I hear the phrase, “Pay For Performance,” all the time.  I think it’s a reasonable concept, that is, the better you perform, the better you get paid.  Naturally, we want to pay our top performers the best, who can argue with that?

Somehow, it seems as though Pay For Performance is getting distorted.  If we want the sales person to do something, other than get orders, we put a bonus on it or add it to the commission plan.  We want the CRM system updated, put a bonus on it.  We want forecast accuracy, let’s pay the sales people for accurate forecasts.  We want the sales person to participate in a task force, let’s put an incentive on it.  Somehow, things seem to be getting confused.  Too often, our solution to motivating sales people to do we need them to do is to put some form of compensation on it–a bonus, a commission element, an incentive.

I get into a conversation about this issue at least once a week.  A sales manager or business executive calls me to ask, “How do I get my sales people to do what I want?  What if I added something to their compensation plan?”  Throw money at the problem, it will motivate the right behavior!

Somehow that seems to be a temporary and, possibly, an expensive fix.

In a comment on this blog, my friend Jim Keenan, reminded me that much of this is all about leadership.  Jim’s right, somehow, the issues, seem to be rooted in leadership.  Leadership–getting people aligned to achieve the organizations goals and objectives, providing them the skills and tools to achieve them, motivating and inspiring them, coaching them–helping them improve their performance.  Leadership is all tough stuff.  It’s demanding, it takes time and patience.  It’s dirty work, a leader actually has to get engaged with their people, they have to set expectations, they have to manage performance–both good and bad.

Getting a sales person to keep the CRM system updated is not just something managers can dictate, we’ve seen the failure of these strategies.  Leaders have to show sales people how the tool helps them–the sales people–become more productive and effective.  They have to help the sales person understand the impact of this information on the rest of the company.  Producing accurate forecasts is important for the company–other functions set their plans and schedules around the forecast, they allocate resources based on the forecast.  Accurate sales forecasts are a cornerstone to overall company performance–leaders need to make certain their people understand this importance of this to the organization.

Leadership requires the leader to clearly identify roles, responsibilities, expectations.  It requires the leader to define expected behaviors, and to model them in their own performance.  It requires the leader to clearly communicate these to the sales person, making sure they understand and own these responsibilities and expectations.  Leadership requires leaders to manage performance.  Thise means they need to invest time in their people, coaching, developing, and helping them achieve the highest levels of performance.

To borrow a term from Jill Konrath, in the “crazy busy world” of sales managers, it’s often tempting to take the easy way out, to substitute pay, an incentive, a bonus to get what we want.   Rather than doing the tough and time consuming work of leaders, we throw money at the problem.

Don’t get me wrong, I think bonuses and incentives are very powerful in motivating certain actions and behaviors.  I think they are best applied over a short period of time for very specific and short term goals.  For example, in a new product introductions, an accelerator or incentive around the sale of that product can give a quick start.  Accelerating penetration of new markets by leveraging a bonus for sales into those markets can be very powerful. 

However, in my experience, bonuses, commissions and incentives are not effective in driving sustained behavioral or performance changes.  Bonuses or commissions to get the sales people to do things that would be considered “conditions of employment,” set the wrong tone for the organization – both the sales organization and the overall organization.

None of these are substitutes for solid leadership!

A  week ago, I posted, “I’ve Succumbed–I’m Talking About Sales 2.0.”  Last week, I had the opportunity to participate in a webinar hosted by Tom Scontras of Glance Networks on this topic.

We had a great conversation!  In case you missed it, you can still listen to it at Glance. If you missed it, take some time to listen sometime this weekend.  It’s only about 45 minutes long.  I’d love to get your comments and feedback.

Your Help!

If you are a regular reader, you know I have no shortage of opinions about sales, business, and leadership.  However, I want to pause and ask for your input and ideas.  I’d really appreciate it if you would take a moment to comment suggesting topics that I should write about.

