumption that
these were our differentiating factors. Fortunately, they immediately
agreed with an emphatic "Yes!" so I knew we have our selling position
set.)

Now, there's a second trap - jumping right into a demo. In their email, we
knew they had specific markets (NYC, Jersey City, San Francisco) and specific
data types - recent sales and rental data. We could have queued up that data
before the sales call and had it ready to show. In this initial call, we could
have powered through these SPIN questions and said - "OK - I think I've got
it - let me show you my screen" then launched a GoToMeeting or Join.me on
the fly. The correct way to handle this is to hold off and set another time to
talk with the prospect unless you discover that there is a very specific time
constraint for their decision process. If you’re selling enterprise software,
software-as-a-service, data-as-a-service, or any type of business-to-business
solution, the initial call is just that – an initial call. This will be a protracted
sales process. You are not going to sell $100,000 enterprise software package
over the phone during an initial inbound phone call. By establishing a clear
process, you’ll be in control of the conversation and pace of the relationship.

I know you have a tremendous fear out that if you let the prospect go
without a demo on that initial call, they'll never come back. Here are a couple
of truths:

1. If they demand a demo right away, then you haven't developed the
correct level of rapport, shown them the level of your
professionalism, and relayed importance of your product.

You have to take the lead in the conversation. In this case, we had
very affable prospects - they were inquisitive and interested, and were
willing to take our lead.

2. If they blow off or miss the second call, they weren't a real lead
anyway - they were just browsing. Of course, you absolutely want to
turn browsers into buyers by establishing an immediate need using
good questions. However, if you can't get there, or they're not a
willing participant, then let the browser browse, be nice, and then
give them a call in a week with: "I was thinking about our
conversation and I had a couple of ideas based on an article I just
read" approach. (See Chapter 2 – “Pick up the Phone” and Chapter 3
- “Find Your Voice”) Totally legitimate. This gives you a chance to
reset the conversation and more importantly, take the lead back in
the relationship instead of letting them push you around.

The demo call should be a quick turnaround, and it can even be the same
day if you can put together an effective custom demo for the prospect. In
our case, we wanted to export data files for these markets and clean up the
data files into a pretty spreadsheet. We asked them for the same time two
days later.

A Note on Establishing Rapport
As we started our conversation on the demo call with our Hong Kong
prospect two days later, I opened the conversation with - "I was checking out
your LinkedIn profile. Looks like you’re from Boston." This is a wonderfully
effective question, especially for me because I'm an East Coaster from the
Philadelphia area. Philadelphia and Boston people have an odd ability to
understand each other. Maybe it’s the weather, the grind, the long-suffering
sports fans. I know that I can most engage anyone from Boston and develop
a connection.

He said he's not from Boston, but spent about five years there. The rest
of the conversation:

Him: "I'm originally from New York. You?"

Me: "Jersey." (With a wry smile that I knew he could hear over the
phone)

Him: "What part - North Jersey, South Jersey?"

Me: "South Jersey near Philly." (Again with a smile)

Him: "That's cool. My parents go down to this little town on the Jersey
Shore called Ocean City."

Me: "You've got to be kidding me. I'm flying to Ocean City tomorrow
for Christmas. My parents just retired – they’ve had a little beach house
down there for 20 years."

We chatted some more about local pizza joints, the boardwalk, and salt
water taffy. True story. And all because I asked him about himself.5 And
when was in Ocean City, I bought a box of salt water taffies and sent to him.

These guys are now customers.

What about the “No-Talkers” and “How much is it?”

For the 1% that ardently resist your attempt to engage in a conversation -
"Just tell me if you have that product" - remember to be nice and smile, then
tell them - "Yep we sure do." Then they might ask - "How much is it?"

In my company’s case, the answer is always "it depends" because it really
does. I tell people that - "It depends. We have some clients that pay us more
than $200,000 a year and others that pay $200 a month. Everyone is
different. Can you tell me a little more about what you're doing so I can give
you a more specific answer?" (I start with the $200,000 number to set a high
anchor price in case it is a very large fund. We get many random inbound
calls ranging from research analysts at billion dollar hedge funds to individual
investors buying 1-2 properties at a time. If I go the other way – “We have
some clients that pay us $200 a month and others that pay $200,000 a year.” –
the big funds will immediately begin thinking about how they can get off
cheaply.)

5
See: "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie.

In this case, you're using their frame of reference to lead them to where
you really want to go - learning about their business and needs. They want to
know pricing, so use that as the carrot to get them to where you need to go.

They may ask - "Can you just send me a price sheet?" Be nice. Smile. Then
tell them - "We don't have a price sheet because of all of the iterations of
customers and products we have, plus the custom work we do for clients.
What sort of work do you do? What is your primary industry focus?" By
offering choices, now you are forcing them to think about who they are, or
aren't, and in most cases this will prompt them to reply with something like -
"We're an online retailer for used bicycle parts." This is far more information
than someone calling with the first words – “I was on your website – how
much is your software?”

Take the conversation down this path until you get something you can
latch onto for a more robust conversation to assess their needs and establish
their buying criteria. Ninety percent of the time, this will work with the 1%
that are difficult. For the rest, just let them go. They’re not worth it right
now. Get their email address and send them some basic information on
pricing without getting specific, then add them to your marketing drip.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #1: For inbound calls and leads, find out why the
prospect is inquiring about your product and has interest in your
service.

Sales Tenet #2: Jumping right into a sales demo on the first call
is the kiss of death



2 - PICK UP THE PHONE

Sales Tenet #3: Use the telephone as the default mode of
communication.

Several years ago, I worked in a commercial real estate office in downtown
San Francisco. There were four senior brokers, each had their own
personality and style. The most successful broker had his cubicle in the back
right corner. He was there every morning when I arrived at 8am and was
already on the phone by then. On a slow day, he probably made 40 phone
calls. On a slow day. One after the other. It sounded like he knew every
person he called for ten years, and every call had a purpose ranging from
finalizing contract details to calling contacts that still had three years
remaining on their lease with a competing brokerage.

After a six-month consulting stint, I thought about going full-time in the
office, so I sat down with this broker to ask him if he thought I’d be
successful. He asked me – “Do you know the most distinguishing trait your
have?” I went through the normal list – determination, hard work,
organization. He answered – “Your voice. Your voice is perfect for the
phone.”

Now I don’t know if he was talking to me individually, or simply telling
me – “Listen – if you want to be successful, you need to pick up the phone.”
This guy was generally a luddite – I don’t think he really knew how to use
email and I know he didn’t know how to use the fax machine and copier. Yet
it didn’t matter – it was all about the phone and building personal
relationships.

You should use email – it’s efficient for sharing information and
managing projects, but when you are developing a prospect and a
relationship, use every single opportunity you can to PICK UP THE
PHONE.

6

Handling an Inbound lead
Got this email from a person I’d been contacting for about a year:

Hi Scott,

I won't be attending the ASF conference this year, but there is some
renewed interest on the team at looking at aggregated data. We are
currently reviewing statistics versus HPI data we subscribe to for several
vendors. Is there a chance you could provide whatever zip code data you
have available for 93550 for review with whatever history you are
comfortable providing? We are reviewing the full history for this zip code
versus HPI to help us determine whether the data is worthwhile for our
broader investment platform.

Thanks,

XXXXX

6
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/CandlestickTelephoneGal.jpg

Even though the email is extremely specific, it’s vital to understand why
they are reviewing the data they are receiving from their current vendors.
This will establish their buying criteria.

So what you do here? PICK UP THE PHONE. This allowed me to ask
“Situation” questions and begin establishing decision criteria.

This email was the start of a six-month sales process that ended up with
this prospect becoming a very large customer. What if I would have just
emailed back with a sample data file from this zip code? The prospect would
have had no idea what they were viewing and as a result, would have made
assumptions. He could have taken four minutes to review it and said – “Oh
well, not what we needed.” By having a conversation and asking “Situation”
questions, I learned and developed the criteria for their decision. PICK UP
THE PHONE.

Using Minutiae to Build Rapport
In a recent sales interview, we executed a Situational call extremely well.
We had the COO and two product managers on the phone. The agreed-upon
next step was a review of a property portfolio that the prospect would supply
to us by Friday, indicating clear interest because they agreed to do some work
and they did it.

However, the property list was cut and pasted into an email - we prefer to
receive files in Excel or .CSV file because reduces the administrative work on
our end. Not a big deal but a nice-to-have as it saves us 15-20 minutes and
enables us to start training the prospective early in the process about how our
systems work with file formats and the order of column headings. The easiest
option was an email reply - "Thanks for sending. Do you have this in an
Excel file?..." But what's the problem with this?

1. It makes us look lazy or that we’re appending requirements to the
test file.
2. The sample file was sent on Friday, just before a long holiday
weekend. If we send an email, they might not get the email before
the weekend, in which case we burn a few days turning this around.
We want to keep the momentum going on this opportunity.

The solution? PICK UP THE PHONE. What does this accomplish?

1. Uncovers additional decision criteria. We’ve only had the one call so
far. Whether your prospect realizes it or not, they are still developing

the criteria around which their decision will be made and haven’t told
you the whole story. A second call offers this opportunity.

→ IMPORTANT NOTE: The decision criteria is a formative
process, always requiring multiple customer interactions to
determine. (See Chapter 6 – “More Sales Process”)

2. Differentiates you and trains your customer. Everyone is bombarded
with email. If you get in the habit of talking on the phone with a
prospect early in the process, they'll then expect it from you and will
take your calls every time. If they’ve been taking your calls
consistently throughout the sales process, it will also be more difficult
for them to screen or avoid your calls when you reach a low point
during the ebb and flow of the sales process. If they do start
screening, then you have a clear signal that’s something’s going
horribly wrong in the sales process.

3. Grows the personal relationship. We can have another conversation
with the prospect - an opportunity to further the relationship. We've
only had the one call with this company - it was productive and
concluded with an advance, and both sides were professionally
engaged and interested in each other. However, we didn't get
personal to begin constructing the peer-to-peer relationship. A phone
call in this scenario offers the opportunity to do this – chatting about
the holidays, the long weekend, or plans for New Year's Eve.

4. Facilitates visualization product usage. We know they have some
urgency in filling this need and how they envision using it because we
asked the question - "How do you see yourself using this data?" –
during the initial call. A second call will inevitably offer the
opportunity for you to confirm what your prospect shared with you
in their answer during the first call. “Tell me again – how do you see
yourself using this data?” or “You mentioned that you saw yourself
using this data for such-and-such reason. Were there any other
places where it might fit?” Yes, it is completely legitimate to ask the
same question again. You are helping the prospect solve a very hard
problem with your product or service. This should not and cannot
be taken lightly. To be a true professional, recapping information is
an excellent way to show that you are focused on helping the
prospect solve their very hard problem.

Ultimately, the result of this call about the file submission enabled our
sales rep to learn about the number of portfolios that the customer was

managing. More volume means greater need for automation and analysis.
Now we knew volume, which emphasized the prospect’s needs and gave us
the chance to think through pricing options well in advance of that eventual
piece of the conversation. Our rep ended up doing the manual cut and paste
for the customer, which still accomplished the objective of training the
customer – “When you’re working with your online account, you’ll be
uploading a .CSV file of your properties.”

Using Minutiae to Build Rapport II
Our same sales rep was working a pretty large deal with a new customer. We
went through four or five calls and our initial product demo to set the course
of the opportunity and establish the criteria. The two main contacts with the
prospective client were in two different cities and time zones. Add in my
time to sit in on the sales calls, and we’re juggling four schedules to identify a
time for the next conversation. Naturally our rep was having some difficulty
finding a time. He asked me – “What should I do?” I answered – “PICK UP
THE PHONE.”

He did, then fifteen minutes later grabbed to tell me how great the call
went. They ended up talking about coffee and personal fitness training, and
set a time for the next call. Now he had more relationship capital with the
prospect.

It’s simple - PICK UP THE PHONE.

Example: The Daily Call
Working with a billion dollar hedge fund last year, our sales rep became so
intertwined with the project leader at the prospect's company that he was
calling every day as the decision day loomed to answer the prospect’s
questions and check on the project’s status. Even after working with them for
nearly four months through the sales process, the prospect’s team was still
identifying criteria based on the products and services available to them from
various vendors. After our rep called the prospect’s project leader on
Wednesday skipping a day on Tuesday, the project leader said - "What
happened? I missed my daily call from you yesterday!" He was joking, sort of,
and that's the point - the relationship was that strong. And yes, we got the
business. They immediately became one of our biggest clients. PICK UP
THE PHONE.

Use the News
Here’s a little secret – you’re allowed to talk to your prospects about more
than just your product and their requirements. Be human. (See Chapter 3 –
“Find Your Voice”) As you find new information about the industry, think

about the secondary and tertiary effects to the market, your clients, and
prospects.

Be smart about this. In our industry, there are very public
announcements from various home price indices. Everyone sees these and
reads them. Even better, look for the nooks and crannies of information –
material that your very busy prospect hasn’t had a chance to read.
Alternately, use the headlines and ask your prospects this question:

“How does this affect your business?”

This shows genuine interest on your behalf for their business and you
will learn all kinds of information that would never surface in a sales call.

Example: Use the News
Here’s an example from my industry. (Pay no attention to the specifics
of my industry here – just focus on the outcome). A “Too Big to Fail” bank
(TBTF) announced that they were experimenting with REO Sales in
managing their distressed mortgage portfolio. This was potentially a very big
opportunity for the distressed investment funds in the market because it
presented a slew of new product for them to purchase. I made four phone
calls that afternoon – three to existing clients and one to a prospective client
– to ask them “How does this affect your business?”. I got voicemail for the
three clients.

Prospective Client: Picked up the phone.

Me: "Hi _____ - Scott Sambucci over at Altos Research. Got a
minute?"

Prospect: "Yeah, actually I do. What's up?"

Bingo - I'm in. I asked about the REO program and how it might
affect his business. He didn't even know about the TBTF REO sale
program and said that this was exactly in their sweet spot for their
investment fund. I learned a number of new aspects about his company -
they have several verticals, including one that focuses on REO asset
disposition and property preservation. I told him about another one of
our clients focusing on REO purchases - that they were contracting with a
company I knew that company also does property preservation services.
"Yeah - they're one of our competitors." New information.

We talked more about the distressed asset market more generally. I
learned that many times banks combine non-performing notes with REOs
in the same pool, so this prospect’s company likes to co-bid with other
firms then they split out the pool based on the assets they want
respectively. Bingo. Now this is a chance for me to add value to both this
prospective company and the aforementioned client by putting them
together. Our other client is focusing only on specific geographic markets,
so this could be an ideal situation for them to access product in pools
where they would be individually blocked because they might include
notes or properties in markets outside of their focus. That’s real
information for both sides because I chose to PICK UP THE PHONE.

For the other three calls where I left voicemails:

Existing Client #1: My voicemail was specific and to the point - that I read
the TBTF announcement, that I remembered that this bank was a client
of theirs, and I thought this new initiative might impact their business.
Then I sent an email following the voicemail. The client replied to my
email with his thoughts and perspectives on the announcement, then
asked me if I was planning to attend the upcoming conference and he
proposed that we get together there. Bingo. This client has been
particularly valuable as they were early adopters of a product we launched
last year, patiently working through several technical issues with us.

Existing Client #2: He called me back and the conversation started:

"Things are good - we're doing a lot on the REO side, and I don't
know if you saw the news, but we just got a big investment to help us
develop the mortgage side of the business." He shared that their
mortgage platform business is going well and off we went on the
conversation. We talked about TBTF’s pilot program on REO disposition
and I got his opinion on that. I shared a few other opinions that I'd
picked up over the last week from other people. This showed my
creditability in the market and my sincere interest in the market and
industry.

As we talked more, he shared that his company was in the final round
of vendors to be selected by TBTF for REO disposition. They are
currently managing thousands of these properties for them every month.
As we talked through this process, we uncovered that our company could
significantly improve their process with our data. New sales opportunity!
(Within an hour after the call he sent me sample portfolio for me to show

him how it works. He showed me he's serious by reciprocating with doing
some work - it's not just all on me to pull, pull, pull - it's collaborative.)

When we were wrapping up the call, he mentioned a new company
that recently formed as a possible buyer of our data. Free referral! I told
him about a client of ours based near him that has a business model that
he’d be interested in hearing about, so I’m setting up that introduction.

How did all of this come about? Because I thought to pick up the
phone based on the news headlines. PICK UP THE PHONE

Client #3: Never heard back from him. Three out of four ain’t too
shabby.

Use the news as a reason to PICK UP THE PHONE.

Billing Issues
We picked up a new customer that was building a set of our technology
tools into their new product. In short, they became a value-added reseller
(VAR) of our products.

It was a start-up product line for them and they wanted a flexible payment
schedule. We reached an agreement quickly and set up their account. We
usually set up payment on a forward basis due on receipt - customers pay for
September's services on September 1, not at of the end of the month in
arrears. This customer wanted to pay in arrears. Okay, no problem - 30 days
is no big deal. We sent the invoice at the end of September due on receipt.
The end of October came and went, and by November 1, we'd been working
with the customer and supporting them for two months without no payment.

Our rep asked me what we should do. I think you know the answer by
now – PICK UP THE PHONE.

So he did. It took a couple of voicemails and a bit of email banter. The
customer finally returned our rep’s contact attempts. It turns out the
customer assumed 30-day net terms, for the September invoice which was
already billed in arrears by 30 days. Our rep politely explained that our billing
is due on receipt and we've already extended payment a month - a decision
that was particularly risky for us given that the prospect’s company was a
start-up and we've been fronting engineering time and support for the
account. The customer wasn’t very happy to hear this initially, but the more
they talked, the more the customer understood. He sent the September

payment that week. We received the October payment in mid-December -
much better.

There is no way this type of understanding happens over email. Imagine
if we went the email route going back and forth and back and forth trying to
explain our billing policy. The customer would be reading emails from us
about payment and billing, asking himself – “Why are these guys so difficult
to work with? I sent the payment 30 days after receiving the invoice like I do
with all of my other vendors. Maybe I need to find another option for this
part of my platform.” We circumvented all of this because we chose to PICK
UP THE PHONE. (See more about billing issues in Chapter 9 – “Revenue
Matters”)

Leaving Voicemails
Michael Pedone at Salesbuzz.com is the man. Spend thirty minutes and listen
to this recorded webinar (it’s free!):

www.salesbuzz.com/free-demo/voicemail-strategies.aspx

He covers everything you need to know. I’ve listened and re-listened to
many of his recordings. There’s no one better in the business when it comes
to phone sales and concepts.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #3: Use the telephone as the default communication
mode.

Sales Tenet #4: The decision criteria is a formative process,
always requiring multiple customer interactions to determine.



3 – FIND YOUR VOICE

Sales Tenet #4: Speak human.

Your voice follows you everywhere – your phone calls, your emails, your
company website, your blog, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Find your voice to build
loyalty and expertise by being personal and speaking human - wherever and
whenever you have the opportunity to do so.

7

Breaking down the walls on the phone
When you’re waiting on the phone to start a phone demo of your product,
never, ever ask “So how's the weather out there?” First of all, chances are

7
By Pirlouiiiit from Marseille, France (crop of Stade_Pavarotti_2b) [CC-BY-SA-2.0
(www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

that it's either too hot, too cold, or really, really nice and the person wishes
they were anywhere else other than in their cubicle talking to you. Secondly,
you can check the weather if you really want to know.

Here's a thought - go to their LinkedIn profile and ask them something
specific about themselves. People are darn proud of their accomplishments
and relish when people ask them something about them. For example, I just
randomly pulled up the LinkedIn profile for my contacts. He went to
Humboldt State University for his undergraduate degree, then immediately
went to the University of Arizona for his Masters degree. That's a big change.
Next time I talk to him, I'm asking him -

"Hey ____, I was checking out your LinkedIn profile. I didn't
know you went to Humboldt State. Then you went right to
Tucson. How was that? Must of been quite a change."

