Effective Selling

Selling Solutions in the New Economy

2009-04-22T06:28:00.000-07:00

On Monday i had the opportunity to pilot a new program for 70+ people. Selling Solutions in the New Economy.
After i had conducted a survey with the participants it became clear what their challenges were. One of the clear challenges was that after the initial contact with the prospect the project stalled.

I shared with them my thinking about the new economy and how our mindset plays a very important role in how we respond top all the news we are hearing. This news can have a great impact on how we feel and that drives how we think, decide and act.

By using some music, they could feel the pressure.

We then moved on to talk about prospecting and how to do that ongoing, so in business we continuously build pipeline and have the relevant information for our current opportunities. This is where we started to talk about the Customer Assessment. Structuring what we know about our customers in a very specific way, so it helps us to find new opportunities. The information can be in our heads, but a lot of it can also be found online. What it need is some structure, so we can drive insight.

Selling hasn't changed. The environment in which we sell has. Less money available, decisions made at higher levels and sometimes even outside the organization (by the government).

In all of this the Customer Assessment helps to get a very clear understanding of the issues that are driving a customer's business and the pain and possibilities it presents them with.

The world in which we sell has changed...have you?

Change your Questions, Change your Life

2007-04-28T05:59:00.000-07:00

An apprentice monk once asked his superior
whether he was allowed to
smoke while praying.

"Of course not!" answered the superior with
indignation: "How dare you ask a question
like that?"

The apprentice thought about
the reprimand and three weeks later he
approached his superior again, and
this time asked
whether he was allowed to
pray while he was smoking.

"Of course, young man. No matter what
you do, you are always allowed to pray!"

"Ask and you shall receive"
was both a promise and a warning.

Words are extremely powerful agents.
Thoughts are nothing but an endless
stream of questions and answers
in your mind.

As long as you ask the
right question you will
prosper and grow. But if you ask
too many wrong questions you will
become impoverished and ill.
Examples of wrong questions:

1. Why do I always have bad luck?
2. Why do I have so many problems?
3. Why am I so overwhelmed and confused?
4. How could I have been so stupid?
5. Why do I always lose my keys?
6. Why can't I remember?
7. How could I have eaten so much?
8. Whose fault was this?
10. How did I get into this mess?

Examples of good questions:

1. Why am I so lucky?
2. How can I use these opportunities?
3. What is the next step?
4. What can I learn from this experience?
5. Where will I leave my keys from now on?
6. How did I remember last time?
7. How can I improve my diet?
8. Who can fix it?
9. Whom can I ask for help?
10. How do I get out of this mess?

All human progress is preceded by a new question.
By improving the quality of your questions you
will ensure your progress and improve
the quality of your life.

(The story was lifted from
Matthias Schmelz's
Millionaire Maker Book)

Do you have the right mind set to be succesful?

2007-03-19T12:23:00.000-07:00

Promise Yourself...

In the 1912 book titled, "Your Forces and How to Use Them" author Christian D. Larson wrote the following creed. Larson, a prolific writer and lecturer, believed that people have tremendous latent powers, which can be harnessed for success with the proper attitude.

I'm pleased to share it with you and I hope it will serve as a helpful reminder as you continue on your journey of success and fulfillment.

Promise Yourself...

To be strong so that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.

To talk health, happiness and prosperity to every person you meet.

To make all your friends feel that there is something in them.

To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.

To think only of the best, to work only for the best and to expect only the best.

To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.

To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.

To wear a cheerful countenance at all times and give every living creature you meet a smile.

To give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.

