Becoming a better Businessman
Discussion
One for B2B Salespeople and Purchasers alike, as there seems to be a wealth of both on here.
I suppose the TL,DR in advance of this would be “what makes a highly successful salesperson, viewed from both sides?”
Been in the “Sales” game for a number of years now and do OK… however, I’m not sure why, but the last few months I’ve found it particularly difficult getting long term customers and new prospects alike to play ball… people I’m quite far down the road with on particular enquiries are now a wall of silence and very little in the way of answered/returned calls or simple courtesy of answering pertinent emails.
We have a niche technology (a particular type of electronic component/s) and are reasonably well regarded manufacturer in the industry, and is I’ve said I’ve been reasonably successful until recently. So during a period of introspection I’m wondering how to improve my game.
What is the very best advice those who are doing well would offer? What qualities should I hone and what should I do more of? I have a limited pool of more experienced colleagues to glean from and I suppose it’s always been a case of get amongst successful people and learn… so here I am
I have a fluent grasp of the cycle, there is no lack of activity and feel like I have sufficient gravitas in my dealings.
Likewise for those on the customer side… what has been in your experience the best qualities of those you buy from, and would do so again.. from the very first contact to the ongoing relationship years down the line?
Thanks all
I suppose the TL,DR in advance of this would be “what makes a highly successful salesperson, viewed from both sides?”
Been in the “Sales” game for a number of years now and do OK… however, I’m not sure why, but the last few months I’ve found it particularly difficult getting long term customers and new prospects alike to play ball… people I’m quite far down the road with on particular enquiries are now a wall of silence and very little in the way of answered/returned calls or simple courtesy of answering pertinent emails.
We have a niche technology (a particular type of electronic component/s) and are reasonably well regarded manufacturer in the industry, and is I’ve said I’ve been reasonably successful until recently. So during a period of introspection I’m wondering how to improve my game.
What is the very best advice those who are doing well would offer? What qualities should I hone and what should I do more of? I have a limited pool of more experienced colleagues to glean from and I suppose it’s always been a case of get amongst successful people and learn… so here I am
I have a fluent grasp of the cycle, there is no lack of activity and feel like I have sufficient gravitas in my dealings.
Likewise for those on the customer side… what has been in your experience the best qualities of those you buy from, and would do so again.. from the very first contact to the ongoing relationship years down the line?
Thanks all
I'm no salesperson but I have people buy from me all of the time.
You should watch Benjamin Dennehy on YT - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iuUqHcEqdE
Turning salespeople on their heads.
You should watch Benjamin Dennehy on YT - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iuUqHcEqdE
Turning salespeople on their heads.
A brain dump of questions for you to ask yourself...
Start with the demand side:
How niche is it?
What are they buying instead of your product? Why? Will they tell you?
Are you being replaced by something from China, etc where they have ripped off your IP?
While it might be because of the sales pitch, etc, if sales have fundamentally dropped then you need to look hard at your competition?
Then the supply side:
How do you position? Are you a strategic partner? Are you critical part of their supply chain? Are you positioning as a partner to be alongside them throughout their product lifecycle or a commodity? etc
Who are your top 5 competitors? What are they doing right now? What have they changed, what are they promising their customers?
How does your company differentiate? - Responsiveness? Quality / low MTBF? etc - how do these factors come across in a pitch?
When you sell at get to terms and conditions, are they still competitive? (warranty, payment terms, etc)
Start with the demand side:
How niche is it?
What are they buying instead of your product? Why? Will they tell you?
Are you being replaced by something from China, etc where they have ripped off your IP?
While it might be because of the sales pitch, etc, if sales have fundamentally dropped then you need to look hard at your competition?
Then the supply side:
How do you position? Are you a strategic partner? Are you critical part of their supply chain? Are you positioning as a partner to be alongside them throughout their product lifecycle or a commodity? etc
Who are your top 5 competitors? What are they doing right now? What have they changed, what are they promising their customers?
