Sales Blog with Professional Sales Tips

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Subrogation of Perjury. It’s a legal term that means you are attempting to get someone to lie for you. The courts don’t like perjury, but they really don’t like this subrogation of perjury thing. You shouldn’t either. Read on.

So what does this have to do with sales? Actually, plenty, and not in the way you probably think. You can sometimes observe subrogation of perjury in a dysfunctional sales environment. Let me give you an example. You’re about to meet with the VP of sales and your immediate manager coaches you to say certain things about your customers to make you (and more importantly, the manager) look better. They may coach you to misrepresent how large the opportunity is, how close to closing a deal is, how many decision makers you have a relationship with, etc. They are clearly asking you to lie. Do I need to tell you where this kind of thing ends? Simply stated, the “truth will out” and when it does it can be ugly.

Even more disturbing than just getting someone to lie is what this kind of behavior indicates about the workplace. A sales culture or environment that promotes this kind of thing is dysfunctional. This behavior is also seen in abusive workplaces centered on fear and intimidation. Working for a company that tolerates this will ultimately take your soul. Here’s why. People that are truly sales professionals will not tolerate this sort of working environment and will “vote with their feet” (i.e., quit). Those that will put up with a dysfunctional work environment will stay, and over time a salesforce is created that is weak and accommodating. Individual salespersons might even start to think that this is normal, but things will only get worse for them and their career if they elect to stay. There are many attributes of a sick sales environment, but this is a bellwether indicator.

If you are a sales manager and you’re asking your folks to misrepresent things, please cease-and-desist. My suggestion to you is to stop doing this immediately and if your company can’t handle it, you don’t want to work there anyway. If for no other reason, do it to improve the quality of your salesforce over time.

If you are a salesperson and being asked to change the facts is part of your company’s culture, find a new job.

I’m going to shake some people’s foundational beliefs when I say this; printed sales collateral in business is a waste of your time and money. Don’t believe me? When was the last time you actually read printed sales collateral from a company you were contemplating doing business with? When was the last time you actually read printed sales collateral given to you by a salesperson you were trying to dismiss by asking them if they had any sales material they could leave behind. When you mail or leave collateral material you instinctively know that the recipient isn’t going to read it. When you were new to sales you used to end every unsuccessful cold call with, “I’ll mail you some information.” Mailing the prospect some information somewhat made you feel like you were moving the sale along, but in your heart of hearts you knew you weren’t.

So why do so many companies continue to print sales and marketing brochures? For two primary reasons. One, it’s a leftover from pre-Internet days. Two, the act of mailing something to a prospect or having a “leave behind” piece makes us feel like we’re accomplishing something. Old fashioned marketing managers will claim that you must have printed sales brochures. Twenty-first century marketing managers will tell you that your “sales brochure” is found on the Internet. Studies have shown that about 70% of business buyers go to the Internet for information before they place an order. They aren’t looking for an outdated sales brochure for this information.

Every sales organization that has been around for 20 or more years has a room or closet where they keep all their collateral material. This material is normally dusty, grossly outdated and disorganized. The second a brochure is printed it’s out of date. There’s a better answer, the Internet. Websites, blogs, email, wikis, etc. provide information to the prospect or customer that is current and can be done inexpensively and quickly. And, the prospect or customer finds it a better and more reliable information source on your products and services as well.

Cisco Systems out of San Jose, California with $30b in annual revenue is a great example of a company that has this concept down pat. Try to find a Cisco sales brochure. You can’t. Over the last 23 years they have educated their customer base to go to http://www.cisco.com/ to find information about Cisco. They work in an industry where things change in a heartbeat and there is a lot of information. A bunch of dated product literature lying around just wouldn’t work for them. And whether you know it or not, it won’t work for you either.

It’s the 21’st century. It’s time to realize that if customers truly want information about your company, they’re going to the Internet to find it.

I think we all know what a decision maker is at a customer or prospect. This is the person or persons that have the authority to order your products and services. It’s as simple as that. It can literally be just about anyone in a company. I’m surprised sometimes by who are designated as purchasing decision makers. Sometimes it’s the receptionist, sometimes it’s the CEO and sometimes it’s actually someone in purchasing. A decision maker is in contrast to information gatherers or recommenders whom you provide information to but aren’t actually involved in the buying decision. Information gatherers and recommenders provide their information to an ultimate decision maker.

Let’s talk for a second about multiple decision makers. There are two types.

