The Time Isn’t Fungible Rant, Part Two
Help Me Understand How to Make My 20 Calls Every Month
Last month we introduced 25 before 8. If you missed it, the concept is simple: send value-based e-mails to clients, pre-clients, associates and industry friends every day before 8:00 A.M. Don’t “try” or “think about doing it.” Do it. Some days 25 don’t go out. That’s a good objective, but if only 16 go out, fine.
As is usual with this column, the response from readers was interesting. One banker wrote “I used to do something like that and it worked really well. Then I got busy with a large portfolio and I don’t have the time anymore.” Another suggested, “I do that sometimes.” A third wrote, “my clients are way too busy for me to bother them with information they likely already know.” There’s a banker with a portfolio at risk.
That brings us to this month’s rant about time–yours and your buyer’s. I was with a major bank recently that requires its branch managers and business bankers to make 20 business development calls each month. “Is that good or bad,” the executive manager wanted to know. Before the answer, let’s get behind the number.
First, what is a business development call at your bank? At the SMH National Bank it would be a pre-scheduled, well-planned, trust-focused conversation with a client, pre-client or Center of Influence, held at their location or at an eating establishment, and has a maximum and minimum goal. What a mouthful. What “counts” as a call is critical and it is the job of the culture to create that definition.
If the call is pre-scheduled, the banker knows how long the conversation will last and can therefore determine how many questions they might ask (or how long the presentation will last if it is at the back end of the sales cycle). The callee also feels good about carving out some of their important time with the banker if they know the beginning and end point. If the call is planned well, the officer has more of a chance to make the conversation a win-win. If there is no maximum or minimum goal, the call should not be made. Feet should only go on the street for a purpose. Period.
The first learning point, therefore, is to define what a call is. Next is to define a standard of performance as it relates to calling activity. Remember, a goal is a dream with a finish line and a standard is the lowest level of performance that allows me to stay on your team. At SMH National Bank, if the standard is 10 calls per month, that means every pair of feet on the street makes 10. Unless there is an emergency or something else unforeseen, 10 is the number. You are going on vacation? OK. Make your 10 in the two weeks you are at the office that month. No excuses, no opt-outs.
What about those 20 calls? Sounds like a goal and while the standard is the same for each banker, goals should be different for everyone. If we control 40% of the market share in a territory where there are few businesses, maybe the monthly calling goal for that associate is 11. In an area where we own 3% of a booming business market, perhaps 25 is a good number.
The second learning point is to create standards and individualize calling goals based on a variety of internal and market factors. Twenty calls, therefore is not good, nor bad, I suggested to the bank executive. It depends. In sales, it always depends.
Finally, if you are responsible for those 20 calls, how can you possibly make them every month given all the other things on your plate? That’s easy:
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Make two calls each week on your way to the office (most entrepreneurs start making payroll at 7:00 A.M. or earlier)
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Eat lunch with two Centers of Influence each week…and you pay
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Make two calls on your way home from the office on different days you made the early morning calls
That totals to six calls weekly or 24 calls per month. You’ve been able to do your many other tasks, attend internal meetings, deal with paperwork and still hit the quota.
What about that 25 before 8 in the above scenario? Simple. If you are making an early call on Tuesday at 7:00 A.M., find and send four or five articles before you go home the previous evening and set Outlook to forward the articles some time between 7:00 and 8:00 A.M. Yep, you can do that.
Time is the great challenge for bankers and it is also the great equalizer. Invest it wisely and you and the buyer will achieve a great return.
Success Practices from Their Home Offices: Effective Trade Show Marketing
A couple months ago a reader sent us an e-mail asking if we could feature a financial institution or two in each edition of Signposts, an organization that has a sales or marketing success story to tell. What a great idea. We hope to continue this as a regular feature. If you have a success practice that you can share, send an e-mail to jhubbard@stmeyerandhubbard.com or call 847.717.4328 and we’ll work out the best way to highlight your accomplishments.
Effective Trade Show Marketing, from a Banker’s Perspective
by a Northeast Banker (name withheld by request)
Business-to-business trade shows and similar events provide financial institutions the opportunity to reach out to new pre-clients, deepen relationships with current clients and open many doors to new Centers of Influence. In this sea of financial sameness, differentiating your brand in the community can pay many dividends. Some believe success is achieved, however, simply by showing up with a tabletop and some brochures. A disciplined approach combined with well executed objectives is the best way to optimize results.
I’ve personally witnessed bankers do a fair to poor job of execution when they staff a booth at a community, regional or national event. These events can be fun and great for team building. At the end of the day, however, it all comes down to “why are we here, what will we get back and how will we make that happen?”
One way to uncover future sales at trade shows, i.e.: get something out if it, is when a member of your sales team accepts an invitation to be a conference presenter. Speaking multiplies your reach and yields immediate opportunities to hold conversations with interested buyers. First, because you are a presenter you have the implied endorsement of the organization sponsoring the event. Second, if your program is engaging and provides value, you become a subject matter expert and it is likely a percentage of the audience will remain after your speech to talk about the information you provided. Finally one good speech always begets another and another and so on. Before you know it, you are holding court at several community events, a great use of your personal marketing time (SM&H calls it Smarketing).
