Posted at Linked In: Sales Best Practices: Best method of motivating a Sales Team?

Hello All,

This is a response to the question: What is the best method to motivate sales? which was rephrased to: How to get better results from your team?

I appreciate your rephrase of the question and am surprised no one asked why you were posting the initial inquiry. It is obviously a question symptomatic to the real problem: Where are the leads, where are the opportunities?

I have noticed that when management asks, “How do I motivate?”, they really mean, “How do I get more sales revenue?’.

Having sold for many years, currently selling, and assisting several companies planning to sell, my suggestion is simple to say but difficult to do.

Invest in your infrastructure, specifically your sales and marketing infrastructure. Note I did not say your people, as everyone fears losing their investment. I said infrastructure which means selling tools, marketing tools, content creation ideas, social media tools, Sales 2.0 tools, or whatever structural tools are needed to reinvigorate your demand/lead generation process.

I rarely see a sales person demotivated when there is activity that can be developed into revenue opportunities.

Simple right? Difficult because what your asking implies that revenue, along with the economy, is slow and you will have a tough time parting with funds. I know as i just invested in a comprehensive infrastructure before having any clients!

As most of us ‘linkedin-bloggers’ know, there are a plethora of tools available to improve every aspect of sales and marketing.

You want to motivate sales? Offer them the chance to assemble and learn a state of the art (or state of the budget) sales and marketing system. Demonstrate your willingness to lead by investing in the infrastructure that, when used efficiently, will generate revenue for both the short and long term for your company and incidentally, the sales team.

Our two cents

Good Luck and Great Selling!

Blue Collar Sales

From Linked In – Brian Carroll’s (InTouch): On Lead Qualification: Steps to Convert Inquiries into Viable Sales Leads

Brian,

As always your points are well made.  When marketing tosses poorly qualified registrants “over the wall”, sales becomes wary of future leads until fully vetted and the separation between church (marketing) and state (sales) continues.

Of course the type of product being sold, length of sales cycle, level of complexity, sales cycle costs, price, etc. all play a part in this dance.

One of the most significant challenges has always been in closing this gap between Marketing and Sales. Sales is charged with delivering on quota; marketing is charged with creating the collateral that you mention and programs or campaigns to generate demand that result in high scoring ready to buy leads.

Sales 2.0 in my mind means that the tools and technology can, when leveraged correctly and collaboratively, close that gap.

I believe a more symptomatic problem is the fact that most folks are still focusing on the specific person who raise their hand with that registration.

Rarely in B2B where the product is complex and the selling/evaluation cycles are long is that single person responsible for the purchase.  Typically there are layers of approval and several buying factions who will determine product requirements.  Even though most of us know this, sales still phone hounds that individual and marketing cranks up the email offer machine.

When the economic buying power is limited by general market conditions as it is today and both sales and marketing teams are tackling the lead scoring and nurturing process at the specific individual level several things start to happen.  Pressure builds for marketing to DELIVER more leads with similar pressure for sales to DELIVER pipeline/revenue.

How many times does the conversation occur where marketing says to sales, “just tell me what you want me to do, what campaigns can I execute in your territory?” and sales says “just give me what you’ve got, calling them is better than calling cold.”

When the Marketing Funnel that you mention is light on “ready to buy” leads, or well nurtured high scoring leads, something has to be passed to pass along to sales even though they are really just registrants.

If the Sales pipeline is light on active evaluation cycles the sales person begins to do their own marketing i.e cold calling, emailing, or they simply pass the pressure along to those that are evaluating products.

In this Sales 2.0 world these two efforts must become unified.  In my mind Sales 2.0 does not only mean that we have the tools to Socially Network, Track, Nurture, and Email to discover leads.  It also means that we have the tools to discover, detect, and solve likely challenges being faced by our prospects.

From a pure prospecting point of view, I believe that there is significant value in both sales and marketing discussing the campaign trending data particular to an individual target at the company and industry level.  This information typically resides in marketing before an individual “lead” is ever identified.

If there is evidence that  many people from a specific company or industry are hitting your web site and consuming your collateral offers then that is an indication that the company or industry is looking to solve a problem. If sales and marketing understand who the most active targets are at the prospect company or industry level they can develop and communicate even more pertinent value and actually earn the right of entry to prove to the prospective company that the problem can be solved.

From a marketing perspective they can find more contacts that might be interested in their nurturing educational offers.  Sales can focus on discovering specific business issues and decision makers where the product can deliver value.  Collaboratively, sales and marketing can create and execute  a penetration strategy that is focused and valuable to both the target company and the pursuing vendor.