How does your company differentiate? - Responsiveness? Quality / low MTBF? etc - how do these factors come across in a pitch?
When you sell at get to terms and conditions, are they still competitive? (warranty, payment terms, etc)
From the business side: A good salesman is one who recognises and understands the difference between turnover, gross profit and margin (and the relative importance of each).
From the client side: A good salesman is one who treats the client like they are their only client and one who knows as much about the client's business and sector as they do.
From the client side: A good salesman is one who treats the client like they are their only client and one who knows as much about the client's business and sector as they do.
Most of the time when this happens its not you mate, its what your flogging or who your flogging it for.
Numerous people i know are average at business but good at picking the right people to work for and thus sell the right product at the right time.
Made the mistake myself before and moved on to more ££££££ even though I'm no better or worse a businessman. Only mistake was not moving on sooner
Numerous people i know are average at business but good at picking the right people to work for and thus sell the right product at the right time.
Made the mistake myself before and moved on to more ££££££ even though I'm no better or worse a businessman. Only mistake was not moving on sooner
There are two aspects to your question;
i) Is the current downturn you are experiencing related to your approach?
ii) And more generally, how might your approach be improved?
To answer the first part you need to sit down with your sales manager/director and discuss the fundamentals e.g. how many leads are you getting, how many appointments are you completing, reviewing your methods of follow-up etc.
I'd presume the company will have some historical data so you can view your recent results in a longer-term context to see whether your recent results are part of a normal pattern or not. You should be able to use this information to benchmark your results against your colleagues.
You can use this information to establish if you are doing something fundamentally 'wrong' or whether the downturn is just part of normal business variances.
As a final point I would add, there are so many aspects related to your sales results which are not directly in your control. It might be for example the company has changed its marketing strategy which has changed the quality of its leads. So the most likely cause of any downturn will be unrelated to something you are doing wrong.
In terms of the best approach, my suggestion is to think of yourself as a problem-solver. not a salesperson. The problem you are solving is to help your client increase their profitability - this might mean helping to increase their sales, reduce their costs, improve their efficiency etc.
So when you are starting to work with a client, the more you can learn and understand how their business works, and what the exact problem is that you think you can help them solve is crucial.
Once you have analysed the problem and quantified to yourself that you can genuinely help improve your client's business, you can start the challenge of explaining this to your client.
If your client is ignoring your calls it means that, at this moment in time, they don't think you can help them. Assuming that you honestly believe you can solve their problem, you will need to revisit the client to check your understanding of their business, focussing on the obstacles you might have missed which you can then use to refine your proposal.
i) Is the current downturn you are experiencing related to your approach?
ii) And more generally, how might your approach be improved?
To answer the first part you need to sit down with your sales manager/director and discuss the fundamentals e.g. how many leads are you getting, how many appointments are you completing, reviewing your methods of follow-up etc.
I'd presume the company will have some historical data so you can view your recent results in a longer-term context to see whether your recent results are part of a normal pattern or not. You should be able to use this information to benchmark your results against your colleagues.
You can use this information to establish if you are doing something fundamentally 'wrong' or whether the downturn is just part of normal business variances.
As a final point I would add, there are so many aspects related to your sales results which are not directly in your control. It might be for example the company has changed its marketing strategy which has changed the quality of its leads. So the most likely cause of any downturn will be unrelated to something you are doing wrong.
In terms of the best approach, my suggestion is to think of yourself as a problem-solver. not a salesperson. The problem you are solving is to help your client increase their profitability - this might mean helping to increase their sales, reduce their costs, improve their efficiency etc.
So when you are starting to work with a client, the more you can learn and understand how their business works, and what the exact problem is that you think you can help them solve is crucial.
Once you have analysed the problem and quantified to yourself that you can genuinely help improve your client's business, you can start the challenge of explaining this to your client.