Here's another example - a Wall Street contact went to high school and
college in Wisconsin, then his first job out of school was in Wisconsin --

"Hi ______. You know, I never realized that you were from Wisconsin.
I saw that you went to University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse then your first
job out of school was in Madison. I'm an East Coaster - What was it like
growing there?"

Next, learn the transition from the niceties to the business conversation
without a structural break in your tone and demeanor. Otherwise, your
questions about them will immediately seem insincere. Something like:

"Wow, that's really interesting. I visited Appleton for a friend's wedding
and traveled to Milwaukee for business a few times, but I've never spent
any real time in upstate Wisconsin. I was just looking at our market data
for Madison - looks like it's a pretty stable market overall. Maybe it's
the university that keeps demand somewhat steady?"

Now you've transitioned into the business conversation. You might let
him run a bit if he wants to talk more about Wisconsin - that's okay. You've
introduced the business lightly to him and then you can say something like:

"That pretty neat. I'm not sure if any of the loans you sent to us are in
Wisconsin, but let's take a look.'

When you are calling into your leads and prospects, be friendly, be
professional, and be human. Have a conversation - don't talk in sales speak.

It's not your words that sell - it's your preparation, your questions, your
comprehension of the prospect’s problems, and your actions to solve them.
Yes, you need to talk about the product and talk about their business, but you
have to do it in a comfortable way. If you talk in sales speak, your prospects
will feel like they’re getting pitched. This is particularly important when you
have a scheduled call or web meeting for a product demo. Your prospects will
instinctively bait you into pitching.

For example, here’s a typical start to a web meeting once all of the
attendees have arrived:

You: “So should we get started?”

Prospect: “Yep, I’m all ears – fire away with your pitch. Should I be
seeing a PowerPoint slide or something on my screen?”

You first instinct on from the sales side is to acquiesce to the prospects
expectations to “hear a pitch.” You must resist. If you hear this from your
prospect, then:

You: “A pitch? Hmmm…. [with a smile of course]. Well I was more
prepared for a conversation we’d have as we go along. We’re both going
to have questions for each other, so I expect you’ll be doing as much
talking as me so we can take our walk-through in the direction that suits
your situation best.”

Now you’ve altered the path and developed a unique voice for yourself
in the way your demonstrate your product, not to mention that an interactive
conversation is the one way to develop the prospect and define his decision
criteria.

Send Thank You cards
As a textbook sales representative with Prentice Hall, I wrote out up to 50-60
of these every Saturday morning - one for everyone I met in person that
week. The cards where custom postcards that I had printed at OfficeMax
with the company logo, my return address, and the heading "Just A Note...".
The notes I mailed were simple:

Dr. Brown - Thank you for your time on Tuesday. As promised, I've order a review
copy of Dessler's "Human Resource Management" for you. I'll be visiting your
department in about two weeks and will be sure to stop by to get your thoughts.

Talk to you then!

-Scott Sambucci

I also used these cards when I stopped by a professor's office and they
weren't there. I'd slip one under the door -

Dr. Smith - Sorry to miss you today. You should have received your copy of
Freeman's "Anatomy & Physiology" that I ordered after my last visit. I'll send you
an email tonight and perhaps we can find a time to chat on the phone.

Thanks!

-Scott Sambucci

The most rewarding moment came when I bumped into a competing
sales representative in the halls of UNC-Charlotte's Business School one day.
We were chatting and she saw my stack of empty cards in my bag’s side
pouch. The competing rep said - "Just a note. [in a mimicked voice] I see
those things everywhere!" Exactly. It would have been just as easy for her to
do them. But she didn't. And that's the point. Take an extra 60 seconds to
handwrite a note and send it. You can buy a box of 50 ‘Thank You’ cards for
$5.00 at WalMart. If you want to splurge, go to a local stationary store or go
to Zazzle.com and have custom ones printed up with your logo and shipped
to your door. Absolutely have these professionally printed. Print them on nice
card stock. Do not print them at home with a laser printer. It'll cost you less
than $100 to have a huge stack.

More recently, I sat down after the an industry conference this Fall.
Over three days, I visited, talked, and met with about 40 people. When I got
back to the office, I blocked out a morning and wrote out thank you cards to
every single person and mailed them. A week later I received a voicemail from
my main contact at a very large investment fund that I’d been working for
more than ten months:

"Scott hi, this is _____ from ______ and thanks for much for your card. It is the
one and only handwritten thank you note I received from the conference. It's so
unique. But that's not why I'm calling. I wanted to just refresh my memory about
what, you know sort of ball park bare bones pricing and service would be. I can
describe to you what our immediate need is and I think that you know we would
benefit from more than we have immediately and so I just wanted to get some idea of
pricing and packages. If you can give me a call back on XXX-XXX-XXXX.
Thanks. Bye"

The only handwritten note he received. I still smile about that.

Here’s another example from my interaction with a sales representative
at a prospective client…

I was developing a very good relationship with the senior managers as
they were pushing through the sales process. The managers kindly invited me
to a closed dinner with their clients so that I could get to know the company
some more as part of the work we'd been discussing. This prospective client
was developing a new product package that would include our services as part
of the product suite - a huge differentiator in their otherwise commoditized
market. Their sales representative would be selling this package to their end
clients.

We met at the dinner, but things were a little cold. Rightfully so - she
didn't really know who I was or why some other salesperson from another
company was at their dinner. After the conference, I sent her a simple note
thanking her for the conversation. A week later, she greeted me warmly in an
email:

Scott,

First, thank you for the very nice thank you note! It was a pleasure also to
meet you.

Second, I saw you are going to the _____ event next week in _____. When
do you get in? We are sponsoring a dinner Saturday night and sent you an
invite. You may not get in until Sunday. Do you want to also try to get
together on Monday for coffee? I guess I need to find out if ____ is going….if
so, then maybe we can all do dinner Sunday night.

Thanks,

Did I misread the frostiness at dinner? Sure I did. She was probably
pretty stressed out in a room full of clients having dinner with her
managers and the company's CEO. But with the thank you card, I was
in for sure.

→ IMPORTANT NOTE: People that think your thank you
cards are cheesy or silly are not nice people. You don't want
to work with them anyway. Move on.

Example: Onsite Workshop
At a very large investor client, after establishing the first-level relationship and
establishing them as clients, we reached a more direct level in the relationship.
Phone calls were collaborative. They asked me questions. I asked them
questions. We were on the same team. I also made it a point to meet and
talk with as many people at their company as I could. In July, I was at an
academic conference where I met with a senior manager in another division.
We chatted and had a very pleasant conversation. (Yes, I sent him a thank
you note afterwards.)

It turned out that this person organizes monthly workshops where key
managers from every division meet together for a presentation. That
collaboration led to an invitation to present to 30+ of the smartest people at
the company. One person kept peppering me questions, especially about
one of our data sets. They were really good questions - very precise and fair.
I think I answered them in a clear, direct way, but spoke candidly and
humanly. Later at lunch, my main contact at the account said - "Oh yeah.
That guy asking all the questions was our chief economist." Oh. Thanks for
letting me know.

Two months later, I received an unsolicited email from the workshop
organizer to ask me about our new product. He's on an Advisory Committee
to review these products. I talked with him about his requirements and then
called my main contact to discuss next steps. In the course of this
conversation, my main contact explained how he's been cleared to hire eight
new people and needs consulting help. We do that too. Our onsite meeting
is set up for later this month.

By developing a voice and a relationship, I got to a point where I had
access to the most senior managers and the entire modeling team to discuss
implementation and uses of our products, and the opportunity to introduce
them to a new product we were rolling out later that year.

Cheekiness
One step beyond “speaking human” is “cheekiness.” If you can get cheeky
with your customers and contacts, and it flows naturally, then you’ve
developed a unique voice. Here’s an example of an Linkedin message I sent
to a prospect that we got to know pretty well throughout the sales process.
The process stalled a little when we got to the contract phase both sides
awaited their legal team’s review of the licensing agreement (See Chapter 11 –
“Negotiation & Contracts”). I thought I’d try to motivate the prospect to
overcome this hurdle with some cheekiness:

Hi ____ - Thanks for accepting my invitation to connect here on LinkedIn.

John forwarded me the email you sent over - we're ready to get started when you
are.

But just so you know, I told John [our sales rep] that he's not allowed to leave
the office until we have the agreement finished. You should see him - he hasn't
shaved in more than 12 days and his clothes are wearing thin. I brought him a
change of socks the other day because it was getting pretty bad.

The good news is that the HVAC is coming to fix the heat soon, so at least he
won't be cold sleeping under his desk at night now. And he can do all of his
Christmas shopping online.

Talk soon,

-Scott S.

The contract’s still taken longer to finalize than we’d like, but the point is
that we reached a point in our working relationship where I felt comfortable
sending this note to him. He laughed about it.

Find your voice.

Social Platforms
I absolutely, positively recommend choosing 2-3 media platforms and
becoming active. Personally, I use our company blog, a personal blog,
Twitter, and LinkedIn. The blogs enable me to share perspectives and
industry expertise in detail, while Twitter and LinkedIn allow for sharing these
posts and for daily interactions with customers.

I post links to my blog posts on my LinkedIn Profile page so that
anyone the finds me on LinkedIn (your prospects and customers will Google
stalk you…), can learn more about me beyond my online resume.

Groups on LinkedIn can be effective but often get spammy very quickly
so be careful spending too much time on these. That said, one of our sales
reps set up a group - “Residential Mortgage Backed Securities (RMBS).”
Given that many of our contacts in the industry use Linkedin for their
resumes, I was surprised to see that this particular group had not yet been
established. We now have 375+ members in the group. For an upcoming
industry conference, I posted a quick thought to facilitate interaction:

This sort of work only takes a few minutes once you get in the flow and
now we have 375+ people in the RMBS community that we can reach with a
post or a message. Even if 3-4 of these people actually read the discussion
posts and respond, that is 3-4 more people that we reached.

Find your voice, and remember:

Sales Tenet #4: Speak human.



4 – THE SALES PROCESS: PROSPECTING & NEW
CALLS
Sales Tenet #5: A lead is only a person of interest. A prospect is
a qualified individual for whom your product or service is a clear
match.

Cold Calls vs. New Calls
By definition, a cold call is an outbound sales call to someone with whom
you’ve never spoken, nor do you know if that person has heard of or is aware
of your company or service. In business selling, you must make outbound
calls to people you don’t know, but not cold calls.

Making a cold call means grabbing a phone book or a purchasing a lead
list from an outside vendor, starting with the As and working through the Zs.
This is telemarketing, not selling, and this type of cold calling is a complete
waste of time. Never ever cold call. If your business relies on cold calls, stop
reading this book or find a new business.

Instead, you need to make “new calls.” A new call begins by identifying
and targeting individuals through research on company websites, LinkedIn, or
conference attendee lists, then delivering a customized message based on
assessed need and product solutions. They are “new calls” because you are
establishing a new connection with a new person. They are not cold calls
because you should know a considerable amount of information about the
person you are calling first. More so, the person you are calling expects you
to know a significant amount of information about them before you call.

8

Prospecting
If you prospect correctly and circulate in the places where your target
customers circulate, you will never ever have to make a traditional cold call.

Prospecting means that you are:

1. Calling qualified individuals that are engaged with your drip
marketing (opening reports for example), have registered on your
website, and read your blog via RSS.
2. Calling people that are not doing any of these and don’t know that
you or your company exist, but are clearly individuals that can and
should use your product. Despite what it sounds like, this is not cold-
calling.

For our company, we receive 15-20 registrations per day on our website.
Every qualified person receives a phone call from us. Why do I use the term
“qualified person”? Because not every person that falls into #1 above is
qualified. For example, if you’re selling enterprise software targeted at law
firms and a real estate broker registers on your website, you need not call that
person unless you have lots of spare time (which you shouldn’t have).
Someday down the road, after you’ve developed your business in your
industry vertical, then by all means call that person to discover if there are

8
By Tony Oliver from Denver, CO, USA (Prospector) [CC-BY-2.0
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gold_prospector.jpg

applications for your product in another industry. Right now, you need to stay
focused on your target.

Now back to your qualified individuals… Some of these leads will
become prospects. They profusely thank you for calling when they answer,
ask questions about your product or service, are clearly interested, and happily
engage in the sales process with you.

For many others, you'll land in voicemail and usually you won't get a
return call. You can up your percentage significantly with some effort. (See
Chapter 2 – “Pick up the Phone”) When you reach out and make these
phone calls, you are prospecting.

In making these calls, you will find early adopters often because they
found you. These early adopters may have started on Google searching a
specific key word and found you, or they found your blog and company
through Quora or Twitter. These people are gold and establishing the right
path to convert them from Leads to Prospects quickly is critical to building
your sales process and customer base.

When you are prospecting, you will be calling people you've never talked
to before – these are “new calls.” Those people have never heard of you or
your company, and many times they don't know that they have the problem
that you're going to solve for them. When you pick up the phone and call
them, it's still not a cold call - as long as you are prospecting correctly. You
cannot rely on single conference, event, speaking opportunity, press release,
news article, deal, or announcement for sales growth. Sales growth stems
from a clear sales process that begins with sound prospecting.

Outbound Calling & Prospecting
Let’s say you are:

1. Blogging regularly about your industry
2. Sent out a few press releases and free reports
3. Active on Twitter and LinkedIn
4. Dripping to email addresses you've acquired from your conference
and industry research.
5. Getting coverage in TechCrunch

Yet, the phone isn't ringing with people ready to buy your product. This
is normal and this is why you have to prospect. You need to go out and find
people, and most importantly, generate interest by identifying an individual’s
business problem and showing how your product solves that problem.

Now, if you're busy and you have a pipeline of solid sales opportunities
from establishing and sharing your voice, by all means, skip the outbound
calling. However, if you're still not getting the traction and inbound leads you
need, you will need to sit down, buckle up, and start calling people you don't
know. Here’s how you do it:

Establish Call Blocks
These are 3-4 hour blocks of time when you are engaged in targeted calling
activities. I suggest call blocks for a few reasons:

Reason #1: It’s exhausting
If you're prospecting and doing it correctly - doing the research before
the call, presenting ideas to customers during the call, and establishing specific
takeaways for both sides to complete - you should, and will, get tired. This is
a mentally taxing exercise. After 3-4 hours, you'll start slipping because you’ll
forget if you’ve explained something already to the person you’re calling, and
most of all, you will lose enthusiasm and effectiveness as your energy
decreases.

As soon as you notice this, take a break. Go for a walk outside around
the block in the sun or the rain to force your body to change its physical
demeanor. Think about your calls and debrief with yourself. Get frustrated.
It means you care and you're stretching your domain to new customers.

When you get back to your desk, write down notes from your personal
debriefing and start again for another 1-2 hours. If you've done your
prospecting calls the right way, after 3-4 hours of calling, you should have

made 10-15 calls with 2-3 specific future calls established for later in the
week.

Reason #2: You can shut off your email for a couple of hours.
You need to focus on the person you are calling. This is impossible if
you are staring at your email and a new message comes in the queue from
another prospect that is returning your correspondence. You will instantly
become distracted.

Everything else can wait - emails from marketing, engineering, and even
your board members. If they complain about not getting back to them right
away, tell him you were growing the company's revenue. If they still
complain, stop working with that person. (Heck, even just now as I was
editing this section, I jumped over to Twitter for just a second and almost
clicked on the headline about Yahoo! announcing its new CEO!) If a
customer emails you and says 'EMAIL ME RIGHT AWAY!' then you
haven't trained them properly to use customer service.

Turn it off.

Reason #3: Master your schedule.
It becomes predictable for everyone else around you in the company.
Your developers and employees will learn not to bother you when you're in a
call block. You become master of your schedule.

Tips for Successful Time Blocks
1. Have your call list prepared and printed in hard copy. This will give a
targeted list so you aren’t wasting time digging around in your CRM
for the contact info of people you want to call next. Plus there is a
95% probability that you'll get distracted while in your CRM with
something else - another lead comes in, you realized you hadn't called
so-and-so in a month, you see that you forgot to include the URL of
an account in their profile and decide to take two seconds to do that.
These are all unnecessary distractions.

2. Use post it notes so that you can see your progress. Develop a color
coding system if you need to – green for calls that lead to a successful
conversation, yellow for a contact made but without a significant or
successful conversation, blue for voicemails. Post these on your wall
or window so that you can see your progress during the time block.
When you’re done, use the Post-it notes as a check list of follow-up
requirements for yourself. Whatever your chose, develop some sort
of system that enables you to see the results of your daily work.

3. Set up a reward system for yourself. Once you hit 20 calls, reward
yourself with 5 more calls after you get back from your walk. Then
buy a deluxe coffee instead of your regular small drip for making
your 20 calls. I bring my workout clothes and go to the gym or on a
run after a call block. You should be too mentally tired to do
anything terribly cerebral, so this is a great time to re-energize for the
rest of the day and feel good about yourself. Make a pact with your
development team or office mates – tell them that if you make 20
calls that include 10 contacts and 3 demos scheduled for later in the
week, you’ll take them to lunch. Believe me, whether your office
mates work with you or not, they’ll be pestering you to do more calls.
Everyone likes a free lunch even if it’s a burrito from the local shop.
Even better, you can make it a working lunch and go with a purpose
and a topic to discuss.

Record your calls
You must (yes, must) dedicate time to learn how to refine and deliver your
pitch quickly. Our sales team records calls regularly, then we critique them,
looking specifically for three aspects of the call that went well and three
opportunities to improve.

There are many services such as Vonage and Onebox that offer call
recording options. Use them. It will be horrifying to listen to your voice and
then count the “ums” and “ahs”, and it is the only way to improve your call
quality. What to look for as you review your calls:

 Listen for your delivery, your confidence, and your enthusiasm.
 Count the number of sentences you speak in a row before the
customer has a chance to speak.
 Count the number of interruptions or talk-overs in your call. Are
you talking over the customer or finishing their question before they
have a chance to finish it? Are they talking over you because you
don’t understand their questions?
 Chart the total number of sentences you say compared to the
customer. You have two ears and one mouth – you should be
listening twice as much as you are talking. Sales calls must be
interactive to be successful. You’re not pitching for a time-share in
Boca Raton – you’re solving business problems and this requires
collaboration.

Call Targeting & Counts
So how many calls should you make in a day? The short answer is – “it
depends.” It depend on:

1. Who you're calling: i.e. C-level execs with gatekeepers with skilled
receptionists or senior/mid-level managers.
2. Why you're calling: i.e. "Dialing for dollars" versus calling to establish
a business relationship. If you are "dialing for dollars," that’s
telemarketing and doesn’t apply to what we’re discussing in this
book.

Here are few personal examples that assume you are calling to introduce
and establish a business relationship, with the objective to initiate a longer
term sales process that might take weeks, months, or even years to close.

Software Product: Higher Education Market

Call Target: University professors

# Calls: 15-25/day

Call Objective: Establish relationship, set up product demo call for the
next week. Sales goal is for adoption of online software for use in the
following semester’s courses; 3-6 month sales process.

Process: Because most professors have a department-supplied webpage
and an online vita, there's a huge amount of information available about
them, including classes taught, syllabi, research interest, office hours, and
personal educational background. It was easy to see their teaching styles
(lecture vs discussion vs experimental), assignments from their syllabi,
and their research interest. This information made it simple to develop a
questioning strategy for the initial call. As I reviewed each professor in
the department, I delineated between those professors which appeared
to be a more qualified prospect than others – taught the classes that
matched our software content, took an experimental teaching approach,
and taught the same courses frequently.