To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

Best wishes ... and Book Yourself Solid

2007-01-06T00:12:00.000-08:00

First of all I want to wish you all the best for the year 2007, may it be your best year ever.
Personally I am looking forward to a great year where my company will have it's 2.0 release and I will be working more from home by offering my clients telecoaching.
If you consider to renew your company I would like to suggest you take a look at what Michael Port has to offer.
I wanted to make sure you got the word on this teleclass with Michael Port right away... because there are only a few spots available.
Plus, he's offering $500 off the tuition plus over $2000 in bonuses.
Michael is the US national bestselling author of Book Yourself Solid.
Have you read it? I sure hope so. I loved it!
Hop on over to his website and have a look http://tinyurl.com/y2xfmc
If you have all the clients your heart desires you might not need Michael's book or program but if you want more ideal clients, clients that energize and inspire you than run, don't walk on over to... http://tinyurl.com/y2xfmc

Meeting preparation

2006-12-01T12:09:00.000-08:00

One way I always prepare for sales meetings is by answering the following 4 questions (I do a mindmap on this):

what would I like them to know (what will I tell)?
what do I want to know (what will I ask)?
how do I want them to feel (set the tone of the meeting)?
what do I want them to do at the end of the meeting (what is their commitment?, I didn’t like being the only one with homework afterwards)

this forces me to make sure i get the most out of the 60-90 minutes you have available in your sales call.

Become aware off and change your beliefs...and change your reality.

2006-10-16T00:45:00.000-07:00

As a Sales Trainer and Personal Coach / Executive Coach I meet with a lot of people. After a training or coaching session many of them are very motivated to commit to making a change. If you have ever been in any type of training or coaching yourself you probably have had a similar experience. Only to find out after a while that really nothing has changed. In my view the problem here is that from the outside the motivation was there to make the change, rationally you have committed to the change, but the emotions and feelings weren't aligned. The biggest inspirators for change, emotions, were not in line with what you mentally, consciously wanted to achieve.

For some reason often we feel ready to initiate change and transformation yet time and time again we get distracted, scared, or just don't follow through. We may commit to the change, we may even take the first steps ... and then we stop.

Think about it...how many times have you DECIDED to change in a major way in some important area of your life...to re-design your beliefs, thoughts and behaviors, and then found yourself right back where you started?

Know this, within each of us exists an amazing potential to completely transform our lives.

One of the most important forces to help us drive the change, follow through, is the way we look at life. The way we choose to experience life. And I am not talking about positive thinking here. Because thinking alone doesn't make the change happen, although it is a major starting point.

It all comes down to beliefs. What are the magic rules that you live your life by?

Until we transform our inner world (our beliefs, thoughts, feelings, emotions) we will not be able to change our behavior in a massive way (our actions) and the outer world will stay more or less the same.

Some people can make the change on their own ones they know how to do it.

For most people, it takes some sort of support and accountability that working with a coach brings them.

This is where in my beliefs personal and executive coaching fit in to really get an understanding of your own beliefs and how they might interfere with your behavior..

If you are ready to transform in both your consciousness and your behavior (both of which are necessary ingredients in our transformational processes) I would love for you to have a look at my coaching offerings.

Personal Coaching or Executive Coaching will help you create accountability for the new commitments you will make and give you the time, space, encouragement, and support that will assist you in co-creating a new way of being, seeing and doing.

Telecoaching - Coaching by Phone

2006-10-08T06:00:00.000-07:00

As a new offering I have started to offer telecoaching, or coaching by phone. Specifically to support the Quota Achievement Plan I am scheduling the friday as my telecoaching day. In time slots of 30, 45, 60 or 90 minutes I will support my clients on very different topics, both personal coaching and executive coaching.

An Intelligent Sales Effectiveness Platform (ISEP™) has been launched by the TAS Group.

2006-09-21T03:25:00.000-07:00

An Intelligent Sales Effectiveness Platform (ISEP™) has been launched by the TAS Group. This platform is a combination of proven sales methodologies, implementation best practices and the intelligent Dealmaker™ software application.

The TAS Group was formed as a result of Select Selling purchasing OnTarget — the sales methodology division of Oracle. The multi-million dollar investment in ISEP was a result of the TAS Group’s drive to fundamentally change the approach of sales organizations worldwide by adopting sales training and sales methodology by putting technology at the core of the implementation.

