Is a Sales Methodology needed? Only if you want to succeed!

From Dave Stein's research area five of
The Real Reasons Sales Training Fails and What To Do About It

#5 Is an inadequate or completely absent Sales Methodology

(the organising principles underlying Selling)

In more than 20 of my Clients medium and small I have discovered that there was no methodology at all to their selling. They had a Sales Department, a Sales Manager and Salespeople but NO methodology for Selling. That is usually why I get called in because: “not having a Sales Methodology”
like “not having a Sales Strategy” means that you usually fail!

Dave Stein’s ESR site has a good enough definition of Sales Methodology and how it differs from Sales Process on http://davesteinsblog.esresearch.com/2009/12/02/more-excuses-for-not-doing-...

In my view, it is also about having a Sales Process that is driven by
YOUR Product/Market BUYING METHODOLOGY.

That is Selling the way your Market wants to Buy.

“Easy to Buy From!” is always the highest rated characteristic of a Supplier in the eyes of the Buyer when you survey Buyers.
“Trusted Advice” scores low at 30%.

How do you know if you have a working Sales Methodology,
a broken Sales Methodology or no Sales methodology at all?

Well, you can retain a Sales Consultant like me, or you can ask your Customers:
“How easy are we to buy from?”

Ask some of your Lost Business Prospects:
“Were we easy to buy from, or did the difficulty in dealing with us play a part in why we lost the deal?”

Fixing a broken Sales Methodology (or a partly working Methodology), really does need a Consultant (internal or external). The output is ‘This is what we do wrong and why (PROOF),
and this is HOW through Changes we will put it right and these are the measures to prove its improving’.

Perhaps the toughest part of SALES METHODOLOGY is when you finally realize you cannot BUY one,
you have to CONSTRUCT one. Some great Companies like Huthwaite (SPIN is only a Part, you have to buy the Package), Miller Heiman, TAS, or Holden will sell you the components, BUT YOU will have to do the Assembly and the heavy lifting IMPLEMENTATION.

You can, if you are smart enough even mix and match
getting the Right, not just good enough, Components.

Sales Training without a Sales Methodology doesn’t work.

 

IBM (referring to their Structured Selling Methodology)
calls them their Cash Generating Machines!

So, save all your wasted expense on novelty courses
and one day training events, daft books, sales blogs and sales tips.
And, invest the money and time to build a Working Sales Methodology.

How do you lose market share, with the best product and best price?

 

It’s easy, give Marketing control over Customer Relationships.

I have just finished a long assessment for Big IT, they told me to find a problem with Sales.

I did, they were losing deals to a ‘softer’ product and the customer was paying the same or even more.

When I made my initial report, they asked me to recommend a “Sales Training”. I could have said anything. But, I replied that I knew what was wrong, but we didn’t know what caused the problem.

They agreed reluctantly to fund some more Sales Consultancy, but they really wanted “Sales Training”, a good two day event that would ‘energise’ the sales force and bring the lost business back!

 

 

My role as a Sales Consultant is to eliminate mistakes.

That is it. Simple!

Find the mistake, then eliminate it.

At BMAC we call it “error detection and error recovery”.
(At least one of us used to design, test and repair Hard Disk drives).

If YOU are not doing something wrong (or not doing something right) then your business would be booming!

At big IT, we did the usual lost business reviews,
with some remarkable and consistent results across a wide range of
Salespeople, Customers, Customer Segments and Geography.

· Did we lose on Price – NO?

· Did we lose on Product – NO?

 

We drilled down, what was the price difference, little or none.

What was the product difference little or none.

Several (sincere) Lost Customers, even admitted that they had bought more expensively and
they believed the product that they bought although good enough may not be as good as Big IT’s.

So WHY did we lose? We asked. It came down to RELATIONSHIPS.

Over the last three years Marketing has taken over ‘Customer Relationships’. Marketing were responding to incoming queries and contacting “quiet” Customers. Sales were told to focus on ‘Closing deals’.

“Show the Prospect that we have the best Product and the Best price”.

Marketing had installed, at great expense, a new CRM. It collated web landing, Social Media searches, recorded incoming and out-going telephone contacts and had hounded Sales for their “Black Contact Books” to be put in the system. The initial results were great; the sales ‘lag time’ had dropped from entry in the pipeline to Order from 7 months to 4 months. Sales were only working ‘qualified’ leads. Marketing was holding ‘pre-qualified’ leads and “nurturing” them.

So, what was wrong? Where is the error?

The Customers had interpreted Marketing’s new CRM approach as:
“We are Not Interested.”

