Sales in a numbers game… and a relationship business. Join Merit Kahn and Julie Holmes every Wednesday, for tech and technique solutions to your biggest sales challenges so you can sell more and stress less. If you are an entrepreneurial sales professional always on the hunt to close more and bigger deals, with less effort and time, this is the show for you.This podcast is full of quick and easy ideas to improve the way you sell and to give you tools that will help you to save time and reduce frustration so you can scale those salesABOUT YOUR HOSTS:Two sales experts walk into a bar… that’s kind of how it happened. Julie and Merit became fast friends and the more they talked about their business challenges, the more they learned from each other. Yin met yang. Chocolate found peanut butter. Harry met Sally… well, maybe not exactly, but you get the drift. Sales technique and sales technology finally team up for your sales success. The Smarter Sales Show is two smart sales women advising each other (and cracking each other up) while you get to eavesdrop.Julie Holmes has been a quota carrying enterprise tech sales rep and the director of product marketing for a global software company where she spent a ton of time doing sales enablement work. While the rest of the world is vegging out, Julie is inventing apps and products currently sold in dozens of countries. When she says, “there’s an app for that” it is because she is the Library of Congress for all things tech… and if there isn’t an app for it now… you can be sure Julie will be the one who will create it.She is an Innoventrepreneur… and to show you how good she is at inventing things, she invented that word! Her favorite question is “What if?” What if you could transform that frustration into time savings and money making? It might sound crazy but that’s exactly what she’s been doing for organizations over the last 25 years.From million-dollar software solutions to higher levels of customer engagement; if there is a frustration you are dealing with – there is an innovative solution to be found… and Julie can help you and your team find it.JulieHolmes.comMerit Kahn has been training entrepreneurs, professionals and sales teams since 1998. Author of Myth Shift, Challenging The Truths That Sabotage Success and writer/performer of an inspiring one-woman comedy show, Book of Merit… she is not your typical sales trainer. Certified in Emotional Intelligence, and a Certified Speaking Professional ©, a designation held by less than twelve percent of professional speakers, Merit’s work is a blend of proven selling skills, solid action plans and the secret sauce… a strong sales mindset.She is known as The Sales Mindset Expert and her favorite question, “Are you open to…” has created new sales possibilities for her clients in the multi-millions of dollars. That’s no joke… though she is a stand-up comedian so beware, sales technique lessons come laced in laughter.MeritBasedBusiness.com
S01 E12 | The Greatest Hits from Season 01
SHOWNOTES:
After eleven episodes of The Smarter Sales Show you’ll hear our all time favorite tips, both tech and technique to sell more and stress less. This episode is our version of The Smarter Sales Show Greatest Hits!
Merit’s Top Three Faves:
Always ask “Is there an app for that that w...
Read moreSHOWNOTES:
After eleven episodes of The Smarter Sales Show you’ll hear our all time favorite tips, both tech and technique to sell more and stress less. This episode is our version of The Smarter Sales Show Greatest Hits!
Merit’s Top Three Faves:
- Always ask “Is there an app for that that will make my life easier?”
- From episode 4: Differentiation
- Video emails with analytics so you can express yourself with tonality and personality and you will know when people watch your message.
- From episode 9: Love Them More to Sell Them More
- Getting to real emotional pain using a series of pain questions designed to go from surface interest to real pain.
- Download the Pain Question Series HERE.
Julie’s Top Three Faves:
- Always ask “Are you open to…”
- From episode 2: The language of referrals.
- “I don’t want you to refer me, I want you to introduce me to people who are open to hearing from me.”
- “I can’t promise you’ll get the same results we’ve gotten, but it’s worth a conversation.”
- Tracking documents you send so you are notified when someone opens a proposal, handout, follow up reports, etc. Then I know when to call them.
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“Technique without tech just takes too long. Tech without technique leads to lost opportunity.”
Cool Tools Referenced in this Episode:
- Download the Pain Question Series HERE
- Persuasive Proposal Pack HERE
- Just Add Words Template Pack HERE
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E12 | The Greatest Hits from Season 01
SHOWNOTES:
After eleven episodes of The Smarter Sales Show you’ll hear our all time favorite tips, both tech and technique to sell more and stress less. This episode is our version of The Smarter Sales Show Greatest Hits!