Even though we operate in a Sales 2.0 environment the Sales 1.0 method of discovering a prospect that has the need to buy and creating a willingness to evaluate your products is still the rule that creates the gold.

Thanks again for the great posts.  I enjoyed your book and appreciate your contributions.

Regards,

Scott Benedetti

BlueCollarSales.com

Like the world needs another blog about selling!

So this is a first post; not like there aren’t a few sites, blogs, groups, communities, associations, etc. available that talk about selling! Or another several hundred that wax eloquently about marketing!

You may find this accidentally, you may know me or my company, Blue Collar Sales and if so you might get my droll sense of humor. If this is your first exposure I mean no offense; just imagine a Jersey (Soprano’s) accent from a guy who drink’s way too much coffee/red bull, talks to fast, works way too hard for too many hours, and faces pressure like a piece of coal hoping to become a diamond.  I expect that you’ll understand the strong sarcasm – what we in Jersey usually find funny and translates into a sign of real friendship – if we are successful in creating this community or eventually connecting in this Web 2.0 world.

Welcome to my blog. I started selling life insurance commission only some 20 years ago.  I was green, scared, broke, and proud.  Since then I have moved through many companies in B2B sales, sold millions of dollars in product and services and lost many more millions of dollars in product and services opportunities.  I have had the as mentioned short lived pleasure of achieving targets and receiving large commission checks and the unforeseen termination for not achieving enough.  In this blog I will share many of those experiences as I hope you share yours and through that collaboration we will discover new ideas and perhaps even a chance too LOL.

It is here I hope to espouse my learning’s and insight into selling, accumulated during 20 year’s of chasing quota. I say chasing because I have said ‘exceeding quota’ in enough interviews to frighten an MBA grad.  If you are a seller, one that seriously measures yourself or is compensated on achievement of quota, you know that the moments of satisfaction are far too short.  Everyone you work with will let you know, “Great job, what are you projecting for next quarter?”  No one really cares, not your manager, not your executives, not your spouse and perhaps not even you care about what you did lately.  They and you are for more caring about what you are gonna do next!

Blue Collar Sales as a name; Do you get it?  You would not believe the questions I get asked.  “What do you sell, Laundry?”  another person asked if I sold tools, another asked if it was cleaning services.  I told them in not too many words, “What different does it make, the name is not to describe what I sell but how I sell it.”  Needless to say they did not become customers.  I am curious, what does the name Blue Collar Sales bring to mind for you?

And so there is our introduction:  It is not about what we sell but how we sell it.  Do you work your white collar job like a blue collar laborer?  Is it as important for you to understand your pipeline and activity numbers and meet those blocking and tackling goals as it is for a guy building a foundation to mix concrete correctly and sweat it out to be on time for other contractors to achieve their goals?  Do you spend more time with your SFA tools, pipeline reports, prospect lists,  than you do your significant partner?  Do you lose sleep thinking about  discovering untapped markets, forgotten prospects, and uncommunicative customers?

If so, this is the blog for you to share and grab ideas and hopefully work a little smarter. If not then this is the blog for you to learn something, improve your work hard ethic and achieve goals. I’m not asking for your money here, your not gonna get steak knives or a Cadillac. There is no commission check, pat on the back, or pink slip.  I plan to introduce topics and create discussions that help salespeople take back control of their territories, leverage internal resources like they were your employees, discover tools that leverage technology and allow you to get back to delivering the value you thought you would when you claimed the title of salesperson.

So, here we are on the eve of a new calendar year, in the midst of the worst economic climate since my father’s father facing the inquisition of management as to how you are going to hit your number?  If you are fortunate enough to work in a company with a marketing department then it is likely you are calculating this achievement on some promised number of leads delivered, events planned, etc.  You are analyzing the deals that slid and looking to find ways to get prospects to turn loose the funds to purchase your product.  if you are like me you are concerned about what is going on in the world but realize there is little to do except tighten the belt, cut your own costs, and find those prospects that can and will become customers.

Mentioning the economy, I am thankful that I am currently one of the employed.  During the last 5 weeks I have been averaging 16-18 hours a day revisiting the basics I have learned and forgotten, began investigating new means of optimizing selling, and promoting collaborative work practices for both my employer and  my side job, owner of Blue Collar Sales.

What are you up to?  How are you getting ready for the new year, the new quota, the new manager, the new job, whatever?  If you are in sales or marketing and facing some of the pressure I mention let’s COLLABORATE!

Best Regards for a Safe, Humble, and Joyous Holiday!

bluecollarsales