 

 

 

 

The Customer wanted Sales Engagement!

So, they got it from the “interested” Competition.

 

Interesting?

"shortening sales cycles"

The most effective way of shortening the selling cycle is to arrive at the very end of the buying cycle. If your buyer is going to decide tomorrow, you will have a selling cycle of less than 24 hours!

Usually, in fact almost always, you won't get the deal.
But, the upside is you have only lost one day!

Other sales people, who started a year before you,
they will have wasted a whole year!

I once visited the flight deck of a 747 Jumbo Jet.
I was overwhelmed at the number of dials and indicators. The Captain patiently explained to me the purpose behind each one.
Fuel Gauge and Fuel Burn Rate.
Altimeter and Vertical Speed.
Air Speed and Forward Looking Radar. 
Each Indicator or Measure giving critical information for the effectiveness or the security of the airplane and their passengers.

 

 

 

But there was one gauge, not mentioned,

marked from 40% to 100%,
with Green, Amber and Red zones.

Pointing to this colourful gauge, I asked “what is that one for?”

“That’s the External ‘Humidity’ Gauge.” replied the Captain.

"But, what is it for?" I persisted

The Captain smiled widely and then answered
“That’s so we can answer a head office Executive’s question, ‘Is it raining outside?’”

“But, that’s not really relevant, is it?” I asked.

“No, but in Sales you have head office Executives who pour over
the ‘Sales Cycle Time’ figures don’t you!”  He replied.


I have to say that, this is the same Aircraft Captain who caused Kaplan and Norton
to write their book “The Balanced Scorecard”, and create "Dashboards"
in response to the Captain flying from New York to London
using ONLY his Altimeter.

They had however, booked a flight from New York to Chicago!

.

Is Sales Enablement really ‘Disabling’ Sales?

I have expressed concern over the use of Sales Force Automation (SFA), which are de-skilling salespeople. Today, I want to express deep concern over a Non-Sales ‘conspiracy’ to disable salespeople by making Salespeople use “sales enablement”.

The practice of Sales Enablement developed by Non-salespeople is simple:

Selling is an activity, like walking.

Selling like walking requires no skill, have a route planned then go.

Sales Enablement is “routes” prepared previously by Non-Salespeople to make Salespeople sell more often and sell more effectively.

BMAC Consultants have just finished an audit of “Sales Enablement” for a blue chip, Hi Tech Company. My initial analysis was straightforward. Sales results before the adoption of Sales Enablement, compared to Sales results after the adoption of Sales Enablement. Since the claimed benefit of Sales Enablement was to sell more and to sell faster. Clear Order intake and Revenue improvement were the expected results.

The actual result was a performance dip, about -12 % on average.

Sales sold 12% less after being ‘enabled’.

I asked for a third group, the control group, which had not adopted Enablement.
There was not one I was told, Enablement is compulsory. It is our new way of working!
I conducted semi-structured interviews with more than 40 sales staff, salespeople and sales management. I found a group of people who had ignored Sales Enablement. They were, in the main, Top Performers, with a few average performers. Their Sales figures had improved slightly or remained the same. I interviewed at length several Top Performers who had experienced performance dip after adopting sales enablement. “Difficult to use”, “not fit for purpose”, and “cumbersome” were the criticisms, while “good in specific situations”, “saved me time” and “it really helped me” were the compliments.

1. Content Creation

a. Customer Intelligence: this was often story board based, based on previous “wins”
The Sales consensus was it didn’t work
b. Product Content: Sales complained about a lack of Product Training, instead they were being giving mini aide memoirs and Product stories.  The Sales consensus was Buyers now knew as much or more about products than Sales knew.
c. Vertical Marketing Content: There was universal appreciation of this. There was particular praise for events which had Customers talk about Key issues and Market Sector drivers in Customer Engagement Workshops
d. Solution Content: There was universal criticism of this. Out of Date materials, irrelevant materials, Issues with Customer Confidentiality (unapproved Case studies) and simply not working or useless content.

Buyers had also stated these were not fit for purpose especially as
RTT (Response to Tender) or RFI (Request for Information) responses.

2. Content Management: is poor or very poor; everyone, yet no one, was responsible, it had become a potpourri. Initially Top Marketing Management had been responsible, but the ownership had dropped to Marketing Operations Executives. The current content owners, were inexperienced, had had little or no Customer contact and were being used for their PC skills (Data Base Management) Storage not ‘Content’ creation, development or distribution.