The perception that you must be a major sponsor or have a booth at the trade show in order to get a shot on the podium is a myth. In my experience most trade show organizers do not require the presence of a booth. I have spoken at a number of industry conferences and trade shows in which the financial institution I represented did not have a presence on the exhibition floor. Truth be told, I gathered more business cards and contacts at the end of a presentation than I would have standing in front of the company booth.
For the past two years I have been the keynote speaker at a national DJ conference (yep, I’m a record spinner in my spare time). After my keynote address this year I was hosted at a booth and during my one-hour stint, the vendor sold more product than he did the remainder of the day. I also walked away with a fist-full of business cards from which to prospect. If executed effectively the financial institution can save on the booth expense and still have brand recognition utilizing the “speak and be seen” method of trade show marketing.
There are particular events, however, that warrant you to have physical presence on the exhibition floor. Based upon my own observations as well as studies of trade show marketing by financial services firms, there are general strategies or rules of engagement that, when effectively utilized, deliver tangible and measurable results.
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Strategy: Prior to the event, obtain both past and present attendee rosters to allow an advance team to make direct phone contact and establish appointments for the sales team during the event. Be certain to obtain as many e-mail addresses as you can prior to the event.
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Strategy: Communicate with attendees just prior to and during the event with your booth location, key seminars they may wish to attend and appreciation events you might be hosting. Since most attendees bring a PDA or Blackberry, texting is a significant way to stand out amidst the flyers, reminder cards and other clutter.
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Strategy: Participate actively (speak) in at least one education session and/or a pre-conference workshop. Pre-conference workshops are usually attended by those with a strong interest to learn and integrate ideas and services into their companies for success. Seminars should never be product-focused out of respect for the sponsor and your audience. Hone in on best practices and practical ideas delegates can use when they return home. Be certain your handout is clear and concise with your complete contact information on the front cover.
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Strategy: During the set-up of the exposition floor, have a team delegated to networking with vendors and develop a micro-COI network. Interaction with this audience should take place during the set-up of the event and not during the actual event hours as attendees become the primary focus. Your goal is to educate other boothsters about you and to learn about them. This allows you to provide and receive referrals you may not have otherwise received.
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Strategy: Gather all the leads immediately after the show closes and segregate the sales opportunities into some type of tiering structure such as A,B,C. Immediate execution of a contact strategy such as the TAPS process increases the opportunity to stay in the game with a prospect. If you have a printer at the booth, you can actually begin crafting follow-up letters before the show is over. Statistics indicate that about 80% of leads from a booth go un-followed up on. That is tragic. Track all activities into your sales force automation tool so strategic metrics can be developed for future events.
Unlike major corporations, financial institutions often neglect to provide success tools for their sales forces specifically targeted to trade shows and events. Often banks send an “all hands on deck” call for team members to participate without providing the appropriate training. Filling the show floor with inadequately prepared sales force is a waste of resources and money.
Questions such as: “What do you want me to talk about?” “Why are we at this event?” “What are we offering?” “How long do I need to be here?” “Will we have brochures?” are all clear indications the sales force is ill-prepared for success at the event. Lack of education and coaching leads to associates standing inside your booth instead of proacting to delegates.
As with anything in the sales process, trade show success begins with the sales manager who properly selects associates to participate, based upon skill and past performance versus just availability. Your “hunters” and not your “farmers” tend to be the best representatives at these events. Holding a team meeting to conduct booth simulations is a great way to get the team ready. Talking through a game plan helps the show floor execution go as flawlessly as possible. At the event, the sales manager should consider observing interactions between associates and attendees. This simple assessment provides managers the perspective they need for future coaching and insight into who to select for the next event.
The measurable success at trade shows and industry events can be directly related to the development of a specific sales strategy, its effective execution and post-event follow-up. If the financial institution’s focus is simply to “build a booth and they will come,” a significant opportunity for prospecting, networking and building future sales is lost.
The High Performance Business Banker
By Ron Buck, Chairman, The Center for Excellence
What is High Performance?
High Performance business bankers out-perform their industry peers as measured by their ability to sustain both growth and profitability over the long term. The two key words are “sustain” and “both”. The ability to “sustain both” growth and profitability over interest rate cycles, market instability, economic challenges and generations of leadership changes and mergers is the true measure of high performance in today’s competitive market.
During the past three years we have carefully tracked the performance of 280 business banks. The ability to “sustain both” growth and profitability over the long term is the benchmark for high performance. Our analysis has included bottom-line financial performance and frontline sales activities. We tracked traditional financial metrics and over 100 key performance metrics related to prospecting, sales pipeline, Onboarding and customer relationship management. We conducted interviews with over 200 sales managers and business bankers. Our research yielded reliable and actionable sales benchmarks but perhaps more importantly we discovered best practices that constitute new thinking relative to sales excellence.