Call preparation: Took 5-15 minutes to read the online info available and
write out a call guide - questions I planned to ask and how I expected to
lead the conversation. Separately, there was the voicemail script should I
receive a voicemail - common in academia - but when you get them on
the phone, they can be a chatty bunch. (Professors are teachers and they

have less allegiance to a regular schedule, so if I asked the right
questions, an initial call could easily go 30-45 minutes.)

Finally, I personalized a follow up email, which was another 5-10
minutes per call.

An average day would be 15-20 calls. 25-30 would be a big day, but also
meant fewer connections. It was far better to make 15 calls and have 4-5
substantial conversations than make 30 calls with 29 voicemails.

Each substantial conversation usually entailed setting up a custom
sample course for the professor to view, then scheduling a 30-60 minute
demo call over the next few days. This meant that after a few days of
effective prospecting, my next few days would be full with demos. From
20 initial calls, I usually scheduled 2-3 demos for a few days ahead.
Completing four demos in a day was full day with preparation, set-up,
pump-up, and follow-up afterwards. I might do 20 prospecting calls a
day for 2-3 days, then not do any for several days.

Analytics & Data: Financial Market Trading Desks & Investment Funds

Call Target: C-level executives, Managing Directors, Traders, Fund
Managers

# Calls: 15-25/day

Call Objective: Establish relationship, learn investment positions and
fund size, ask “Situational” questions, set up an initial product demo call
for the next week.

Process: Most targets have LinkedIn profiles, so I spend about 15
minutes prior to each call researching the person’s background and their
fund, then preparing questions and an effective voicemail script.

Generally the same outcome is sought as in the first example - generate
interest through Situational questions, and then set up a more
substantive call for a few days or a week later to look at sample data and
research together.

Commercial Real Estate: Community Banks, Regional Banks, Credit
Unions

Call Target: Senior VP of Operations, Operations Managers

# Calls: 20 calls in 4 hours; 40-50 for the day.

Call Objective: Establish relationship, set up face-to-face meetings with
our broker.

Process: This was pre-LinkedIn (2003), but banks aleady posted their
senior management bios, so that was a start. Then I would research that
bank in places like Business Journal for articles about mergers, buyouts,
or new branch expansion. This would enable me to speak intelligently
about their real estate and location needs.

A Sales Management Note about Inside Sales
Do not mistake "inside sales" with "telesales." Telesales are useful for the
$50/month product or satellite TV. A true inside sales professional is a highly
skilled individual who is able to develop relationships, read customer
psychology, generate interaction effectively on a product demonstration, and
motivate the prospect to take action - all over the phone.

If you're selling at the enterprise level, the initial point of contact is as
critical as the initial sales presentation and approving the final contract. Who
would you rather have talking with a conference lead or a Senior VP that just
downloaded a white paper on your company's website - a technical inside
sales professional or an inexperienced telesales person?

Onsite Visits
Enterprise-level sales and technology are complex. You may get to a point
when you will go onsite to meet with a prospect, however that will only be
after you have developed a sound fundamental relationship with a clear path
in the sales process. Everyone is too busy to host you onsite even if you've
flown 2000 miles for an initial conversation about your product or service.
There are months of preparation to invest in the sales process before you
earn the right to do an onsite visit. Yes - get personal and break down the
walls, but only go onsite when you have a really, really good reason. And it
will usually take an incredible amount of phone work before you have that
reason. For several of my biggest customers, I have never met them in person
or visited them onsite

No one likes meetings. We try to use phrases like - "How about I swing
by the office?" or "I'll be downtown this afternoon - I'll stop by." Sure.
Sounds easy, but fact is that your clients are busy. That 10am "pop by"
meeting means they have to block and hour from their day for the meeting,
plus they lose the 30 minutes before the meeting where they can't dive into

anything substantial because you’ll be arriving soon. If your contact is a
manager, the 30 minutes after the meeting are blown because everyone needs
to talk to him just after your meeting because he’s been unavailable for the
last hour. Then it's almost lunch so he can’t dive into anything substantial
right away, not to mention that he may also want to wear a slightly nicer shirt
that day because he doesn't want you to get the wrong impression, which
means he has to remember to pick up the dry cleaning or ask his wife to do it.
Then she forgets and they have an argument - all because you wanted to "pop
by" the office. Yes, a little sarcasm here, but you get the point.

Enterprise and senior managers are notorious for resisting meetings and
"pop-bys." In the capital markets industry, these guys live in front on their
Bloomberg terminals. When we do visit the big banks and funds, it's usually
downstairs in the common area or first floor conference room because they
don't want you interrupting their workplace. So, if you are invading their
space, you better make it good. Do something that you otherwise could not
have accomplished over the phone. That might be reviewed a complex topic
or examining an intricate detail of your product and how it relates to a core
problem the prospect has.

Reminder: PICK UP THE PHONE
The phone is your umbilical cord to the market. The market and your buyers
know this. Because of that, if you are skilled and professional on the phone,
you will be able to progress a sale just as well over the phone as you would in
person, if not better.

At Prudential CRES every broker every day sat in their cubicle and made
phone calls, even though they were selling real estate right there in San
Francisco. They were not visiting clients all day every day – the opportunty
costs are too high. You can get an enormous amount of work and selling
accomplished over the phone if you do it effectively.

The market also knows that the phone is their shield from you.
Everyone expects that no one expects them to call a salesperson back when
they receive a voicemail. This means you must be skilled at connecting and
establishing value with your prospects. You must also be resilient to these
expectations and be repetitive in your outreach through multiple channels -
phone, personal emails, blog, newsletters - anything that gives you a reason to
call your prospects. You need to give them a reason to take your calls, return
your calls, or spend five minutes with you when they do answer the phone.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #5: A lead is only a person of interest. A prospect is
a qualified individual for whom your product or service is a clear
match.



5 – PROSPECTING AT CONFERENCES

Conferences are daunting and expensive, and they are a complete waste of
time unless you are exceptionally prepared. As you are ramping up your
business and sales pipeline, go to the events and avoid registration fees at all
costs. There is plenty of LobbyCon you can do. It will be painfully obvious
when it's time to actually pay to register. Don't feel bad about this.

9

To Booth or Not to Booth
If you’re not sure whether you should plunk down the cash for a booth, then
you shouldn’t. You’ll know when it’s time. Booths do provide a nice meeting
place and you will get a few quality leads if you have a clear booth strategy.

9
Aerial view of the crowd in an exhibition hall at computer trade show CeBIT in 2000.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CeBIT_2000_exhibition_hall.jpg

However, consider the hard and opportunity costs of a booth as a small
company or worse, if you’re by yourself. Consider this – booth traffic comes
in waves between sessions or during lunch and coffee breaks. You might get
a swarm of people for an hour, then nothing for a couple of hours. If you are
a one-man show, you can only talk to one person at a time. What do you do
when you have three people standing aside poking their head over the
shoulder of the guy to whom your demoing your product, and whom you
know isn’t a good fit based on your short conversation? Professional courtesy
dictates that you be nice and continue the demo with him. Meanwhile you are
distracted wondering if the three people that looked interested but walked
away were possibly your next great customer. It’s a tough racket. Think
about it before you spend $10,000 on the booth.

Generating Appointments
Yes, you should go to conferences, but not because you want to stand at a
booth for three days. You should be setting up appointments based on the
attendee list and people that are reading your outbound drip emails and
newsletters.10 If you can't book at least 4-5 appointments per day of the
conference, then you either need to try harder or stay home. It’s a losing
gamble to show up to a conference without a book of appointments
expecting that you will randomly bump into a brand new qualified prospect
that is ready to buy your product in the next three months. That’s hope and
desperation, not reality.

If it’s a three-day conference, compress your meetings into two days.
Go back-to-back-to-back to optimize your time and save a few dollars on one
fewer hotel night. Besides, compressing your schedule into two days also
forces yourself to be efficient with your time.

Look for registration names at industry conferences and events. At a
minimum, the event organizers post the company names attending. You can
call into the main number of these companies and ask for the department that
is most relevant to your product. From there, ask which people from the
company are attending the conference. Whoever you talk to will either know
immediately (“Oh that’s probably Michelle – she’s our Managing Director and
attends all of these conferences…”) or can transfer you to the department
admin that will know.

Use your email list and blog to announce that you're going and set up a
date book. Here's a template that I've used. It is admittedly passive but gives

10
Constant Contact is an excellent tool for tracking email open rates: www.constantcontact.com

a specific reason for the recipient to respond. There's a fine line between too
passive and too aggressive – play around with your market and contacts to see
what works best for you.

Subject: Going to the ABSEast in Miami next week?

Just a quick note to see if you're attending the ABSEast conference in Miami
next week. I'll be there with our Market Analytics team (booth #122) to
walk through our new Forward Valuation Model launched this month.

If you are, shoot me a quick reply so we can get together - booth, coffee, meeting
before/after sessions - whatever works.

Many thanks - looking forward to your reply.

-Scott

This type of email is an excellent start to setting up a dance card for
yourself starting a month before the conference. In this case, I had the luxury
of a booth because we had a team of people attending. If you aren’t setting
up a booth, try something like this:

Subject: Going to the ABSEast in Miami next week?

Just a quick note to see if you're attending the ABSEast conference in Miami
next week. I'll be there and wanted to schedule a few minutes with you. My
team released our new Forward Valuation Model this month and I thought
you’d be a great person for a few perspectives on it. I’ll treat to a real Starbucks,
not the fake kind they saw they brew by the gallon and give away for free at the
conference.

Just reply back with a time or two that works with your schedule.

Many thanks - looking forward to your reply.

-Scott

The really busy executives and decision-makers that you want to meet
often have event planners that keep a master schedule. The biggest
companies will have their own meeting rooms and their dance cards fill up
very quickly – they have customers too. They prefer selling over buying while
they’re at the conference. This is why you need develop a relationship early

and often by adding value and integrating yourself into their work practice.
Start at least two months ahead of a big conference if you want to make it on
the dance card of these big companies.

Here’s an example from a large company that’s a lot of fluff. There’s no
way anyone is reading this email. This email requires me to enable my view of
images in my email and scroll to read the entire message. Sending the email
to “undisclosed participants” is a nice personal touch too… Jeez…

You’re a small company – be personal. Speak human. (See Chapter 3 – “Find
Your Voice”).

Tactical Tips
 Look for registration names at industry conferences and events. If
anything, these events post the company names attending. You can
call into the main number of these companies and ask for the
department that is most relevant to your product. Go to the events
but avoid registration fees at all costs. There is plenty of "LobbyCon"
you can do. It will be painfully obvious when it's time to actually pay
to register. Don't feel bad about this. Yes, I am purposely repeating
these points.
 Get to know the companies and people running the events and
always submit for speaking slots. You'd be amazed how many times
the conference organizers have speaker and panel needs, experience
cancellations, and are searching for new perspectives on stale
industry topics. This is a good way to get free registrations and
showcase your expertise. But also know that the big conferences

usually save speaking spots for sponsors and supporters. That’s just
the way it is.
 Offer to volunteer. See if the conference organizers need volunteers
to help for a few hours with checking badges, chair drops, or
pointing attendees to the correct sessions. A couple of hours might
yield you a free pass and lots of good will.
 Ride the escalator. You never know who you're going to meet plus
you can read nametags of people going in the opposite direction.
You'll have a fixed audience in an open setting versus the fictitious
“elevator pitch.” Elevators are uncomfortably quiet and everyone
departs at different floors. On an escalator, everyone is going to the
same place – the next floor. Then you can get off at any floor with
the person you've met and walk with them to the next session. It’s
open aired and thus less psychologically restricting for conversation.
 Get an iPad. It reduces the psychological wall introduced by laptop
clam-shells and speeds up the "let me show it to you" transition for
your one-on-one meetings.
 Condense your demo to five (5) minutes and then ask questions. You
are not selling (in the traditional sense) at the conference. Your job is
to pique interest and get an advance in the sales process. It’s unlikely
the person you’re meeting can decide “yea” or “nay” on your product
right then, right away. Instead, have a quick five (or three) minute
demo ready. Then be armed with questions specific to the prospect
and a suggested path to continue the sales conversation after you
both return to your respective offices. This must be specific.
Specific is not when your prospect says - “Looks good – give me a
call in a week or so after the dust settles.” Specific is when your
prospect says – “This looks interesting. Let’s have a call with John
Smith who runs our software management group. He’s usually best
to grab early in the week. Send him an email and copy me on it to
arrange a demo next week.”
 Ask: "What brings you to the conference?."11 This gives you the core
reason to address in your conversation and tie your product to the
over-arching strategy or problem the prospect has on their mind.
Some people go for a set of specific presentations. Some people are
speakers. Some people go because their manager made them. In any
of these situations, you’ve opened a conversation channel to learn
more about that person and if your product will help them. Read
industry publications and ask your prospect for their opinion about
conference topics. You'll be surprised how this type of conversation
unveils true customer sentiments and ultimately their product needs.
11
Attribution to Mike Simonsen (www.linkedin.com/in/simonsen)

 Set goals for yourself for small time blocks. For example - "Have
three substantial conversations with potential leads at the opening
breakfast" or "exchange business cards with at least five speakers
from the afternoon sessions.” This will keep you motivated and
focused at the task at hand – developing relationships and finding
new prospects.
 Blog about a session you attended. Take notes in a couple of sessions
and type up a blog post summarizing a few key statements. Provide a
paragraph of your own perspective and commentary on the topic.
You can also use your article post-conference to talk with people that
didn’t attend. Now you’re adding real value (See Chapter 7 – “Build
with Value.) I did this at an event then posted to my Seeking Alpha
blog. The conference organizers saw it then asked if they could re-
post it on the conference website. Um… yes. See:
http://seekingalpha.com/article/126728-rmbs-opportunities-in-2009-recap-
from-imn-s-distressed-investment-summit

At the Conference
 Conferences are for advances. If you can't get a meeting with a
prospect, they're not a prospect yet. It means that you haven’t yet
illustrated enough value to them. As you are developing your
schedule prior to the conference, you will receive a few – “Just call
me when you get there and we’ll find a time.” You definitely should
do exactly that, but don’t depend on these appointments to fill your
day.
 If the prospect keeps the meeting you scheduled, you better be darn
ready to advance the relationship. No one wants to meet for coffee
or chat. Everyone at the conference is spending time away from the
office and their families while getting further behind every hour that
passes. If they are at the conference, they want to learn new
information that the otherwise would not have discovered. Give
them some excitement and inspiration that their really hard problem
at work can be solved with your product. If they are at the
conference because they have to be, then be their inspiration – make
them happy their boss made them go.
 If you set up a booth, have a system. A real system. Putting business
cards in a box is not a system. Writing notes on the back of cards is
not a system. A system is having a tear sheet with the top 10
questions you would like to ask each booth visitor. It should be easy
to fill out. Have a stapler to attach the business card to the question
sheet. Use it like an order pad as you are talking with them and fill it
out with them. I prefer hand written notes over an iPad or electronic

scanner because it is more personal to the prospect. This shows your
visitors that you are interested in understanding their business and
discovering their Critical Business Issue. Call it that. If they ask, tell
them that unless they have a problem equivalent to their house on
fire and you are the fire department, insurance company, and grief
counselor combined, you both know that you won't be doing
business together because that’s how things work. This conveys your
seriousness and they will respect you for it.
 People will blow you off. If a prospect tells you "I'll stop by the
booth,” about one out of five actually will, and then you know you
have a good prospect. The rest are blowing you off because you
haven’t displayed enough value to them yet or they missed you
during that one time your ran to the bathroom.
 If you book a meeting and they either cancel or don't show, be nice,
try again, then move on and put them back into your drip marketing
pile. It means you haven’t shown them enough value. I was
introduced to a very good prospect (or so I thought) about a month
before a very big industry conference. He agreed to a meeting at the
conference based on our preliminary phone conversations. He then
proceeded to delay our 11:00am meeting to 12:30pm, then to 1:30pm
by texting that he was late “because I wanted to get in a workout.”
When he showed at the booth, he spent half of the time checking his
Blackberry instead of engaging in the conversation. When he came
up for air, he completely dismissed our product approach and said it
would not work for him. That was it. Six months later at another
industry conference, we agreed to another meeting, which he
cancelled about an hour before we were scheduled. Guess what? He
is not a prospect.
 People that hang out at your booth for long periods of time usually
don’t have anything else to do and probably aren’t going to be
customers. It means they probably like you personally they and think
they're doing you a favor by keeping you busy. All they are really
doing is wasting your time because they have time to waste and aren’t
interested in getting busier, making decisions about your product, or
building their own business (in which case they won't be very good
customers anyway). Be nice, excuse yourself and go walk the
conference floor to find new people to meet.
 Bring Starbucks Via, Altoids, Power Bars, a big bag of raw nuts, and
Purell. Conference coffee is awful – it’s watery and never has enough
caffeine to do the trick for me. Fill your coffee cup then lace it with
Starbucks Via. The Altoids keep your mind and mouth fresh from
drinking coffee. Power Bars are adequate replacements for missed
meals. Nuts are a filling alternative to the sugary cookies and Nutri-

Grain bars served during breaks. Purell keeps you germ free. Not
everyone washes their hands.
 Never eat in your booth. It’s unprofessional and is deters would be
visitors to your booth because most people are nice and they don’t
want to interrupt you while you’re eating.

Eating & Prospecting
 Eat small portions of food so you can stick and move. Take small
portions at the breakfast, lunches, and happy hour buffets so you can
circulate quickly. The meals are usually served buffet style then
attendees are left to find a place to stand or sit and eat. There are
usually too few places with just a few standing bar top tables. By
taking a small portions, you can belly up to a table or group, have a
round of conversations, find out if any are potential leads, exchange
cards, then move on with – “Wow those egg rolls are really good –
I’m going to grab another one. It’s been really nice chatting with you
– I’ll call you next Tuesday when you’re back in your office.”
 Drink club soda. Alcohol makes you stupid. You’re there to build
your business not drink free Bud Light. Avoid tonic water – it has a
lot of sugar in it.
 Take an etiquette class. How do you eat pitted olives served in your
salad? How do you hold a conversation in a 10-person round table
format? Where does your fork and knife go after you’ve finished?
Trust me – spend $100 on a really good etiquette class and learn
these things. It matters.
 Learn to say “Let’s swap.” As a conversation wraps up, potential
prospects will often say to you – “Give me your card and I’ll give you
a call next week.” They won’t call. Not because they’re jerks, it’s
because they’re busy and forget. When they ask for your card, say –
“Sure thing – let’s swap.” This gives you control and permission to
contact them. If they say – “Oh jeez, I ran out” or “I left them in my
room,” then say – “No problem!” then pull out your notebook and
pen (See Chapter 1 – “Handling Inbound Calls & Leads”), flip to a
clean page and say – “Just write down your info here.” You will look
professional and prepared. Review what they wrote to make sure you
have their spelling and contact information correct.

Final Thoughts
 When you're at the conference, send reminders and confirmations
for all of your meetings. You will get cancellations in reply to your
confirmation message. That’s okay - it tells you that either that
person isn't a good meeting or you did a poor job showing the value

of getting together. Sometimes, the person decided not to travel
after all for personal reasons and will ask you to call them after the
conference.
 If you use text messaging for confirming, then begin every text with
“Hi [prospect name], [your name] from [your company].” It makes
the text more personal and it’s likely that your prospect won’t
recognize your cell phone number. Treat it like a mini-email.
Spelling counts. End with a question to confirm receipt and
acceptance. Take the extra time to do this – it makes a difference to
your prospect. For example:

“Hi Ron, Scott from Altos. Confirming for our 10am. Would you still like to
meet at conference registration desk on the 2nd floor?”