In the past year, I’ve written extensively about sales process, value propositions, sales management/leadership, metrics, and customer focus.  I have more that I want to add to those topics.  I also plan to write quite a bit more on coaching and developing sales professionals, channels, collaboration and partnering in sales, funnel and pipeline management, sales on-boarding, and sales strategy development.

What would you like me to be writing about?  Thanks for taking the time to give me your ideas.  I so appreciate your comments and support, either on the blog, through your emails, or at the other sites these articles appear.  Thanks for your continues support, encouragement, and ideas!

I few days ago, I started a discussion with “What Are The 3 Characteristics That Set Great Sales People Apart?”  followed by “How Important Are ‘Techniques’ To Sales?”  I hadn’t meant to turn this into a series (or saga), but the discussion has been very interesting.  For me, it has been a bit of a journey of discovery.  I’ve always had an aversion to what I call “techniques”  — those 68 closing techniques, the persuasion technique and so forth. 

At the same time, there are techniques or tools that I have found very helpful, questioning approaches, storytelling as a means of illustrating complex points, using humor to offset my natural clumsiness, and so forth.   Somehow, these techniques have become “a part of me.”  They are natural, I never have to think about them, they seem to flow with what I am trying to achieve in engaging the customer.

Perhaps my aversion to what I view as “the techniques” is that I’ve never been very good at using most of them.  I get too caught up in listening to the customer and having a conversation to remember that I should be “mirroring” them or that I should be using certain neuro linguistic or psychological wording  (Make sure you say their name in every sentence …. or whatever that one is).  Somehow I’m too busy working with the customer defining the next steps and moving forward to remember to ask if they like German Shepherds or Saint Bernards (I think the puppy dog close goes something like that).

I wonder if being yourself counts as a technique?  Somehow, I have found my customers and prospects seem to like having a conversation, they tend to appreciate directness.  I have managed to stop saying “that’s the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard, “  but I chalk that up to politeness.  I tend to handle that with, “Have you ever considered looking at it differently?”  Maybe that’s a technique.

I think of the experiences I’ve had with people selling me something.  I know they are trying to sell me something, I don’t resent it, after all I participating in the discussion.  But the sales calls I appreciate the most are those great directed and focuses conversations.  No pretense, no techniques (I know most of them well enough that I watch for them), just a discussion focused on what I am trying to achieve and how they can help me.

I sit in meetings in large corporations–I see selling going on in every meeting.  People trying to persuade others about an idea or an approach.  People discussing different things, having honest disagreements or differences but working to resolve them.  People aligned to achieving common goals.

Sometimes I think we would be much more effective as sales professionals if we started simplifying things, if we had the courage to be ourselves, if we focused on natural conversations with our customers.  Be sure, these aren’t random or wandering conversations.  Remember, one of the characteristics that I think distinguishes top sales performers is “goal directed curiosity and a problem solving orientation.”  I don’t have a lot of patience (or the requisite social graces) for random conversations.  I’m interested in having great conversations with people who have problems or goals that I can do something about.  I’m interested in learning what they want to achieve and demonstrating how I can help them achieve their goals better than anyone else.  I tend to be very focused and direct about this and they know it.  Somehow, virtually everyone seems to appreciate it—they like getting to the issues without the typical “dancing” we often do.

Let me crawl further out on the limb I’m on.

Sometimes I think we use ” the techniques” for surrogates for being ourselves and being truly engaged in having a conversations with our customers.  When we aren’t curious about the customer and what they are trying to achieve, when we aren’t trying to solve problems, when we really don’t care about them other than convincing them to buy our products, it’s hard to be ourselvesa and be engaged.  Perhaps this is when we use techniques.  Perhaps this is a sweeping generalization and very inaccurate, but it seems those people (I hesitate to call them sales professionals) who use “the-techniques” in the most manipulative ways are those who are more focused on themselves and selling their product and less focused on me and what I need.

Techniques can be important and useful, but I think they have greatest impact when they allow the sales person to be her/himself and enable them to connect more naturally in real conversatons with the customer.

Am I crazy?

