Selling Isn't Debate: Confessions of an Engineer in Sales

The following was written by my good friend Chip Doyle with the Sandler Sales Institute. I think you will enjoy it!

I'm guessing you've heard jokes about engineers in sales. Accountants, contractors, PhD's, and lawyers don't have stellar reputations in sales either. Yet these professions generally are an intelligent lot. They are quite skilled at what they do since our daily lives may depend on their specific calculations and recommendations. I transferred from engineering into sales in 1988...

Here's how I used to sell: 1) Research the prospect and prepare a powerful presentation that applied specifically to them. 2) Provide the prospect with detailed features about the product. 3) Explain how these features worked and the significant benefits they would create. 4) Show the prospect an applicable analysis of return-on-investment and estimate how much money would be saved over time. 5) Ask the prospect how many of my products they would like to purchase.

If the prospect suggested a problem with the analysis or why the features weren't so beneficial, I would use my debate and technical skills to refute their argument and reaffirm my claim. My product knowledge was impeccable and I let no prospect get away until I had supported my argument and convinced them I was correct.

In the spirit of successful engineering, I had created a repeatable and systematic approach to selling. There was only one problem: My prospects rarely bought anything. It was a great way to prove my product knowledge but it wasn't an effective method for closing new business.

Product Knowledge Used at the Wrong Time Can Be Intimidating

In a sales discussion, there is only one person who can "convince" the prospect and it isn't the engineer or salesperson... Prospects base their buying decisions on their own personal and intellectual reasons. Studies show that salespeople who suggest benefits that aren't perceived as valuable or applicable to the prospect are actually undermining the sale...

Debates are useful to convince a third party such as a judge or observer that welcomes all viewpoints. There, the relationship between the two opposing parties is usually adversarial. However, adversarial relationships don't support buying in two party interactions. Words and phrases containing "I disagree," "That's not true" and the infamous "But" can destroy the delicate relationship between buyer and seller in a matter of seconds. While this may be intuitively obvious to most readers, they may be surprised to hear themselves saying something similar on their next challenging sales call.

Successful salespeople spend more time on the "why" questions than a traditional salesperson. They bend over backwards to find ways to agree with their prospects and probe for deeper understanding instead of taking an opposing view. Start using insightful questions to help your prospects "discover" why they should buy and watch your closing ratio improve.

Let us know your thoughts on this!

Why Business Owners Shouldn't Cold Call

by John Dini, President MPN Incorporated

The Owner as Salesperson

If your business employs salespeople, then you’ve probably had them bring an account challenge to you. “You need to talk to this customer, Boss. You can (fill in the blank) better than anyone else.”

The fill-in-the-blank part may be convincing, explaining your product, negotiating or being tough. Whatever is needed, it’s likely that your employees think you do it better than they do. In most small businesses, the owner is the best salesperson. Why is that?

In some companies it’s because the owner started out as a salesperson and built the business that way. But that isn’t true in all cases. Even in situations where the owner is the best technician, the best analyst, or the best designer, he or she is usually still the best salesperson.

That’s because owners have gravitas, the weight of ownership attached to their words. If they promise something, the customer freely (and correctly) assumes that such promises carry the reputation and resources of the company behind them. If the owner says something can’t or won’t be done, there is no court of appeal. The owner’s word is final.

The owner is usually better able to reach an understanding, because the party negotiating for the other side is more accepting of the owner’s positions. There are fewer things to negotiate, and more acceptance of the facts as presented.

So why do owners hate cold calling? I mean, everyone dislikes cold calling, but all the business owners I know hate it with a passion. Even those who grew their business with cold calls (and most did) steadfastly refuse to do it today. What makes it so loathsome?

The Owner’s Sales Identity

The issue lies with the owner’s ego. I don’t mean an ego that says “I’m too good to do this,” but rather the entire sense of self-worth that drives your personality.

When you started out, you didn’t expect new customers to take you at your word. After all, your business had no track record, so why should a stranger believe you when you promised something? You probably weren’t too certain that you could actually deliver everything you promised. But as the business grew, you established your reputation for quality, dependability, integrity, and any other feature you take pride in. You carry that reputation with you as an owner. It is part of you.

It comes along whenever an employee introduces you to a customer. There is always a little bit of pride in hearing “This is my Boss.” or “This is the Owner of our company.” or “This is the President of ABC Corp.” It’s a position you earned- no one bestowed it upon you. It is part of you, of your gravitas.

All of that disappears when you make a cold call. To begin with, you are probably trying to make an entry through a gatekeeper who doesn’t know your company, and doesn’t care what you have to offer. His or her job is to deal with people like you, so that the real decision maker doesn’t have to.