 Pick a central place to meet that is easy to find and close to
everything else – such as the conference registration desk - not the
hotel registration desk. It’s too busy and usually too far from the
conference activity.
 You can always walk to the coffee shop or lobby together. Use the
walk and store line to exchange niceties so you can transition to
business talk when you grab a table. If you meet at the coffee shop,
that time goes ephemeral. When you get to the coffee shop, order an
Odwalla or sparkling water. You’ve probably already had too much
coffee anyway and the fresh juice or water will do you good.
 Assume that 1/4 to 1/3 of your appointments will either bail on you
or be a no-show. Don't take this personally. It's just the way it is and
use the missed connection as a reason to set up a call the week after
the conference. Just like your onsite meetings, you absolutely
positively must give the other person a clear reason why they should
meet with you.



6 – MORE SALES PROCESS
Sales Tenet #6: A prospect’s decision criteria is a formative
process. It will always take more than a single phone call to
determine.

Sales Tenet #7: It's never about the money; it's about the cost.

Chapters 4 - “The Sales Process - Prospecting & New Calls” and Chapter 5 -
“Prospecting at Conferences” focused on the prospecting area of the sales
process - differentiating between leads and prospects and how to develop
prospects using a clear set of techniques. These techniques will bring you to
the start the sales process. Let me repeat that – these techniques will bring
you the start of the sale process. Until now, you are simply qualifying leads
and vetting prospects. In some of these conversation, your leads and
prospects will tell you – “Wow! This is exactly what we need!” Don’t call
your partners and investors to tell them you closed a deal. What did you do?
You opened a sale and started the sales process with this company. The
next stages include multiple product demonstrations, working through
committees, developing decision criteria, and finding out who holds the purse
strings. This can take weeks, and more likely, months to accomplish.

Now we’ll examine the questions to ask that will firmly entrench yourself
into the sales process with your target prospect. It’s a grind, and if you know
what to expect and what’s happening while it’s happening, you’ll be in control
of the grind. Starting the sales process is a challenge itself. Once you’re in the
process, achieving advances in this stage are possible only through effective
questioning that shows your prospect that you are both keenly aware of and
interested in solving their problem.

Example: Did I just Open or Close a Sale?
Last year, I spent a solid ten months developing a very large prospect. This
included several calls to my main point of contact who recently joined this
account from other firm where I first met and worked with him. He arranged
an onsite meeting with his peers though he was personally unable to attend.
We met in person at a conference that year and I lobbed in more than 30
phone calls to him and his co-workers concurrently with our regular drip
marketing throughout the year. He articulated a clear need for our data
products and saw several places to implement these throughout their
organization.

This contact then organized a sales demonstration to the key decision-
makers in the company and we were off to the races. We hosted the
demonstration on GoToMeeting and all of key players attended. They asked
specific questions and I could hear them envisioning the use of our products.
As the demonstration call wound down, the action item was left for our main
contact to coordinate the feedback from the attendees and then he and I
would discuss next steps on their decision. Immediately after the call, our
Product Champion and I did a quick review. He said that the call was
EXACTLY what the team needed to see and that it articulated the need for
our products. Woohoo!

About two weeks passed and after several outbound calls and voicemail,
I finally was able to connect with our contact on the phone for a short
conversation. He was clearly busy but willing to offer an update on their
business. They have been extremely busy buying assets and setting up a new
investment fund. Growth is good. We turned the conversation to the
demonstration call.

He said that the right people were in the room to see what they should
be buying and they bought into the concept - this is the right point to get
them thinking about these types of products. He said that they decided now
that they "most definitely will subscribe to market data whether that be from
your company or someone else” and that he would give me an update at the
end of the week or early next.

Here’s the point: All of that groundwork got us to the starting gate
of the sale. We’ve established a need but have only started the sales
process without any real analysis begun from the senior managers at
the fund as to how they might implement our products to solve the
problem they have now articulated for themselves.

Questions & the Complexity of the Sale
The objective in the early stage of the sales process is asking effective,
intelligent questions that enable you and your prospect to determine that a
need exists, and that your product or services can potentially fill that need.

The complexity of the enterprise sale is very real and cannot be
circumvented. If you have an “in” with a big company, be optimistic and be
cautious. If this person tells you – “I love your product. Send me all of your
materials and I’ll present it to the team” then your contact is not a decision-
maker and you are only at the start of the process. If your “in” is a senior
level executive, remember that really good managers attain buy-in from their
downstream team.

Few managers will make a singular decision to implement a new product
or service without checking with the team because the team will be the ones
implementing and using the new product. Additionally, junior managers may
already have discovered other outside vendors. Internally, the team could be
developing an in-house solution that will not only be 100% customized but
provide job security to those working on the project.

10 Questions You Should Ask On Every Sales Call

Relax. It’s a conversation, not an interrogation. Have courage – you’re
allowed to ask questions. It’s daunting at first because you want to placate the
prospect – they are sitting there on their “Throne of Decision-Maker” and
you are visualizing dollar signs all around their head, knowing that closing a
deal this size means you can hire another developer or begin renting office
space.

Here are ten questions to ask that will turn your sales interrogations to
sales conversations:

1. How do you mean?12 Prospects will tell you all kinds of things on a
call – much of it won’t make sense. Ask this question to clarify what
they’re thinking so you can be 100% sure you understand what
they’re communicating.

1b. I don’t think I understood – would you mind running that by me
one more time? This is a variation of “How do you mean?” You’re
allowed to ask for clarification. The prospect is a prospect, not the
great and powerful Oz. Take a moment to ask for another run-
through of what they’ve just explained. It is probably complicated
and they probably know it. They’ll appreciate that you want to
comprehend their problem fully so that you prescribe a treatment for
it with your incredibly awesome product.

2. What’s the most important part of your business? The idea here is to
dig to the root of the prospect’s existence so you can eventually
unearth the critical business issue on which you’re going to sell your
product. Be careful! You must be truly interested in the answer to
this question and give the prospect a reason for asking. More so, this
can’t be a question that can be answered on the prospect’s company
website. Also, I don’t recommend asking this question as your first
question because it can sound trite and patronizing. Instead, ask
specific process and problem questions first then after developing
rapport, circle back to this question. A good transition is something
like – “Okay, so I think I understand your process pretty well, though
I’m sure I’ll have more questions. Let me ask you this – what’s the
most important part of your business?” This is a much smoother
transition to this question and your prospect will be more apt to
answer truthfully now that he’s confided in your about his current
process and problems.

3. How would this help your business? This question gets the customer
doing two things – 1) It gets the prospect envisioning the use of your
product and 2) It gives you the selling points to drive at the rest of
the conversation.

12
Attribution to Brian Tracy, “The Psychology of Selling”

4. Why is that important? How important is that? Prospects like to
push just to see what you have and usually they don’t know they’re
pushing. Or they’re just be naturally inquisitive. Here’s an example:

Prospect: “Is your platform built in Java?”

Now, what if your platform is built in Ruby or Python? The
customer is asking a simple question that you can easily
interpret as – “Oh my gosh, the customer said it has to be in
Java! We’re doomed! What do I do? Do I tell them it’s not but
that we’re willing to replicate the entire code base in Java for
him if that’s what he needs?”

You: Instead of freaking out or answering – “No, we built our
platform in Ruby,” answer with – “It’s not – why do you ask?” (a
variation of “why is that important?”)

Here are a number of responses you might hear to your well-formed
question:
 “Oh just curious. Seems that a lot of software platforms are
built in Java.”
 “Thank God, I’m a huge fan of Ruby.”
 “I dunno. I’m not much of a programmer myself so I just
thought I should ask that question.”
 “Hmmm… We prefer software built in Java but we can work
with any tool.” To which you ask – “Why is that?” and
you’re on your way to understanding and defining part of the
decision criteria.

Notice how none of these four responses above are show-stoppers
for you, but had you simply replied with – “No, it’s built in Ruby” –
you never would have discovered this path. Remember – your sales
calls are conversations, not interrogations.

Don’t panic – just ask them how important the particular feature is to
their work. Usually, it’s not very important. For those times it is
important, you’ll be able to build that functionality into your product
later. If you can’t, then chances are the competition can’t either.

5. What are the 2-3 most important objectives for your business this
year/for this quarter? This question will drive right to those areas that
the prospect most cares about each and every day. If they tell you –
“Well, senior management is really focusing on growing our revenue

with the blah-blah product line. We spent a lot of money developing
and marketing the product and they want to see results.” Bingo –
then determine how your product or service will get them there. This
hits home personally too. Your prospect is a normal guy. Maybe he
has a wife and a third child on the way and he needs to buy a better
car or a bigger house? Maybe he wants to get out of his two bedroom
apartment and move to the suburbs where the schools are better.
Help him get there. By asking him this question, you become a
member of his personal team achieving his professional objectives.

6. Why haven't you purchased the product yet? This question is more
for an opportunity that is losing momentum. If you ask directly, you
should get a direct answer like – “It’s just that our IT team is so
backed up with other projects, I can’t add this to their plate right
now” or “We’ve have a stop on all new purchases until we get into
next year.” Okay, now you have your objections to overcome. If it is
the former, figure out how you can assist with implementation. Fly
there and install it yourself. If it is the second, do a delay billing until
next year. If they resist either of these, then you haven’t found the
real reason they’re aren’t buying yet or you haven’t identified their
critical business issue and how your product solves it.

7. "Here's why I'm asking - we've had our development team locked in
a dark smoky room for the last six months working on several new
product initiatives and I think that several of them will help you guys
[make more money/win more bids/etc.]. My team and I have a fixed
amount of time to spend with our customers, so the reason for
asking is so that we can decide if there's a real opportunity to work
together." This is a follow up to #6 if you think the answer you
received was a bland “time” or “budget” excuse. This is also the
takeaway close and its selling without showing or talking product. If
they tell you – “That’s okay – just come back to us in Q1 of next
year” then move them back to your marketing drip, set a reminder to
call the prospect in a month for a non-sales reason, and move along.

8. "What's changed recently, or do you see changing in your business in
the next 3, 6, 12 months?" Just listen. Don't sell or pitch products.
Take notes, then come back to the client with specific ideas based on
what you learned. Treat these meetings as you would an information-
gathering sales call with a new lead or prospect. You wouldn't try to
sell on the first call with a new prospect, so don't do it here.

An advantage to this approach is that if your customer has changes
coming down the road, and you have a product in development or
beta stage, it's an opportunity for you to get your product team
involved with an existing customer as an early adopter or beta tester.
The client benefits here because they are first to market, and you
benefit because assuming you have a solid relationship, if the new
product fails in some way, there is less pressure on you and your
company.

Additionally, you can also influence the strategic direction of your
client by educating them on new products and services you have in
development. Many times the client has an idea or a vision, but
execution on that vision requires a product that doesn't exist. That
presents an opportunity for you to define criteria for the purchase
around the specs for your products in the development pipeline and
blocking out your competition before an opportunity or “Request for
Proposal” (RFP) becomes public.

9. Who else on your team will you have evaluate the product? If you ask
– “Who else would be involved with making this decision?” then the
prospect hears – “This guy doesn’t think I’m important enough to
make a decision on my own. And even though I’m not, that’s so
condescending.” By framing the question in the suggested way
instead, you are both feeding ego by showing that you expect the
prospect to take the lead, while still finding out who is involved.
Decisions are not made in a vacuum by a single person. Even if your
prospect is the CEO of Home Depot, she is going to have his
downstream team evaluate the product because he knows that they
know more about their business needs and how to implement
solutions than he does. And even if your prospect is the only person
in the company that will be using the product on a day-to-day basis,
the outcomes of his work will affect the team. Besides, if that
prospect ever leaves the company, you’re dead. Spread through the
organization with as many contacts as possible early in the sales
process. You will see a direct correlation between the number of
contacts you have at a company and your sales. Places where you
have 1-2 contacts are unlikely to become clients because it means
either you have Gatekeepers or you are talking to the wrong people.

10. What happens next?13 This establishes a specific course of action for
when the call ends. You need advances, not continuations. This
13
Attribution to Michael Pedone at SalesBuzz.com.

gives you control by forcing them to set the next steps. They might
say – “Well, I need to talk to Bob’s group and tell them what I saw.”
Aha! Now you’ve discovered there is another group involved with
the decision, and you’ve uncovered a potential Gatekeeper. Now you
can jump in and ask – “Tell me about Bob’s group. How are they
involved with your work?”

“Send me the presentation and your marketing materials and I’ll share
them with the rest of the group…”
If your sales calls end with this sentence, you’re dead. Besides, I bet you don’t
have any marketing materials anyway. (This is another excellent reason why
you should sparingly use PowerPoint slides in a presentation. It looks canned
and your prospect thinks they are just another prospect watching a canned
presentation.)

You absolutely, positively must push your way through this outcome and find
a close. A “close” is simply an advance in the sales process. The perception of
the salesperson winning the order with a slick presentation or closing line is
completely fictitious. In fact, when you actually reach the contract stage of the
sale, it will be anti-climactic (See Chapter 10 – “Negotiation & Contracts”).

Think of closes as an compass to show you where you are with the
prospect and the sales process. You need to find out what the next steps are
going to be for both you and your prospects. This is why the “What happens
next?” question is such a good one. If your prospect tells you – “Well, send
me your marketing materials and I’ll pass them here with the rest of the
group…” – then you know you haven’t shown enough value for your
prospect to spend his internal capital rounding up his colleagues and plopping
in a meeting to hear you talk. If your prospect says – “I’d like to have you
present to the whole team next week…” they you say – “Great, I how about
Tuesday afternoon at 2:00pm?”

At first, asking for closes will inevitably feel clumsy. That’s okay – ask
them anyway. By asking the right questions during the call, you should now
know key aspects to the sale – the end users, the current problems and how
you can solve them, and who else would be involved with the decision.

Here are a couple of suggested responses to the dreaded “Send me your
materials” request:

 “You know what, I’d like to except that we really didn’t look at any
slides together – we were diving directly into the live application to
show you how it works. Instead, let’s do this - let’s schedule a 20

minute time block next week with your team. Now that you’ve seen
it and know how valuable it might be, I’m sure they’re going to want
to see it for themselves. I have my calendar open right now – how
about on Tuesday at the same time?”
 “I can’t let you torture yourself like that. I’m sure the people on your
team will have a few questions and then you’re stuck trying to
remember every nuance that we covered today. Let’s do this – let’s
schedule 20 minutes….[see above]”
 “Who are the other people on your team? I’ll send the materials over
to them and give them a call to answer their questions, that way
you’re now stuck being the middleman in the conversation. I’m sure
you have enough to do every day, let alone worry about answering
questions about our product.”

If you are still meeting resistance, politely agree and then say – “What day
next week is best to give you call so we can discuss your team’s feedback?”
This forces them to agree to do the work to gather the feedback, or they will
push back and say – “Well, I don’t know if everyone will have time this week
to look at the materials.” Then you can reply with – “Oh, okay. Let’s do this
then – let’s hold off circulating the materials right now. I’ll call you back next
week to see if that’s a better time to focus on this. I’ve got my calendar open
right now – is 1:00 on Monday okay to do that?”

If your prospect shares names then write them down and be sure to spell
their names correctly. Then, personally call each one to let them know that
you would like to talk with them directly. Do not blast one email to everyone
on the list – start working the committee that’s now been formed. Treat every
single person in the committee individually – learn specific situation and
needs. Before every call, spend time on Linkedin to develop targeted
questions for each person.

Even More Sales Process
Just like with voicemails and phone strategies covered in Chapter 2 – “Pick
Up The Phone” – there more in-depth resources for immersing yourself into
the excruciating details of the sales process and developing a new market for
a new product. After finishing this book, read these two:

1. “Major Account Sales Strategy” by Neil Rackham
2. “Selling into a New Market Space” by Brian Burns

Concepts covered in these books that you must learn include:

 Product Champions: These are true believers in your product. They
will cheerlead internally and help you navigate through their
company’s decision process
 Continuations vs. Advances: You want advances. These are a clear
next steps that both sides agree to complete. For example, an
advance is when your prospect agrees to send you a file for loading
into your platform and sets an appointment for you to demonstrate
to the team. A continuation means there is an unspecified next step,
such as “Call me next month and we’ll set something up.”
 Decision Committees: Decisions are not made in a vacuum. You
need to know who are your protagonists, antagonists, end users,
financiers, and contributors to the sales process.
 Phases of the Purchasing decision: If you are selling into an
enterprise, the decision process will take several phone calls and
interactions with the prospect. Know ahead of time that there are
four major stages: Needs Analysis, Evaluation of Options, Resolution
of Concerns, and Implementation. Within each stage, you will find a
number of sub-stages. The sooner you become intimately
knowledgeable with this process, the sooner you will be able to
identify where each prospect stands in the sales process.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #6: The decision criteria is a formative process. It
will always take more than a single phone call to determine.

Sales Tenet #7: It's never about the money; it's about the cost.



7 – BUILD WITH VALUE
Sales Tenet #8: Add value, add value, add value.

Add value, add value, add value. Your prospects are busy. Everyone is busy.
When the phone rings at their desk, you are interrupting something that they
are doing. That something might be a meeting (yes, people answer the phone
while they are in a meeting…), a conversation with a colleague, solving a
really hard problem at work, wondering why their manager is in a bad mood,
emailing with their kids about what time to pick them up from soccer
practice, or anything else more important to them than you are at that
moment. This means that when you make an outbound touch by phone or
email, you absolutely positively must make it worthwhile for the prospect to
stop whatever it is that they are doing and pay attention to you.

Pitching a product five seconds into a phone call is not adding value.
Spamming a list of people requesting a time to give them a call is not adding
value. In our case, adding value is a very simple offering – our “National
Housing Report.” It’s a monthly outbound touch that includes real-time data
about the housing market as of the most recent week. We send these reports
to our contacts and track open rates. From these open rates, we now have a
call list. If someone opens the report, that means that we’ve provided value
to them in some way, otherwise they would have ignored us. These contacts
that open the reports are potential leads. Contacts that take our calls to talk
about the data in the report are potential prospects. Contacts that return your
calls and talk with you are definitely prospects.

You need to do all of this before you can justify a real opportunity with a
prospect. When you add value, you earn the right to talk about your prospect
problems and how your product is their fix.

Valuable Content
 White Papers: White papers highlight your expertise and show your
focus on solving your industry’s business problems, and they are
relatively inexpensive to produce because of the time involved. Take
a few of your blog posts and expand them to three-page white
papers. Then convert them to PDF and post to your site. Have
three or four of these. Writing the papers will crystallize many key
challenges of your industry that you may be talking about without a
truly informed perspective. Check out what other companies are
publishing as “white papers.” You’ll be surprised at how low the bar
is set and how you can easily exceed market expectations for good
content.

As you are calling each of your prospects and inbound leads, white
papers are effective because they show that you are serious about the
industry and that you are participating with thoughtful contributions.

These papers also provide you with reasons to re-call prospects or
inbound leads where your last call ended with a continuation instead
of an advance. Remember those people that told you – “Yeah, send
me over some stuff and I’ll share it with the team…”? Well, now you
have real information and perspectives that you can send and ask for
their opinion about what you wrote.

 Webinars/Webcasts: (I like the term “webcast” more, but that’s just
personal preference). Hosting a webinar event is a very inexpensive
way to reach your market, and it offers upstream/downstream
market communication opportunities. Your webinars need not be a
60-minute dissertation dissecting your industry with marketing drop-
ins throughout the presentation. Twenty minutes are all you need.
Pick a current event and then relate it to your industry.

For example, the “Stop Online Piracy Act” (SOPA) legislation is a
big topic of conversation across the Internet industry right now.
Let’s say you sell enterprise project management software. Your
webinar title can be “SOPA & Enterprise Project Management.”
Then develop a 10-slide presentation spending 60-90 seconds per
slide. Start the event on time and keep it to the time length you
promised. Leave 3-5 minutes for Q&A and if no one asks a question,

then make up two questions and tell the audience – “Here’s a
question in the Chat Box from Margaret in Phoenix…”

Any respectable webinar software platform (i.e. GoToMeeting) will
log who has registered and attended, so now you have a two-part call
list – those that attended and those that registered but did not attend.