Merit’s Top Three Faves:
Always ask “Is there an app for that that w...
Read moreSHOWNOTES:
After eleven episodes of The Smarter Sales Show you’ll hear our all time favorite tips, both tech and technique to sell more and stress less. This episode is our version of The Smarter Sales Show Greatest Hits!
Merit’s Top Three Faves:
- Always ask “Is there an app for that that will make my life easier?”
- From episode 4: Differentiation
- Video emails with analytics so you can express yourself with tonality and personality and you will know when people watch your message.
- From episode 9: Love Them More to Sell Them More
- Getting to real emotional pain using a series of pain questions designed to go from surface interest to real pain.
- Download the Pain Question Series HERE.
Julie’s Top Three Faves:
- Always ask “Are you open to…”
- From episode 2: The language of referrals.
- “I don’t want you to refer me, I want you to introduce me to people who are open to hearing from me.”
- “I can’t promise you’ll get the same results we’ve gotten, but it’s worth a conversation.”
- Tracking documents you send so you are notified when someone opens a proposal, handout, follow up reports, etc. Then I know when to call them.
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“Technique without tech just takes too long. Tech without technique leads to lost opportunity.”
Cool Tools Referenced in this Episode:
- Download the Pain Question Series HERE
- Persuasive Proposal Pack HERE
- Just Add Words Template Pack HERE
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E11 | The Secrets of Savvy Sales Coaches
The top performers in every field have coaches who have helped them get to the top. Learn how to give coaching, how you can use tech as a coaching tool and why coaching is important to your success. You will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode...
Read moreThe top performers in every field have coaches who have helped them get to the top. Learn how to give coaching, how you can use tech as a coaching tool and why coaching is important to your success. You will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode…
Technique Tips from Merit:
· Getting the right coach for the right application is job number one.
· The questions that your coach will ask should be questions that open up your ideas or create new possibilities that you may not have seen before.
· Be specific with your coach about what you’re looking to accomplish in that coaching relationship.
· In the real world, things are happening very fast and we don’t have the luxury of time trying to figure this out on our own, so Prescriptive Coaching is a great solution.
· When practicing a technique with someone you are coaching, always demonstrate the technique first.
· The Commend and Recommend technique: Find something to commend and something else you can recommend for their improvement.
· Before I tell you what I heard in that practice session, tell me, what you think you did really well in that practice session and where do you think you could make an improvement?
Technology Tips from Julie:
· When you are give feedback on anything, be as specific as possible.
· Don’t just say, “you did a good job with dinner” instead, say, “Wow. I really love that you actually set the table and really thought about how the food was going to look on the plate.”
· Tech can help you capture information for coaching sessions
· Tech can help you scale that information and aggregate that information, not only so that you can provide better feedback one on one, but also so that you can provide almost globalized coaching.
· Use technology and tools to record sales conversations and analyze them.
· Analyze the language that’s being used and the tone of the call. The system can listen to the words and the cadence and the speed. And if you combine that with your sales analytics, it can tell you the questions that actually generate the best results.
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“Sometimes we get so caught up in the way the world looks from our chair that we just forget to have a look around us and to see the world from a different perspective or to even see our own behavior and own strategies from a different perspective.”
“Coaching can be one minute of genius that you share with someone, or it could be an actual program that spans months or years of dedicated and specific coaching protocols.”
“A coach is going to see something that might be right in front of you the whole time and invisible to you.”
“A good coach doesn’t want to work with you forever. I want you to outgrow me. I want you to get my lessons so deep in your bones that you don’t remember how you had a sales call any other way. And then I know you don’t need me anymore.”
“Merit, you’re like Mary Poppins for sales.”
Referenced in this Episode:
Think And Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill https://www.amazon.com/Think-Grow-Rich-Original-RevisedTM/dp/0990797600/ref=sr_1_5?crid=2DV7YT751YI1R&dchild=1&keywords=think+and+grow+rich&qid=1595391242&sprefix=think%2Caps%2C193&sr=8-5
How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E10 | How to Avoid Plummeting Your Price
Show Notes:
There’s a difference between what somebody has set aside in their budget for a solution to their problem and what the pain really costs them and what it’s worth to them to solve the problem.
In this episode you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here a...
