A Goal Setting Formula

I have spoken to hundreds of top salespeople to find out what makes them better than others. One of the key characteristics and one of the things they ALL have in common is that thy have GOALS.

They have taken the time to decide what they want in life and out of work. They have sat down and put on paper (this is key) what it is they want - both long-term and short-term. You see, they built a a clear blueprint for themselves and their future lives.

Why is it so many people don't set goals? I believe they don't know how. And I believe they are not prepared to work to achieve them.

A Little Skeptical
You may start the process of goal setting with some skepticism. But I guarantee you -you will become a believer in a matter of weeks when you begin achieving your goals. Every person I know of who sets goals, is absolutely amazed at the incredible power of goal setting. Every one of them has accomplished far more than they ever believed possible in selling and their success.

What To Do
Make and take the deliberate process of thinking through every aspect of your work and your life and decide what it is you want. Do you want to earn $300,000 per year? Live in a bigger hime? Have enough money in the bank to retire early? Be physically fit? Then, decide by writing out what it is you want. Then detail out what you are going to have to do to achieve it. You must develop a detailed, written road map to get you to where you want to go.

The Definition of Happiness
Happiness has been defined as, "The progressive achievement of a worthy ideal, or goal." Goal setting is really about achieving your own happiness. It is frankly in the doing - the work - the road to achievement, rather than the achievement itself.

When you are working progressively, step-by-step toward something that is important to you, you generate within yourself a continuous feeling of success and achievement. You will actually feel more positive and motivated. You feel more in control of your own life. You feel happier and more fulfilled. You feel like a winner, and you soon develop the psychological momentum that enables you to overcome obstacles and adversity.

All goal-setting requires that you start with knowing "Who you are." This means; what are your values? What do YOU stand for? What will you NOT stand for? Write these down. All improvement in your life begins with you clarifying your true values and then committing yourself to live consistent with them.

Make sure your goals are in alignment with these values. Your goals and value cannot be out of sync or you will experience frustration and problems. Do you believe that being healthy is important? Do believe money is of value to you? Of course you do.

Successful people are successful because they are very clear about their values. Unsuccessful people are not sure. And complete failures have no real values at all. When you take the time to think through your fundamental values, and then commit yourself to living your life consistent with them, you feel a surge of mental strength and well-being.

Here are two things you can do immediately:
1. Put these ideas into action. First, decide for yourself what makes you truly happy and then organize your life around it. Write down your goals. Then write out the steps you will need to take to actually achieve them. Then take each written step and work on that first step, until it is completed. Then take the next step, and the next, until each step is done. Work on the next step each day. Do some one little thing to accomplish that next step on the path toward achieving your goal.

2. Second, begin with your values by deciding what it is you stand for and believe in. Commit to living your life consistent with your inner most values - things that matter the most to you. Promise and commit to yourself that you will behave and act every day in a manner consistent with your convictions. Do this, and you will find that you will never make another mistake again.

Selling High-End Services and Solutions

I have been researhing and studying sales for almost 20 years. I have spoken at major events, turned around business units, trained large and small consulting firms, and yet, in all these times, I am amazed how many professionals do not step back and look at the major trends ocurring around them.

When you step back - you will see "selling conundrums" - sales effects that are opposites and cannot be resolved using old fashion selling methods.

Here are 10 major factors - you as a professional - should consider in any sales effort or campaign you are launching into your prospective client base:

1. In every sale, both large or small, there are more people getting involved in the purchase decision. And each person has a different role and is approaching the purchase from their own vantage point.

2. The length of time to close a sale is increasing drastically. How can we shorten the sales cycle without providing discounts and incentives?

3. More clients are unsure, confused, and are weighing options and criteria that should not even be considered in approaching the purchase of a major solution. How do you educate your clients in what they should be evaluating? How do you keep them from making the important criteria unimportant and boiling everything important away and make price and terms the final two criteria?

4. With global competition, uncertain economies both local and global, reorganizations, acquisitions, mergers, new industries and bankruptcies, your sale can be derailed by any one of these seemingly random events. How can you forsee and make plans for these events, should they occur?