The above chart illustrates some differences between average business banks and best-of-breed. The highest performers think differently. They believe it is strategically important to focus on employee retention, face time with the client and execution of uniform sales processes that are non-negotiable. The highest performers have shorter sales cycles, 40% shorter than the average, and each banker handles more business, 43% more than average because they invest more time with the client. The highest performers spend 135% more in-the-field time than average banks. Face time is a strategic focus and priority of all high performers.
The data also indicates that best-in-class are more eager to adopt technology such as CRM or sales force automation tools. Our research validates Gartner Group’s findings that over half (55%) of sales technology introduced to salespeople fails, most often for the following reasons:
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Lack of strong end-user buy-in because management does not hold the front line accountable for adoption
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Focusing on management’s needs without enough focus on salespeople and client needs
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Poorly defined and flawed sales processes
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CRM projects initiated with unclear goals, metrics and expectations
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Lack of commitment from executives and sales management
Sales Processes
Sales processes enable and sustain performance within an organization. However, our research found that less than 23.5% of banks can articulate specifics in even one of their sales processes. Conversely, 100% of the highest performers can clearly articulate all sales process specifics in prospecting, sales pipeline, Onboarding and customer relationship management. The following diagram illustrates these critical sales processes.
These four critical sales processes were tracked, measured and score-carded for each bank. The actual results are available in our High Performance Business Banking White Paper to be published in November/December 2008. The sales process benchmarks were compared to financial performance. We studied the correlation of these key performance indicators to the bank’s ability to sustain both growth and profitability over the long term. We tracked the following:
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Input rate: number of new leads/month (by source)
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Output rate: number of qualified sales-ready opportunities/month
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Number of touches and meetings before qualification
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Return on time invested in the sales process
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Forecasting accuracy of each sales process
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Consistency and predictability of sales process output
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Percentage of time invested in a specific process
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Number of new deals closed/month (and new money)
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Win/loss ratio
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Time to close (time to first meeting, time to approve credit, time to proposal)
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Opportunity size
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Cross-solve ratio
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Onboarding calls, percentage of follow-ups actually completed, effect of retention rates
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Short- and long-term retention rates of A, B, C clients
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Growth rates of A, B, C clients
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Contact frequency of A, B, C customers; quality of contact
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Upward and downward profit migration of all clients
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Change in profit mix
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Profit contribution of new and existing clients
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Percentage of total new opportunities come from A, B, C clients (versus prospecting for new clients)
Prospecting accounts for about 21% of all new sales-ready opportunities (11% for the highest performers). Client relationship management accounts for about 65% of annual opportunity growth (82% for the highest performers). Lead-nurturing provides about 11% of the new opportunity growth (7% for highest performers). The highest performers focus more time in current client relationship management than average banks that tend to over-invest in the prospecting process in their quest for new clients to compensate for low client retention or relationship diminishment. The highest performers have changed their thinking relative to CRM. High performers believe they must focus on creating lifetime partnerships, growing them, making them more profitable and serving them more effectively.
Growth & Profitability
The ability to sustain both growth and profitability over the long term defines our highest performing business bankers. The following charts illustrate the difference between the highest performers and average banks relative to the ability to sustain profitability and growth.
These charts represent all 280 banks (28 banks/decile). The chart on the left illustrates that the highest performers sustain profitability 4X greater than average banks. The chart on the right illustrates that the highest performers sustain growth rates 10X greater that average banks.
These results are driven by a new way of thinking about how the front line invests their time, how organizations retain frontline employees, what sales processes they use, a coaching focus on behaviors and a strategic focus on client face time.
Best Practices
Our research disclosed many best practices that are practical, simple to adopt and offer a big impact on every bank’s ability to sustain both growth and profitability.
During our research study we observed a large and growing gap between management’s expectations and what actually occurs at the front line. This is the high performance gap. We observed one best practice in common with all high performers that dramatically reduces this gap.
The highest performers build a corporate strategic sales and marketing plan. They then make certain that critical sales processes are in place to enable and sustain change at the front line. They also take two more critical steps in bridging the performance gap. They build frontline sales plans that detail “how” the business bankers will actually meet and exceed their goals. These front line sales plans detail critical activities and behaviors along with minimum performance levels for each along stretch goals. These behaviors and their associated minimum performance levels and stretch goals become critical synergies with sales managers coaching plans.
The following chart is a high level illustration of this best practice.
This chart illustrates one best practice the highest performers use to sustain both growth and profitability over the long term. Our research found that less than 23.5% of business banks can articulate even one sales process, less than 12% build frontline (team) sales plans, less than 8% translate goals to frontline behaviors and less than 18% coach to behaviors.
In Conclusion
Our research indicates that high performance is achievable but it requires a new way of thinking about how the front line invests its time, what sales processes it uses, how it retains its frontline employees, a coaching focus on behaviors, a strategic focus on face time and a dedication to closing the frontline performance gap. Subsequent articles in Conversation Signposts will address each of these practices in greater detail.
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