Show Notes:
There’s a difference between what somebody has set aside in their budget for a solution to their problem and what the pain really costs them and what it’s worth to them to solve the problem.
In this episode you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode…
Technique Tips from Merit:
- Ask questions about the outcome they are really looking to achieve, because that outcome often has multiple solutions and those solutions can be paid for with different budgets.
- Make sure I’m solving the real problem, not just that surface level problem.
- People will find incredible ways to fund projects that they’re personally committed to.
- When a prospect doesn’t really understand their own pain, then any investment will seem like too much. If there is no pain, then no amount of investment is worth it.
- Pain multiplier: Is that a one-time cost or do you experience that cost over and over and over again?
- Sell them what they want and then make sure that you’re setting it up so that tomorrow you can give them what they need.
Technology Tips from Julie:
- Understand how to use Excel or other spreadsheet applications to analyze your pricing.
- Before you build anything, go out and test the market test whether or not anybody clicks on a particular price.
- Use a profit prediction tool to help you understand the potential of various pricing models.
- If you know your numbers and you know your conversion rates, you can start to really look at your pricing and your profit to determine if your numbers are set the right way.
- You need to set some numeric expectations with your clients. when you understand what their problem is and their pain and then you talk about how you’re going to help them solve that pain, and ask, “How are you going to quantify that that pain was solved?”
Check out:
GERU – Profit Prediction Tool
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“There’s a difference between what somebody has set aside in their budget for this solution and what the pain really costs them or what it’s worth for them to solve.”
“We undersell our own solutions and go for that quick sale to our detriment.”
“Think from your clients perspective, are you really solving the real problem with this solution or are you leaving some aspect of the solution on the table because we’re afraid to ask for a certain amount of money?”
“The real sales solution is a combination of having your mindset it right, getting the mechanics of selling correct and also being in consistent motion.”
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E09 | Love Them More to Sell Them More
SHOWNOTES:
This episode is about how to find out what the pain is that people are willing to pay to fix. Learn what people really buy, the questions to ask them so that they discover for themselves they need what you have and some amazing tech tools to keep you organized and on track. In each episod...
SHOWNOTES:
This episode is about how to find out what the pain is that people are willing to pay to fix. Learn what people really buy, the questions to ask them so that they discover for themselves they need what you have and some amazing tech tools to keep you organized and on track. In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode…
Technique Tips from Merit:
· The way that we buy impacts the way that we sell.
· Ask questions so people discover for themselves that they have pain.
· People make decisions intellectually, but they buy emotionally.
· Say what you do in a way that hits those emotional hot buttons for them.
· The multiplier question: Is this a onetime cost or do you pay this over and over and over again because this problem is still in place?
·
Technology Tips from Julie:
· Tech enables us to capture both qualitative and quantitative evidence about pain.
· Strategy 1: Do market research on social media to learn what people are complaining about.
· Strategy 2: Ask Google what people are searching for to find solutions to problems.
· Strategy 3: Survey your existing audience to help me understand which messages resonate and which pain they’re experiencing.
· The big thing that tech can do is it can help you to find what people are talking about and the words that they want to hear.
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“People will do more to to avoid pain than gain pleasure.”
“You didn’t walk in your doctor’s office because you were interested in her solutions to solve your heel pain, you walked in because you had an emotion that finally got you into that doctor’s office. Buying is emotional.”
“Take the things we find through tech like, here’s the top 10 reasons that people go and find this solution and then say, what we hear most often is that people are frustrated by this. Is that true for you?”
Referenced in this Episode:
Listen to what the market is saying about you and your competition.
Research what the market is searching for when it comes to your product, service or industry.
Ask your market what matters to them.
Merit’s download: Pain Questions
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E08 | The Secrets to Serve Better So You Can Sell More
Like it or not, we are all in sales… so the question is how do you serve better in order to sell more? How do you grow the lifetime value of a client? You will love this episode because increasing existing business is the easiest way to grow. In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you wi...
Read moreLike it or not, we are all in sales… so the question is how do you serve better in order to sell more? How do you grow the lifetime value of a client? You will love this episode because increasing existing business is the easiest way to grow. In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode…
Technique Tips from Merit:
- Serving clients well is really the key to growing sales.
- To grow your businesses with existing clients, first solve the problem they hired you to fix and then upsell additional offerings.