Many sales methodologies are complex, making them difficult to use. Because of this difficulty, many sales teams won’t regularly use them. Through a combination of world-class sales methodologies and easy-to-use software, ISEP guides sales professionals through the sales methodology intelligently, offering interactive feedback along the way.

The TAS Group has positioned ISEP as the first sales effectiveness solution that incorporates sales methodologies into an efficient and effective software environment. For existing OnTarget users, they are promised an easier realization of the value of their previous investments. For new methodology customers, ISEP is meant to accelerate the methodology’s benefits and adoption.

According to Donal Daly, CEO of the TAS Group, the measure of the successful implementation of a sales methodology is an increase in revenue. The key to achieving that in a sustainable way is to deliver a solution that sales professions will want to use because it actually helps them sell more without increased effort. When that happens, everybody wins – the sales professional gets increased sales and the sales manager gets increased sales, along with accurate sales forecasts, sales process compliance and great metrics to manage the business.

The ISEP components consist of Dealmaker, which is a software application that is designed to integrate sales methodologies with CRM systems for a customizable enterprise-wide solution. The underlying sales process intelligence engine learns about what works, encapsulates best practices guidelines, reinforces sales effectiveness learning and provides a superior ROI on both CRM and sales training investments. As a result, Dealmaker should provide accurate forecasts, deal clarity and pipeline visibility.

Proven methodologies from the Target Account Selling solution have been incorporated into ISEP, including Portfolio Management, Account Planning, Opportunity Management, Individual Sales Effectiveness and Channel and Partner Management. Successful adoption is driven through the TAS Group’s six-point implementation ‘best practice’ service.

When sales systems became easier to use, however, their attributes did become more appealing. The ability to properly store information in a system that would also organize it for me was very attractive — especially if it led to increased sales. The most important element, however, was not whether or not the sales teams were using it to their benefit, but rather if the corporation was requiring it in their reporting. If no one else used the system to its full potential, why take valuable field time to input data?

The TAS Group is doing well to focus on user-friendly features while also making sure the solution appeals to all those in the sales chain of command. Without adoption and promotion from the top, these solutions will really just take up more hard drive space.

Planning your sales territory for Quota Achievement

2006-09-01T08:36:00.000-07:00

Many sales people are so busy answering the phone and replying to emails, that they can hardly find the time to plan their sales approach. "How am I going to achieve my quota?" is a question they should have more regularly on their mind.

It's very easy for salespeople to get wrapped up in the details of a specific opportunity or a specific sales execution action, that they often don't tend to look at the big picture. The focus is on the current pipeline and less on the whole process of building the pipeline, figuring out how to achieve quota, is this one deal really going to help me?

A lot of sales people are so focused on sales execution, focusing all their efforts on making a first call, sending that email or visiting a customer, instead of planning how they are going to attack their territory for quota achievement. That Quota Achievement Plan should drive their daily actions and their interaction with their colleagues.

If you are bounded by a certain territory where you have to make your quota, it's necessary to create a high-level, "how a I going to achieve my quota?" and "on which customers should I focus" type of plan. Your Quota Achievement Plan.

No matter which role you have in sales, if you carry a quota, you need a Quota Achievement Plan.

This Quota Achievement Plan needs to address certain area's:

1. What is the current Status of your Business, and where are you supposed to be heading?

One thing you need to start with is where are we today?
And where should we be at the end of a certain period?...What is it we are trying to achieve?

Here we try to establish a baseline. You take a current snapshot of your pipeline (raw, weighted, ...), look at your sales history (actuals) and define what is still needed to achieve your quota. In this case realizing that not all opportunities in your pipeline are the same. They differ in where they are in the sales process, in the amount of revenue they could possibly bring you, in the date when you expect to get an agreement and in how fast you expect them to (be) move(d) through the pipeline. This understanding feeds the next part of the plan.

