Lets ask what actions do you take to influence a sale, and what steps done differently would have ended in a different result? It’s a great question to ask, and you if your worth anything you have pondered this before. The truth is you never will know, and there is no real way to find out becasse there are so many things which have an effect on the end result. There are the Marco level things such as the way you got out of bed that morning, there was the years of training both formal and informal, and the way you naturally relate to people. Then there are the micro level actions, such as the words you choose to use, the tone in your voice, or even the time of day you choose to call your prospects. There are tons of actions, but only  one simple truth about how they all affect you which is “Action is always better than No Action”.

So when your sitting there with nothing to do, think to yourself what can I do right now to build on my performance for tomorrow? Ask yourself this and take some positive action and you will be better in the long run for it.

The reason I am bringing this up is because lately it has come to my attention that many companies who had large market shares in their respective industries are going to be losing large amounts of clients during this period of time when money is tight across many companies. Many businesses will be switching to lower tier suppliers, and giving companies a chance who might not have had one other wise.

This will be due to many different factors mainly derived from budget cuts. The issue is not will business be lost but, what will happen when the economy comes back around? Will those customers come back around, or be happy with their new providers?

Lets take for example the scenario of a company which is currently using a software (saas) to do function T. Company XYZ, which sells the software to do function T, prides itself on being the top of the market, and many companies gladly pay for that prestige. Now with budget cuts many of those companies will have to look at cutting back and see that they can get by with a second tier which can do many of the same functions with half the cost. They find the core functionality they need in a new supplier and save the money to keep the doors open. They might not like it but it will be a good move to extend their cash during harder times. So company XYZ loses business but then a second tier company/supplier picks up new business.

Now lets say the company who just switched, to the low cost provider, now finds out that the second tier company will suite their needs just fine. They realize that even after the economy turns around that they can save money by keeping what works and what they have now with the second tier product works very well. The other side of the coin is that the new provider (second tier provider) has gotten so much business from customers leaving XYZ that they have been able to pump money back into R&D and have caught up with XYZ and are now keeping their customers who thought they would go back to XYZ once hard times were long gone. The graph below demonstrates what happens to XYZ company.

Before the hard times they were at D1 and their Price was high and the demand was steady. Then hard times hit and they lost business due to the economy and they moved down to D2. They had to compete more on price and the demand for prestige was less. Then good times come back around and they only move back to D3 because a good many of their customers decided to stay with the secondary supplier.

I hope you have followed me up to this point, because here is the bit of gold. During the hard times if your a second tier company you are going to be given a chance to eat away at your competitors lead by taking their customers on price, with out having to change at all. You then will have the ability to woo the customers who would never have considered you before, or the ones who were on the fence and went with the prestige of the larger company. It will be your turn to shine and grow, and learn how to keep these customers for the long haul. Of course some will go back when things turn around, but some will also stay.

This also goes to every indusrty from Marketing firms, Software Companies, Telephone providers, and even toilet paper brands. Just remember it is a good time to be taking away your competitors market share so go and get it.

1. Realistic expectations for their skill set.
2. They were aware of the possibility of failure.
3. They were smart.
4. People wanted to see them succeed.
5. They never stopped learning.
6. They found what worked for them.

Sure there was an idea they had, and lots of the ones you know about are great ones, but just like an iceberg there are the millions of bad ideas you have never seen or heard about. We set our dreams and expectations on the few that really make it, the top of the iceberg, and dream about the great idea that will take us there. As if it was so easy, all we need is just a “million dollar idea”, and we will be lucky just to have one in our life. What we fail to realize is that it is not the ideas that are rare, but the people who can take an idea and execute with it to create a business. They are the real rarities.