- If we’re not serving our clients, delivering on what we’ve initially promised, then there is nothing more they’re going to want to do with us.
- You don’t get any extra credit until the original job is done.
Technology Tips from Julie:
- Customers that have exceptional salespeople are ten to fifteen times more likely to remain loyal.
- One of the challenges I would encourage everyone to take on is not only capturing what success looks like, but how will success be measured.
- Capture metrics in your CRM system, Excel, GoogleDocs or Office.
- If you don’t have your photo in your signature on your emails, go do that right now.
- Do more video messages, incorporate your humor and your personality into those messages.
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“I want to solve the problem that you hired me to solve. And then if you’re open to it, I would like to have two other conversations with you. One about who else you might know that I would be able to help in similar way and also what else you and I might do together to expand on the solution that is now in place and delivering the result that I promised.”
“70 percent of the time when a customer leaves an organization it is because they believe that they’ve had poor service and almost always that is attributed to the salesperson.”
“One of the things that every customer needs once they’ve joined you is reinforcement that they have made a good decision. They’ve got to demonstrate that success, not just for them, but for us as well.”
“Measure the indicators on the way to the results.”
“Good customer service is just an integral part of being a professional salesperson.”
Referenced in this Episode:
Myth Shift: Challenging The Truths That Sabotage Success by Merit Kahn (formerly Merit Gest)
https://www.amazon.com/Myth-Shift-Challenging-Sabotage-Success/dp/0997646802
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E07 | Profitable Proposal Tech & Techniques
Whether you work with a standardized proposal or each one is a custom work of art, this episode is for you. You will learn about the technique to write your proposal and how to use tech to make customizing proposals easy and you can track them to so you know when it’s being considered.
How do yo...
Whether you work with a standardized proposal or each one is a custom work of art, this episode is for you. You will learn about the technique to write your proposal and how to use tech to make customizing proposals easy and you can track them to so you know when it’s being considered.
How do you save time, use the right language, know when to send and track those proposals?
In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode.
Technique Tips from Merit:
- A proposal is my best guess at what I think you want. A working agreement is let’s have a discussion about what you really need and what you want, and then I’ll give you the good business reasons why there might be some other elements that you need to get to your outcome.
- When they say, “put together a proposal…” Respond, “I’d be happy to, but Are you open to co-creating a working agreement so you get exactly what you need/want and it makes good business sense.”
- There won’t be any surprises in the proposal, I’m just writing up what we discussed.
- Proposals outline benefits, deliverables and costs. Make sure you’re also includes your prospect’s pain and review that before getting to the costs.
- Tracking a metric of how many proposals have you done is not as effective as tracking the metric how many qualified proposals have I done?
- Recording sales conversations then use the exact language they articulated their problem in your proposal.
Technology Tips from Julie:
- Use tech to track, expedite and make the proposal process more consistent.
- Separate out the idea of the proposal from the contract, because those are two different stages of the sales cycle.
- One of the first ways that we differentiate is by being beautiful. Don’t just word document proposals, do beautiful proposals using PowerPoint, PandaDoc or Proposify.
- Reuse components of your proposals. So rather than crafting proposals from scratch, every time, decide the 10 different things that you typically sell and have a page for each.
- Proposal technology platforms allow you to go straight from a proposal to a signature.
- Being able to follow up on your proposal is one of the most critical things that you can do so you can call them when they are looking at your proposal and are ready to buy. I use DocSend which lets me see that they’ve opened it and I get notified every time somebody opens my proposal. But the other thing it does is it lets me see which pages of my proposal they spend the most time on.
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“A lot of people rush to get to the proposal that they think is going to sell for them instead of really hang out a little bit more in that question and discovery, part of the sales process, to even discover whether or not this prospect really qualifies for the time and effort that they’re going to put into a proposal.”
“One of the challenges is making sure that we don’t use proposals as a crutch for selling. If I’m just measured on how many proposals did I get out the door, there’s no incentive for me to do the qualification step properly so that I’m maximizing the proposals that I do have out there.”
“There aren’t gonna be any surprises in what we discussed.”
“I don’t think I’m doing anybody any favors by taking my time to create a proposal that’s only based on guesswork.”
Listener Challenge:
- Make sure that you’re not creating proposals before qualifying prospects.
- Create beautiful proposals.