If your client is ignoring your calls it means that, at this moment in time, they don't think you can help them. Assuming that you honestly believe you can solve their problem, you will need to revisit the client to check your understanding of their business, focussing on the obstacles you might have missed which you can then use to refine your proposal.
Thank you all for your considered comments 
I think the "long term relationship" thing here is probably, when I think about it, going to be the most important thing.
I'm not in a typical "sales" position in a corporate type of firm - we're a global company with a branch in the UK comprising of a sales director and I, and an admin lady.
I wear pretty much every hat for my region of the UK, insofar as I'm effectively running my own business with my own P+L.... I am the prospector, the driver of engineering what we sell with the customer and my engineers in our factories (custom components,) get it "designed in" for a multiple year lifespan (so good recurring biz,) decide which vendor to manufacture the product at and negotiate with these, co-ordinate it's production and delivery, manage the order book (we're talking 10-100k pcs/month delivered for industrial production of PCBs,) and work with their contract manufacturers across Europe and UK who place the actual orders.....
There is no marketing or advertising apart from me.... so an old school sales operation.
jonamv8 mentioned i'm flogging the wrong product for the wrong business - that's quite interesting point of view.
Perhaps I'm in a saturated market - whilst niche and specialised, i'm still batting off the competition on a daily basis!
I think the "long term relationship" thing here is probably, when I think about it, going to be the most important thing.
I'm not in a typical "sales" position in a corporate type of firm - we're a global company with a branch in the UK comprising of a sales director and I, and an admin lady.
I wear pretty much every hat for my region of the UK, insofar as I'm effectively running my own business with my own P+L.... I am the prospector, the driver of engineering what we sell with the customer and my engineers in our factories (custom components,) get it "designed in" for a multiple year lifespan (so good recurring biz,) decide which vendor to manufacture the product at and negotiate with these, co-ordinate it's production and delivery, manage the order book (we're talking 10-100k pcs/month delivered for industrial production of PCBs,) and work with their contract manufacturers across Europe and UK who place the actual orders.....
There is no marketing or advertising apart from me.... so an old school sales operation.
jonamv8 mentioned i'm flogging the wrong product for the wrong business - that's quite interesting point of view.
Perhaps I'm in a saturated market - whilst niche and specialised, i'm still batting off the competition on a daily basis!
PopsandBangs said:
Thank you all for your considered comments
I think the "long term relationship" thing here is probably, when I think about it, going to be the most important thing.
I'm not in a typical "sales" position in a corporate type of firm - we're a global company with a branch in the UK comprising of a sales director and I, and an admin lady.
I wear pretty much every hat for my region of the UK, insofar as I'm effectively running my own business with my own P+L.... I am the prospector, the driver of engineering what we sell with the customer and my engineers in our factories (custom components,) get it "designed in" for a multiple year lifespan (so good recurring biz,) decide which vendor to manufacture the product at and negotiate with these, co-ordinate it's production and delivery, manage the order book (we're talking 10-100k pcs/month delivered for industrial production of PCBs,) and work with their contract manufacturers across Europe and UK who place the actual orders.....
There is no marketing or advertising apart from me.... so an old school sales operation.
jonamv8 mentioned i'm flogging the wrong product for the wrong business - that's quite interesting point of view.
Perhaps I'm in a saturated market - whilst niche and specialised, i'm still batting off the competition on a daily basis!
No wonder you are struggling! Its like you are running your own business doing a bit of everything, you cannot focus on one aspect. I think the "long term relationship" thing here is probably, when I think about it, going to be the most important thing.
I'm not in a typical "sales" position in a corporate type of firm - we're a global company with a branch in the UK comprising of a sales director and I, and an admin lady.
I wear pretty much every hat for my region of the UK, insofar as I'm effectively running my own business with my own P+L.... I am the prospector, the driver of engineering what we sell with the customer and my engineers in our factories (custom components,) get it "designed in" for a multiple year lifespan (so good recurring biz,) decide which vendor to manufacture the product at and negotiate with these, co-ordinate it's production and delivery, manage the order book (we're talking 10-100k pcs/month delivered for industrial production of PCBs,) and work with their contract manufacturers across Europe and UK who place the actual orders.....