2. Where should I put my attention?

Depending on the current situation as described in step 1, you need to consider your approach. You need to find a balance between finding new opportunities, driving current opportunities through the pipeline and managing the relationships with your current customers who may have bought in the past (and may need more in the future).

3. What am I selling?

What are your offerings? Which products or services do you have?

4. To Whom am I selling?

If your sales territory is given you need to find a way to prioritize your customers. Which customers do you believe show room for growth and which customers are more like your cash cows...delivering nicely on revenue year over year (hence very important) but not really offering an opportunity for growth?

Who are really my customers? What departments are buying your products or services...or strongly influencing the decision?

Prioritizing for Growth helps you to find new ways to achieve your quota.

5. Through which Channels am I selling what?

If you sell all by yourself, you know you have a limited capacity. So you ask yourself, which resources can I leverage to achieve my quota more easily?

6. Make an executable Plan

When you have you overall Goal, and you have made the previous analysis, it's time to define what matters most to achieve your quota. You need to develop your plan. This means defining milestones that support you in achieving your goal and show you you are on the right path. Next is to define a strategy how you will achieve each milestone and define the appropriate activities. What are you and other people going to do specifically to turn the plan into reality?

If you run a sales territory, either as a sales specialist, an account manager, a sales manager...or any other role....

If you have to achieve a certain sales quota, the Quota Achievement Plan helps you to take a look from a different, more strategic perspective.

Take a step back from your daily routine and habits, give yourself some quality time, to really consider "How am I going to achieve my quota?".

De Zwarte Consultancy offers the Quota Achievement Plan as Consultancy, Training your Sales force, or by way of personal coaching or executive coaching.

I wish you lots of success and love to hear from you.

Jan de Zwarte

Quota Achievement Plan: Are you on Track to Results?

2006-08-02T00:52:00.000-07:00

For many sales people the vacation is here. For many they just finished a fiscal year and are starting a new one. Some aere about to close the current fiscal year and are looking at their personal commitments...did i achieve what i was supposed to achieve? Will i get my bonus?

Based on work with a recent client I have developed the Quota Achievement Plan. A way to increase awareness and conscious decision making for everybody involved in selling...

This is a plan that is more than your account plans or opportunity plans. This plan is a Business Plan that helps sales people to consider what their quota is, where they are today in achieving it, and thinking through what they need to really achieve it, with the least amount of effort.

For more information feel free to contact me.

TAS Group acquires On Target

2006-07-11T13:49:00.000-07:00

Select Selling Acquires OnTarget Sales Methodology Business
Monday July 10, 8:50 am ET
Forms The TAS Group, One of the Largest Sales Effectiveness Solution Providers
The TAS Group to Offer Broadest Range of Proven Sales Methodologies, Most Advanced Software Solutions and Most Extensive Local and Global Delivery Capabilities

SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 10, 2006--Select Selling today announced the acquisition of the majority of the global assets of the OnTarget sales methodology division from Oracle. The transaction did not include France or Italy, and the OnTarget businesses in those countries will continue to operate as they did before the acquisition.
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The combined company will now operate as The TAS Group.

OnTarget, the creator of Target Account Selling®, was one of the largest and most recognized sales methodology providers. It has served more than 500 clients and trained well over 400,000 sales professionals. OnTarget marketed primarily to companies in the high technology, telecommunications and business services industries. It helped increase the effectiveness of both direct and indirect sales channels with its portfolio of methodologies including TAS®, Enterprise Selling Process, Portfolio Management Process, Territory Management Process, Create & Win for Inside Sales, Value Driven Selling, and CHAMP®, Channel & Alliance Management Process.

