Austin 2019 Construction Monthly

elated responsibility. You can’t have a canned presentation for
a canned customer base. If it was that simple, anyone could sell.
The advancement of technology doesn’t automatically mean
incorporating selling into it will reap success. Often that technology
has been developed by someone who sits in a cube all
day eating chips while they work. There’s an old saying; “Those
that can’t sell, measure!” If you want a pure analysis of the
effectiveness of a sales person only 2 numbers count, revenue
and profitability…period! Close rates, call volume and bids sent
will always follow someone producing in those 2 areas. The
key to getting there from scratch is high activity leading into
high productivity. Simplified, see and talk to people. The more
people, the more customers. The more customers, the more opportunities.
The more opportunities, the more sales. Fish, bigger
fish, biggest fish. Boom! There’s your sales system. How do you
make it work? Teach sales people how to connect with customers.
How to read people. How to work a networking event.
How to develop customer loyalty. These are relational skills
that a system does not teach. What good is a CRM program if
there’s no personal customer information to put into it? Worse,
no sales! Most good sales reps know their close rate off the top
of their head. They don’t necessarily need a sales system to tell
them. Mentoring a rep with another successful rep or trainer
allows a new or underperforming rep to actually see how it’s
done. They learn body language and communication skills. They
learn how to “hear” the customer as opposed to speak at the
customer.
This is accomplished through dynamic coaching. Really getting
into the behaviour patterns of your typical customers and
learning what they respond to. Then discussing the successes
and failures. All to become more adept at connecting with a
customer base. It’s just too simplistic to think you can buy a
sales system, implement it and watch the money roll in. These
programs are usually developed by more administratively bent
individuals so they appeal to administratively bent individuals,
who see the value because they’re ADMINISTRATIVE! That’s
the second big issue, most of these systems have not been developed
by true sales people. Often not even presented by truly
successful sales pros. They’ve been trained to be trainers of the
system. I often come in behind a sales system that was used by
a company and I’m hired to either motivate the team or fix the
mess. The key to a good coaching trainer is twofold. Is the information
verifiability effective and is the presenter entertaining
enough to listen to.
People retain more information when they feel the trainer is
passionate and enjoyable. They take the information as fact and
a good presenter makes that information easily transferable. The
trainer can handle questions with ease as opposed to referring
to page 7 in your training manual. They understand the challenges
and frustrations of being in front of the customer. They
can prompt trainees to believe in their own ability rather than
the machine. I’ve been recruited by the biggest training firms
in the country to be a trainer for them. Even to start a train the
trainer program. No thanks, I’d rather help and inspire people
to succeed in their own skin. I have resources and materials I’ve
created but it is not some mechanical system and that burns
through people. I very much believe in training, I’m a trainer,
but when we lose the human aspect of sales the only guaranteed
definer is price. Sales systems are by the numbers and so
is price. A system doesn’t teach you how to shake a hand, read
eyes or recognize voice inflections over the phone. I do use a
CRM and love to read about sales, but if you try to teach me I
must do left foot here, right foot there, I’ll probably do the opposite.
I know some will email me telling me I’m old school and
I’m ill informed. Nope! As the 45 year old sales system trainer of
the course my boss sent me to told me at 19; “Dang son, you’re
better than me already!” I never read the manual.
Don’t Miss Tom Woodcock’s Keynote
addresses at the Austin Build Expo
Wednesday & Thursday 1:15pm - 2:15pm
SPECIAL AUSTIN SHOW EDITION 2019 23