You can repurpose this content by posting the recording to your blog
and sending out to your contacts list with an email – “We hosted this
webinar last week and I thought you’d like to watch the recording.
We host these every month. Our next one is scheduled for
November 10. Would you like me to reserve a seat for you now?”
End with a question that makes the email personal, not marketing
speak like – “…and if you’d like to register for next month’s webinar,
click here…” That’s marketing. We’re selling here, which means that
you must be personal with every interaction, not pretend personal.

I just rooted through my inbox and found this offer from a company
that does memory storage and backup. (I have no idea how I ended
up on their marketing list, but I digress…).

This particular approach feels a little too salesy. The main topic of
the webinar is all about their company and product, which is a turn
off for me. Also, while the person pictured in the email (whited out)
is probably a fantastic dude, but I’m not sure how including his
picture adds much value. Seems like something a real estate agent or
mortgage broker might do in an attempt to brand themselves.

I do like the bullet points below the main text and how the time is
clearly articulated with several calls to action and an incentive to
attend. He may not get five people total to attend, but the suggestion
that “only” five people will receive the book is a nice marketing
tactic.

 Blog about your industry: This is an easy source of web traffic and
shows your dedication to the industry. This will help your learning
curve, will providing you content and value to share with prospective
clients as you develop your product and business. Writing also forces
you to formulate ideas and opinions around industry topics. Use
articles on industry-specific sites as fodder. Start your blog post with
– “On HousingWire today, it was announced that…” Then write –
“Here’s another perspective…” Voila! Blog post and a voice (See
Chapter 3 – “Find Your Voice.”)

 Know your industry-specific news sites. These industry news sites
give you plenty of reasons to call a lead or a prospect to ask them
how a particular happening affects their business. Develop a
relationship with the writers and editors. Send them personal emails
about perspectives on current industry issues. They will notice your
expertise. Conclude your emails with – “Call anytime if you’d like a
perspective for an article you’re writing.” Writers are always looking
for quotes. This is free marketing and shows your expertise to the
readership. It’s another reason to blog and produce white papers –
they reiterate your expertise for industry journalists.

14

Be a Connector
Usually this means networking and connecting people and it also means ideas.
As you are talking with the industry, by nature you become a communication
hub for ideas. The “industry” could be hundreds, thousands, or millions of
people. Here’s a little secret – not everyone knows each other personally nor
do they know what other people in the industry are thinking. As a self-
developed communication hub, you develop the ability to establish
connections between people and ideas. This is adding value.

Example: Connecting Ideas
In the housing industry right now, there is an ongoing conversation about the
re-emergence of securitization, meaning that banks that make residential
mortgage loans can package these loans into a large bundle called an
Residential Mortgage-Backed Security (RMBS). (You might remember that
these securitizations got out of control back in mid-2000s and contributed to
the housing crash.) Principally, the idea of packaging loans and selling is a
way for banks to mitigate lending risk. The industry is anxious to see when
bank regulations will flush themselves out making it possible for new RMBS
issuances to emerge. I know, I know - a very stimulating topic. Here’s the
point – every trader, regulator, and analyst in the housing industry has
opinion about this.

Whenever I’m calling someone that is involved with RMBS, I am asking
their opinion. When I am reading industry publications, I’m searching for
public positions and ideas on this topic that I can share. Then, when I make
my next round of phone calls, the conversation presents value to the
prospect.

14
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Social-network.png

“Hi Roger. It’s Scott Sambucci over at Altos Research. I’ve been
reading about RMBS issuances this morning and just read an article
on Housing Wire about how Company ABC projects that there will
be at least five new RMBS issuances by Q4 of this year. I’ve been
calling a few people that I know trade RMBS to see what they
thought about this. Is that too aggressive? Feasible? What do you
think?”

Maybe Roger gives you his opinion. And maybe by the end of the
call, Roger says something like:

“… so yeah, we’re pretty optimistic. In fact, I’m working on a
research report right now to present internally on this topic as we’re
setting our trading targets for the year.”

Then, once you get that person’s, log the notes of your call in your CRM,
distill it for yourself, then call the next person on your list:

“Hi Ann. It’s Scott Sambucci over at Altos Research. I’ve been
reading about RMBS issuances this morning and just read an article
on Housing Wire about how Company ABC projects that there will
be at least five new RMBS issuances by Q4 of this year. I’ve been
calling a few people that I know trade RMBS to see what they
thought about this. Is that too aggressive? Feasible? What do you
think?”

Then when Ann gives you her opinion, you can say –

“That’s interesting. I was just talking with another trader this
morning that’s working on some research on this area. I wonder if
I should put the two of you in touch just so you can exchange a few
ideas.”

That’s it – that’s how you become a connector of ideas with yourself firmly
planted as the cog for that information. Build with value.

Prospecting
This means scouring industry publications and emailing customers -

"Hi Bill - I saw this article on HousingWire and immediately thought
you'd find it interesting. How is this related to the work that you’re
doing on [insert topic]....?"

That's all. Nothing fancy - just a way to start developing a voice and a
place with your customers to engage and converse. The more you talk with
your clients, the more opportunities they'll have to hear your voice. It is
soooooo easy to set up your Google News Alert to gather these articles every
day, yet no one does it, which is the opportunity for you to take advantage of
everyone’s “busy-ness” to cut through the day-to-day noise and become a
beacon of light and knowledge. Spend 30 minutes each morning sending out
3-5 articles to specific contacts and prospects. Now you are an information
conduit, not just a salesperson or vendor.

An Over the Top Example of Adding Value
Katie works at a large homebuilder and has been a customer for a couple of
years. It's a small account, but one we like to have because it is a notable
company and they always pay for the year ahead of time so it's a nice little
cash flow pop each year.

Katie and I hadn't spoken in several months, so a few weeks ago, I saw
an email that her company was expanding to a new market. I sent over a
quick email congratulating them on the expansion and of course mentioned
that we have some pretty awesome market data for that market. (Looking
back, I should have picked up the phone - See Chapter 2 - "Pick Up The
Phone.") The good news, whether due to my sending that simple note or
otherwise, Kate emailed me a week later with a problem she was having.

Good morning Scott! I hope you are ready for the holidays!

We have been relying on your data for active listings in our Southern California
markets. I am wondering if you track home closings or sales too. I am interested in
increasing the integrity of the closing data I already have and would like to use
another source.

Thanks for your assistance Scott.

My reply:

Hi Katie - We don't specifically have that info, but I have a couple of ideas/places
where you might get this info. Can I call you Monday to discuss?

We talked on Monday and I first listened to the "why" behind her need.
Turns out they are getting county assessor data from multiple sources but it is
still missing key data elements that they need. First, I suggested another
company is our industry - a semi-competitor - but a reliable company that I

know well. She appreciated that, but she said they weren’t a good fit for this
project. As we talked more, I realized that there was an opportunity to use the
active market data she's already buying and how it's possible it could be
matched with the transaction addresses. However, currently they were only
buying slices of data in time - once in a quarter instead of a time series. She
thought it might work but had to think about the budget. Finally, I asked if
she knew another company in the industry that had building permit data
which might include the key fields she's looking for - she could cross-match
addresses from the assessor's office with addresses in the permits. She hadn't
heard of them, so I set up the email introduction. I know the guys at this
company. I had met them several times at industry conferences - they are
good people that I can trust passing along to her without brokering the
communication. As a last follow up, the referred company released a press
report on 12/16 and an industry blog reported on it. I saw it in my Google
Reader later that day by chance. I sent that link to Katie to get her more
acquainted with the index.

One more thing - I exported six months of data for Orange County, CA
to her account so that he can run a trial match between the assessor data and
our historical listing data. If it works, I'm sure she'll buy and I'll add an extra
$1000 to the bottom line. If not, then it took all of five minutes to do this
and I've added another tether to the relationship.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #8: Add value, add value, add value.



8 - VAMPIRES & GATEKEEPERS

Sales Tenet #9: There is generally an inverse correlation between
the amount of work the client expects you to do before the sale
and the likelihood of the sale actually occurring.

A good prospect will say things like - "I think if we can run a test file or
two and talk with you about how we would apply it to our daily workflow.
That will provide us the insight we need to decide if this is a product we
would want to implement."

Uneducated prospects will say things like – “Can you guys build out a
custom model so that I can see if it will work in our system?” or “I’d like to
run the sample files that we looked at last month to see how they’ve
changed…” or “I think that once I figure out exactly how we would use your
product, we can come back to checking out your system in our next cycle...”
They don't understand the complexity of your product or the magnitude of
the work that is required for what they perceive as a simple request. These
people are Vampires.

15

Avoid Vampires. Your time is your primary currency as you start-up, so
in the sales process you need to consider the opportunity costs of custom
products, projects, and gatekeepers. Learn to say no, and learn to ask "Why
do you ask?” and “What do you want to accomplish?"

Vampires appear to be prospects but really aren't. They take the form of:

1. Nice guys that just want to be nice guys. They think they're doing
you a favor talking to you. If a prospect asks – “Do you have some
materials and pricing you can send over?” then ask them: "When
would you like to see this?" If they tell you - "It doesn't matter -
whenever you have time…" or "whenever you can get around to
it…" then you have a Vampire. There should a clear action step
coming out of your conversation, with the client responsible for part
of that action to show they are serious. If the prospect is not
indicating urgency, that means that you have not identified their
critical business issue. Either the customer doesn't know that they
have a problem that you can solve the problem, lacks urgency, or the
person could be gatekeeping. You’ll be calling that person for
months to “follow up” with no results.

2. Lazy, er “busy,” people. They are always looking to pilfer ideas,
assume they have their system perfected, or think they don't need
your product. They might like your product and concepts, but are too
busy or too lazy to implement. Your product is priority #19 on list
of two things they have to accomplish this quarter. These people will
often talk with you and agree to stop by your booth or meet you at
conferences.

15
Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Little-vampire.svg

3. Non-committal executives. They're executives because they usually
know what they are doing. But, good executives also want their team
to drive initiatives - they don't want to commandeer the ship too
often unless you specifically articulate the reason they should dive
into the weeds and promote your product. Instead, they expect you
to do the leg work and the grunt work marketing and selling to his
team. He'll dive deeper into the sales process when he's needed,
which is usually at the end of the sales process, not the beginning.

4. Gatekeepers. Can be junior or senior executives, both usually seeking
to hoard good ideas as their own and take the glory for them. You
can use this motivation to your advantage, but this takes tremendous
navigational skills. If you are an early stage company looking for early
adopters, gatekeepers aren't worth your time. They aren't risk takers
and will be a huge pain in the rear. Identify these people quickly,
market to them, but do not cater to their whims. After a product
demo, they’ll say things like – “Okay, let me share this with the team
and I’ll get back to you…” or “I’ll have to spend more time with
your system and if it makes sense, I’ll present it to the team…”

5. Oddly Enthusiastic. Alternately, beware of the overly enthusiastic
prospect that promises to pass around your presentation and
documentation to the entire team. You'll find this person shrouded
in a statement like - "This sounds like exactly what we need! Can you
forward me a presentation that I can share with the team?," even
before he's seen a demo himself. If you forward your presentation
and let him control the sales process, you're dead. They won't do
what they say they will do. If they do, then they'll literally hit the
“forward” button on their email. It's too early for them to be a
Product Champion - this takes time. Or worse, they do share your
materials and completely botch questions they’re asked when you’re
not there. When you talk with them again, they’ll say – “Yeah, we
talked about your system as a team but it’s not a perfect fit right now.
Keep us posted as things develop on your end.”

If you have a Gatekeeper or an Enthusiastic, you have a couple of options:

1. Tell her - "That sounds great. Let's first do a walk-through of
our XYZ software so you can see it in action. How about next
Tuesday?...” In setting up that demo, ask him to pull in a
technical person to join him - "Who's the best person on your
end to talk through any technical requirements - things like
XML feeds and CSV data file transfers via FTP?" (This will

test his technical prowess and also make him feel that it's okay
to get other people helping.)

2. "Who would be the end user there?" If it's him, then you have
a legitimate chance of developing a Product Champion. If it's
not him, you have a potential Gatekeeper that wants to present
your product as a solution and take the credit. Ask him -
"That’s great - then if you have 5-6 guys working the desk that
will be the end users, who are the 1-2 people you trust to
evaluate this with you?" To your Gatekeeper, it implies that
you think he has control and that he's an influencer within the
organization. He'll be more likely to bring in someone else.

Your primary objective is to get at least one other person with you on
your next call. You need to elbow around in the organization and find more
contacts. Each contact will offer more color and with each conversation, you
can ask them for additional people that should get involved. Prior to the
meeting, contact each person on the meeting invite to confirm the meeting -
this is very professional and warrants getting more perspective prior to the
presentation on hot buttons to push.

If you're worried about your Gatekeeper feeling a loss of control, call
them first to confirm and if you get voicemail, give yourself permission to
contact the rest of the attendees -

"Hi Bill - Thanks a million for our call tomorrow at 2pm. You're
going to love what you're going to see. I'm calling to confirm that
you'll be dialing into the GoToMeeting info I provided in the
meeting invite. I'll check with Mary and Tim as well. Thanks again
- talk to you tomorrow at 2pm Central."

When you do get 1-2 new people on the next call, they can often be
silent. You must get them talking. Find out their role in the process. What
makes them tick? How will your product influence their daily workflow?
Many, many, many times the silent people are your Gatekeeper’s manager.
Your prospect (the Gatekeeper) squeezed their manager for 30 minutes to
check out your totally awesome software. At the end of the call, this silent
person will give the Roman “thumbs up – thumbs down” call on whether to
proceed to the next stage of evaluation. If you don’t sell to the silent people
and their personal needs, you’re dead because you’ve left the selling to your
Gatekeeper instead of controlling the sale yourself.

Example: New Lead
We recently had an initial call with a new prospect that was referred to us.
We focused the call on situational question, yielding these positive outcomes
from the calls:

1. We had the COO and two senior product managers on the call on
their end.
2. They patiently allowed us to ask our Situational questions.
3. After 5-6 of these questions, their COO jumped in and pointedly told
us that their interest in the specific data product we've been
discussing stemmed from 5-6 client requests they'd had in the last
few months. Aha! He cracked!
4. They asked if they could see a demo of our product, which we did
not do on this initial call. Remember:

Sales Tenet #2: Jumping into a sales demo on the first call is the
kiss of death.

5. They agreed to send us a list of internal data that would be used in
our system as a test case so they can see our software applied to a
project they care about.
6. Our sales rep scheduled the next call for Wednesday at 2:00pm
Central.

What they didn't ask for that indicated they were are a real prospect:

1. “Send us the data we'll take a look….”
2. “Your system sounds interesting. Let us think about how we might
use it and we'll get back to you [even though they’ve yet to actually
see the product]…”
3. "Let's run this with 1000 of our portfolio properties and then ask our
clients if they like it. If they do, then we can talk about a partnership
of some kind."

Now we know we have a genuine prospect. They've committed to a
meeting and committed to doing work on their end by Friday. Our sales rep
said that he would call them if he did not hear from them by Friday. They
agreed. Whether they keep to that Friday schedule or if we hear back from
them is yet unknown, though I strongly suspect we will. This is why getting
the client to agree to do work is an excellent signal indicating their level of
commitment to investigating your product or service. This is the difference
between a prospect who is truly interested in your product and a prospect
that is looking for free stuff or just browsing.

Inbound emails
Joe Carpenter planejock@earthlink.net via altosresearch.com
5:58 AM (3 hours ago)

to info
Greetings,

Your web site offers an opportunity to "look under the hood". I'd like to do just that.
What do I need to do?

Thanks,
_Joe

My exchange with our sales rep:

Scott S. -

Have you reached out to this guy? Not sure if he's on the agent side or capital
markets...

-John

Scott Sambucci
12/30/11 (2 hours ago) in reply to John

Nope - all yours. I would strongly recommend qualifying him well with his email
address. Could be an individual investor just waiting to suck the life from your veins.

A very well-meaning person. A quick Google search of his name and
email addresses yielded no results. Yes, he'll get a reply email but if he doesn't
bite or isn't willing to share more information, then I'm moving on.

The reply to this email should be something like:

Hi Joe - Many thanks for the inquiry. Absolutely - we always love talking about
our products.

Because we've got many of them (products, that is) and so that we can talk about
what's important for your work, tell me a bit more about yourself.

Are you a Realtor, Broker, Individual Investors, or Wall Street tycoon? What
brought you to Altos Research?

End the email with open-ended questions so that he'll hit the 'reply' key and
get back to you with more information. Meanwhile, I've checked our inbound
registrations in our 'Leads' tab in Salesforce - he didn't register to the site.
He's asking to look "under the hood" which is an offer we only make on our
Capital Markets section of the site. Maybe he's somebody important, or
maybe he's a Vampire with nothing to do but talk about cool products
without any intention or budget to buy. I'll take my chances with engaging
him in an email string instead of replying back with - "Oh great! What time
can I call you?" You owe it to yourself and your business to manage your
time wisely.

Yes, be excited about every inbound leads - it's a pretty cool to think that
some random person found your company and wants to know more. Just be
smart about how you handle this exchange.

Bad News Brian

Hey Scott,

I left a voicemail for Brian as I saw him in my pipeline and no one has reached
out to him for a couple months. Any input from you on how to handle or what
the status of that account is?

Thanks,
John

----

Scott Sambucci
11:00 AM (23 hours ago) in reply to John

Run.

Why? Because the initial call was a referral from several months ago and
the conversation revolved around a valuation product, which we didn’t have.
He continued to ask for another round of demos and discussion around how
he could fit our round peg into his square hole of a problem. And worse, we
obliged. We went round and round with three or four more demos anyway,
included our Quantitative Analytics Director in the conversation to assist with
model development and how to use the data. Adding up our calls, we spent
15-18 hours with this prospect. All that for a 'no sale.'

“I thought we could get 100,000 records as a test”
We've had a few conversations with this lead - he's running a direct
marketing company and would like to use our data to target specific
consumers. His budget is tight, however, he's been forthcoming about this
and so we constructed a purchase program that works for his budget. We
shared the price and he verbally acknowledged that it would probably work.
This all went down on Friday just before Christmas.

The next steps? He wanted to run a quick test of sample data to make
sure the output is exactly what he needed. Sounds reasonable, so our sales
rep reached out to him twice in the week between Christmas and New Year’s
Eve. Crickets. Until the afternoon of Friday, December 30th as everyone was
packing up for the weekend - his assistant emailed to request 100,000 files for
a test and wanted to get them before the end of the day.

Ahhhhh.... Now we see where this might be going. Here's where we are:

1. First, we're not releasing a file size that big as a test without a clear
path to contract.
2. Processing a file that big takes a couple of days anyway.
3. We'd be willing to do that is we had a purchase order/contract
squared away.
4. We’ve identified a potential Vampire.

The action we took?

"That's sounds great - we're excited that you're ready to go with the test.

Here's what we can do:

1. We'll request the sample data that you'd like to see for your test. Because this is
such a large file, it'll take the weekend to process so we can kick that off today and
probably have that ready on Jan 2.

2. So that we can save time on implementation, I'll send over a contract to you with
the terms that we've discussed. Let's get that signed and done. Then if the sample file
is what you expected, we can roll immediately into providing you the updated data files
right away."

What does this do?

1. It determines if they are really serious or not. If they're serious, they
response to this proactive project management will be - "Wow -

that's a great idea! This will save us time to get things implemented
once the test is finished."
2. Smokes out any underlying objections - if they resist - "Oh no, we're
not ready to sign the contract yet." Then this opens the opportunity
to ask - "Okay, what other questions do you have? Let's make sure
we have them all answered before we avalanche you with these
sample files."