The other day, I wrote a piece, What Are The 3 Characteristics That Set Great Sales People Apart?  It stimulated quite a reaction as people started suggesting their ideas.  I was surprised by the focus of a number of people on the “right techniques.”  These comments started to make me wonder about my own belief system and biases.

I guess I have a very negative reaction to the concept of sales techniques.  When I think of these techniques, I think of sales tricks and manipulation.  I did a little research:

• Persuasion techniques like, “the art of repetition,” “the foot in the door,” “the bait and switch,” “low-ball,”that’s not all,” and the lists of techniques for persuading people can go on.
• Closing techniques like, “the assumptive close,” “the puppy dog close,” “fire sales close,” “thermometer close”, “the ultimatum close.”  I actually found a site listing 68 closing techniques!
• Objection handling like, “the boomerang,” “pushback,” “deflection.”

I could go on with list after list of techniques I found in researching “sales techniques.”  I went to the dictionary to look up the definition:

tech-nique  [tek-neek]  1.  The manner and ability with which an artist, writer, dancer, athlete, or the like employs the technical skills of a particular art or field of endeavor.  2.  The body of specialized procedures and methods used in any specific field, esp. in the area of applied science.  3.  Method of performance ; way of accomplishing.  4.  Technical skill; ability to apply procedures or methods so as to effect a desired result.

After reading the definition, I started to think, much of the “advice” I and others I respect offer are “techniques” — or methods — or processes.  After all, I’ve written a lot about effective questioning, listening, qualification, developing and communicating value.  I present tools (techniques) people can use to make them more effective in connecting with and engaging customers.  Likewise, there are a large number of other consultants and bloggers that offer great approaches that create real value for customers, sales professionals and others.

So why do I have such a negative reaction to “sales techniques?”  I think I my negative reaction to “techniques” is not the techniques themselves (though I saw very little redeeming in the list of 68 closing techniques), but the intent or use of the technique.

So often, underlying the use of technique is an intent to manipulate, trick, or deceive.  Anytime the person(s) on the receiving side of a sales person using “techniques” in these ways, everything sours.  What may have been good suddenly turns distasteful. 

On the other hand, techniques can be important to gaining insight and understanding about the customer.  They can help you engage the customer in a conversation about their problems, dreams and goals.  Techniques can be important in communicating complex ideas.  They can help people understand, they can serve to simplify.  Techniques can be important in helping facilitate the customer’s buying process, in helping present value, in helping manage change.  They provide structure for us to work with customers, improving the way we engage them.

I suppose any tool, tip, process, methodology, and, yes, technique can be abused.  Their use can be manipulative and misleading.  Yet we do need techniques.

I’ll have to mull this over a little while, I’m still uncomfortable.  I’m trying to talk myself into believing that techniques are good.  However, I just can’t help it, whenever I hear the term “sales technique,” I immediately think of scenes from movies like Boiler-room.  I think of sleazy sales people doing the “bait and switch,”  followed by the “boomerang” objection handling technique, capped off by the “puppy dog close.”  They trigger the worst examples of sales I can imagine.

Am I wrong on these sales techniques? Can any of you offer advice that can make me more comfortable?

Last Friday, I had the privilege of being interviewed by an executive on critical issues in buying and selling.  It was a great conversation, but one of his questions stuck in my mind.  He asked me, “What are the 3 characteristics that set great sales people apart from others?”

I responded, “Oh, there are so many……”  He interupted, saying, “Dave, you only get to choose the top 3, no more.”

This caused me to pause, any of us can come up with lists of characteristics of great sales people, sometimes it’s half a dozen characteristics, often a dozen, sometimes the lists go on and on…..  Brian’s question was really challenging, he only allowed me 3 characteristics.  I thought to myself, how can I combine several into one, maybe I can create a giant run-on sentence with all sorts of adjectives describing great sales people.

After a few moments of reflecting, I provided three carefully worded phrases:

1. Goal directed curiosity and a problem solving orientation.
2. A genuine interest in helping people achieve their goals and dreams.
3. An ability to embrace changes and to get the people they work with to embrace and own change.