Further, your aura of ownership is left at the door. Your words carry no more weight than anyone else’s. For all they know, you’re just another lyin’ salesman. It’s hard not to respond to their skepticism with “Do you know who I am? Do you understand the commitment that stands behind what I say?” They don’t, and they won’t.

Negotiation Strategy- Matching Levels

The underlying problem with owners making cold calls isn’t that they are uncomfortable. No one likes making cold calls. It’s not that they result in rejection that bruises the owner’s inflated sense of self, either. It’s that they aren’t an appropriate use of an owner’s time.

A basic tactic of negotiation strategy is that you match levels of negotiators. If their final decision maker isn’t in the room, your final decision maker shouldn’t be there either. Negotiations (and all sales are negotiations) can only take place between equals.

So it is appropriate for someone else to make the cold call. Teach them that it is their job to only put you in front of your opposite number- someone with the same ability to commit as you have. Then the work you put in to earn your stripes brings value into the room with you.

What do you think? Do you still cold call? How do you set up your gravitas before a meeting? Let me know.

Four Capacities Every Great Leader Needs

The following is a great article on leadership that was sent my way. It is written by Tony Schwartz.

Develop a work environment that compels employees to give the highest value to your company. by Tony Schwartz


WHEN I WAS a very young journalist, full of bravado and barely concealed insecurity, Ed Kosner, editor of Newsweek, hired me to do a job I wasn't sure I was capable of doing. Thrown into deep water, I had no choice but to swim. But I also knew he wouldn't let me drown. His confidence buoyed me.

Some years later, I was hired away by Arthur Gelb, the managing editor of The New York Times. This time, I was seduced by Gelb's contagious exuberance about being part of a noble fraternity committed to putting out the world's greatest newspaper.

Over the last dozen years, I've worked with scores of CEOs and senior executives to help them build more engaged, high-performance cultures by energizing their employees. Along the way, I've landed on four key capacities that show up, to one degree or another, in the most inspiring leaders I've met.

1. Great leaders recognize strengths in us that we don't always yet fully see in ourselves.

This is precisely what Kosner did with me. He provided belief where I didn't yet have it, and I trusted his judgment more than my own. It's the Pygmalion effect: expectations become self-fulfilling.

Both positive and negative emotions feed on themselves. In the absence of Kosner's confidence, I simply wouldn't have assumed I was ready to write at that level.

Because he seemed so sure I could - he saw better than I did how my ambition and relentlessness would eventually help me prevail - I wasted little energy in corrosive worry and doubt.

Instead, I simply invested myself in getting better, day by day, step by step. Because we can achieve excellence in almost anything we practice with sufficient focus and intention, I did get better, which fed my own confidence and satisfaction, and my willingness to keep pushing myself.

2. Rather than simply trying to get more out of us, great leaders seek to understand and meet our needs, above all a compelling mission beyond our immediate self-interest, or theirs.

Great leaders understand that how they make people feel, day in and day out, has a profound influence on how they perform.

We each have a range of core needs - physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. Great leaders focus on helping their employees meet each of these needs, recognizing that it helps them to perform better and more sustainably.

Arthur Gelb helped me meet not just my emotional need to be valued, but also my spiritual need to be engaged in a mission bigger than my own success. Far too few leaders take the time to figure out what they truly stand for, beyond the bottom line, and why we should feel excited to work for them.

3. Great leaders take the time to clearly define what success looks like, and then empower and trust us to figure out the best way to achieve it.

One of our core needs is for self-expression. One of the most demoralizing and infantilizing experiences at work is to feel micromanaged. The job of leaders is not to do the work of those they lead, but to serve as Chief Energy Officer - to free and fuel us to bring the best of ourselves to work everyday.

Part of that responsibility is defining, in the clearest possible way, what's expected of us - our concrete deliverables. This is a time-consuming and challenging process, and most leaders I've met do very little of it. When they do it effectively, the next step for leaders is to get out of the way.

That requires trusting that employees will figure out for themselves the best way to get their work done, and that even though they'll take wrong turns and make mistakes, they learn and grow stronger along the way.

4. The best of all leaders have the capacity to embrace their own opposites, most notably vulnerability alongside strength, and confidence balanced by humility.

This capacity is so powerful because all of us struggle, whether we're aware of it or not, with our self-worth. We're each vulnerable to believing, at any given moment, that we're not good enough.

Great leaders don't feel the need to be right, or to be perfect, because they've learned to value themselves in spite of shortcomings they freely acknowledge. In turn, they bring this generous spirit to those they lead.

The more leaders make us feel valued, in spite of our imperfections, the less energy we will spend asserting, defending and restoring our value, and the more energy we have available to create value.

All four capacities are grounded in one overarching insight. Great leaders recognize that the best way to get the highest value is to give the highest value.

Tony Schwartz is the president and CEO of The Energy Project and the author of The Way We're Working Isn't Working.

Let us know your thoughts on this article!