3. Content Governance: this was the most worrying area. Senior Management had made substantial investment in Sales Enablement; they expected to see two things; usage of the new systems and sales results. Sales managers were enforcing usage with ‘Enablement Police’ ensuring compliance. The use of materials was being checked during sales calls, the use of Knowledge Data bases were being reported automatically by the system with details on access frequency by individual salespeople, by groups and as a whole. IT is driving sales!
Sales ‘Propositions’ were being checked for content and “Standardization” against ‘winning’ models. The whole area of governance was being abused. Some salespeople were going to extreme s in appearing to use the system, while in fact defeating the checks and measures. Other salespeople were in complete compliance, but were seeing their sales results dropping; this dissonance was causing a great deal of stress.

4. Content Delivery: This was an area of innovation. Many Corporate Presentations had been remodelled into Video, Storyboards, White boarding, Podcasts and state of the art Interactive Websites etc. Attempts are being made to use social media, Facebook, Blogs and Twitter and there was a willingness to explore all of this on the part of salespeople. Sales major complaint was lack of Training and no Coaching on these innovations. Buyers had also complained about some of these innovations when inappropriately used, and had rated poor content delivery as a major factor in Lost Business Reviews.

Conclusions

If you really want to ENABLE your salespeople, then listen to them.

• Customer Engagement workshops with Sales, Marketing, and IT in conversation together with Customers is the most productive source of Sales Enablement Material. What Content do Customers value? How do Buyers want in delivered, where and when do Buyers want it.
• Sales Enablement appears to work best when it is specific, build an Ideal Customer Profile then work through a Competitive strategy.
• If you value Selling Time, a repeated criticism by Buyers of Salespeople is that they do not have time! Consider reintroducing some of the Sales Administration Support that was ‘Cost Cut’ in order to pay for Sales Enablement.
• The cheapest way of increasing selling time and gaining sales results is Sales Admin. If you are short of expense, then fire the Senior Marketing Manager who introduced, then abandoned, Sales Enablement.

BMAC Consultants audit Sales Enablement and make recommendations putting enablement to work. We also have a unique Customer Engagement Workshop process that puts the Buyer’s Voice right to your ear!
Contact brian.maciver@googlemail.com

Is Sales Force Automation Broken?

The weak link of SFA and CRM,

is to accurately

represent REALITY,

the actual ‘on the ground’

Sales situation.

The evidence is that
Sales Force Automation (SFA) and
Client Relationship Management (CRM) place too much STRESS on Salespeople,
by producing a ‘crisis of information’.

 

 

 

 

This Data Storage “Fortress” has become so complex it needs sophisticated software
to access, read, display, interpret and manipulate the Sales Data.
Hence, the output read and accepted by Managers,
bears no relationship to the input presented by Salespeople.

The crisis comes from the overwhelming input and output of unrelated Data,
without apparent application. 

The problem BMAC set out to overcome
by analysis and diagnosis was the following dissonance.

• The principle Inputs  are   Qualitative.

• The principle Outputs are Quantitative.

The evidence for this is that the outputs produced at
a Management Level are both Numerical and TIME based.

A ‘Sales Forecast’ is the amount of expected Revenue,
from which Customers, by which date!

However, the inputs are the subjective view of the Salesperson.

The Salesperson describes and categorises
their own Activity on a best-fit basis, often from a drop down list. 

The Salesperson then second-guess their Client’s view
for revenue Value of potential business and likely Close dates.
Then, most improbably of all, they guess
their own likelihood of success as a Percentage!

All of this subjective information is ‘rose tinted’ by the salesperson’s desire to ‘look good’.
This is done by presenting a strong pipeline, from a portfolio of well attended accounts.

Giving the impression of a well managed and well worked territory
and therefore a strong likelihood of future sales success!

This whole process is so inherently unstable, such that the Sales Manager 
takes a  ‘view’ nominally subtracting 20%-40% from Sales Data. 

This ‘modified view’ is then further modified, up or down,
by a ‘C Level correction’ based on Historical Trends, or Business Plan Forecast!

SFA and CRM have led to a lack of ‘socialisation’, that is real discussion of the actual status of the Sales forecast.  This has a severe negative effect on the ability of the Sales Organisation to Learn, for peer sharing or replication and rollout. 

The measured impact of SFA and CRM, as currently used,
has been found to LOWER Sales Revenue Generating Activity,
and has REDUCED Sales Productivity. 

The claimed benefit of ‘Sales Performance Improvement’ through SFA and CRM relies on anecdotal evidence, with little correlation to Sales Revenue Improvement.