Let me explain myself.

1.Goal directed curiosity and a problem solving orientation.  Every great sales professional I’ve met is incessantly curious.  They want to learn as much about their products and solutions as they can, they want to master them, so they can present them to their customers.  They are curious about their customers–both their customers’ businesses and their customers as individuals.  they study their businesses, their customers’ customers, their customers’ markets and competition.  Their curiosity is not random, it’s very focused.  The greatest sales people know how they can help their customers.  Their curiosity is purposeful, it’s focused on trying to find problems and opportunities their customers have–that the sales person can do something about.  Great sales people don’t go on random fishing expeditions, they don’t cold call–every call is carefully researched and planned,  they don’t waste their customers’ or their own time.  They don’t fool themselves with wishful thinking, but focus pragmatically–does the customer have a problem I can solve?  Can I present and opportunity that would accelerate the ability of my customer to achieve their goals?   In the end, they are about results–those they help the customer produce and those they produce for their organizations.  The greatest sales people are also curious about their profession.  They are constantly reading, attending workshops and seminars, talking to others they respect.  They know to stay at the top of the profession–to be a top performer, that the bar is constantly being raised.

2.  A genuine interest in helping people achieve their goals and dreams.  Top performers care about their own performance, but they know they only way they achieve their goals is through helping the customer achieve their own–whether it is the overall business goals, their function’s departments goals, or their own personal goals.  Top performers revel in seeing their customer being successful in implementing the solutions they have sold them.  Top sales people never “hit and run,” if things aren’t working, they don’t ignore the customer, they go back in and do everything they can to correct things.  Sometimes they can’t correct things, but the customer knows it isn’t for the lack of trying.  Top sales people care!

3.  An ability to embrace changes and to get the people they work with to embrace and own change.  The greatest sales people in the world know that sales is fundamentally about change.  We ask customers to change suppliers/vendors, to select a different product than they have been using.  We ask people to change their processes, the way they do business–to explore new ways of growing being productive.  We ask customers to embrace a new vision for their organizations, to consider new ways to improve or grow.  The best also realize they are asking their own organizations and the people in their organizations to change–how we hold and value customers, how to create the best experiences, how to retain and grow our customers. new products and solutions we might provide to enhance our relationships and grow our business.   Top sales people realize that people may fear or not understand change.  They realize their role is to help people understand it, to own it, to take it on as their own mission and goal.  The best in sales realized they are change managers and that they must create the same vision and excitement for change, with their customers and within their own companies, that they envision.

There’s a lot more characteristics for good sales performance.  But I think these three set the best sales people in the world apart from everyone else.  Do you agree?  If you had only 3 characteristics to choose, which would you select?

I guess as a blogger, twitter user, and sometime pundit, it’s natural to get into a lot of conversations about the impact of Social Media, and the Internet for that matter, on buying and selling.  In the past several days, I’ve had a number of conversations with people all over the world.  “How do we leverage social media to sell?”  “What should we be doing with social media?”  “What is social selling?”I have to admit that I feel a little awkward in these discussions, I don’t by any means consider myself a social media expert—it seems, I’ve just learned how to spell www….

Social media, social selling, and the Internet are very powerful tools for buyers and sellers.  As with any tool, there are good and bad aspects.  As sellers, we can reach out to a far wider customer base, we can get our “message” to people that were difficult to find and reach in ways that are much faster and cheaper than before.  As buyers, we can be much better informed.  We can do a tremendous amount of research on the Internet, in discussion forums, through blogs, through a tweet here or there.  I recently bought my wife a new car.  I researched models on the Internet, researched pricing, researched dealers and was able to walk into a dealer armed with data to get the right car at the right deal.  We do this in the products we buy every day, our companies do that for the solutions they are purchasing, and suppliers they are considering.