5. Clients in the past preferred and had no problem with generic, off-the-shelf solutions. Today they want customized and tailored solutions. Tomorrow, clients want not only customized solutions, but they want them with the safety and assurance of a proven, off-the-shelf solution. They want the solution tailored to the way that meets their business needs and provide their company a leg-up in their marketplace, but not be the first or be at risk. They want it to be risk-free and proven. Yet be unique. This is a conundrum professionals must over come and solve in order to distinguish themselves from their competitors.

6. Clients are looking for long-term relationships with their professional service and solution providers. Clients are looking for a symbiotic relationship, where both firms are intertwined to achieve the success and end result of a major purchase. Clients want "skin in the game."

7. While clients want the symbiotic relationship as described above, your firm is being pushed down to the procurement department - or what is known today as "Strategic Sourcing." This is a fancy name for the purchasing agents of long ago who want to beat you down on price and shift the burden of risk to you and your firm. This is another conundrum facing professionals.

8. Selling by providing features without the benefits has long been known as a "no-no" is selling. But today that is not enough. Your solution must bring some measurable value in terms of revenue, cost improvement, customer satisfaction or some other value defined by the client. And companies are asking their providers to "put their money where their mouth is" by requiring stringent terms in their contracts.

9. As the information economy or knowledge economy explodes, there is a new Murphy's Law. The new Murphy's Law is: "Everyone Knows Everything About Anything." Your clients may know more than you about your solution. They certainly know more about your competitors. And they certainly know more about their problem or need that they have and the affects upon their organization if they don't address it. They have "interviewed" and met with your competitors and so the client has already formed an opinion. On the client's staff are people who came from your company or have come from a company like yours and they know what to ask and where to research information on the internet. What you tell them and provide them may not be as important as how you tell them and provide them the information. This leads to the last and final and perhaps the most important trend affecting the marketplace.

10. How you sell is more important than what you sell. Assuming you have a product, service and/or solution, how you sell (and Market) - how you interact and follow-up may be the most critical distinguishing factor in today's economy. Some in the retail business call it the "customer experience." In major sales, how you sell is a clear indication of how the relationship will look after the client buys. How you sell is about trust, integrity and credibility. The good news is, Number 10 can be the most important factor in selling high-end products and services AND it is completely within your control!

This post is derived from a presentation I give to companies across the US and Canada. It has been well received and according to audiences, has "provided a fresh look at how they are conducting business with their clients today."

I hope it does the same for you.

Why Leadership Is Important to Excellent Client Relationships

The true consultative professional understands the importance and value of being a leader and demonstrating leadership characteristics in working with both prospective clients and current clients. Leadership in consultative selling and client relationships can be misunderstood and confusing. For the record I have been highly influenced by several noteworthy writers, practitioners, and influential people who have devoted their lives to the study and application of leadership. Here are a few of the noteables: Warren Bennis (Read everything he writes! His writing is true art); David Maister (a consultant to consultants and advisors); Brian Tracy (he has great audio and video programs). There are many others - and I name more in later posts.

To clear up any confusion around consulting and advising clients, I will borrow from Warren Bennis' book some contrasting ideas about leaders and "also-rans." I have revised his writing, but the ideas below were inspired by his book "On Becoming A Leader."

• The Consultative Professional innovates; The Also-Ran Professional administers.
• The Consultative Professional is an original; The “Also-Ran” is a copy.
• The Consultative Professional develops; The “Also-Ran” maintains.
• The Consultative Professional focuses on people; The “Also-Ran” focuses on systems and structure.
• The Consultative Professional inspires trust and confidence; The “Also-Ran” relies on control and controls.
• The Consultative Professional has a long-term view and looks to the future; The “Also-Ran” looks at the immediate and short-term view.
• The Consultative Professional asks "what?" and "why?"; The “Also-Ran” asks "how?" and "when?"
• The Consultative Professional has his/her eye on the top line; The “Also-Ran” has his/her eye on the bottom-line.
• The Consultative Professional originates; The “Also-Ran” copies.
• The Consultative Professional challenges the staus quo; The “Also-Ran” creates it and tires to keep it.
• The Consultative Professional is his/her own person; The “Also-Ran” is the classic "good soldier."
• The Consultative Professional is focused on the client first; The “Also-Ran” is focused on their firm first.
• The Consultative Professional says "Where do we go from here?" when there is a mistake; The “Also-Ran” says "Who did it?"
• The Consultative Professional passes on the credit to others; The “Also-Ran” takes the credit and looks for photo ops.
• The Consultative Professional does the right thing; The “Also-Ran” things right.