There is at least the same amount of anecdotal evidence that SFA and CRM is ‘padded’ or manipulated by sales people with exaggerated pipelines, early close dates to show good account ‘husbandry’.

The view that SFA/CRM ‘drive’ Sales by encouraging Sales to ‘drive’ Buyers to the ‘Close’ on a specific date for specific revenue amounts, is FALSE.
 
It is as deceptive as believing the Sun rotates around the Earth.

It denies the fact that Sales revolves around the Buyer,
and that Sales are subject the Buyer’s LOCAL conditions.

SFA especially fails to account for Buyer Contingencies:
BUYER Environmental Data is ignored, often it is disallowed!

• Great difficulty is experienced by the Salesperson reporting
  a Reversal of the Sales Stage or Phase.
• Sales Velocity is presented as fixed speed, and
• Sales Acceleration (or Deceleration) is not treated as a variable,
  but used as a constant or ignored.

 

To use an analogy from Coal Mining, SFA fails to take account of ‘local disturbance’.

 

In Mining, ‘local disturbances’ can be “rising floor” or “falling roof”. 

Where for geological reasons the Mine floor alters or the roof collapses.
These are both phenomena outside of the miner’s control!
Huge varieties of unfavourable and changing environmental conditions happen at the coalface; most of which are impossible to predict. Even those which could be predictable conditions, most are impossible to alter. 

In mining terms these are described as
‘bad conditions’ and are
treated differently from ‘bad work’. 

‘Bad Work’ are errors of judgement or activity and are attributable to the Miner.

Both ‘Bad Conditions’ or ‘Bad Work’ will lead to much additional,
but unproductive, work to get back on stream. 

The interaction of BOTH ‘Bad Conditions’ AND ‘Bad Work’ can be catastrophic.

Recognition ‘at the coalface’ in Sales situations,
demands ‘Structured Customer FACING Time’ by Sales Managers!

This time is specifically planned to examine and determine “Local Disturbance”
i.e, ‘Bad Conditions’.  Additionally, time spent by the Sale Manager with the Salesperson, in the Customer environment, enables diagnoses of ‘Bad Work’
performed by the Sales person. 
It is worth giving a clear example of each:

• ‘Bad Conditions’,
  

  the Customer has decided to postpone the RFP, ITT, or Request for Quotations. 
  The Project is on hold.  The Delay causes Sales Forecasting problems.
  The  Sales Person is wrongly criticised for ‘lack of account control’.
  Normal SFA or CRM input “pending”
  
• ‘Bad Work’,
  the Salesperson has failed to respond appropriately (i.e. they were late)
  to the Buyer’s RFP, ITT, or Request for Quotations. 
  The Project proceeds without us. 
  The Salesperson avoids the consequence of ‘Bad Work’. 
  Normal SFA or CRM input “lost on price”.

The problem we set out to overcome by analysis and diagnosis was the following dissonance.

• The principle  inputs  are Qualitative.
• The Principle outputs are Quantitative.

In Sales we have come from an Executive Decision Making and Planning basis of experience, knowledge and skill.  This was replaced by charts, spread sheets, ratios, graphs and calendars ‘paper clipped’ by software into The ‘Monthly’ Report or even, The ‘Weekly’ Report. 

These reports are then analysed for fault, or explained away,
but always without validation, hence without judgement. 

Opinion becomes Fact!

The solution is, as you may expect, is both difficult and slow,
it requires Leadership, Inspiration and a Systematic Approach based upon
evidence and validation, not anecdotal vindication. 

At BMAC we have conducted extensive research using validated models for:
Sales Performance, Sales Velocity, Sales Acceleration to Validate Quantitative Input. 

BMAC then developed a proprietary model for Buying Behaviour and Sales Process,
which enables the effective functioning of both Sales Force Automation (SFA) and
Client Relationship Management (CRM).

Sales Automation leads to low productivity

 

I read Richardson’s Blog on Sales Automation http://bit.ly/Xdatti,
I reply with a 2010 Blog I wrote on the same theme.

 

The inappropriate use of Sales Measurement and Management systems is doing more harm than good.

Workflow systems may have eliminated the need for skilled short order chefs (burger flippers), at Burger King.  Replacing the Cook’s Judgement with thermostats, bells and buzzers does work with fries and patties -
but it does not work in sales!

Instead, Low Productivity becomes the norm due to an ‘adaptive method’ of handling the contingencies of Buyer/Seller relationships.  The poor use of a complicated, rigid and large-scale sales system, itself borrowed from an engineering production system with little modification. 

 

Simply put, applying the same approach to two radically different situations
is not likely to have the same outcome.