I can’t imagine what we would do without all the information, data, and insight we can quickly get from the internet, social media, and through many of the tools that enable us go find information quickly and easily.  However, it creates a great challenge for buyers and sellers.

The explosion of garbage and bad information available seems to grow at a rate faster than anything else.  Sometimes we (as sellers and marketers) do it ourselves–the victims of our enthusiasm in communicating through this medium call that SPAM.  Sometimes the volume of messages, communications, and information is so much, it’s difficult to sort through the clutter and noise.  The reaction is to turn it off.

Buyers use social media to become informed—not necessarily well informed—just informed, or often misinformed.  Social media can create an illusion of validity.  After all, if it’s in a blog, it must be accurate!  If there’s a discussion about a certain product, company, or topic, it must be true–the words are right there on my screen, it’s the next best thing to being in the newspaper.  Someone has anointed themselves with the title “Expert,” or “Guru,” and they immediately become experts.  We must hang on every word they write.  The problem is so much of it is just wrong!  It’s bad data, harmful advice, or something taken way out of context or misapplied.

All of this makes us informed–not necesssarily well informed.

It brings new meaning to the concept, “Buyer Beware.”  Buyers have to sort through mountains of garbage, research and understand, validate to get “good insight.”  Just because it’s on the Internet, doesn’t mean it’s gospel.  Just because it’s written in a blog doesn’t mean it’s true (present company excepted

But sometimes buyers are naive and accept things at face value.  Sometimes they don’t have the time to dig and research–afterall, isn’t social media and social selling supposed to make things easier and faster.  Sometimes buyers to their homework and reach incorrect conclusions.

All this creates a challenge for sellers, “Sellers Be Aware.”  I get sales professionals and executives telling me they don’t have time for social media.  You need to make time.  You need to be Aware!  It’s critical to understand what customers are saying—about their issues, trends and business.  It’s critical to understand what customers and others are saying about you and your competition.  Some of it is accurate, lots of it is dead wrong.  If you aren’t aware of what is happening on the Internet, of how your products, services and companies are being reviewed, you will walk into your customers disadvantaged.  They think they are informed, but they may be misinformed.  As sellers we need to know that and address that–with customers and through social media. 

Social media, social selling, and the internet are powerful, we can’t function without them.  But it creates challenges for buyers and sellers.  Buyer Beware, Seller Be Aware!

The other day, I wrote an article, Appointments With Sales People Fall Short Of Executive Expectations.  In it I cited data from a Forrester Research report on executive perspectives of sales people’s ability to understand their business needs, priorities, and issues.  I wanted to extend the discussion, focusing on a topic I’ve found a little nebulous, business acumen.

There are training programs on business acumen, programs that help you understand the structure of business, how they work.  There are MBA programs many sales people take to understand more about how businesses operate.  Those are all great, sales people should seek as much formal training as they can get.  At the same time, I think these programs aren’t enough.  Additionally, many sales people don’t have access to these kinds of formal training.

The best sales professionals I know develop their own “business acumen training.”  It’s simple, it’s ongoing, it’s driven by their natural curiosity and genuine interest in solving customer problems  (Which if you don’t have, no training program will ever give you the business acumen you need to connect with your customers).

Here’s what I see top sales professionals doing to better understand their customers’ businesses and more effectively connect with their customers:

1. They read about the industry incessantly.  They devour “trade materials”  and industry publications, whether on-line or in print.  They use these to understand critical issues, trends, players, jargon.
2. They devour their customers’ web sites—looking at the investor materials, downloading and actually reading annual reports, 10K’s , proxy statements, investor presentations.  They do this not only for their customers, but for their customers’ competition.   They look at their customers products and services–reading those marketing materials, understanding how their customers seek to position themselves with their customers.
3. They attend trade shows and events their customers go to.  They attend not only to meet with their customers, but to wander, watch, listen, observe, and learn.
4. They wander around in their customers, they take tours of the customer facilities, they listen to how people describe their jobs, their views of the company, what issues they face.
5. They imagine themselves walking in the shoes of their customers.  They think, What would I do if I were running this company, function, department?  How would I improve this operation?  What are the realities of this business? They explore these ideas in conversations with their customers.
6. They read broader business materials, to learn more about the business of business.  Whether it’s the business magazines and journals, or great blogs on various aspects of business management.  They understand critical issues facing all business professionals, they learn from thought leaders.
7. They read books–not just the latest sales books, but books on other aspects of business, books on economics, current affairs, history….. and a few of the latest great fiction.
8. They do all this critically–not blindly reading and accepting, but challenging the concepts, thinking about the ideas, discovering how they can apply lessons in their own world.