- Use tech to track that proposal.
Referenced in this Episode:
Creating Proposals
Tracking Proposals
Find/Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
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Read lessS01 E06 | Analyze So You Can Finalize More Sales
SHOWNOTES:
If you’ve ever felt like pulling your hair out because you feel like you have to do everything, but you aren’t really sure of what is and isn’t working when it comes to sales, you are going to love this episode all about ANALYZING YOUR SALES PROCESS. In each episode of The Smarter...
SHOWNOTES:
If you’ve ever felt like pulling your hair out because you feel like you have to do everything, but you aren’t really sure of what is and isn’t working when it comes to sales, you are going to love this episode all about ANALYZING YOUR SALES PROCESS. In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode…
Technique Tips from Merit:
- Ask yourself or your team, “what don’t you have time to do?” Whatever they say is code for “I’m not comfortable doing that activity”. That’s where real training is needed.
- Get clarity around the steps involved in prospecting, the things that you do to fill the funnel so that you know if you’ve got enough in your pipeline to have the business results that you want.
- Track the number of leads that you’re working on.
- How many of those leads turn into conversations?
- How many of those conversations turn into appointments?
- How many of those appointments turn into money, conversations, and closed deals?
- How much are those closed deals worth or how much did you lose if it didn’t close?
- Then ask, “What do I need to learn to be more effective in this particular part of that process?”
- Take stock and look at what are you tracking. Are you using that information? Are there other metrics that would be more useful to you in meaningful ways that would inform your behavior change so that you can get to a better result?
Technology Tips from Julie:
- First, what is important in sales? What should be measured?
- Next, how do you know if you should measure it and what you do with that information when you have it?
- Understanding what is a good conversion ratio. That would help you know if you are underperforming on that target ratio and it would help you predict the future results.
- Lagging indicators track results achieved. Leading indicators are measures, metrics, behaviors or attributes that I can change in the process that will automatically create a change farther downstream.
- There are three things that have to happen before you start really owning key performance indicators and really owning measurements and analytics around a process and listening
- Know what matters- what data are you looking at
- Know if that data is good or bad and at what point you high five
- Know what to do if data is bad- have a plan
- Once you have this information, the technology that you now add to that is appropriate for the situation and will give you the data that you need. But if you just go right to the tech, without understanding this technique part of it, you’re shooting yourself in the foot or you’ll spend a lot of money on tech that isn’t going to produce.
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“I can imagine that every one of you can think of at least one time that a manager said, “I feel like you should be doing more of this.” And you thought, “Well, what does more look like? How will you know if more happens? How will you know?”
“You have to identify what you are trying to measure so that you can know where you want to make improvements. If you don’t understand the steps involved in getting to certain results and goals, then you can’t know whether or not you’re doing enough.”
“Track and measure the actual data and not just what you think or feel you are doing to be busy.”
“You can’t change the result. But you can change the behavior on their way to getting the result. And if you’re not tracking the right things, you can’t make those decisions.”
Referenced in this Episode:
julieholmes.vip/kpiguide
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E05 | Overwhelmingly Organized with Sales Tech & Technique
SHOWNOTES:
If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by what it takes to keep all your prospects, clients and deal flow organized, you are going to love this episode ABOUT ORGANIZATION AS A TIME-SAVING STRATEGY. In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you will get tech and technique to sell more and st...
SHOWNOTES:
If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by what it takes to keep all your prospects, clients and deal flow organized, you are going to love this episode ABOUT ORGANIZATION AS A TIME-SAVING STRATEGY. In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode…
Technique Tips from Merit:
- Qualify or disqualify the opportunity sooner in the sales process.
- By disqualifying prospects who are not a good fit earlier, you only have to organize and follow up personally with the best prospects. Everyone else who is moderately qualified gets an automated follow-up.
- Are you open to … sharing with me who will be attending the luncheon before I move it to next month when you are at the phase when you are selecting speakers?
Technology Tips from Julie:
- Tech strategy – Automations and notifications – only deal with what you NEED to deal with WHEN you need to deal with it.
- Tech caution – Beware the tech traps … getting lost in tech that takes you more time than if you’d actually done it yourself.