The rise of ‘Process Selling’ (steps of the sale) and Sales Force Automation was not due to a need, but to a perceived failure of Sales Departments and the widespread availability of low cost Hardware and Software to implement the ‘systems’.

What was the perceived failure of Sales departments? 

Steadily lengthening Sales Cycle Times.

In IT and Telecoms, this has moved from four months to seven months,
in major Projects (Data Centres) it moved from 12months to 24 Months. 

In fact, Sales Cycle Time does not exist!
It is Buying Cycle time, which has increased!

 

BMAC research into Buyer Behaviour has found consistently that the Buying Process has become more structured, more formal, while involving more people, more activity and a greater degree of complexity than before.  Buying has adopted technology in Searching for alternatives, Evaluation of alternatives and Information assisted Decision Making.

Buyer sophistication has meant that basic facts are gathered on the Internet, negating the need for the ‘Talking Brochure’ salesperson.

 

http://brianmaciver.blogspot.com.es/2010/09/sales-force-automation-broken.html

Yet Marketing Departments continue to produce Brochures and Boilerplate Presentations (death by PowerPoint).  Marketing has also failed to educate and inform Salespeople in Market Sector Knowledge, leading to the situation where Buyers know more about the Product than Sales, and Sales know little about the Product’s Application in the Market.

The net result is you have Salespeople following a Sales Cycle driven by Management reports, following a Sales Process, which is disconnected, from Buyers, Markets and Applications.  Managers have implemented Measurement and Control, and Salespeople have to adapt for function and utility.  Dissonance occurs where Salespeople daily use Outlook for mail, Time management and document filing.  Then, they reluctantly update their sales automation application weekly.

The real problem is that Selling has not extended to take account of the New Buying Process;
Selling is a team responsibility, a team effort.  It involves integrated roles for Marketing, Sales, Product Management, Technical Support, Implementation, Finance and After-sales Service. 

 

The key dimension is NOT the Sales Cycle time,
it is the Product to Cash Cycle time,
and that is an organisational duty, not a sales responsibility. 

BMAC’s proprietary Sales Process to Market Model delivers Product to Cash.

Where are you Integrated or Process driven? 

Cash target behind or ahead?

Sales Management is out of date.

Well, in fact Management is out of date, not just Sales Management.

Automobiles are based on same the Internal Combustion engine for the last 70 years. Cars are redesigned, restyled; saloon, station wagon and SUV, but all are based on the same 70-year-old technology, simply adapted but not evolving. It is Genesis not Exodus. It is the same in Management, new bodywork but the same 'engine' for 70 years.

In 2010 Sales is constrained, not by their ability to adapt to new technology, nor the speed of uptake of FAD Sales Training, but Sales are constrained by Sales Management! For it is Sales Management, which Plans, Allocates accounts with Account Managers, Organises territories, sets Strategy, and accepts Product/Markets, Motivates and Rewards. If Sales is unsuccessful then look to Sales Management, do not swap out sales people, start at the top – swap the Sales Director, the Sales VP or the CSO.

A 21^st century sales force is identified by one unique trait. Not the smart phone, or SFA software, in fact it is neither technology nor the speed at which technology is implemented. It is about Decision Making. 21^st century Sales is about WHO makes decisions, WHERE decisions are made, WHEN decisions are taken, WHAT can be decided and HOW decisions are made. Why is this trait so important? 21^st Century Sales in 21^st Century Firms make decisions FASTER than their Competitors, the decision is right more often than their competitors are, and they implement their decisions faster than their Competitors do.

Having an I-Phone and an I-Pad, as well as Sat. Nav. in the car, but then having a Sales force Automation Package decide who you speak to is NOT 21^st century selling, its ROBOTIC. It is the Marketing Assistant's dream, no need for a Sales department!

Get up to speed in 2010; use the wisdom of the crowd.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wisdom_of_Crowds

Sales forecasts, it’s a numb3rs game

 

Into second half of the year, how is 2H forecast looking?

How accurate was the first half year?

Just before the Summer Vacation is a good time to review 'Sales Forecasting'.
Whiz-bang software in place, got the latest apps?
Remote server based and cloud delivered?
Your Sales Executives disciplined to keep it all up to date.

How good is your forecasting?

Does it 'rain' where your predictions say?

Can you predict how much 'rain' and when?

The accuracy of a Sales Forecast to predict

Which Customer will order,

What product, and

When they will order it is, let us be honest, poor.

In fact, against the standards of - which, when and what,
Sales Forecasts are less than 10% accurate.