What have I missed–this is a starting point, but I’d like your ideas on how you develop “business acumen.”  What do you do?

There is no excuse for a sales person not to develop business acumen–it’s critical professional success, it’s critical to connecting effectively with your customers.  Don’t wait for your companies to provide a formal program, don’t limit yourself to these programs.  Become a student of your customers’ businesses, become a student of business.

Last Week I wrote about “We Have To Call At The Top,”  suggesting the concept of right level selling.  There are many times when calling at the “C” level is critical for our sales efforts, yet we struggle to get appointments with these executives.  I was interested to read a Forrester Research report on this topic, presenting the executive perspective.  Only 15% of the “C” level executives surveyed felt their meetings with sales people were valuable and lived up to their expectations.  They went further, based on the outcome of the initial meeting, only 7% would accept follow-on meetings.  No wonder they don’t want to see us, we waste their time!

• The report goes on to look at the reasons sales people fail to meet executive expectations in meetings, several specific areas hit me:
• Only 27% felt sales people were knowledgeable about their specific business.
• Only 34% felt the sales person could relate to their roles and responsibilities in the organization, with 38% saying sales people understood their issues and how they could help.
• Only 34% felt the sales person had relevant examples or case studies to share with the executive.
• Only 38% felt sales people were prepared for the questions an executive might ask.

Clearly, sales people aren’t “connecting” with executives effectively.  In some ways it’s understandable–if you’ve never been in an executive role before, how do you relate to their roles, responsibilities and issues?  How do you know what to talk to them about, what examples to use, how to respond to their questions?  In a way, the sales person is caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place.  How do you overcome this?

Many organizations try to do this through training–I think training is a key element–but training needs to focus on industry, market, and business training.  In addition to this, I think organizations too often overlook their own executives and their ability to help their own sales people understand the “executive” view.  For example, if you sell software to CIO’s, why don’t you leverage your own CIO to better understand the “real world concerns of CIO’s?”  If you sell to manufacturing execs, why not leverage your own VP of Manufacturing to help you understand the way manufacturing execs think?

The executives in your own organization can help you better understand the perspectives of their peers.  Companies could develop their own “executive training programs” by having the appropriate functional executives in their own organization.  Each functional executive and senior manager should sit down with sales people to help them understand what makes people like them tick.  They can discuss:

• Their role and responsibility in the organization.
• How they are measure and how their performance is evaluated.
• How they measure and manage performance in their function and organization.
• Key business issues that “keep them awake at night.”  What questions sales people should be asking them.
• Issues and trends facing their functions.
• What they look for when they meet with vendors and sales people.  Questions they tend to ask sales people and why they ask them.  Proofs they are looking for from sales people and why they are looking for that information.
• What sales people can do to conduct a meeting worth their time.
• Why they would even meet with a sales person in the first place.
• How to secure an appointment.
• Why they might delegate sales to a lower level.
• ….the list can go on.

I guarantee, the issues your own functional executives face are not that much different than those their equivalents in the customers face.  Businesses will be different, strategies will be different, but fundamental issues for the function are likely to be very similar.  These conversations help accelerate the ability of sales people to connect effectively with the customer.  There is are important side benefits to these discussions.  It helps the functional executive to better understand their own sales people and the challenges they face.  Every once in a while, you are also able to leverage functional executives in your own organization to help you meet their counterpart in the customer.