1.    Honing Script/Pitch

• Put yourself in their shoes
• Rehearse in a mirror
• Change it with reactions
• Use a tape recorder, and practice, and record your calls. Replay it and ask yourself “How would I react to that call, if I was on the other end of the phone”.
• Make sure you can say it flawless and with out hesitation

2.    Mental Attitude

• Smile while you talk
• Think of them as a friend or old pal, never think of them as someone you don’t know
• Treat them with respect

3.    Dealing w/ Rejection

• You only get 5 questions so figure out what you want them to be
• Don’t ask stupid questions
• “NO” only means you haven’t answered all of their concerns yet. Follow it up with a “Why” question.
• Prepare for the worst, make a list of all possible scenarios of rejection and figure out what you would say. Practice these and know when and how to overcome these common objections.

4.    Interacting with the Gatekeeper

• Chat them up, be nice. Must be sincere, Be nice, be nice, be nice. I usually just call up and ask for the person I want (use first name and act casual, never say Mr. Jones they know if you say that you don’t know the person) and if they ask you questions just say “ I am calling about _________” Make it short, and then stop and let them make up their mind about what to do.
• Call back as much as you need to, and remember they will not remember you. So don’t worry about calling multiple times.

5.    Getting to the Decision Maker

• Call early, call late, and don’ leave more than 1 message
• Persistence pays off here
• If you have to use “Lumpy Mail”

6.    Pitching

• Figure out your style and then stick with it
• Practice your pitch, but don’t have it canned. Just know what you want to say, and be able to adapt it to the person you are delivering it to.
  • You have to understand when pitching there are 4 personality types, which means 75% of the people you talk with won’t be the same as you. So you have to adapt your style to how they want to obtain information.
• Lambs - always agree even if they really don’t
• Owls - very analytical and numbers are important
  • Most CFO types are Owls
• Bulls - quick decisions and usually can be gruff, and very to the point
  • Most CEO types are bulls
• Tigers - shinny things distract them, they ask questions which have nothing to do with their buying decision.

7.    Getting the Appointment

• Set appointments when you can
• Always set the next time you will talk to them while you are on the phone.
• This is a close, so use this to get to a close as well. You can say, “We can get you set up on wednseday, how does that work for you?”

8.    Follow up

• How to follow up with a call you have never made
  • They wont remember you, ask for your contact, if you dont get them put that person back in the cue to call again. No message.
• How to follow up with a call you have contacted
  • Ask to speak with the person.
• Always have a reason for calling, this allows you to call more often and not be a pest
  • Wanting to catch up
  • You saw they were in a paper
  • You saw something them might be interested in
  • They kids birthday
  • Their team won
• It is okay to leave a message for someone you call every month or so, but email is just as good. Call people you have spoken with and have a good understanding of their business every quarter or two.
• Always ask for a referral,
• IF YOU GET NO ask them what you should have said to get a yes. Be honest and say you just starting to cold call and you want to get feedback.
• One key to selling is just like telling a joke. You have to wait for people to respond. Don’t overload them and keep talking. Know when to stop and shut up and let them make up their mind and give you a response. If not you will sell you way out of a sale.
• Good luck

Software as a Solution (SaaS) is in my mind the end of an era and the beginning of a new generation. This is not just my thinking it is way the software industry has turned. Just think in 5 years you wont buy computer software at Best Buy, or your local store, it will all be served over the Internet. You wont have to pay for software in lump sums, but pay on usage based scenarios, if you choose. Computers will not be storing data, but rather just pizza boxes where you can retrieve your data from your cloud server. The days of businesses having to buy software with huge upfront outlays, worry about storing data on their servers, and having system admins to install new employees computers with needed software, is all long gone. There is a day not to far away when you buy a computer and all you have to do is boot it up to have all of your programs, and data on that machine. Your browser will allow you to access all of your programs and data.

I have long felt this way about software, and love the saas model of delivering it. I am a huge fan of 37signals for their use of this model, and Salesforce.com as well. These guys get it, and now I will be taking on a job working for another great company who gets it. I will be joining the Pardot sales team on Monday. These guys get it, they have a great product which I am very excited to be behind. I will be selling solutions for businesses to help them with marketing automation so they can better utilize their sales efforts, and marketing programs. I have long talked about sales, marketing and startup technology and this job is going to allow me to dive into all of those area, and really use a lot of my skills. SaaS is the future for most businesses, and now I will bet apart of the next evolution in B2B software and very excited about it. So look for some more posts to come out about selling in the SaaS space, and some best practices as well.

