SM&H Virtual Learning Labs Series Announced
We’re late to the party as a whole when it comes to sponsoring and leading Webinars. Not that we haven’t participated in our share. Ron Buck has done several over the past couple of months and his most recent offering “Sales Execution in a Challenging Economy” drew an estimated 1,000+ financial services professionals. If you would like to hear a replay of Ron’s program, go to www.thedisciplineofexecution.com and listen to it for free.
The rest of our company is taking Ron’s lead and sponsoring a series of free programs designed to provide practical ideas as we head into 2010. Three Virtual Learning Labs will be kicked off by two-time bestselling author Charles Green. It will be followed by Jim Dickie, Managing Partner of CSO Insights, and we put a bow on it before the year closes with an SM&H best practices in prospecting program. Mark your calendar for these dates and times. Registration information and more details will follow as we get closer to the dates:
- October 9, 2009, 3:00 P.M.–4:00 P.M. (CST)
Rebuilding Customer Confidence…Six Ways to Becoming Trustworthy
Presenter: Charles Green, President & CEO, Trusted Advisor Associates - November 3, 2009, 11:00 A.M.–Noon (CST)
“Leveraging People, Process, Technology and Knowledge – 5 ways to ignite 2010 in an uncertain economy”
Presenter: Jim Dickie, Managing Partner, CSO Insights - December 10, 2009, 11:00 A.M.–Noon (CST)
Killer Acquisition Strategies…Three Ways to Get More than Your Share
Presenter: Jack Hubbard, Chief Experience Officer, St. Meyer & Hubbard
July Edition: We Turn it Over to Strategic Partners
In the summer we ask partners within organizations we trust and value to create Conversation Signposts. This time you will enjoy three very different articles from Steve Cundall, Erica Stritch, and Patrick Stakenas.
We met Steve Cundall from The Cornerstone Group over a decade ago when we were doing work at Fleet Bank. We found Steve’s approach to dynamic hiring practices and the effective testing tools he uses to be second to none. We refer Steve to our clients and we know of at least three that have hired him to help bring in the right talent and put that human into the right job. Steve can be reached at:
888.829.7575
www.thecornerstonegroupinc.com
steve@thecornerstonegroupinc.com
Inspect What You Expect and Get Better Results
By Steve Cundall
Are you equipped to develop strong Commercial Bankers? I recently met with a group of CEOs running small and mid-sized community banks. The purpose of the meeting was to identify opportunities to improve results within their commercial banking organizations. The groups ranged in size, with most having between 2 and 15 Relationship Managers. In all cases, these RMs had three primary goals:
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Manage and retain a book of current clients
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Grow revenues by cross-solving (an SM&H term) other services
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Bring new clients to the bank
First, we evaluated RMs based on results in these three categories. No one was surprised that the majority of bankers performed very well when managing current clients. Their performance was mixed in the category of cross-solving with only about half considered to be performing very well. What really stood out was the dismal performance in the area of bringing in new clients where just 18% of Relationship Managers performed at a level to be considered very good or excellent. Given these results we set out to identify the main contributors to this problem along with opportunities to positively impact results. What we learned truly surprised us all.
After an animated discussion and a very intense process we determined that the most critical issue impacting the bank’s success in developing new client relationships is “sales force accountability.” Although most banks hold RMs accountable for overall sales results, few hold people accountable for sales activity (the process of generating new prospects), while almost no one held RMs accountable for the quality of their sales skills (how they execute that process).
During these conversations we also learned that most community banks are plagued by “diluted sales management.” Diluted sales management simply means that the person in charge of sales has other responsibilities and these other jobs water down the ability to manage the sales organization, thus challenging the ability to develop higher levels of accountability. In some cases the CEO is the sales manager, in other cases the sales manager has a book of clients and that book is the primary responsibility. Neither situation allows the manager to focus time, energy, and expertise solely on running sales and, in the end, salespeople and the organization pay a very big price.