Connecting with executives on the things that matter to them is critical for saless effectiveness.  Are you leveraging your own company’s executives to help you learn how to connect with your customers?

A few years ago, I was talking to a sales manager.  He was expressing some frustration, “I’m doing my job of selling, my customers need to start doing a better job of buying!”  When you think about it, there’s actually a lot of truth to that statement — at least the “doing a better job of buying” part.

Our customers do a bad job of buying because they don’t know how to buy.  With the exception of purchasing professionals, it’s not our customers jobs to buy, they focus on doing their jobs whether it is building products, running an operation, providing IT support, whatever their function is.  They don’t know how to organize their buying effort, they don’t know how to define what they are trying to do, they don’t know how they should look at and evaluate alternatives.  Buying is something is a disruption to their normal work flow–they are already busy, often just trying to survive, now they have this new task — it takes time away from doing their normal job.  They probably recognize they need to change–they need to find a new solution, but they don’t know how to organize themselves to make a decision.  They also have to go through all that awkward stuff of managing a team, each with a different agenda, each with different views on what is needed, each with a different priority.  just coordinating the buying group, requires a lot of skill and time.

Customers worry about making a bad decision.  They are accountable to their management to do the right thing for the company.  They are held accountable for investing company funds well–they need to demonstrate their purchase creates a return for the company.  If they make a mistake, their management will be all over them, they may even lose their jobs.

Customers don’t buy very often.  In complex B2B solutions, they may purchase these once in their careers.  Think of it, a new piece of capital equipment–something that has a life of more than 5 years, a major new software system, outsourcing services, whatever.  Their lack of experience makes them apprehensive–both because of the “long life” of whatever they are buying, but they just haven’t looked at thse solutions very often.  They don’t know what’s out there, what’s good, what they should avoid.  Even if they buy more frequently, things are changing so quickly, it’s difficult for them to keep up.  Think of something that has become commoditized like PC’s.  The product life cycle of a PC is probably around 3-6 months.  So if I looked at PC’s last year, there have been 2-4 generations of new PC’s since then.  Everything that I knew about buying them a year ago has changed.

Procurement professionals help.  Their job is buying, they keep up with the products they are responsible for.  But it’s still difficult for them.  They aren’t making purchasing decisions on their own.  They are acting on behalf of people within the organization.  They have to make sure they understand and are satisfying the needs of their customers.  They face the challenge of helping manage the process, expectations and align the different agendas and priorities of their customers.

Finally, buying is about change—none of us like change, it’s always so difficult, it’s often easier just to keep doing the same old thing.

It’s no wonder that customers do a bad job of buying—after all their jobs aren’t about buying.  So they need help–and that’s where great sales professionals differentiate themselves.

See the peddlers don’t recognize that customers don’t know how to buy.  They blindly assume the customer is expert at this, they never ask questions to determine if they do know how to buy.  All they do is pitch their products hoping to dazzle the customer with Features Advantages Benefits, ghee whiz Technology, and large doses of Charm and Personality.  Peddlers are pitching their products but not solving their customers’ problems–one of which is “How Do I Buy?”

Great sales professionals recognize their job is to help their customers solve their problems–both operating their businesses more effectively and efficiently and addressing new opportunities.  Great sellers also recognize that part of solving customers’ problems is helping them understand how to buy–they work with the customer in facilitating their buying process.  They realize, that by helping their buyers buy, they are creating great value for their customers.

Are you helping your customers do a better job of buying?

(As a side note, my friend Sharon Drew Morgen worries about Buying Facilitation (TM) a lot.  I highly recommend looking at her site, and devouring her books and matierials.)

The other day I was having dinner with a close friend.  He’s the President of a division of a company.  Eventually, the conversation got around to social media (is it something about me?).  He said, “Dave, I just don’t get it, you keep talking about social media and how important it is, but I just don’t get it, I don’t have time for it, my customers aren’t using it.