 
If it were the production forecast you would not know, which Customer,
would get their order or when they would get it, 90% of the time!

BMAC have audited nine sales forecasting 'systems' for which, when and what.
The results were slippage of date by at least a month 60%,
losses or discontinuations 20%, a total error of 80%.
The 20% wins were inaccurate in customer, product or forecast pricing.

Overall, you cannot run a business based on this.

If yours is better, it is because you exercise better judgement,
but good forecasting does not rely on 'Judgement'.

My friend and colleague (MH) has a higher degree in Pure Maths
(he calls it 'hard sums' and he is a bit like the character Charlie Eppes in the TV show Numb3rs).

He does not teach, but he is the CEO of Software Company. We worked together on Buyer Behaviour developing a mathematical analysis to predict and modify Buyer Behaviour and Buyer Decision Making.

When we did this something remarkable happened.
Forecasting accuracy improved.
The more we worked at predicting BUYER BEHAVIOUR and how to modify it,
the more accurate the Sales Forecast became!

First, we had to eliminate or greatly reduce BIAS.
Bias (the 'b' factor) in the formula, Bias held a weighting of four.

Bias comes in two forms

1. Sales-executive 'Optimism', I hope to win this deal and
   I want to look good by having a BIG pipeline or
   
2. Sales-executive 'Pessimism', I do not want to forecast it until I have won the deal.
   We eliminated bias by having consequences for bias.

The BMAC "Numb3rs Forecasting Formula" has three more letters.

• Factor 'a' is for ATTRACTIVENESS.
  How attractive is our offer, the price and proposition we offer the buyer?
  A high price or a weak proposition decreases your likelihood to win the deal!
  
• Factor 'd' is for DESIREABILITY,
  how desirable is this Customer and this deal in the marketplace?
  i.e. How much Competition is it going to attract?
  And that leads us nicely on to the final letter
  
• Factor 'c' is for COMPETITION.
  How many are present?  Which competitors?  How active?  How aggressive?

  The formula arrangement of a. b. c. and d. is
  Attractiveness, Bias, Competition and Desirability put together correctly in mathematical terms with their relationships and weightings a b c & d they really do predict and drive your results, accurately!
  
  Moreover, you will not need whiz-bang software.

At BMAC we consistently work with and test, Frameworks, Models and Logic.
Contact us for more information.

“What gets measured gets done.”

The Lord Kelvin, gave us the 'Kelvinator' (Refrigerator),
and the first Transatlantic Telegraph Cable.
He was a Scientist and Engineer, taking science and applying it to everyday situations.
He said,

"To manage something, first you must be able to measure it".

As Business Scientists, we know that "What get measured gets done!"
That is why we use Sales Standards and Sales Discipline.

Knowing how many Crocodiles there are, is NOT going to help!

I have written of the difficulties with Sales Force Automation (SFA Software) before, not only in it's poor ability to measure, (GIGO) Garbage in Garbage out, but also even when the Measures are good it is:

 

 

How you MANAGE from
The Measure that counts!

• Pipeline is measured, but Revenue is not coming in.
  Management Focus then goes on 'Closing Deals'.
  This causes Crisis Management behaviour.
  Sales Activity becomes un-linked to Buyer Process.
  Quotations are then written too early meaning that the Buyer “delays” their decisions.
• The OUTCOME is: 
  Inverted Selling Behaviour with more focus on ending 'Selling Cycles',
  than on starting ‘Buying Cycles’.

BMAC Research uncovered that Productive Selling benchmarks show a:
higher focus on Starting Buying cycles than on ending 'Selling Cycles'.

If you want Management Control back, if you want Revenue results without Crisis Management,
if you want shorter delays from Quote to Cash, then contact BMAC Consultants

Sales Force Automation places too much stress on Salespeople

 

 

The evidence is that Sales Force Automation (SFA) and Client Relationship Management (CRM) place too much stress on Salespeople, by producing a

'crisis of information'.

The crisis comes from the overwhelming input and output of unrelated Data, without apparent application. This Data Storage Fortress has become so complex it needs sophisticated software to access, read, display, interpret and manipulate.

 

 

Hence, the output read and accepted by Managers,
bears no relationship to the input presented by Salespeople.

The problem BMAC set out to overcome

by analysis and diagnosis was the following dissonance.

 

• The principle Inputs are Qualitative.

• The principle Outputs are Quantitative.

 

The evidence for this is that the outputs produced at a Management Level are Numerical and time based.

A 'Sales Forecast' the amount of expected Revenue, from which Customers, by which date.

However, the inputs are the subjective view of the Salesperson.