This approach worked. Sort of but not really. We signed up the client two
months later after several rounds of price negotiation where we developed a
“ramp up” pricing schedule for them. They paid less in the initial few months
then “ramped up” payments throughout the life of the agreement. During
product implementation, we hit several rough patches where the customer
asked questions about the product and began using our product in ways it
wasn’t intended. Six weeks into the agreement, they cancelled. While we
earned some short term revenue from the work, the opportunity cost of time
surely exceeded the dollars earned.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #9: There is generally an inverse correlation between
the amount of work the client expects you to do before the sale
and the likelihood of the sale actually occurring.



9 – REVENUE MATTERS

Sales Tenet #10: Using a product and buying a product are very,
very, very, very, very different.

Breaking the revenue seal matters. It is everything that makes or breaks your
business. It shows that the market values your service and that prospects are
not abusing your willingness to support them perpetually during an evaluation
stage or beta test. Engaging in the revenue generation process forces your
client to go through their internal RFP, approval, contracting, billing, and
payment process. This will be revealing about your prospect’s decision-
making ability for the purchase.

Be confident – if your prospect is articulating the value of your product
and its use for their organization, then ask for their business. Still gun shy
about this? Afraid to rock the boat? Think of it this way - would your
prospect ask a prospective employee to work for free for a couple of weeks?
Of course not. After the interview stage and decision to hire, the new
employee begins receiving a salary. So should you.

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If your prospect answers with “no” or “not yet” or “not right now” or
“we don’t have the budget” or “I’m not sure” or “let me see if I can get this
approved,” then they are not ready to spend money with you because you
haven't completely shown the value of your product to solve a critical
business need or you’re dealing with the wrong person. Keep selling. Start
over with the sales process if you must. Re-ask situational questions to
identify and to define their decision criteria and critical business issue. The
decision criteria may have changed since initially interacting with your
prospect three or six months ago. By asking for the business, you’ll find out
where you stand in the process and smoke out any underlying objections.
There are many times where you’ll discover that you are much farther away
from receiving a check than you think.

Here a few responses to your purchase questions that tell you exactly
where you are in the sales process:

 “It’s a little early for that yet. We still have a few other options
that we’re considering and haven’t gotten as far evaluating them
as we have with you.” Surprise! You may have thought that you
were close to the end decision. This response tells you that the
prospect is still evaluating options instead of resolving final
concerns before entering into a contract with you. This may be
the first time you’ve heard that other solutions are on the table.
Now you can redefine criteria and really sell the key points and
benefits of your product. Ask what other products they are
evaluating and why these other products are under
consideration. If they refuse to share this information you, that
signals a weak relationship and means that there is other vital
information they have not shared with you. Reset the sales
conversation by confirming decision criteria again and
reaffirming the situation and problems your prospect needs to
solve.
 “Sure – send over the pricing details. It will help me out with
requesting a budget.” This response tells you that the customer
is the first of several decision layers at the target account and it
tells you that this expense is probably a new one. You now
have a “double sale” to tackle – the first sale is on your product
(“Does it solve their problem?”), the second is selling internal
channels on a new expenditure (“Can we pay for it?”). In this
second part of the sale, you’ll be hitting fundamental cost-
benefit questions with the bean counters, managers, and legal
counsel, so be prepared to sell all over again from the start (See

Chapter 10 – “Negotiation & Contracts”). This latter group of
people may only be vaguely familiar with your product (if at all)
and you can assume that they haven’t thought through the
intricacies of a complete cost-benefit analysis.
 “I usually don’t handle the expenses and budgets. I’ll have to see
who the person is that does.” This tells you that your prospect is
not a decision-maker. If they were, they would know exactly
how to gain approval for the purchase because they would have
gone through this budget approval process at least once before
with a previous purchase. This is an important finding because
you now must find out who this person’s manager (and often
their manager) is and begin selling to them.

As a start-up, begin the revenue process as early in your product
development cycle as possible. The process of migrating a 'user' to a
'customer' will reveal the answers to several vital questions about your
business and its viability. For startups, Eric Reis refers to the release of an
MVP - a “Minimal Viable Product.” Developing an MVP is not just
important to deliver a solution that you think the market will accept, but also
introduces you and your prospect to the required process involved with the
purchase of your product.

In “Selling Into a New Market,” Brian Burns discusses how to manage
the technical and business sale simultaneously. This is an excellent method of
testing how serious your prospect is about purchasing your product instead of
lingering in evaluation purgatory. The premise? Each sale has a “technical
sale” (the users of you product) and a “business sale” (the managers and
bean-counters). The technical users have to accept that the product will
markedly improve their work life to justify its expense. The business sale
requires you to highlight this value in dollars and cents so that the managers
approve it. By engaging in both processes simultaneously, you can determine
the seriousness of your prospect. If your prospect gives you access to the
business team, then they are clearly serious about implementing your product
upon a successful evaluation. If not, then you run the risk of winning the
technical sale, then starting all over again with presentations and objections to
win the business sale. Alternately, you might have an executive-level Product
Champion ready to approach the business sale, only to be vetoed by his
technical team because they feel your product fails to meet their requirements.
Work both together to save time and to determine which of your prospects
are real and which are Vampires.

Questions to Ask Yourself & Your Prospects
Here are a few questions to ask about your product and revenue generation:

1. Is my target user able to approve the budget expenditure, and where
does your product fit into the user's budgeting process? By seeking
revenue, you'll find out if the target user (the mid-level manager) is
capable of approving the $5000/month budget amount herself, or if
she needs to go up the ladder to her manager or the Division
president. If so, then you may be required to host a second (or third
or fourth...) sales presentation to the user's manager or Division
head. That person will likely have a completely different set of
decision criteria requirements to meet and objections to overcome
before approving the order. In this third or fourth sales demo, you
might see the Division President turn to your Product Champion and
ask - “Okay – so why should we buy this? How will it help you?” The
president is testing to see if your prospect is really dying to use your
product, or if they’re just caught up in the sexiness of your product’s
interface. The Division President is tearing through the veneer to be
sure that your user will solve a critical business issue with your
product. It’s the ultimate “sink or swim” for your sale.

Many companies have specific time cycles and budgets allotted for
new purchases. If your project management software is not a
replacement for an existing cost and your target user doesn't have
budget available, you may end up waiting until next quarter or next
year before you can actually complete the transaction. Be ready to
offer flexible payment terms in these cases, such as delayed billing
(See Chapter 10 – “Negotiation & Contracts”). Offering this option
will expose whether “budget” is the real objection or if there’s
something else festering beneath the surface that your prospect
hasn’t yet shared or emphasized.

In the sales process, you'll be able to start identifying Gatekeepers
versus decision-makers. This is HUGE when it comes to
understanding opportunity pipeline projections from introduction to
closed sale.

2. What legal, contract, and due diligence requirements are needed? You
might be expecting that you can send over an invoice (or even an
email) and expect it to be paid by the user. Or, you are expecting the
user to charge the expense to a credit card and expense it on their
own budget. Or maybe you haven’t thought about this at all and are
hoping your Paypal account will do… Instead, the user's company

likely requires a list of due diligence requirements from you including
proof of up-time, server security, and protection of any proprietary
information shared in your software. The user's company might
require a license agreement and contract, even if you're not requiring
one. These all add overhead to your customer acquisition costs.
Think about this from a project management and time management
standpoint.

3. Is the product priced correctly? Your free users during beta stage told
you time and time again that they'd "easily be willing to spend the
$5000/month for your totally awesome product." Now they are
balking. Too many start-ups depend on hypothetical questions with
regard to pricing. You cannot depend on what people say, only on
what they do. The only way to validate a price is to actually sell the
product at that price. Alternately, you might have every new
customer tell you - "Wow! $5000? That's it? Send me the invoice and
I'll have that paid by bank wire transfer in two days!" Then for your
next batch of leads, move your asking price up to $7500 or $10,000.

4. Can you sell to the other 95% of adopters? In every industry, there
are early adopters that always use the latest and greatest innovations.
By selling to these early adopters, you'll start to see patterns in their
objections or even hear comments like - "I love your software. A lot
of people I talk to at other companies might want to see more
features or have problems with such-and-such functionality that you
have, but I can work around it." This reveals potential objections
from the mass audience that you ultimately need to reach in order to
explode sales. Early adopters might view your product as a nice “add-
on” to the tool set and have the budget to pay for it. However, the
rest of the market won’t have the budget for an “add-on” product,
nor will they be willing to spend the time implementing a product
that isn’t perceived as core to their daily work. Look for these signals
as you are selling to early adopters so that you can address them with
the rest of the market.

17

5. Is your product a "nice-to-have" or "gotta-have"? Money talks but
sometimes it’s not about the money – it’s about the implementation
costs and resources required. You envision that the customer says
“Yes!” to the contract and then “Poof!” – magically, your software is
installed and the three key users immediately begin using it with
grand success. Because of your software, they now only work four
hours a day, spend the extra time with their wife and kids, and
because of you they earned a bonus so they can take the two-week
African safari they’ve been dreaming about for years. Guess what? It
doesn’t work that way.

If your totally awesome product requires regular updates or some
level of hardware or personnel to maintain, then your product
doesn’t cost $5000/month to the customer. It costs much more.
Until you get through the implementation process and have the users
completely trained and utilizing your product every day, the sale is
not complete. More so, you are ignorant to all of the factors weighing
into your prospect’s decision to make the purchase. You must factor
these implementation costs into your price for the long run
sustainability of your business.

Many times the implementation process reveals landmines in your
product and service. It’s not until the local systems integration

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manager begins installing your product that technical hurdles are
noticed. Every client will be different and many clients will not have
IT people with the same motivation and interest in proper
implementation as your Product Champion and you. In fact, the
local IT people may see your product as extra work, especially when
they have to upgrade their system software or hardware to properly
implement your product.

6. “Based on our conversations, we’ve covered [enter defined decision
criteria here]. Can you think of any other outstanding questions
before I put together our work agreement and we can begin the
purchase process?” A specific example:

You: “Based on our conversations since we met at the Enterprise
Software Conference, we’ve covered how our ABC software
enables you to keep an extra administrative headcount off the
books, increase your batch processing time, and turn around
customer support requests at least two hours faster than your
current system – a 400% improvement. Can you think of any other
outstanding questions before I put together the working agreement
and so we can begin the purchase process?”

Prospect: “Nope – I that’s it…”

You: “That sounds great. Do you have a standard vendor
agreement that you company prefers to use?”

Always go this route first because by using their paperwork, you
avoid the legal review of your homegrown contract. (See Chapter 10
– “Negotiations and Contracts”) More importantly, this will tell you
if your prospect knows how to buy products from outside vendors.
If they respond with – “Jeez, I don’t know. I’ll have to figure out
who to ask about that…” then you know you have more work to do.

Saying no to Big Earls
In my consulting days, I spent six months pre-selling my services leading up
to an international trade event hosted in San Diego. The Embassy of
Kazakhstan organized a trade summit between US and Kazakh companies
and government leaders. Because my company focused on establishing and
developing these types of relationships, the event was a prime opportunity to
develop a set of clients on both sides early in my company's life.

One of the US companies was a manufactured housing company based
in Chula Vista (just outside of San Diego) – “Big Earl’s” company. (I call him
Big Earl because he was a gruff, portly man - the kind of guy that saw
business transactions as bar fights.) In helping to promote the conference in
the US, I gained access to the list of firms interested in attending. When Big
Earl showed interest in the event, I contacted him to answer his questions
and to prime him for consulting work. Earl and I hit it off marvelously and
after a phone call or two, we decided it made sense for me to spend the day
with him to understand their business and logistics of doing business in
Kazakhstan.

I jumped on a flight to San Diego (on my own dime) and spent the day
with Earl. After the first hour of our meeting, I was introduced to the
company owner. Oops… I mistakenly thought and assumed that Earl was the
man in charge. Now I had another layer to sell. We talked through the
opportunities and pulled out a map to talk through shipping options for
materials from the US to Kazakhstan. Big Earl sported a classic 6-series
BMW and treated me to a wonderful lunch at a fancy restaurant. Things were
going along swimmingly as I ignored the signals early in the relationship.

At the event, I established meetings between Earl and the key Kazakh
government ministers. This included translation services while my Kazakh
business partner sat with him in meetings to help Earl show well to the
ministers. The meetings went great and Earl was excited about the
opportunities.

In the afternoon, we had a break in the action so Earl, my Kazakh
partner, my US partner, and I sat down for a pow-wow. We asked Earl how
things were going and he couldn't hide his excitement. We said - "Wow -
that's great. So what happens next?" Earl proceeded to talk about timelines
and shipping and all of the fantastic work we were going to do.

We asked him - "That's great Earl! So when do we start getting paid?"
That wasn't exactly a question Earl wanted to hear. He sternly replied - "You
get paid when I get paid." We were talking about 6-, 12-, and 18-month
timelines here, at least. Earl expected us to help him out all along - organize
the logistics, manage the customs paperwork, and develop the business locally
in Kazakhstan, which then would open the opportunity for him to sell his
product, then and only then we would begin receiving payment. Huh? That
was the last time we spoke with Big Earl.

Here are the mistakes I made:

1. When I hopped on the plane on my own dime to visit Earl before
the conference, I signaled that I was working with him as a partner,
not as a value-adding service provider.
2. At the initial on site meeting, I should have laid out a fee schedule to
him and negotiated terms – weekly, monthly, and project rates.
3. I failed to qualify Big Earl’s role as a decision-maker.

Customers intentionally or unintentionally will take advantage of you.
Earl was doing so intentionally and I let him get away with it from the
beginning. Other customers will do this unintentionally, either thinking that
the long ramp up and testing periods are part of your normal sales cycle, or
they know that you are a new company in the industry and they think they’re
doing you a favor as a user. It is your responsibility to the customer, your
company, and yourself to generate revenue and articulate the steps to getting
there.

Example: Big Hedge Fund
We initiated a sales process with a very large hedge fund. Because they've
been burned in the past from vendors that have over-promised and under-
delivered, they asked us produce custom report on specific product
performance metrics. This was a legitimate request and very different from
the client asking for us to export all of the data and saying - "let us use it for 6
months and we'll tell you if it's useful. If it is, then we can talk about a
contract." Now… the problem is that creating this custom report would take
about two days of coding time and then a day of computing time – substantial
resources for our company.

Before going down this road, we hosted a phone call with our product
sponsor at the fund to find out:

1. What are their benchmarks - what percentages and performance
metrics are acceptable? The prospect didn’t know the answer to this
question! There were no other competitive products or industry
benchmarks. This meant that we could have a 95% success rate but
the prospect could arbitrarily decide that it needs to be 100% without
understanding that 100% would be impossible to reach. They wanted
to view the evaluation results then decide if the rates were something
they could work with, yet they weren’t working with anything now.
See the circular argument in this?

2. What other outstanding questions do you have with respect to the
product? We needed to know if we were in the final stages of the
decision process, or at stage 2 of 20 or stage 17 of 20. This question

uncovered a critical point in the sales process. The prospect told us –
“It’s too soon to tell. Once I have all the materials from you, then I
need to present it to my managers. They might have questions that I
haven’t thought of yet.” Aha! So the person who we thought was the
decision-maker really wasn’t, at least not on his own.

3. If we can get this to you by next week and the numbers are
acceptable, will we be able to initiate the agreement process? This is
an excellent trial close to smoke out any lingering objections. If the
answer was “yes,” then we'd be happy to spend the time and
resources to deliver the requested diagnostics. If not and they replied
with - “No actually we have some other questions…” then we've
smoked out other objections to overcome before allocating the
coding time.

In this particular case, because question #2 showed us that we were
far earlier in the process than we thought, we skipped question #3.
But, if the answer to question #2 was something like – “I can’t think
of anything else…” then question #3 is an trial close to be doubly
sure that there aren’t any other lingering objections. If the response
to this question is “Nope, I think we’ll be good…” then you follow
up with – “Okay great – while we’re putting together the diagnostics
you requested, we can work on the agreement in parallel to save time.
Do you have a vendor agreement that you prefer to use?”

Tracking Payments
Just so you know, tracking and receiving payments from customers generally
sucks. You may have to develop your inner “Vito The Collections Guy.” You
can do everything right on your end – send the invoice, confirm receipt,
provide wiring instructions, and answer every question that your prospect’s
accounts payable person has. Despite all that, invoices do not always get paid
in a timely way, or at all, nor do your prospects always know how to resolve
these situations. Always, always, always find out from your new customer
who the main point of contact is for you on the accounting side. If possible,
organize a ten minute phone call with your prospect, their accounts payable
person, and yourself just to talk through the payment process. This will make
your invoice memorable, curtail side tracks, and it might be the first time ever
that your prospect actually talked to their accounts payable person.

We had a challenge with a very large existing customer that went
through a corporate spin-off. They had paid reliably every month for more
than two years until the corporate split. As a result of the split, no one in the
company knew who was responsible for paying vendor invoices now. It took

three (yes, three!) months of phone calls and emails to find this person. It
happens, so be ready.

Here’s a great question to ask - “So that we don’t have to bother you
with accounting questions, who is the best point of contact for payments?”
then PICK UP THE PHONE, and develop a relationship with that person.
This person will be the lifeblood of your existence with your new customer.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #10: Using a product and buying a product are very,
very, very, very, very different.



10 – NEGOTIATION & CONTRACTS
Sales Tenet #11: Always tell the truth so you never have to
remember what you said.

Congratulations! You've received commitment from the end user and team,
now you are engaged with the legal, due diligence, and implementation team.

18

A few rules on negotiation:

1. Tell the truth so you don't have to remember what you said. You are
selling a new product as a new company in your industry. Don’t be a
douchebag by telling your prospect one price early in the sales
process then jacking it up because you think you quoted them too

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low. It is acceptable to change your price based on new information,
which is why is it is vital to provide summary notes of every call and
articulate for your clients the difference between the initial quote and
the new one – “Yes, back in August we did say that the annual
license would be $25,000 for our Economy product for all three
users. However since then, we’ve been evaluating our Premier
product for twenty users, which is why we’re looking at $150,000
now.”

2. Develop a road map or flowchart of the negotiation process and
pivotal conversations. Sketch this out on a white board before a big
call. Think ahead of questions and options that your customers
might request.

For example, let’s assume you’ve been discussing a site license that
include 15 seats for your prospect’s entire team. You should prepare
the answers to these questions:

 What if your prospect asks for 3 or 5 (or 50!) licenses instead?
How will that affect pricing?
 What if your client comes back at you with a price proposal
that is a third (or a tenth!) of what you quote? How will you
respond?
 How will you offer any adjustments to the price without
appearing to be price cutting, such as a quarterly payment via
bank wire transfer instead of monthly invoices?
 What if your customer requests a 30-day cancellation clause at
any time throughout the agreement instead of committing to
a full year term?

You must think about these iterations ahead of time so that you can
work through the major agreement issues in a calm, natural, and
professional way during the call. Be prepared.

You will not always work through every single question or objection
in a single call. That’s okay. The goal is to identify outstanding
questions so that you can progress the negotiation and finalize in a
subsequent call if needed. Certainly try to resolve these items in one
call if you can and having a flowchart on a white board will help you
move through more of the process on the initial call. Ultimately, treat
the contract process as you would a sale in itself – your prospect’s
legal team will have questions, objections, and expect some
concessions. Clearly articulate their questions in your own words,

confirm that you have their questions understood, then treat them
like a checklist. Once you reach the end the checklist, your contract
process should be finished.

3. Ask your Product Champion for help in preparing for the call with
his attorneys. Ask him – “What sort of questions does your legal
team typically ask? What are the concessions that they usually
request?” At this point in the sale, he’s as invested in the process as
you are and wants to see this project gain approval. Frequently his
reply will be something like – “Oh boy, they ALWAYS ask for a 30-
day opt out” or “In every contract, they always start with slicing the
price quote by 50% even when I tell them that we’ve already been
through the price agreement conversation.” Now you have a heading
for your call prep and flowchart.