So, given the challenges, we need to develop a simple but effective approach to increasing accountability in an environment where time and sales management expertise are limited. The following outlines a simple but effective process for improving sales force accountability, particularly for banks with diluted sales leadership:
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Develop a set of weekly/monthly activity goals that includes client visits (to generate referrals), meetings with centers of influence (accountants, lawyers, and others considered to be trusted advisors), and contacts with targeted prospects. Most agree that the meeting standard should be between 15 and 20 per month.
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Take a back seat and observe the behaviors of your banker. This allows you to better assess the sales skills of the RM and, in turn, provide valuable feedback and coaching.
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Hold regular one-on-one meetings that allow you to review overall activity as well as individual meeting results. Make sure that you have a template requiring RMs to document meeting goals, key discussion points, and meeting outcomes.
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Commit to a proven acquisition system (like the TAPS program from SM&H) so everyone in the organization shares a similar process for generating new sales opportunities. Having a system helps managers to hold RMs accountable and coach everyone to the same set of disciplines and skills. This truly simplifies the process for sales leaders who are challenged with other responsibilities.
Following this simple but effective process results in improved accountability, more sales activity, and stronger sales and business development skills. Most importantly you should start to see improved sales results within six months. So inspect what you expect and you’ll surpass your sales expectations.
We met Erica Stritch through a referral from Charles Green. In one telephone call, Erica provided more information about developing, marketing, and delivering Webinars than we could have ever hoped. She is the selfless, gregarious, and outgoing General Manager of RainToday.com (www.raintoday.com), the premier online source for insight, advice, and tools for growing a professional services business. She is also a Consultant with the Wellesley Hills Group (www.whillsgroup.com), a consulting and marketing services firm that helps service companies grow. Erica can be reached at estritch@raintoday.com.
Team selling continues to lag in financial services selling. One of our clients has developed a CAT (Client Action Team) process and it is an awesome thing to behold when partners get in a room and talk needs, not products. Another is doing quite well with CMP (Client Management Process). Working with internal partners and removing silos is the only way to show true value to the client and to meet every financial need.
Two Minds Are Better Than One: The Power of Team Selling
By Erica Stritch
I recently met with the CEO of a firm that called us in to learn how we could help the company grow. Two of my colleagues joined me for the meeting and during our ride back to the office, we had quite a rich discussion about how to approach working with this new company:
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Jonathan picked up on the prospect's yearning to bring marketing to the next level
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Margaret heard the same message, but she keyed in on the prospect's implied dissatisfaction with current staff
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I noted that the client kept mentioning his desire for aggressive growth, but avoided (even after some nudging) putting any hard numbers around it and might not be clear himself about what aggressive growth really means
Listening to the number of key points and take-aways we each left the meeting with, I was struck by how much we gained in this business development situation by working together. In the right situations, this type of "team selling" can be powerful and have many benefits, including the following:
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Tapping into different perspectives
While recapping important discussion points, each of us had a different perspective to add based on our varied backgrounds, experience, and areas of expertise. We discussed the different ways we’ve approached similar situations with other clients and how those might apply here.
Every professional at your firm has a different background and can bring his or her perspective to client challenges. With team selling, you can tap into collective expertise to develop the best solution for your clients. -
Employing many eyes, ears, and voices
One of the most common complaints buyers of professional services have is that sellers don't listen to them. It can be a challenge for one person to listen to (and really hear) what a prospect is saying, ask thoughtful questions that flesh out the prospect's aspirations and pains, take notes, and, during the same conversation, advocate for various approaches—all while picking up on client reactions.
There is a lot going on in any sales conversation both verbally and nonverbally. With additional eyes and ears, you can pick up on subtleties and points you might have missed were you alone. You also benefit from your colleagues’ questions and comments when, perhaps, they find areas to help the client that might not be your personal expertise. -
Connecting with different personalities
In professional services, people buy people. Rapport is essential to building relationships that ultimately lead to a paying client. What can I say? Some people connect better than others.
