How Your Humanity Can Future-Proof Your Tech Sales Career

As a salesperson, you need confidence and passion to win. But as buyers and robots (AI options) continue to gain power, it’s easy to feel beaten down in a world where customers no longer seem to need you. As deals fall through and commissions dwindle, you feel desperation begin to sink in. Blow after blow, you wonder: Am I going to lose the career I love—to a robot?

Be sure to mark your calendar for Thursday, July 11th at 9am PT and join John Golden, Martha Neumeister and Anita Nielsen, author of Beat the Bots, to learn strategies and techniques that ensure customers won’t want to buy from anyone or anything else!

Recorded Live 11th July at 9am PT/Noon ET

EPISODE QUESTIONS:

1.  Value matters most in selling. How can a salesperson use the power of personalized value in order to win better, bigger and more?
2. How can sales professionals create a meaningful human to human connection with buyers?
3. The new ABC says: Always be considering your Client’s emotional and rational needs and challenges. How can salespeople start to use this to get better results?

Our Guest

Anita Nielsen

Anita Nielsen is a sales performance consultant with over twenty years of experience in B2B sales and support. As an advocate for salespeople, she is dedicated to coaching and equipping these professionals for success. Extensive experience and expertise led to Anita being named one of the Top Sales Enablement Consultants of 2018 by Selling Power Magazine and she is considered one of the 50 Top Women Sales Professionals. Anita trains and coaches using content based in psychology, neurology and behavioral economics combined with more traditional consultative selling skills and techniques in order to provide sales professionals with a holistic approach to connecting with customers and closing bigger, better and more deals.

Links › ldkadvisory.com | twitter.com | linkedin.com

Our Hosts

John Golden

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Martha Neumeister

Martha is social media strategist, responsible for all social media platforms of Pipeliner CRM. She is a communication expert with social media affinity, which she has been focusing on throughout her professional career. She has a bachelor´s degree in Entrepreneurship & Management and a master´s degree in Online Marketing which supports her in her career as Social Media Strategist.

About SalesChats

#SalesChats is a fast-paced (no more than 30 minutes) multi-media series that provides leading strategies, tactics and thinking for sales professionals worldwide. It can be found on Twitter (#SalesChats), as a live Google+ Hangout, and as a podcast available on iTunes, SoundCloud and right here on SalesPOP! If you think you would make a great guest for #SalesChats, please contact co-host Martha Neumeister.

#SalesChats is co-hosted by John Golden, CSO Pipeliner CRM, and Martha Neumeister, Social Media Strategist Pipeliner CRM.

Creating Confident Salespeople

Tom Abbott, founder of The Sales Optimisation Company, speaker, consultant, and author helps companies build high-performance sales teams through training on his 7 pillars and 29 strategies for selling success. In this interview, Tom talks about the importance of discipline as well as mindset for selling success.

This Sales Expert Interview covers:

Why is a mindset for selling success so important and how do I fortify it?

• Sales is probably the one job where you face rejection the most so you must have resilience.
• The mindset is going to separate you from everyone else. Tom talks about the importance of disassociating yourself from the product you’re selling.

How to have a mindset for selling success

• Draw upon past success. It can serve you in the present. It doesn’t just have to be a success as it relates to sales.

The confident competent infinite loop

• As you get good at things, your confidence levels go up. Tom talks about what happens next.
• Understand what you’re doing to contribute towards your success.
• You need the people skills as well as the process skills.

Discipline

• This is part of the mindset for selling success. You have to have the discipline to follow the sales process.
• There are a lot of aspects of our jobs we don’t necessarily love. You have to love the other parts enough to make the less exciting parts worthwhile.

Slumps

• First, recognize when you’re in a slump. Then ask why. It’s usually either external or internal or both.
• The more you learn the more you earn.
• There are no excuses to not learn more about your job role and improve.
• Tom explains the difference between winners and whiners.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Presence in Your Own Presentations

Tanvi Gautam is an award-winning keynote speaker, coach, and consultant who works with companies large and small with go-to-market planning, narrative building, and storytelling. She talks about what she means by no story, no sales and what it means to be present in your own presentations.