4. Be flexible but consistent on pricing. I know you want to finalize the
deal, but if you start creating arbitrary prices and discounts to finalize
agreements with individual clients, you’ll regret it down the road.
Need an example? I thought you might…

We provided a super-duper discount to a customer to get a deal done
a couple of years ago. He was happy and wonderful. Then he
moved companies. He wanted to buy our service at his new job and
we quoted him our normal price which was 400% what he was
paying at his old job. Guess what? He freaked. He had already told
his new director all about our product, how awesome it was and how
much it costs – all before picking up the phone to call us to place an
order with no selling involved. That was a tough conversation to
have because then he had to go back to his director at his brand new
employer and ask for 400% of the budget already approved. Think he
felt like a boob in front of his new boss?

If you do offer a tremendous discount or highly favorable terms,
document it for your customer and in your account notes. You
never want to look back months or years later and say – “Huh? Why
is this monthly payment $1000/month when our going rate is
$5000/month?”

5. Be prepared to act quickly and then be ready for a protracted
contract, due diligence, and negotiation process. Your Product
Champions might expect that the contract will take “a week or two.”
This can easily turn into a month or two or three or four. Be
proactive throughout the cycle and be very nice to corporate

attorneys and vendor managers. After each conversation, send a
summary email with both resolved and outstanding questions. This
develops a checklist for both sides to view during the process. Find
the LinkedIn profiles of the attorneys, vendor managers, and
accounts payable people just like you did with your prospect.
Everyone is part of the sale.

“OK – Send me over a quote”
If you hear this, then you haven’t finished selling. Earlier in the sales process,
you should have discussed approximate pricing based on the product and
service that you are providing with your prospect. This conversation
generally happens between the first couple of calls and the point when your
Product Champion and team begin hammering you with final objections and
questions about support and implementation. Discussing price is part of the
qualification process – it is YOUR responsibility to initiate this part of the
sales discussion if it appears that the client appears to be ignoring the topic.
Don’t pretend everything is okay. It’s not okay if you haven’t discussed price
at a reasonable point in the sales process.

Here are some questions that you can use either earlier in the sales
process to initiate this conversation, or later in the process if you did not get
there first time around:

 “What’s the approval process for a purchase like this?”
This tests a few key aspects of the sale. First, it will indicate to you if
your contact is indeed a decision-maker. Sometimes your contact
becomes squirrely. If they answer with – “Oh, I make all the
decisions” or “Eventually I’ll run it up the flagpole but I’m be leading
the initial product evaluation for now” - then you might be in trouble
with a Vampire or Gatekeeper. Yes, there are times where a single
person in a company is able to make a unilateral decision and has the
budget. This is very, very rare. Do not fool yourself into a fall sense
of optimism that you’ve now completed your sales process due
diligence. Or they might say – “I don’t know. I have to figure out
how we’re going to pay for this.”
 “Are you planning to allocate this to your budget or cost-share with
your IT department?” This is an indirect way of asking whether your
prospect has the budget and the ability to make a decision on their
own. If they are planning to cost-share, then know that you may
need to dive back into the sales process with a second team to run
through another set of demonstrations that includes asking
situational questions, defining criteria, and illustrating how your
product solves a critical business issue for the second team.

 “While I know you’re not yet at a point to make your final decision
to begin using the product, it probably makes sense to provide you
with some pricing guidance. How about we review a few pricing
options to make sure we’re all on the same page?” Your prospects
will respect you for this and you will find out much earlier in the sales
process or not you have a qualified prospect. (See Chapter 8 –
“Vampires & Gatekeepers”) Almost always your prospect will say –
“That’s a good idea. So how much is it?” Then you can begin the
discussion. You might quote $10,000/month and your prospect
replies with – “Hmmm… We have $5000 budgeted for this project
and that includes another unrelated product we need to purchase.”
Great! Now you know that they have budget for this expenditure and
how much is available. You can then tailor a solution to match the
budget available before reaching the end of the sales process and
having it completely deflate because you didn’t discuss pricing earlier.

Example Conversation
With this example conversation early in the sales process, your objective is to
make sure that you and your prospect are in the same relative price area. You
need to make sure your prospect isn’t thinking that the price is $1,000 a year
when the actual price is $100,000 or $150,000. If you are having this
conversation later in the sales process, be prepared to walk through a variety
of options and paths to reach a mutual agreement.

You: “While I know you’re not yet at a point to make your final decision
to begin using the product, it probably makes sense to talk through the
transaction side of things. How about we review a few pricing options to
make sure we’re all on the same page?”

Prospect: “That’s a good idea. How much is a site license?”

You: “Sure. Let’s recap what we know so far. You have 15 people on
your team that will need a seat license, and you’ll want to have a
manager’s account so that you can view everyone’s activity in a summary
report each week. Does that sound right?”

This assures that you and the prospect are in agreement with the
expected use and you are ending with a question that requires active
participation from the prospect. This should be a conversation, not
a presentation or a pitch. Relax, it’s just a business transaction.

Prospect: “Yeah, pretty close, though I don’t think we’ll need one for all
15 people. I’m thinking we’ll probably only have 10-12 users.”

You: “OK – that makes sense. We can always add more seats as we go.
Is there anything else that you can think of in terms of users or licenses?”

Here, you are confirming that there are no add-ons that the client is
expecting. This is very, very important because later in the
transaction as you are finalizing the deal, prospects will often ask
for a few ‘throw-ins’ – “Oh you know what, I totally forgot, but
we’ll need three licenses for the IT team so they can prepare reports
for the team. Can you just include that in the price we agreed to?”
Asking this question early in the sales process gives you cover to
respond to these ‘throw-in’ requests with – “We can definitely add
three more licenses though they will be a little extra above what we
agreed to last month…”

Prospect: “OK, sounds good. I can’t think of anything else right now.”

You [speaking slowly, clearly, and confidently]: “Great, then here’s a
summary - A manager’s license is $2500 per year and the user seat
licenses are $1500 per user per year. With 10 users, that comes to
$152,500 for a one-year license for your team. Again, that’s 10 users at
$1500 each and your manager account which is $2500, which is how we
arrive at $152,500.”

Yes, repeat yourself to make sure they heard you. Their cell phone
may have just buzzed with a text message or they could have
dropped their pen. Once you’ve repeated the quote, immediately
be quiet. Don’t speak, don’t talk. Even if the prospect is quiet.
Let them think about it. Your prospect could be scribbling notes,
doing back-of-the-envelope math, or whispering to their operations
manager sitting with them on the call. Just be still – they’re not
going anywhere and they didn’t hang up the phone.

A Few Possible Prospect Responses and How to Handle:
Response #1: “That’s a lot more than I expected.”

This might be a true statement, it might be a negotiating tactic, or it
might be reactionary. Do not take this personally. This is not an
insult to your company, your product, or you. Remember, this is
just a business transaction.

You: “Okay – let’s talk about that. What did you have budgeted for this
purchase?”

Response #2: “We don’t have any budget for this. We’re trying to see what’s
out there to see if this is purchase we want to make…” or “I wasn’t sure what
to expect.”

This tells you that you are still early in the sales process because
your prospect has not yet presented a case to management for
budget allocation for this purchase. They are still evaluating
options, which might include 1) your product, 2) another product,
3) building a product themselves, or 4) doing nothing. Just based
on those four options, you’re now at a 25% probability of getting
the sale, and that is before the rest of the sales process is complete
where each stage might chip away at that 25%.

You: “Sure – I understand. What is that process like?” Your prospect
might say:

1. “Well, I’ve been priming my manager for a few months
that this is something we need. I’m pretty sure I can get
this approved – how much flexibility is there on the price?”

Now you know you have a real prospect who is willing to
go to bat for you internally. You can openly begin
negotiating with trial closes:

You: “I think there’s some. What did you have in mind?”
(or “What were you thinking?” or “What works with your
budget?”)

Prospect: “Well, what about an even $100,000 for all of
the licenses, plus three additional for the IT team?”

You: “I think we can do that. If I can get my partner to
agree, are we good?” (Personally, I don’t like using the
“do we have a deal?” because it sounds too salesy.)

Prospect: “Yep, we do.”

You: “Great. Hold on a second and let me grab Bob to
make sure we can do that.” Then put your hand over the
receiver, sing Happy Birthday or a couple of rounds of 99
Bottles of Beer on the Wall, then take deep breath, smile
into the phone and say – “Okay we’re good.”

2. “I’m not sure. I’ll have to look over these numbers and see
if this is something that I want to present to the rest of the
team. [And by ‘team,’ he means ‘my manager’]. Can you
send me over the PowerPoints so that I can present this
internally?”

You know where to go with this from Chapter 6 – “More
Sales Process.”

3. “I’m not sure. Let me think about and I’ll get back to
you.”

Gulp. Your prospect just told you that they are not
interested, ready to buy, or able to afford it. Right here,
right now, you absolutely positively must resuscitate the
sale.

You: “Tell me more about what you’re thinking.” Get the
prospect to talk. Your objective right here is to find out
why you are now getting stonewalled. Was the price
waaaaay too high for this person to approve? Were they
only toe-dipping from the beginning? Did you fail to
uncover a critical business issue?

If they resist telling you more, then you need to be
honest –

You: “Here’s why I’m asking – we’ve had a couple of
very productive phone calls. You told me that in order
for your business unit to make it’s Q1 revenue goals, you
need to increase the call volume they are handling. The
product we’ve been reviewing together will increase you
call volume handling by a minimum of 35%, which
translates to approximately $1,500,000 in new revenue for
you. A $150,000 investment yields you a 10x return just
in Q1 alone. Help me understand your decision process
some more.” Now you are back in the sales process and
asking questions to identify needs and establish decision
criteria.

Response #3: “Your competitor’s product is less than a third of your
price.”

Okay, this is a really annoying because you know that either there is
not a head-on competitor for your product or your competitor’s
product is deficient which is why you decided to build your product
in the first place. It’s also dejecting to think that after all of the time
and work invested, the decision is shrouded as a price-based
decision. But… the good news is that now you have a clearer
picture of objections to overcome and places where you can
differentiate your product for your prospect versus other options
he has.

“OK – Send me a contract”
Two strategies:

1. Turn it around. "Joe, I can definitely do that. Here's a thought - you
guys are a bigger organization with corporate attorneys that get paid a
lot of money. In my experience, the approval process will be
smoother and quicker if you send over your vendor agreement and
I'll just fill in the details of what we're doing together."

If your buyer hasn't bought from vendors before, this might present
a challenge to them. They won't know where to get this agreement.
So be flexible. If you notice ANY hesitation on this, just move on to
#2.

2. Send your generic contract. Why? It keeps the momentum of the sale
going. Additionally, when your customer sends the contract to legal,
their legal team will happily either mark-up your contract so that it
meets their internal criteria, or they'll scrap it and give your customer
the company's vendor agreement for you to sign. This can turn out
to be the best method to moving things quickly because now you're
using their contract and making the attorneys look smart. They like
that.

If you don’t have a contract, go to DocStoc.com and find a template
you can use. After you send out two or three contracts to various
prospects, you’ll see a pattern emerge of common changes and
additions that you can add as standard (or purposely omit to use as
negotiating concessions).

More on Pricing – Vendor Managers
Be firm and transparent on price. Some companies have vendor
managers shrouded as attorneys. They will take your contract with all of
the terms you've agreed to with your customer and then begin a new

negotiation process. I've had this happen with a very large investment
bank. After working with the trading desk for several months on test
files, reviewing products, and agreeing to terms on price, delivery, and
duration, I was introduced to Martha during the contract phase. Martha's
job was a vendor manager whose job is to negotiate contracts with
vendors. After sending our flimsy contract, I was returned their standard
vendor agreement. Martha took the terms of our contract and pasted
them into their agreement. We reviewed the agreement point by point
and reached the last section detailing price and delivery. She said -
"Okay, so let's talk about the price." Huh? I'd already gone through this
process with the end users - the trading desk - and had already put
together a nice deal for them based on certain concessions they
requested. I thought we were good to go. No one informed Martha this
nor had an incentive to do so. In her mind, the traders didn't care about
price and bought everything that they wanted. It was her job (and later I
learned she was measured on this) to negotiate discounts and favorable
payment terms (i.e. net-90 instead of 'due on receipt.')

Martha: "What can you do with the price?"

Me: [Gulp. Was this going to be a deal breaker?] “What do you mean?"

Martha: "Let's work on this price a little."

Me: "Martha, this is the price of the product that is being purchased. Let
me explain why…" In this case, I started with our standard list pricing
(set a high anchor price) and the showed how the price included in the
contract included a 25% discount from our list price because of this and
that. I think she was disappointed that she missed out on the negotiating
fun, but ultimately understood where we were. Looking back, I should
have avoided this by asking the users about the contract process earlier
in the sales conversation. They might have told me – “Oh year, we have
a Vendor Relations department that handled all of the contract mumbo
jumbo.” From there, I could have asked if the Vendor Relations
Department handled budgeting and pricing, or if that stayed resident
with the user group. Who knows? Maybe I would have learned nothing
from that questions, and if I learned something by asking, I would have
been better prepared for the conversation with Martha.

19

Corporate Attorneys are People Too
Remember the people that you're working with at this stage are often
corporate attorneys. Most of them are really, really nice people that are also
really, really smart. They’re not out to add “gotcha” ticks to their wall –
they’re just paid a lot of money to ardently protect their employer so you need
not take their comments, suggestions, and negotiations personally. Also
remember that most corporate attorneys have little or no experience with the
product or business development side of their company. They may not even
really understand what their own company does, the problem it solves, and
how or why their company makes money. (Yes, this is a massive over-
generalization, but you get the point – corporate attorneys are not sitting in
front on their customers building or pitching products.)

Contract Versions & Call Summary Notes
Make life easy for attorneys and they will make life easy for you. You’re going
to have several back-and-forth emails and phone calls throughout the process.
Attorneys like to work in Microsoft Word so they can mark changes in the
document. Retain a copy of each revision and include a time and date in each
file name. Trust me on this one.

For example:

ABC_Corp_YourCompany_License_Agreement_2012-01-19_815am
ABC_Corp_YourCompany_License_Agreement_2012-01-21_945am
ABC_Corp_YourCompany_License_Agreement_2012-01-22_230pm-FINAL

Take really, really good notes of every call, then summarize your notes in
a well-formatted email, send them to the other party, and ask for their

19
John Breckenridge, Attorney General of the United States under Thomas Jefferson.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/John_Breckinridge%2C_Attorney_General.jpg

agreement on your notes by ending your emails with a question – “Anything
else from our conversation that I may have missed?”

Remember:

Sales Tenet #11: Always tell the truth so you never have to
remember what you said.



11 – BE NICE & EAT YOUR BROCCOLI
Sales Tenet #12: Be nice. Always, always, always be nice.

This is a rule of life. Be nice all of the time, without exception, to everyone
you meet. This includes taxi cab drivers, front desk managers, airline
attendants, the retail clerks, waitresses, and your family. Everyone is out there
doing their own thing. They all have a reason for being where they are right
now, whether they be there in a good mood, bad mood, or somewhere in
between. Ask people with earnest – “How’s it going today?” Not – “Hi -
How are you?” as you trail off to a question about whether the French fries
are thick cut or thin cut. Really ask them – “Wow, it looks like it’s crazy busy
in this place today. How’s it going?” Speak human and be human. It
matters, especially when you’re having a crappy day. And you’ll feel a whole
lot better when you’re nice to other people.

20

20
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Don%27t_worry,_be_happy.jpg

Why being nice matters for business too
In December, I had a long conversation with an analyst at a very large bank.
He and I have been working together for more than a year to discover
applications for our data products in his predictive modeling. Check out how
I came to work with John:

1. How did I find John? From blog post comment he left last year.
2. How did he find me? From his new colleague, Jim, that joined his
team.
3. Where did come Jim from? An inbound call in June 2009 when he
was exploring the start of a hedge fund seven states away from where
he lived and worked now.
4. How did Jim find us? He registered on our company website after
seeing a blog post referring to an article published in Forbes
magazine using our housing data back in 2007. (See Chapter 3 –
“Find Your Voice”)

Our company receives phone calls every week from investors and
individuals starting hedge funds. Starting a hedge fund is no easy task, though
the newbies trying it may think it is. We’ve seen most of these new funds
never get off the ground, but as a part of their research process they need to
understand what data is available to them so they can build a case to their
potential investors about the informational advantage they will have in their
investment process. It is very easy to bristle when receiving these inbound
calls because they almost never lead to any business for us and for those that
do, they are a high opportunity cost because of the inordinate amount of
service and support required for these small accounts. But, I always, always,
always tell myself to be nice to these inbound callers. They are out there bird-
dogging a new idea and pursuing it. Who am I to be snarky or assume they
can’t make it? So I was nice to Jim, then went two years before I heard from
him again via my initial call with John the Analyst who said – “I heard about
you guys from Jim Smith who just joined us.” Same guy who was trying to
start a hedge fund back in 2009! How about that?

During the course of the conversation, John the Analyst asked me if I
had heard about his bank’s new program related to their asset portfolio. This
new program presented a very large opportunity for our company. A key
person heading this initiative was a person to whom I was referred to by
another vendor, who I called to talk with about a white paper that he wrote
and published. This vendor and I hit it off and established a pleasant working
relationship, including this second vendor referring me to key personnel that
he works with at other large institutions. All of this because I was nice.

21

Read Books Everyday
News articles, magazines, and TechCrunch don't count. They are important
for daily reading and to identify business opportunities, but they don’t reach
into your creative brain to spawn new thoughts.

 Novels. They will improve your vocabulary and develop a deep
roster of cocktail party conversation. Try a variety of authors. In the
past year, I’ve read Jack London, Kurt Vonnegut, Orhan Pamuk,
Oscar Wilde, Joseph Heller, Amos Oz, Salman Rushdie, and Isaac
Asimov.
 Research-based books and nonfiction. Personally, I like reading
about the human brain and decisions, economics, and price theory.
A few popular authors nowadays include Malcolm Gladwell, Dan
Ariely, and Thomas Friedman. Find your own niche of nonfiction
and read it regularly.
 Business and entrepreneurship books. You’re already doing that with
this book. More of this.

You need not take my word for it. Here are a few articles showing the
positive effects of reading:
 www.journals.lww.com/neurotodayonline/Fulltext/2010/01210/Wh
ite_Matter_Brain_Changes_Result_from_Reading.9.aspx
 www.pickthebrain.com/blog/improve-your-mind-by-reading-the-
classics/
 www.pickthebrain.com/blog/the-5-types-of-books-that-increase-
intelligence
 www.cedu.niu.edu/~smith/Unpubs/mwera94_2.pdf

21
Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Broccoli_and_cross_section_edit.jpg

Reading List for Selling, Strategies, and Account Management

The Macro Process on Sales Strategy & Process
These books will start you on your PhD in the sales process for enterprise
and major account selling:
 The Huthwaite Institute - “SPIN Selling” and “Major Account Sales
Strategy” (www.huthwaite.com)
 Brian Burns - "Selling in a New Market”
 Geoffrey Moore - "Crossing the Chasm"

The Micro Process
 Jeffrey Gitomer (www.gitomer.com) focuses on why people buy,
how purchasing decisions are made, and how to develop your
personal brand. A bit of his personal branding is kitchy for enterprise
sales, but you’ll skim a few good ideas. I mostly like Gitomer for his
perspective of why people buy.
 Brian Tracy (www.briantracy.com) recorded his audio series “The
Psychology of Selling.” Listen to it in your car.
 Dale Carnegie’s “How to Win Friends and Influence People” covers
everything you need on engaging in conversations and placing your
prospect squarely in the spotlight every time. This book teaches you
how to listen and the importance of “you” in a conversation versus
“I/me” and how to use “and” instead of “but” in a conversation.
Read this book and you’ll even experience better results from your
post office and DMV interactions.