There is no marketing or advertising apart from me.... so an old school sales operation.
jonamv8 mentioned i'm flogging the wrong product for the wrong business - that's quite interesting point of view.
Perhaps I'm in a saturated market - whilst niche and specialised, i'm still batting off the competition on a daily basis!
The people i mentioned in my previous post that are IMO average business people couldn’t handle 2/3rds of that. The reason they do well is they have a good product and focus 100% on building relationships and selling. They’d be doing terribly if they had to manage all those other jobs!!!
Can’t you do this on your own and at least benefit 100% from your effort? Or jump ship and get a role with a company that allows you to focus on Sales and not everything else?
PopsandBangs said:
I'm not in a typical "sales" position in a corporate type of firm - we're a global company with a branch in the UK comprising of a sales director and I, and an admin lady.
There’s your problem right there! How can you hope to be successful with just an admin lady!? I’d be hiring an admin man too!You’re welcome!
PopsandBangs said:
One for B2B Salespeople and Purchasers alike, as there seems to be a wealth of both on here.
I suppose the TL,DR in advance of this would be “what makes a highly successful salesperson, viewed from both sides?”
Been in the “Sales” game for a number of years now and do OK… however, I’m not sure why, but the last few months I’ve found it particularly difficult getting long term customers and new prospects alike to play ball… people I’m quite far down the road with on particular enquiries are now a wall of silence and very little in the way of answered/returned calls or simple courtesy of answering pertinent emails.
We have a niche technology (a particular type of electronic component/s) and are reasonably well regarded manufacturer in the industry, and is I’ve said I’ve been reasonably successful until recently. So during a period of introspection I’m wondering how to improve my game.
What is the very best advice those who are doing well would offer? What qualities should I hone and what should I do more of? I have a limited pool of more experienced colleagues to glean from and I suppose it’s always been a case of get amongst successful people and learn… so here I am
I have a fluent grasp of the cycle, there is no lack of activity and feel like I have sufficient gravitas in my dealings.
Likewise for those on the customer side… what has been in your experience the best qualities of those you buy from, and would do so again.. from the very first contact to the ongoing relationship years down the line?
Thanks all
Some thoughts.I suppose the TL,DR in advance of this would be “what makes a highly successful salesperson, viewed from both sides?”
Been in the “Sales” game for a number of years now and do OK… however, I’m not sure why, but the last few months I’ve found it particularly difficult getting long term customers and new prospects alike to play ball… people I’m quite far down the road with on particular enquiries are now a wall of silence and very little in the way of answered/returned calls or simple courtesy of answering pertinent emails.
We have a niche technology (a particular type of electronic component/s) and are reasonably well regarded manufacturer in the industry, and is I’ve said I’ve been reasonably successful until recently. So during a period of introspection I’m wondering how to improve my game.
What is the very best advice those who are doing well would offer? What qualities should I hone and what should I do more of? I have a limited pool of more experienced colleagues to glean from and I suppose it’s always been a case of get amongst successful people and learn… so here I am
I have a fluent grasp of the cycle, there is no lack of activity and feel like I have sufficient gravitas in my dealings.
Likewise for those on the customer side… what has been in your experience the best qualities of those you buy from, and would do so again.. from the very first contact to the ongoing relationship years down the line?
Thanks all
Have you properly qualified your prospects?
Are they the "MAN" i.e. do they have the...
Money
Authority
Need
If the person you're dealing with does not have all of those things he is not in a position to buy. Basic stuff, but often it's the basics that go wrong.
Who are your competitors and are they selling a homogeneous for a tenner less per unit?
How long has this been going on? If it's only recent it may be bad luck or a lack of form. If it's been six months perhaps there is a bigger problem.
If you can, chill out and enjoy Christmas. Don't even think about your performance. Everything may fall into place on its own.
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