"Oracle's focus was to find a specialist partner for OnTarget to maximize the value delivered to our customers," said Oracle SVP of Corporate Development Douglas Kehring. "We are confident The TAS Group will not only optimize our customers' existing investment, but also bring significant additional value through the additional Select Selling originated solutions. We're looking forward to maintaining a strong relationship with The TAS Group as a key sales methodology partner for Oracle and our customers. "

"We believe that there is significant room to improve the value customers receive in this market - and we're raising the bar," said Donal Daly, CEO of The TAS Group and former CEO of Select Selling. "First and foremost, we are focused on honoring existing commitments and leveraging the combined assets of The TAS Group to deliver more value and choices to our customers. By more, we mean the most complete range of proven sales methodology solutions, the highest level of customer satisfaction, the most extensive local and global delivery capability, and the most advanced tools and software solutions in this market. These combine to increase sales effectiveness and accelerate revenue growth for our customers."

In addition to marketing OnTarget solutions, The TAS Group will continue to offer Select Selling methodologies and sales forecasting and pipeline management tools based on the Select Selling Dealmaker(TM) software platform. Select Selling Dealmaker provides the most advanced tools and technologies available in the market - to ease usage, increase adoption and integrate sales effectiveness solutions with existing CRM systems.

In addition, all customers will benefit from immediate access to a broader range of solutions. The Dealmaker platform is being extended to support each of the OnTarget methodologies. Existing OnTarget customers will have the option of integrating their sales effectiveness solutions with their CRM systems. Select Selling customers will have immediate access to the full range of OnTarget solutions.

TAS Group customers will also have access to the most extensive global support network in this market. Select Selling, as a European originated company, with a US headquarters, brings an added dimension to the existing OnTarget support network in Europe. The TAS Group will have a combined global network of 100+ partners to service its customers, covering North America, Europe and Asia Pacific.

The firm said it will continue to provide consulting, implementation, and measurement services to help all of its clients maximize the return on their investment in The TAS Group solutions.

"We're very excited about this acquisition," said Mark Gardner, VP of marketing of The TAS Group and former managing director of the OnTarget business. "We are now in a position to provide the innovative solutions and enhanced value that we had envisioned for OnTarget clients."

"The sales methodology and sales training market is highly fragmented and for years there has been no clear leader," said Dave Stein, CEO of ES Research Group, an independent business advisory firm specializing in sales performance. "With its acquisition of OnTarget, and the subsequent creation of The TAS Group, Select Selling will be able to deliver an array of high-value offerings. These include a new "open source" approach to the Target Account Selling methodology that will provide customers with highly modifiable components from which client-specific solutions can be created, and enhancement of Select Selling's Dealmaker software that will enable everyday usage of the The TAS Group methodologies to improve customers' sales performance. The TAS Group now has the opportunity to achieve a market leadership position."

About The TAS Group (www.thetasgroup.com)

The TAS Group and its predecessors have been helping companies around the globe meet critical sales challenges since 1989. It helps clients accelerate revenue growth by improving business-to-business sales effectiveness. The TAS Group provides the most complete range of sales methodologies, the most extensive local and global delivery capability, and the most advanced tools and software solutions in the market. The company is headquartered in Seattle, WA, with international headquarters in Dublin, Ireland. For more information, please visit: http://www.thetasgroup.com.

All companies and products listed herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

Target Acount Selling

2006-05-27T06:25:00.000-07:00

Sales seems to become more complex every day. Structure, following a method to make sure everything that is important to win the deal has been concidered, is very important.
Target Account Selling is a methodology that offers that structure. It helps you to Qualify, Strategize, Plan and Execute the plan better with your (virtual) sales team. Target Account Selling also makes life as a sales manager a lot easier, because you can use the same structure to review the opportunity plan with your sales people. You coach them upfront, instead of having to join them all the time to fight "fires". For more information on Target Account Selling or Managing Target Account Selling please click the link above.

Interested in more Effective Sales?

2006-05-13T13:10:00.000-07:00

As a sales trainer and sales coach I work a lot with sales people of multinational firms throughout Europe. For some reason cultures differ by country but sales people are the same no matter which country you visit. Even though many companies have predefined sales processes, in practice often they are not used.