Bring more people and create more opportunities for connecting. -
Improving sales skills
Even the most seasoned professional who has spent the last 50 years selling can pick up an idea or two to improve his or her sales skills. It is often difficult to recognize how you might improve your selling (or any) skills without feedback.
With team selling you create an environment where feedback and continuous improvement can flourish. Service providers learn from each other—they learn each other's stories, background, expertise, and abilities. If you want to know how you’re doing and how you can improve, bring along your colleagues and ask them. -
Creating the best outcome for clients
As professionals, our raison d'être is service to our clients. In the right situations, team work can produce faster and better results than individuals can produce working alone. Often we produce the greatest success for clients when we bring the full capabilities of the firm to bear for them. This can begin with the first sales conversations. Including multiple perspectives, backgrounds, and experiences can lead to more value for your clients.
Having two or three people attend a client or prospect call can add up to a lot of hours. Still, the benefits to the client often outweigh the costs. On your next sales conversation, consider bringing an internal partner from Treasury Management or Trust. You may find it just the thing you need to make the most difference for the client. And the more you can impact your clients’ success, the more yours is bound to follow.
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We met Patrick Stakenas a couple of years ago in his Libertyville, Illinois office. I went with the intention of seeing yet another CRM system. Was I wrong! I left the meeting totally blown away with what I had experienced. It wasn’t CRM at all, rather a technology that monitored sales management activities and behaviors in a way I had never seen before.
ForceLogix delivers OnDemand sales management process optimization solutions for leading sales organizations that are striving to attain world-class status. ForceLogix solutions enable top-line revenue growth and enhanced sales organization productivity to companies in diverse industries such as Financial and Business Services, Technology, Health Care, Transportation, and Manufacturing.
The firm’s Optimizer process improvement and coaching technology allows firms such as Lenovo, Corning, and Motorola to manage the sales functions to a high degree of accuracy and are seeing staggering improvements in sales management process and revenue generation. The key is to understand the end-to-end sales management process and start measuring and managing the inputs and throughputs—not just the outputs and coaching every day.
To reach Patrick Stakenas for a demo of this amazing technology call 847.984.3781 or visit www.forcelogix.com.
Leverage Measurement and Coaching Technology to Optimize Your Sales Resources
By Patrick Stakenas
More companies today are leveraging technology in the area of coaching, sales management, and sales operations to drive not only selling efficiencies, but the overall effectiveness of salespeople and sales teams. In doing so, the obvious goal is to increase sales volume and hence, top-line growth.
Traditionally, investments in sales technology have been looked at as a necessary evil and shunned by IT as they think they can build it themselves. The reality is that it took sales guys like Tom Siebel of Siebel Corporation and Mark Benioff of Salesforce.com to build true CRM systems while IT guys were building and throwing away miles of code.
Forward-looking organizations like Lenovo, Corning, Innovex, Motorola, and many others are leveraging the capability and domain expertise of technology built by sales managers to empower their sales force for sales and marketplace execution. Many of these solutions are using SaaS (Software as a Service) technology to build flexibility in sales management, measurement, and coaching.
Common with the contraction of economies around the world is access to resources and the utilization of technology. As organizations tighten their belts, resources, including financial capital, human capital, and others, become difficult to obtain. This means managers have less financial capital available for employee incentives and bonuses and less human capital available to get the job done. Therefore, managers will have to ensure their employees are focused on achieving critical objectives and staying focused on these objectives rather than being distracted by less critical activities. Technology can be a key enabler to achieve these goals. If employees, especially salespeople, are coached and have clear objectives that are tied back to the organization’s strategy and operational plan, it’s more likely the strategy will be achieved.
In a recent study done by the Aberdeen Group, it was confirmed that this economic downturn has placed even greater pressure on the sales function. Sales leaders must increase sales effectiveness, while external forces reduce the number of real opportunities and threaten top-line revenue growth. Business leaders need actionable data to align sales behavior with business objectives and rapidly adapt to changes in the market. Aligning and automating sales execution with organizational goals requires a holistic approach that includes compensation management, process optimization, and data analysis.