As we continued our conversation, he started saying, “I don’t have time to blog, I don’t have time to read blogs—even yours—and I really like your stuff (my ego was bruised a little), I don’t get twitter, Facebook is for kids….,”  he went on, “I’m overwhelmed by information, I don’t need more….,” the litany went on.  I just let him vent.

He is not unusual, I hear this from many senior executives.  I think it’s a result of not understanding what social media is and how they participate.  I think some of what causes this confusion is a caused by some of us who are relatively active in social media.

One of the problems with social media is there is too much of it… and there is too much junk.  I can see how executives and others get frustrated when they dip their toes into the social media pool.  There is a bit of a learning curve to figure out what you should be doing. 

However social media cannot be ignored—primarily because customers aren’t ignoring social media—not just consumers, but B2B customers.

Let me go on with my conversation.  We spoke a little about information overload.  I asked him, “How do you learn what’s on your customers’ minds?”  He jumped all over that, “It’s important to me, I talk to our sales guys, our applications engineers; I try to talk to customers as frequently as possible.”

“That’s great, “ I replied, “How many customers do you talk to a week?”

“Maybe 2-3, if I’m lucky,”  he responded.

“What trade events do you attend and publications do you read?”  I asked.

“Well, I try to make 1-2 of the key shows, every once in a while I skim one of the trade rags, but I really don’t have much time for them,” he responded.

I started to see a problem—and a potential for demonstrating the value of social media.

This executive is like many others I meet.  Somehow, everyday problems and events overtake us.  As much as we want to, we don’t get to spend as much time with customers, learning about customers, immersing ourselves in the industry and our markets, as we should.  We are overwhelmed with information, much of which does not increase our knowledge and understanding.

Nothing can take the place of getting information directly from customers, either in meetings or in calls.  The sales organization and others involved with customers on a daily basis are important sources of information.  The reality, however, is this ultimately provides a very limited perspective.  Top executives need to cast a wider net.

In the “old days—remember way back to the turn of the century—2000,” I would consume as many trade magazines I could.  Since I was on planes a lot, I always carried a bag filled with them.  I’d skim them on the plane and leave them in the pocket of the seat in front of me for the reading pleasure of the next passenger.  In those “old days,”  I’d subscribe to these specialized clipping services—they’d aggregate news and stories, based on my criteria.  I’d attend conferences and trade shows, I’d do everything I could to be listening to the markets, industry, customers.

Every executive needs to “listen” as much as possible—understanding what’s happening with customers, their problems, where they are going, what’s happening.  Every executives needs to make time to listen.

However, this is where social media comes in, there are so many powerful tools that help you listen.  There are tools to that help fit your information consumption needs to your own personal style and time commitments.  There are great news consolidators like InsideView and Hoovers.  There are numerous blogs—covering every topic imaginable, some consolidating industry and market information, others by industry thought leaders.  There are all sorts of readers that enable you to consolidate much of this information, presenting  a custom, real time clipping service.  Even tools like Twitter, searching on certain topics, key words, give an interesting snapshot of the conversations happening among your customers and competitors.

What about the issue, “my customers” are not there—using social media?  I think this is really wrong!  In this specific case, I had an unfair advantage with this client.  I had spoken to his marketing, product management, sales, and support people.  They said all their customers were all over the web.  They cited all sorts of discussion groups, news sites, activity at their own web site, and other things.  Their customers are technical people who leverage the web for gathering information on issues, solutions, suppliers….  While my experience base may be limited, I have not found an industry in which similar things are happening.  It may not be the CXO blogging, writing, or being interviewed, but in every sector I look, people are leveraging the web as a primary source of information and to screen potential suppliers.

Listening to customers is critical for every business professional—first we have to make the time to listen and immerse ourselves in our customers.  Social media provides a tremendous tool to leverage your listening—but it’s just a starting point. 

My advice to this executive and all others in the same situation is social media is critical in leveraging your listening productivity.  There is a bit of ramp up time in discovering the credible sources and sorting through the junk, but once you’ve done that, it gives tremendous insight.  Start with listening, over time you will also see more that social media can do.