Selling ⁽¹⁷⁾

Rory Sutherland at Ted Talks helps me understand the value and cost of customer loyalty

I recently discovered Rory Sutherland from one of my favorite podcasts: Ted Talks.  After rapidly devouring all the You

The Chinese Market fallacy in business planning....

When you have a great idea, but the world will not come to you...

I was recently invited as a guest speaker and panelists for an entrepreneur development group.  My fellow panelist, Charles Leadbeater (a recognized proponent of innovation and Web2.0 thinking) started with a call for more collaboration and cited amazing successes and fantastic creativity.  While I agreed with his thesis, I could not help but recount the many initial business (tech initiatives) failures caused by an improper reliance on collaborators for their sales channel.  Charles was right to highlight a new paradigm of collaboration as a significant opportunity for small entrepreneurs, but for the sake of the technical entrepreneurs in the audience, I found myself taking a contrary position and highlighting the limitations of collaboration.

Engineers have a serious defect-- they cannot resist solving a problem.  The reason I call this a defect is that it keeps getting in the way of sensible business.  For the most naive, they normally worry about things like manufacturing, on-line order taking systems, and future developments, but dismiss the challenges of path to market by either assuming customers will come on their own (once they recognize the brilliance) or they assume that they will outsource sales through resellers.  The truth is that many people have very successful businesses using resellers and OEM relationships, but this will not be possible at the same time as you are just entering the market. (See earlier, related blog post "Production vs Prototype Sales").  I wish it were possible to simply outsource initial sales the same way you can outsource initial manufacturing-- in truth, I am a "recovering engineer" (an addictive and life long disease) and would likely have stayed a happy engineer if it were not for this unfortunate truth.

"Not just is it profitable, but is it right?" -Obama

I just listened to Psychologist Barry Schwartz  give a lecture on "virtue" at TED Talks.  If you have not heard of TEDTalks, they are Technology, Education, and Design talks,  a free-form gathering and speaking by some truly intelligent people.  I highly recommend it.  In this season's speakers, Barry was a standout.  I also found his talk on moral intelligence and virtue particularly relevant to sales.

First off, we need to eliminate the "pusher" and "manipulator" salesmen as not "real" salesmen because the value of a true salesmen is that they connect need with ability to supply.  A true salesman knows that discovery is key:  "You probably did know we exist (or could do this) but...."   While this is a necessary part of selling, it is only the first, smallest, step. The real bulk of the work begins when the salesman has identified a customer with a need his company can fulfill.  After discovery, the salesman identifies an entire list of reasons why the customer will not make the obvious business engagement; They can't decide;  the order process is too complex;  already committed to another (likely less good) supplier: we don't trust your company;  we are scared and can't decide...  There are also supplier side barriers that come into play:  We don't know that they will pay; they want special treatment; we sold to them before and had a bad experience.... Continue reading...

Numbered because I suspect there will be more....