The Sales Executives describe and categorises their own Activity on a 'best-fit' basis, usually from a drop down list.

The Salesperson then second-guesses their Client's view for Value of Potential business, likely Close dates, and most improbably their own likelihood of success as a Percentage. All of this subjective information is coloured by the salesperson's desire to 'look good', by presenting a strong pipeline, a portfolio of well attended accounts, a well managed and worked territory and therefore a strong likelihood of future sales success!

 

 

This whole process is so inherently unstable, that the Sales Manager adds their 'view' nominally subtracting 20%-40% from Sales Data. This 'modified view' is then further modified, up or down, by a 'C-Level correction' based on Historical Trends,
or The Business Plan Forecast!

 

SFA and CRM have led to a lack of socialisation, affecting negatively on the ability of the Organisation to Learn, for peer sharing or replication and roll-out. The measured impact of SFA and CRM, as currently used, has been to lower Sales Revenue Generating Activity, and has substantially reduced Sales Productivity while increasing 'efficiency'.
The claimed benefit of 'Sales Performance Improvement' through SFA and CRM relies on anecdotal evidence,
with little correlation to actual Sales Revenue Improvement.

There is at least the same amount of anecdotal evidence that SFA and CRM is 'padded' or manipulated by sales people with exaggerated pipelines and 'early' close dates to show good account husbandry.

The greatest failure of SFA and CRM, in their current form, is to accurately represent reality, the actual 'on the ground' Sales situation. SFA especially fails to account for Contingencies.

Great difficulty is experienced by the Salesperson when reporting a Reversal of the Sales Stage or Phase.

Environmental Data is ignored or often it is disallowed.

Sales Velocity is presented as fixed speed, and Sales Acceleration (or Deceleration) is not treated as a variable,
but used as a constant.

The view that SFA/CRM 'drive' Sales by encouraging Sales to 'drive' Buyers to the 'Close' on a specific date for specific revenue amounts, is FALSE.

It is as deceptive as believing the Sun rotates around the Earth,
it denies the fact that Sales revolve around the Buyer, and the Buyer's local conditions.

To use an analogy from Coal Mining, then SFA fails to take account of 'local disturbance'.

In Mining, these can be "rising floor" or "falling roof" where for geological reasons the mine floor alters or the roof collapses are both phenomena outside of the miner's control. Huge varieties of unfavourable and changing environmental conditions happen at the coalface; most of which are impossible to predict, and of the predictable conditions, most are impossible to alter.

In mining these are described as 'bad conditions' and are treated distinctly from 'bad work' where errors of judgement or activity are attributable to the miner. Both 'Bad Conditions' or 'Bad Work' will lead to much additional, but unproductive, work to get back on stream. The interaction of both 'Bad Conditions' and 'Bad Work' can be catastrophic.

Recognition of 'at the coalface' in Sales situations,
demands Customer time by Sales Managers,
Structured Customer Time
specifically planned to examine
and determine Local Disturbance 'Bad Conditions'.

Additionally, time spent by the Sales Manager with the Salesperson in the Customer environment enables diagnoses of 'Bad Work'. It is worth giving a clear example of each:

 

 

• 'Bad Conditions', the Customer has decided to postpone the RFP, ITT, or Request Price Quotations.
  The Project is on hold.
  Normal SFA or CRM input "pending".Delay causes forecasting problems, the Salesperson is criticised for lack of account control.
  

   
• 'Bad Work', the Sales Team have failed to respond appropriately (i.e. they were late) to the Buyer's RFP, ITT,
  or Request Price Quotations.
  The project proceeds without us.
  Normal SFA or CRM input "lost on price".
  Sales person avoids the consequence of 'Bad Work'.
  

The problem we set out to overcome by Analysis and Diagnosis was the following dissonance.

• The principle inputs are Qualitative.
  
• The Principle outputs are Quantitative.
  

In Sales we have come from an Executive Decision Making and Planning Basis:
i.e. experience, knowledge and skill to be replaced by charts, spread sheets, ratios, graphs and calendars
'paper clipped' by software into The Monthly or yet still worse, The 'Weekly' Report.

These reports are then analysed for fault, or explained away, but always without validation, hence without judgement.

Opinion is fact.

The solution is, as you may expect, is both difficult and slow,
it requires Leadership, Inspiration and a Systematic Approach based upon evidence and validation, not anecdotal vindication.

At BMAC, we have conducted extensive research using validated models for Sales Performance, Sales Velocity, and Sales Acceleration to Validate Quantitative Input. BMAC then developed a proprietary model for Buying Behaviour and Sales Process, which enables the effective functioning of both Sales Force Automation and Client Relationship Management.