Leaders have nothing else but themselves to work on. They take responsibility and make things happen. Leaders inspire others to be everything they can be and become. They embody the classic adage, "If it's to be, it is up to me!"

Good Luck!

The Sales Interviewing Question

I have interviewed a lot of sales people over the past 5 years. And something remarkable occurs in each interview: the sales candidate sells him or herself pretty well.

Until ......

I ask these series of questions:

1. Tell me how you structure your day.

This little question is like a major "Duh" to some of the people I have asked. What do you mean by, "structure my day?" is the unspoken reply. But perhaps more interestingly the sales candidate goes on and answers something they have no clue of what I mean.

What I mean by this question is: Tell me how you block out time to do the important things that are critical to the success of your role as a sales person. For example: what time do you block out for doing appointment setting? And if you block out this time, how did you come to realize that this time was the right time? Was it your best moment of the day? Or did you find through trial and error that this was the best time to reach prospective clients?

Interesting questions. People who are very good at whatever they do, BLOCK OUT time to get the important things done. They realize it is not the urgent but the important that is critical to the success of their job. This is especially true for sales people. People get caught up in other people's dramas and events and crisises that there is no time to do what they were hired to do.

My advice: Find a sales person who is obsessed with time management.

2. What books have you read on sales lately? (How about ever??????)

Do you know I have found sales people who prefer to "wing it"? They say, "I don't need to learn how to sell. I know people. And I can sell." It is amazing how many people prefer not to read about how to be better at their craft. What if you went to a doctor or lawyer who said, "I don't need to learn how to be better at surgery" or the lawyer who says, "I don't need to learn how to be more persuasive in court." WHAT????? Are you KIDDING me?????

3. The best sales people ask me this question, one that led me leave the company where I was hired to do a start-up: "How does marketing (or your company) help generate leads?"

Wow. A powerful question. If your company is not actively out trying to generate leads, then the company is on the verge of revenue generation issues. You see, the time of the sales person is TOO VALUABLE to have to sort through the list of prospective clients and figure out which potentially viable client is better than another. This is MARKETING'S JOB!!!! The sales person is too expensive to be sorting through low potential prospects in order to find the most likely candidate. As a sales condidate - you should expect your employing company to have a target set of companies and define who in the company is the likely buyer, who are the likely influencers and what the value proposition to each of these buyers is. In addition, there should be marketing materials all centered around those buyers and the results driven in companies similar to them.

If you get asked the third question, and you have a weak answer, and the sales candidate still wants the job, question the sales candidate's capabilities and real reason for wanting to join you.

More importantly, ask yourself, if you don't have a good clear answer and process of gaining access to these companies and individuals - why you are in the current position and instead don't go running for the hills.

That's my story for today.

My Biggest Weakness

Well, I have come to realize something - that - perhaps I should have realized long ago, and that is what I have come to find is MY BIGGEST WEAKNESS.

I have to admit now, in talking to anyone about my strengths and weakness, that my weakness in business, is the stretching of the truth. There are variations of the truth to be sure - because we all see things through our "filters" of the past. The past can make the filter strong in some areas - such as our religious beliefs or our politics.

But this is not to excuse the little lies of covering up or blaming someone else for something that someone did not really do. It is the little "hedging" of admitting the truth - that "Hey, I screwed up, I see your point of view, I will fix it and get on with addressing it." Instead of - "Well, you should have..." or "He should have..." We as employees need to act with courage and admit - we all screw up or make mistakes or forget - or slack off and not cover up by looking to see who we can blame.

This is my RANT.

I disdain feeble management who cannot accept responsibility. And I disdain management who says one thing and does another. For example, "I will be right there to help you." And no one shows up. Or "Save money." And they fly first class.

These are the little inconsistencies that drive me BONKERS.

They set my rockets on fire. Next time - when I take a "personality test" I am admitting this is my BIGGEST WEAKNESS. And I feel compelled to address it with my peers when I see it.

I must learn that this sometimes needs to be addressed and then other times - to let it go. But it is so hard - when I see leaders - Not walking the talk.

MY RANT for today