1. Vertical Decision Makers. These are decision makers that either get or give information relative to the buying decision and must act in concert with other Vertical Decision Makers before a buying decision is made. This is group buying. If you are selling to person “A” who has to get approval from manager “B” before buying then they are a Vertical Decision Maker. And if manager “B” won’t make a buying decision before talking with person “A” then they are also a Vertical Decision Maker. We typically don’t like dealing with Vertical Decision Makers because we aren’t selling to a unilateral decision maker and so we burn a lot of time. When you find yourself in one of these situations make sure you develop an ultimate decision maker by earning his or her trust and bypassing the group process.

2. Horizontal Decision Makers. We like this kind of selling environment. This is a situation where you are dealing directly with multiple ultimate decision makers who can all buy from you. This would be common in situations where you are selling your product or service to multiple departments within the same company. Here’s a simple and yet unbelievably infrequently used selling tip. When you are selling to an ultimate decision maker at a large company be sure to ask them this simple question, “Besides yourself, who else orders these products and services at this company?” This question will help ferret out other Horizontal Decision Makers.

Your goal as a sales professional is to eliminate Vertical Decision Maker selling environments by developing an ultimate decision maker at those customers. You also want to create Horizontal Decision Maker selling environments and expand the ones you have.

In an earlier post I talked about the importance of open ended questions. You remember that open ended questions are questions that can only be answered with an explanation. This kind of question helps the sales process along because it gets more information from your customers or prospects and helps to build a relationship with them. Let me be clear about one thing however; there is a place for closed ended questions too. Closed ended questions can be answered with just one or two words.

Customer: “Your price is a little high, but you’ve got them in inventory and I need them tomorrow.”
Salesperson: “Do you want me to put them on order right now to ensure that you get them on time?”

What a great example of a directed closed ended question. Closed ended questions work best when we are trying to steer a customer or prospect in a certain direction. Think of them as a railroad switch where the train is put on a different track in an instant. We’re not trying to build relationships or get additional information. We’re simply trying to get the customer or prospect to move in a different direction.

Keep these points in mind regarding closed ended questions:

1. You’ll use more of them as you get closer to making the sale. This happens because you are trying to influence the customer or prospect’s thinking in a direct way. If you are using a lot of closed ended questions at the beginning of a relationship you’re probably making mistakes.
2. Open ended questions are great, but you can’t use them for everything. There are times when closed ended questions are more appropriate for the information you need.
3. Too many or poorly contrived open ended questions can hurt more than they can help. Sometimes a closed ended question seems more sincere.
4. Don’t confuse a series of closed ended questions for an open ended question. I see this error almost every time I work with a salesperson. If you machine-gun a customer or prospect with closed ended questions you’ll definitely turn them off. Use closed ended questions sparingly and they’ll have more impact. Telemarketers and “sales-is-a-numbers-game” prospectors are the most frequent violators of this rule. They’ll call up a prospect and just kill them with a relentless series of closed ended questions.

There is most assuredly a place for closed ended questions in the sales process. The problem is that a lot of salespeople only use closed ended questions or use them at the wrong time in the relationship.

I’m not talking about employee terminations here. I’m talking about when your customers or prospects dismiss your sales efforts.

Prospect: “I can’t meet with you until the end of the year Debbie. Do you have some literature you can send me in the meantime?”

Debbie has just been dismissed. We all know that prospects don’t read collateral material and they use the, “Can you send me some literature?” ruse to make you go away. It’s an objection. Remember, a customer or prospect objection is anything they do to get you to stop the selling process. They want you to stop selling them and they’ll come up with anything, whether true or not, to make that happen. Their goal is not to give you good information at this point; their goal is for you to leave them alone.

There are many kinds of dismissals. Another popular one is the, “Call me back in six months.” dismissal. Do you really think they want you to call them back in six months? They’re just buying some time.

So what do you do about customer or prospect dismissals? First, recognize dismissals for what they are. The customer or prospect is trying to disengage you. You may have engaged the decision maker at the wrong time, you may have the wrong decision maker or you might not be explaining your product or service very well. Do a reset on this sales call and correct whatever is causing the problem. Second, ask yourself if you are getting more than your fair share of dismissals. If you’re getting an inordinate amount of customer or prospect dismissals then it could mean that you are not contacting qualified prospects, you’re forgetting to develop the relationship with the customer or you’re not listening and getting enough information.

Everyone gets dismissals. It’s a sign that you’re out there beating the bushes. That’s a good thing. Just be careful not to take too seriously what the customer or prospect is saying when they dismiss you because it’s almost certainly not accurate information they are providing. When you get a dismissal understand it for what it is; if you are getting too many, then modify your sales approach.