Do you agree? Why?

Do you disagree? Why?

Steps of the Sale

 

Everybody in, or around, sales knows "The Steps of the Sale", right?

Wrong!

Do you know the 5 steps or the 7 or the 9 or the 11 or the 13 or the 15 steps
or the variations: the staircases, the ladders, the triangles or the circles?

 

 

 

 

ALL of these are based upon a beginning, middle and an end.
They are 'formula for success", RITUALS, rain dances and, sadly, just like rain dances they do not work!

The adept Rain-dancer only dances on cloudy days, and then only in the rainy season.

He performs only when he is most likely to succeed, ideally when it is raining!

Hence, the belief in the power of the Rain-dance grows.

Witnesses confirmed that they saw him dancing while it was raining.

In Sales Rainmakers do not dance
and they do not follow the steps, any of the steps of the sale.

Rainmakers follow and lead the Buyer,

who follows a process from intellectual curiosity to emotional commitment then to engaged action.
The inconvenient fact is that Buyers are not aware of the Steps of the Sale so, instead they use their own process.

When, during sales training, I am challenged over this, killing a sacred cow.
I ask a closed question: "Can a buyer buy without a Sales Executive?"
The answer as we all know is YES, ask Amazon.com.
My supplemental question is:
"Can a Sales Executive sell without a Buyer?"

Although the answer is clearly NO, they pause, feeling a belief being replaced by a fact.
The 'selling cycle', the 'steps of the sale' are a rain-dance, best done while a buyer is buying they simply do not exist.

You can make fish soup from fish, but you cannot make fish from fish soup!

I have observed more than 2000 sales calls, I log 'behaviours' and 'out comes', as well as 'objectives' pre-call. The conclusion is Sales Executives who follow a sales steps process rarely succeed, the more faithfully they follow their steps then the less success they enjoy. Yet they follow the steps faithfully to make it rain! Successful sales people do NOT follow the Steps of the Sale, they may report that they do in Sales Force Automation software, they may even pretend to believe in the ritual, but they do not follow the practice.

Instead, successful sales executives follow, influence and sometimes lead the Buying Process.

Sales Philosophy is interesting; the pragmatic application of it's conclusion is PERFORMANCE, sales achievement.

BMAC Sales Consultants will replace obsolete 'Steps of the Sales' models with a functional Sales Process which optimises your Sales force.

Sales Energy

Who gets the most done, the busy bee or the smart bee?

Is sales a Hare or a Tortoise game?

We can demonstrate from evidence that
Sales Activity CAUSES Sales Results,

Activity does not just ‘affect’ results it causes results.

Two Salespeople of similar ability with comparable potential in their territories,

then the more active salesperson will produce higher sales results.

 

Common sense, is it not?

 

So let us go beyond common sense to research.
BMAC research confirms that high Activity = more Sales,
but also uncovers a series of anomalies.

Rarely are Top Performers winners of the most Sales Visits contest.
Often two people of the similar ability and comparable territory produce
the anomaly that the most active is NOT the most successful.

 

 

BMAC completed a factual research program across five firms,
selling in various sectors and three countries.

The research definitions changed to define ACTIVITY
into two distinct Categories:

• RGA (Revenue Generating Activity) and

• NrGA (Non-revenue Generating Activity).

Factual research is not a survey;

it took hard data of Activity and correlated this data to Results,
Sales Advances, Contracted Sales, and Revenue Generation

RGA is for example: Sales Visits, Writing Sales Proposals,
giving Sales Demonstrations.

 

NrGA is for example: Reorganising the office, tidying the desk, having a coffee.

Travel time, meal times, filing and admin became items of hot dispute, so we compared variations of these and they showed no impact on Revenue Generation,
so are NrGA.  As are Company Meetings, Sales Meetings and almost all training events.

Activity sampling at 15-minute intervals identified 100+ distinct activities,

23 were RGA, and the rest or more than 70 activities were not.

This is not just Time Management, or Effective Habits
it is about Awareness, Perception and Focus.

 

Let me share in overview the Comparison between:

 

Top Performers	Poor Performers
60%+ on RGA Support systems Single Task focus  Below average stress	60%+ on NrGA Data/Information overload Multiple task Diffusion  higher than average stress

 

Sales are about FOCUS,
smart bees produce more honey;
busy bees get tired and produce a lot less honey.

If you would like to discover the 23 RGA Smart Activities, then contact brian.maciver@googlemail.com