- Tech application –
- Project and Task Management (Asana, Trello, Evernote)
- The Joy of Searching (Evernote, OneNote, Rocket Book)
- Email Auto Follow-Up (Boomerang, Outlook)
- There’s an app for that –
- Project and Task Management (Asana, Trello, Evernote)
- The Joy of Searching (Evernote, OneNote, Rocket Book)
- Email Auto Follow-Up (Boomerang, Outlook)
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“Organization is about things, like the process, and time management is about how you plan your time.”
“Qualification is going to limit the number of things you have to organize.”
“I own a labeler and I am not afraid to use it.”
“Tech and organization to me do two primary things. It helps me to see everything that I need to do and when I need to do it. But the other thing that it does is it enables notifications.”
“If you’re going to ask for a piece of information, what is the action you are going to take on that piece of information?”
“So many sales managers that track things because they think they’re supposed to, and then they don’t do anything with that data.”
“The first step is to figure out what your sales process looks like so that at any given moment, you can see where things are in the process.”
“We waste more time looking for things than we do anything else so the second step is making sure that you have a good search.”
“The last step is making sure that you have some good notification systems in place so that things are being surfaced to you when you should take action on them.”
Referenced in this Episode:
- Asana – Project management with a great FREE option
- Trello – Kanban task management tool
- RocketBook – Smart, reusable notebooks
- Boomerang – Gmail scheduling tool
- Outlook – Trusty email client from MS Office
- Microsoft OneNote – Get organized with virtual notebooks
- Evernote – Get organized with virtual notebooks
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
Our Websites:
https://www.meritbasedbusiness.com/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Read lessS01 E04 | Differentiate to Dominate with Sales Tech and Technique
SUMMARY:
If you are frustrated about how to stand out from the sea of sameness and differentiate yourself and what you sell, this episode is for you! Don’t be different, be impressive. With clearly communicated expectations and some cool tech that will blow your prospect’s minds, you will stand ...
SUMMARY:
If you are frustrated about how to stand out from the sea of sameness and differentiate yourself and what you sell, this episode is for you! Don’t be different, be impressive. With clearly communicated expectations and some cool tech that will blow your prospect’s minds, you will stand out as the most impressive sales pro around!
SHOWNOTES:
In each episode of The Smarter Sales Show, you will get tech and technique to sell more and stress less. Here are the highlights of this episode on differentiation…
Technique Tips from Merit:
- The key to avoiding a price negotiation is making sure that you show up as different than all your competition and all the other salespeople out there.
- It’s not just about the product or service being different. It’s about the sales process, the mood, the tone that you set, the questions that you asked.
- Process differentiation is probably one of the most important things that sales professionals can do to really stand out and be above and beyond their competition
- To differentiate yourself and your sales process follow these steps:
- Tell the truth about how much time you have to talk
- Clearly articulate the purpose of the communication
- Discuss the agenda for the conversation
- Agree on an outcome and next steps
Technology Tips from Julie:
- Differentiation isn’t necessarily about being just different. Because different isn’t good or bad. It’s just different. I would encourage people to think about impressive.
- If you have a good strong technique, then technology can be that wow factor. The way that you leverage technology can be that impressive differentiator.
- Try video voicemail instead of traditional email follow up as a differentiator.
- Adam.ai can record your meeting, it can also pull out automatically all of the action items that get stated during your meeting. So you can record your meeting, you can get all of your action items, and it’s shareable.
- With Microsoft OneNote, I can have these templates pre-built. So I know as soon as I get on a call that those are the boxes I should be filling in. From a consistency perspective to make yourself a better salesperson
Smarter Sales Soundbites:
“If nobody sees you as different in the sales process, then it’s always going to come down to price.”
“I’ve narrowed it down based on features and functionality. And to be completely honest, I went with the one that sold better.”
“Just ask for what you really need.”
“What are you, as a sales professional, doing at any given point during the sales cycle, that you legitimately think your prospect would think, wow… that’s impressive.”
“There is a big difference between just being different and being impressive.”
Referenced in this Episode:
- Dubb – Video Email/Video Voicemail
- Adam.ai – Artificial intelligence meeting management suite
- Microsoft OneNote – Get organized with virtual notebooks
- Evernote – Get organized with virtual notebooks
Find us at:
Contact us at:
Connect with us on LinkedIn…
https://www.linkedin.com/in/meritkahn/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejulieholmes/
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