In a previous post I introduced the concept of Connectors (people who can introduce you to Targets) and how to think of them in terms of Introducabilty & Referencabilty as well as how to 'activate them".
Can this scale? Most people would say no. In my experience, the answer is Yes. How? Starting with the obvious assumption that you have a great product or service and Continue reading...
Take the express lane to getting customers for large, complex products
Introducability gets you the Target's attention and results in a high probability of a meeting taking place. Unfortunately it does little to build trust or get you any closer to closing a deal with the prospect. For this, you need another type of Connector-- one with "Referenceability". Connectors with Referencability Continue reading...
Three books I find useful in launching into new markets (updated since first posted in 2009)
I am not a big reader of sales, marketing and business books. However, whenever I am working with someone who is interested in further developing their ability to sell and market, I find myself recommending the same three books.
The first is Rob Jolles book, Customer Centered Selling. It is unlikely that you have heard of this book as Rob is a relatively minor author in the field of spin/consultitive/complex selling, but I find his presentation is by far the best. He is a veteran salesman and sales trainer from Xerox. For me, there were two world class Silicon Valley companies in the Eighties: the great engineers came from HP and the great salesmen came from Xerox. While both have lost their shine in recent years, they were in their time factories for their respective talents. Rob concisely communicates sales as a science and a process for large complex consultative sales. Rob also does a great job of explaining why salesmen (real salesmen, not order takers) are a good thing for society.
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I have managed different types of professionals, but I can attest that no group is harder to influence than Salesperson. A typical interraction might be:
In fact, this chain of events is so predictable that I started to use this as an indication of future sales success. Let's look at each step in detail and I will try to explain this from the Salesperson's perspective/nature and explain my insight.
Continue reading...With all the technology people who have ambitions of joining the startup world, I thought I might talk about why technical people struggle so hard at learning the critical sales roles. The interest in this D-Labs sponsored talk was far more than I expected.
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