This Sales Expert Interview covers:

Storytelling in sales

• As salespeople we can get too caught up in the facts and stats and forget about the human connection.
• Facts don’t make people take action. Humans are not rational beings.
• Tanvi talks about the science behind storytelling. Storytelling is culturally relevant too.
• There’s a lot riding on the shoulders of the buyer so success stories can have a comforting effect.

B2B or B2C?

• Most people think that B2C is the only place for storytelling. As long as you are talking to a human, storytelling works in either scenario.
• Because there are more stakeholders in B2B, your stories may need to be a little more nuanced.

What are the right stories?

• First, try to understand the context you are entering into. Where in the sales process is the customer? What’s the story in their head?
• Don’t show up and throw up as Tanvi says.
• The stories don’t have to be about the product.
• You have to interrupt the pattern.

Be authentic in your storytelling

• Not all stories can be told by everyone. Practice the story with yourself. Is it making you feel uncomfortable?
• Checklists don’t work. The most recent Avengers movie is a perfect example.
• Stories don’t need to be long or success stories to be effective.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Panel Discussion: The Mobile Salesperson

Watch the recording of the panel discussion that happened on 26th June 2019

If you are a Salesperson you are used to being on the go, moving quickly from prospect to prospect, customer to customer, meeting to meeting – sometimes it seems like you are in perpetual motion! The question is how can you operate most effectively while in the field – how can you stay organized, focused and on top of your book of business? Whether it is Mobile CRM, other technology tools or simply best practices to leverage when on the go, our panel of experts discuss how you can be the most effective mobile salesperson possible.

John Golden with guests:

Janhvi Johorey – Janhvi believes that B2B marketers can accelerate sales volume by using innovative tools like social media and compelling brand narratives. Decoding B2B sales, she is a writer, storyteller, and blogger who feels social listening is the key to really connecting with the audience.

Jim Pancero – Jim has been influencing, guiding and inspiring sales professionals in more than 80 different industries to increase sales, market share and profitability. Jim’s combination of humor, larger-than-life personality, outstanding research and real-world examples that hit home provide even experienced sales pros who think they’ve heard it all with strategies and concepts that work.

Kenny Weiss – Kenny Weiss. A Coach, Speaker, Author and Founder of The Greatness Movement. I have been studying and contemplating what it takes to achieve happiness and success for nearly 30 years.

Small Wins and Big Victories

Rusty Komori is a motivational speaker, author, TV host, leadership consultant, and tennis professional. The varsity high school tennis team he coached from 1994-2005 won 22 consecutive state championships – the longest high school streak in US history in all sports. His book, Beyond the Lines, teaches leaders how to create a superior culture of excellence. In this interview, Rusty shares some insights from the book on this and leadership in general.

This Sales Expert Interview covers:

Superior culture of excellence

• Rusty talks about how he relates this idea to tennis which also explains the meaning behind the title of his book.

Repeatable success

• It may be easy to win once but 22 times in a row is impressive. Rusty talks about how to sustain a culture of excellence.
• Rusty talks about the 4 P’s he came up with when he became a head coach.
• A lot of coaches and CEOs focus so much on winning and not enough on the things that make you win.
• Share with your team the goal and work backward. Little things lead to big victories.

Managing adversity

• Look for the challenges and be prepared for them. Know that you will become better from it. This mindset is better than thinking you won’t face adversity.

Integrating new faces

• There’s always a danger that people slip in who don’t fit in with the culture of excellence. Rusty talks about how he communicated the culture to his team.
• Strive for things just beyond your reach.