Tactical
This includes phone strategies, leaving voicemails, asking the right questions,
and leading effective demonstrations:
 Michael Pedone (www.salesbuzz.com) – Nobody is better when it
comes to selling over the phone, leaving voicemails, and prospecting.
 Peter Cohen - "GreatDemo!" (www.secondderivative.com) – He will
amaze you. If you have the opportunity to attend his live workshops,
they are very, very, very good and well worth the investment. The
groups are small (my workshop had ten of us) and each of us spent
the day working on our own demos plus gave a presentation at the
end to practice our new delivery. I employed this strategy and closed
an account that had been sitting on the sidelines for almost a year in
the “we’re not ready to make a decision” mode.

Motivational
 Zig Ziglar is the man you want when your need a push with a side of
humor to make the next sales call. Check out "The Secrets of
Closing the Sale" (www.ziglar.com). He's a fantastic speaker because
he talks like a normal person and injects self-effacing humor into his
talks. It's great stuff for the car or the plane. You'll laugh out loud at
least a few times.
 James Altucher writes “The Altucher Confidential” blog
(www.jamesaltucher.com). He’ll make you think about yourself,
what’s holding you back, and what really matters. It’s a raw
perspective on starting a business, taking action, and being happy. In
particular, I used his “Daily Practice” idea for my own work.

Stay Inspired
I spent Thanksgiving with my in-laws at a pretty little vacation spot in
Oregon. I was feeling a bit lazy, then my mother-in-law and my wife, who
was five months pregnant at the time, announced they were going to the gym,
so I followed. That's what it took to get me out of the condo and feeling
good about myself and my body – a guy who’s run marathons and finished
triathlons. Find inspiration wherever you can.

Read a blog post about someone who taught themselves Python or Ruby
on Rails. Spend time watching videos and presentations about how other
entrepreneurs persevered and found solutions to their business problems.22
Do whatever you have to do to stay inspired. Your customers need you to be
happy, motivated, and enthusiastic. Be the most positive conversationalist
your prospects speak with every day. Years ago during my career in textbook
publishing, I worked with a recruiter who always, always, always had a
positive and upbeat tone on every call we had. It was truly delightful to have
those conversations because I knew I would leave the call feeling optimistic.

The Charlie Rose Show
I read an article a couple years ago about The Charlie Rose Show in Fortune
Magazine. Apparently Warren Buffett records every show and watches them.
Good enough for Warren is good enough for me. I set up my DVR to do the
same and on Sunday mornings, I sit down to watch the week’s interviews that
interest me. Just this week, I watched interviews with Wade Davis, author of
"Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory, and the Conquest of Everest," and
Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith on their book "Van Gogh: The

22
Check out Stanford University’s Entrepreneurship Corner:
http://ecorner.stanford.edu/podcasts.html

Life." Last year, Charlie Rose hosted a 12-part series on the human brain and
all of its intricacies. None of this is at all related to my work, which is exactly
the point. Besides, these are crazy smart people on his show, much smarter
than you or me. If you don’t like Charlie Rose, try TED.com. Stretch your
mind outside of software, product, customers, and finances.

Find a regular resource to give yourself a respite from your day to day
madness with thinking that will stretch you in new places. You’ll be surprised
how often you can use your discoveries in your daily conversation.

Remember:

Sales Tenet #12: Be nice. Always, always, always be nice.



12 – LOVE THE GRIND

Sales Rep: "Man, I was really busy at work today."

Manager: "Great! Lots of demos? Couple of advances? A new
client?"

Sales Rep: "Not one, but my email was blowing up all day. Then
the marketing team asked me to sit in on their two-hour monthly
planning meeting. Then one of my customers asked me to call
them so we ended up talking for almost an hour about problems
they were having with their database."

Manager: "We don't sell, service, or manage databases. We're a
trucking company."

Sales Rep: "I know. Can you believe it? Before I looked up, it was
1:30 and I hadn't eaten lunch, got back at 2:30 and a bunch of
people I replied to in my morning emails had more questions."

Focus on your "business" not your "busy-ness."23

23
Attribution to Jon Sterling (www.linkedin.com/in/mistersterling)

24

What do you notice when you go to the doctor's office? Her schedule is
full and she frequently doesn't know what patient she's seeing until just before
she walks in the door and grabs the clipboard. (This part is a little troubling -
but you get the point.) Your doctor, attorney, accountant - every other
personal services professional has their days mapped out in advance. You
need to do to the same. A couple of rules:

1. Twice as long, half the reward. This is a simple rule. Accept it and
get used to it. The sooner you do, the sooner you'll enjoy your
success. It's the sales process that you must appreciate and enjoy, not
the "close." You might enter the sales process with visions of a new
$500,000/year customer, that ultimately will end up starting off at
$50,000/year. That’s okay – it happens. Be nice, focus on the
relationship, and help your customers succeed. They will reward you
when they grow faster and you were a reason for it.

2. This is why you must love the grind. Slowdowns occur. Priorities
change, budgets change, personnel changes, CEOs leave, champions
leave. People who you thought were champions really were just
Vampires and Gatekeepers. It’s part of the process. Smile, be nice,
and keep going.

3. Do NOT hire "closers" or aspire to be a "closer." “Closers” hate the
grind. In business-to-business sales, enterprise sales, major account
selling - whatever you want to call it - you must expect and thrive in a
complex organizational sales process and understand your own to
that process. Achieving advances, hosting on a call with the decision

24
Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grind_stone.JPG

committee, receiving action from the client, discussing price - these
are all "closes" and if any one of these fails to happen, you don't have
a sale. Any salesperson that prides themselves on being a "closer" in
a Glengarry Glen Ross sort of way is the last person you want
developing relationships with high-ticket customers.25 The Huthwaite
Corporation studied over 35,000 sales calls and concluded that
"closers" and closing techniques have no and even a negative impact
on enterprise-level sales.26

In the enterprise sale, you're dealing with multiple decision-makers
and committees (formal or informal). As a salesperson, you will be
interacting with committee members numerous times over several
months and any cheap attempt to prematurely close the sale may
torpedo the sales process for your company altogether.

You cannot compress a six-month sales cycle into one-month just by
being a "closer." Your clients are sophisticated managers (usually)
that are seeking a long-term solution for a difficult business problem.
The sales process requires a sales professional to identify Product
Champions, antagonists, and the critical business issues to target
throughout the stages of the sale.

You will very rarely find a point in any conversation where you are
present to deliver a "closing line" (i.e. "It looks like you have all of
information you need, so if you'll just sign here.... Use my pen.")
Instead, the prospect's decision is an educational process in which
your sales professionalism needs to be integrated in order to earn the
sale. The contract and negotiation phase itself even after the decision
is made will take several calls and offer opportunities for the sale to
fail. In most big sales, the line is blurred between the decision, the
contract’s execution, the initial payment, and an implementation
phase that might last months or even a year.

Who do you want managing this process - a sales professional or a
"closer" worried about when to deliver a cute line? Ultimately, of
course, you want a sales professional who is comfortable with leading
the prospect through the sales and contract process. This is not for

25
Recommend reading: "Trust-Based Selling" by Charles Green

26
Huthwaite published numerous white papers on these topics: www.huthwaite.com.

the impatient "closer" but instead for a sales professional that
genuinely cares about solving her client's problems.

Planning
Monday is the most important day of the week. Well, it’s really Friday
because you're planning ahead to Monday. Tuesday, Wednesday, and
Thursday are important because you should executing your weekly plan,
gaining advances, and prospecting to set appointments for the next few days.
Seeing a trend here? Every day is the most important day of the week.

I find that Monday, especially Monday morning, is the single best time to
do outbound calls. Why?

1. It's early enough in the week that if you get voicemail that you can
give yourself permission to call back on Thursday without seeming
pushy. Do this on a Tuesday/Friday plan and people can use Friday
to blow you off or tell you – “Yeah, just call me next week and we’ll
set something up…”
2. Most people don't set internal meetings for Monday morning because
no one wants to start the week in a meeting. (A generalization of
course.) This means calendars are clear PICK UP THE PHONE.
3. You’re setting the pace for the week and accomplishing the hard
chores of selling. You’ll feel a tremendous sense of accomplishment
when you’ve had five new calls and set two demos for later in the
week before 11:30am on Monday. Plus, think about your team
walking in the door on Monday watching and hearing you on the
phone tracking down business to support them and their work.

Do a Daily Practice27
This is easy. It's a business plan for the next day. After doing weekly "Sales
Cannons" with the idea of identifying the three (3) major goals to accomplish
during the week, I found that the “urgent-but-not-important” customer
requests, emails, phone calls, and generally poor time management skills force
the Top Three out of view. Now I do a Daily Practice – “What three
things/calls/accomplishments must I complete before I leave the office
tomorrow?” Your time management will improve remarkably, as will your
results. By making this simple list, your brain goes into high gear in the
background when you’re at home with your family. It is subconsciously
developing ideas so that when you awake the next day, you’ll have 3-4 new
ideas to implement that day to meet your daily objectives.

27
Also see www.jamesaltucher.com and www.tdp.com.

The Holidays
I love the weeks before a holiday. People are motivated to get things done.
It's the ultimate "poop or get off the pot" realization for your pipeline. If you
call a prospect and they want to talk, initiate another call, or set up a demo for
the week before a holiday, then they're interested. If you hear the "let's come
back to it after the holidays" waffle, then first you should respond by
developing urgency. If that doesn't work, drop them down your priority list.
It means they really aren't interested right now, which means that you haven't
shown them enough value. This gives you the opportunity to reset the
relationship and come back at them in the New Year with a fresh approach
(See Chapter 6 – More Sales Process).

Prospects are also generally more affable during the holidays. They'll
open up to you - they've been spending time grinding through budget
meetings, strategy meetings, explaining why they missed their number this
year and justifying why they are sandbagging for next year. THIS IS YOUR
OPENING! Talk to them about their business.

Some questions to use around the holidays and year-end:

 How did you year end up? What worked for your business that
surprised you? What didn't? Stay positive. Don’t make the prospect
delve into too much negativity but do have an honest conversation
with them.
 Where do you feel like you missed opportunities and what
opportunities do you want to capture next year?
 What are you seeing for next year? What are your 2-3 top priorities
for Q1? What do you need to do to get ahead of the curve in 2012 so
you're not chasing your numbers all year?

These are all strategic questions, and more importantly, situational
questions. You're learning about their business and places where they know
they need improvement. Then you can return to them in January with
specific ideas on how your products can solve their problems. If they are
really in pain, then help right away before the end of the year.

Schedule time with yourself to review your top 10, 20, 50 targets - take
stock of where you are with them and write it down. Post-holidays, set aside
2-3 days to go through your dropped priority list and power through them.
Be ready with ideas on how to grow their business. Don't do a demo of a
new product. Don't talk about the new product that you just released or the
one soon to be released. Just talk about their business and the ideas that you

have for them. If you can't come up with any ideas, then do more research
before you call them.

Even if they reject your idea, it doesn't matter - it shows that you're
thinking about their business - that you took the conversation during the
holidays seriously and you're ready for action. If they still don't take your calls,
then drop them back into your marketing drip and move along.

Why isn’t this person/company a customer yet?
This is the primary question you need to answer for yourself. It forces you to
take stock of your sales activities and answer questions like these:

 Who is/are the real decision-makers?
 Do I have a Vampire or a Gatekeeper here? How do I get around
that?
 Are trends emerging of customer types that are not interested in
purchasing my product?

I use this simple table for reference then fill in a worksheet for each
prospect and lead to understand exactly where I am with the sales process. If
you don’t know the answers to all of the areas of the table, this alone could be
the reason why you don’t yet have the sale. Only after you know the key
aspects of the process will you be able to address each.

Prospect | Company Name & Division

Product Champion | How do I know?

Main Decision-Maker(s) | Am I sure?

Antagonist(s) – Who’s working against
me and why?

Other Committee Members | Who
could I be missing?

Decision Phase - ie. Early stage,
Committee Formation, Reviewing
available options, Getting serious, I’m
either in or out28

When will the final decision be made and
why?

How do I know?

Call Preps
Type out what you expect to say and where you expect to lead the call, then
practice delivering what you plan to say two or three times aloud. If you have
a whiteboard, sketch out a flowchart of how you’d like the call to progress.
You may be knocked off course – perfectly fine. The flowchart keeps you
focused and also identifies what you missed in this call and what you know
you need to achieve in your next call with that prospect.

When you’re on the phone, stand up while you are talking – you will
sound more authoritative and confident.

Here’s an example Call Prep that we did with a “Big Bank” account.
Notice the level of detail:

28
Check out “Major Account Sales Strategies” by Neil Rackham for more a formal structured
approach to “Stages of the Sale.” He breaks them into four main stages: 1) Needs Analysis, 2)
Evaluation of Options, 3) Resolution of Concerns, and 4) Implementation.

Big Bank – Jim Chambers

REO PROCESS - AS DESCRIBED FROM JIM BEFORE
1. Property comes in the door
2. Goes into a valuation status - and real estate agent gets assigned
immediately to the property. (VALUATION)
3. If the property is occupied, then eviction process starts. If property is
vacant, then a broker is assigned to do a BPO, and then an Appraisal is
ordered as well.
4. Delivered back to Big Bank
5. Enters another valuation process - to confirm the value and repairs
needed. (VALUATION)

OPENING SCRIPT:
“Hey Jim, thanks for getting on a call with us. I know this has
been an adventure so I appreciate the time to show you the case
studies that we worked on a few months ago.

What I’d like to review a couple of ideas with you on your
valuation process. Based on the information you provided on a
few properties, I did an analysis on each using our data so that
you can see how your team would utilize the data. Sound
good?”

More Situational Questions for the call:

1. What goes into this valuation process?
2. Over to the Bank reps to decide on a Marketing Strategy based
on $ amount of repairs needed, and when to list the property.
3. How do you decide on how much $ should be spent on the
property? What factors go into this decision? Is it safe to say
that there are times that the market is tanking and dumping
$5000 into a rehab might be pointless?
4. Property is now listed at a price based on values + strategy
decided upon by Marketing Team.
5. What factors go into the listing price? Would it be beneficial to
have a complete list of all active comps in a central location that
can be sorted? If you knew that the market was tanking, would
that have an effect on how you price the homes? Do you rent
them out at all?
6. Either they start getting offers, or have to take price reductions.
At 30 days, a review is done. Do reps have the authority to
reduce the price at any time?
7. How many price reductions do you do? Is there a max? Seems
like having a normalized list of the days on market for each
property would help forecast when these assets will sell.

SHOW PRESENTATION

[Remember to pause and ask questions!]

SET CRITERIA

“This is just showing you a small sample set... just in California
alone you have over 10,000 properties on the market. Even if
we helped you evaluate and make rehab decisions on only 2%
of the properties, that’s already 2000 homes and assuming a
very low $2000 per home, then that’s $4 million we’ve added to
your bottom line.”

ACTION ITEMS

“So based on what we’ve covered, what should we do next?”

“While I know we’re still early in your evaluation process, tell me
this – how are purchases like this normally channeled and
approved?”

DO NOT LEAVE THE CALL WITHOUT

 Other committee members
 Commitment for presentation to committee
 Budget & approval process

Take Call Notes
Your memory will fail you. Take the time during calls to record notes, even if
you have to pause and ask your prospect – “Would you mind repeating that?
I don’t think I got everything that you just said and I want to make sure I
understand it correctly.”

Here’s an example of call notes from a recent call:

Opened up call with intro from call prep. He confirmed that he was very
engaged with the Bulk REO process. “Testing the waters.” Said other
banks have tried.

Current process is out for bidding with 2 level process – indicative bids
incoming now. Investors were asked to participate. Finalizing and
accepting bids now. Possible second round of bidding if needed. Can do a
partial acceptance.

Choosing assets – looking at inventory, selected based on geography,
condition, age Said they provide AVMs, BPOs to sellers.

He then asked about where I data could fit. Explained how BPOs are
generally incomplete – 3 listings and 3 comps. Not a complete look at the
market. No insight on trend.

He understood immediately – thought that we could provide ‘color’. Told
him that was exactly it. Said he liked the idea.

Told him we could run a pilot for his next pool. Said next pool is Feb/March
2012. Agreed that I would call him mid-January to re-engage and see
where this process went. I used the term ‘partnership’ – said ‘we’ve
gotten to know each other pretty well this past year and we’re completely
comfortable running a beta/pilot w/o his bank feeling that they need to buy a
bunch of data and sign a contract. He liked that and agreed. Said he
knows our data is unique and useful and it’s about finding a niche in his
company for it. (I hate the idea that he’s thinking ‘niche’ but if that gets us
in, I’ll take it.)

Summary Notes
After the call, take fifteen minutes to draft and send an email to the client that
includes the three main takeaways from the call. They should follow this
order:

 Bullet 1: The client’s problem
 Bullet 2: Proposed solution discussed
 Bullet 3: Next steps

For example:

Hi Bill:

Thank you for your time today. We covered a lot of ground today, so here are
the main takeaways that I’ve summarized from my notes. Let me know if I’ve
missed anything important:

 Despite spending $150 on a BPO for every property in the portfolio,
there’s continuing unease about the current market value of the
property because of the lagging nature of BPOs.
 We discussed our “Bring to Current” product and “Listing Intel” –
both could be applied by your analytics team to zero in on a real-time
valuation to speed up asset disposition and initial list pricing.
 By Friday, you’ll send me a list of 20 properties for us to review with
your team on Tuesday at 2pm via web meeting. I’ll send over the
meeting invite separately.

Does that sound about right?

Looking forward to getting to work on those 20 properties on Friday. If I
don’t hear from you by 12noon on Friday, I’ll give you a call for the proverbial
kick in the tail. Talk soon.

-Scott Sambucci
Title, My Company
me@mycompany.com
(415) 555 1212

Do what you promise
Then, if Bill doesn’t get back to you with these properties, then you call him
at 12noon on the dot on Friday. No exceptions. Your voicemail could be
something like this:

“Hi Bill – Scott Sambucci here from Altos Research. I promised to
give you a call at 12noon if you didn’t get the chance to send over
the sample properties. So this is me giving you a kick in the tail. I’ll
try your assistant as well just in case you’re out of the office
unexpectedly. Give me a call at (415) 555-1212. Scott Sambucci
here with Altos Research. Look forward to your call.”

Always do what you promise. If you leave a voicemail in your
prospecting and tell someone – “I’ll try you back at 2:00 today” - then call
them back at 2:00 today. Not 2:15 or 2:00 tomorrow or sometime next week.
This is your opportunity to unilaterally build trust and show your prospect
that you are dependable. It matters more than you think.

Remember:
Love the grind.



(That’s me sticking my head outside of a dirigible above Los Gatos, CA. )

Hello. I’m Scott Sambucci and I wrote this book.

I’ve been busy working over the last 15 years, most recently building the
sales teams, sales process, and products for two successful start-up companies
in Silicon Valley.

Most engineers in Silicon Valley build software or architect computer
chips. I engineer the sales process by building frameworks for customers to
discover the answers to their questions. I think I’m pretty good at it and I’d
like to share what I’ve learned over the years, ergo, this book.

As a quasi-academic, I’ve also taught Economics, Finance,
Entrepreneurship, and Strategic Management at several universities and
received the “Faculty Member of Excellence” award from Saint Leo
University this year.

I’m currently the Chief Operating Officer with Altos Research and the co-
founder of SalesQualia – a company dedicated to improving sales
performance with technology and analytics.

Google-stalk me here:

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/scottsambucci
Personal Blog: scottsambucci.posterous.com
SalesQualia: www.salesqualia.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/salesqualia.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/salesqualia
www.twitter.com/scottsambucci

Startup Selling: How to sell if you really, really have to and don't know how by Scott Sambucci

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