Research reveals traditional manual coaching and sales management processes reduce productivity for multiple functions, not only sales. Finance, operations, and IT are all impacted as the sales demand for information increases, which impacts both top- and bottom-line growth.
The study, Optimizing Sales Performance Management Through Data Integration and Analytics, conducted by Aberdeen Group, a Harte-Hanks company, finds managing sales performance is a high or top three priority for 59% of all survey respondents in 2009.
“Sales Performance Management (SPM) is not just about technology. It’s about using technology to support performance management practices and processes which tie operational execution to business objectives,” explains Ian Michiels, Research Director of Aberdeen’s Customer Management Technologies Group. “The best-in-class demonstrate an affinity for data-driven decisions. SPM initiatives will continue to grow as organizations start to realize that technology is only one ingredient to superior performance. Best-in-class companies demonstrate the critical capabilities that support all three components of SPM and, as a result, realize higher growth in annual revenue and improved productivity,” finishes Michiels.
“Lack of automation means manual processes become cumbersome and costly and it’s difficult to rapidly adapt to market volatility,” says Alex Jefferies, Senior Research Associate in Aberdeen’s Customer Management Technologies Group. “All respondents want sales to be selling as much as possible to get their share of the opportunities. This means sales must be compensated with realistic incentives that are in line with the business strategy and not wasting time on shadow accounting or selling the wrong products. The holistic SPM approach uses elements of ICM, process optimization, and business goals to identify exactly what products or services to sell, how to sell them, how to incentivize the sales force to maximize the opportunity in the market, and how to maximize resources to meet business objectives,” concludes Jefferies.
It has become imperative that companies shift their focus on enabling their sales management groups. Research and recent data offer powerful proof of how using technology to track, manage, monitor, and coach helps companies meet the challenges faced by today's sales organizations. Even much smaller organizations and companies that rely on diverse distribution channels to sell their products and services face the same kinds of challenges. And regardless of the industry, salespeople must be held accountable to know the products, know the marketing message, understand and live the sales process, and have the skill set to use the arsenal provided by the company or institution. Face it: no sales, no business.
Companies must keep abreast of the latest technology strictly from the standpoint of whether or not it can help you increase your business volume. This includes ideas for using existing technology to serve your management team better through follow-up, tracking, and coaching programs.
We live in an era when information is king and retention and utilization of the information is paramount. It's a professional businessperson's responsibility to know how to use information and technology to his/her advantage. This is critically important to internalize because the sooner you use the available technology to your advantage, the sooner you'll beat your competition in growing your business.
Just as important as the people you hire is the technology you select. You must obtain technology that truly supports the process or actually creates the process that will drive uniformity.
Many consultants subscribe to the adage that applying technology to a broken process is just an automated broken process. I have to be the contrarian: there is much technology in the market today that allows you to map a process, reinforce, provide workflow and consistency to fix that broken process.
If coaching, planning, tracking, monitoring, reinforcing, teaching, leading are a necessary part of business, then technology will help achieve the end result.
Another way to use technology to your advantage in coaching and SPM is to have it accessible while the coaching session is taking place. To have the ability to coach on the spot and track what you have coached on is invaluable. To follow up immediately with the salesperson on objectives set, hold the salesperson accountable to that objective, and create an ongoing visible dialogue of the coaching and leading creates better, more effective, more productive salespeople.
In this highly competitive financial services industry, where a plethora of sales processes, methodologies, and technologies are cluttering the market, a key source of competitive strength is the degree of execution skills possessed by the on-ground or telephone sales force. This has become more critical than ever as the economy has slowed down and workforces are shrinking. Hence, facilitating on-the-ground decision-making becomes a critical factor in establishing an organization’s effectiveness. Without a system to track the ability, skill, and overall effectiveness of your sales team, you will suffer the consequences in today’s competitive environment.
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