Communication

• It’s better to be proactive about things that can and will happen. Rusty talks about the 4 “misses” in life he communicated with his team to reinforce the culture of excellence.
• Challenge yourself to be better than you were yesterday.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

High Touch AND High Tech

Frank Somma is a lifelong salesperson who has used neuro-linguistic programming to develop his own approach to sales and selling in a high tech world. In this interview, Frank talks about how B2B sales should really be called P2P (person to person) and how to be high touch in a high tech world.

This Sales Expert Interview covers:

Pros and cons of technology

• Frank talks about the upsides and downsides of selling in a high tech world.
• Body language and tone are important in communication.

Doing things differently

• When you enter into a sales interaction, you have to distance yourself from the negative perceptions of society.
• Ask questions and listen! Always be engaged.
• Pay attention to the little details when communicating because they matter. This can be a competitive advantage for salespeople.

The best of both worlds

• Frank isn’t suggesting that selling in a high tech world but still being high touch means you never use email, LinkedIn, or other technology. Take the time to get to know how your clients prefer to communicate.
• You make people feel good about themselves by listening and paying close attention.
• You can still use technology to engage. Skype is a perfect example.
• There are ways to prove you’re engaged on the phone with your own physicality.

Active listening

• We have to train ourselves to really listen and understand what the other person is saying instead of thinking about what we’re going to say next when selling in a high tech world.
• Frank uses a certain technique in his training that is uncomfortable but works.
• Most buyers know a great deal about your product the first time they talk to you. It’s your job to shepherd them through the process and explain why your company is the best option.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Empowering Your Employees

For over two decades Scott Greenberg has energized audiences with his presentations and workshops on leadership and coaching skills as well as mindset. Some of his clients include Nike and Allstate. He was an owner of two Edible Arrangement franchises in Los Angeles for ten years and won “Best Customer Service” and “Manager of the Year” out of more than 1000 locations worldwide. He’s even beat cancer! In this interview Scott talks about his presentation called The Coaching Cure that focuses on coaching employees, retaining them, and keeping them engaged.

This Sales Expert Interview covers:

Leadership and coaching

• In retail businesses, there is a high correlation between high sales, customer experience, and employee experience.
• Scott talks about the real essence of coaching and what most people do wrong.
• Leadership and coaching are ongoing and constant. Coaching and reviewing are two different things.

Making time

• Busyness is the enemy of leadership.
• Clarify your role and then start asking the right questions.

Emotional intelligence

• People could be using the exact same systems but get different results. The primary difference is the ability to manage mindset and humanity.
• Emotions drive consumer and employee behavior.

Letting go

• You definitely don’t want to micromanage your employees but you need to feed their fire so they don’t burn out.

Getting to the bottom of issues

• Scott developed a leadership and coaching model with a colleague to diagnose an employee’s skill set and mindset and then take action accordingly.
• The model diagnoses if a problem is due to what an employee knows (or doesn’t) or how they feel.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Emotionally Intelligent Salespeople

Merit Gest, a stand-up comedian and business owner for over 20 years, works as a consultant and coach with companies large and small to improve their overall performance. She was previously the head of a sales training organization so she definitely knows how to develop sales skills and strategy. However, she created The Merit Method for Sales Mastery to emphasize the greater importance of the sales mindset which includes the things we say to ourselves as well as the things we say to others. She discusses the need to understand the relationship we have with ourselves first above anyone else to achieve sales mastery.

This Sales Expert Interview covers:

The Merit Method for Sales Mastery

• It’s about being the type of sales professional that is deserving of the rewards of working with clients and earning.
• One of the most important things about sales mastery is the sales mindset. Skills come second.
• Salespeople need to understand the emotional mind specifically. Figure out your triggers because they can catch you off guard in situations.

Understanding the mind

• People think all they need are sales skills and strategy for sales mastery but they need more.
• Merit uses a few different assessment tools to help clients understand their internal, behavioral, and emotional mind.
• When’s the last time you did an inventory of your beliefs? Get rid of or rewrite “hand me down” beliefs!
• How we buy impacts how we sell – be careful what you project on your prospects and clients.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.