The golden rule of marketing on twitter: Tweet at others how you would want them to tweet at you.

I was taught the “Golden Rule” in Sunday school as a kid and it is the basics of marketing on twitter. People who get what Twitter is, are using it to find out and engage in conversations about things they enjoy, and not just to hear noise. Such as myself, I use twitter to follow others in the marketing space, and the startup community. I want to see them talk about these topics, and not about what they are eating for lunch. Just the same they don’t want to hear me talk about my turkey sandwich, because it adds nothing relevant to the conversation about these topics.

• Treat others with respect by tweeting things relevant to why they are following you

This is the key to building a strong following, segmenting and delivering relevant content to that segment. Find your audience, and them give them what they want. This is a strategy, and how Twitter should be used.

The future of twitter is going to be very segmented, people will have multiple accounts. One for their personal tweets, one for the office tweets, and one for their side projects and hobbies. This is segmenting, and creating a relevant story to the target audience. It is the basics of marketing just applied to Twitter. So remember have a goal of what you want to get out of twitter, and use it for that. If you have multiple goals set up multiple accounts, and make sure to stay on topic with your tweets.

This graph (from venturbeat) shows the use of twitter among other forms of social networks. The idea of Twitter is: if you can say it in 140 characters you can tweet it across the world, and people will listen, and they do as shown by the graph above. So people are using Twitter but not necessarily correctly nor getting the most out of it. There are different ways to use Twitter and here we are going into how to use Twitter for  Corporate use, and how to use Twitter for personal use. The general point is Twitter is a very specific tool and you need to stay on topic, and reduce your noise to get the most out of this tool.

Corporate accounts:

1. Separate Accounts: Now you can brand your company with a twitter account. Start an account for your CEO, your Company and one for your companies central purpose. Brand your CEO as hip, cool, and someone to know. Brand your company as the best in your field, and then brand your companies central purpose. The key is to separate them out so that they are always on topic and can build following’s around those accounts.
   • Example: Home Depot could have a do it your self Twitter account, talking about how to install showers. A Home Depot Corporate account keeping up with the companies performance, store events, deals, coupons and the like, and a HomeDepot CEO account giving the company a real face in the virtual world. (They currently have @homedepot as a corporate account) If I am a management consultant I would want to follow the Homedepot CEO, but not the Homedepot “do it yourself” account, and like wise if I was a do-it-yourself guy.
2. Customer Service account: Find out when your customers are not happy in real time, then reach out and help them in real time. Great example is @ComcastCares. Use TweetDeck and set up a search for terms such as your corporate name, keywords, and topics. Make sure the account is branded and used just for Customer Service.
3. Sales/SEO Account: Search for key words and find people having problems that your products solve. Comcast does a good job on this one waiting for consumers to talk about them then responding very quickly. Amazing way to market, reach people when they are in need, for your product or service and help them. DONT SPAM THEM or URL bomb them. Use this account to drive traffic. Check out namecheap does to drive traffic from their twitter campaign.

Personal accounts:

1. Pick a topic: Pick a topic and stay on point, NOISE is bad. Remember nobody cares that your cat is coughing up a hair ball (unless its your cats twitter account), but they might care that your latest project hit a snag and your amazing coding skills solved it in a flash. Use different accounts for different reasons. GIThub is a good example, @Github is corporate account where Chirs Wanstrath talks about coding and his business but @defunkt is Chris’s personal account where he explains the exploits of his personal life.
2. Stay on point: Stay on point and talk about what your good at, and help others with those problems. Use TweetDeck groups, and search to find others in your area and make yourself well know as a resource. The key is to talk about it, after you have found out your expertise make sure you talk about it. Get jobs just by talking about stuff your good at.
3. Find others like yourself: Use the search features to find and connect with others who have similar interest. Understand #hastags and how to use them to do more effective searches. Use groups to seperate your followers into specific people who you care about what they say.
   • Example: If your topic is marketing you can have a SEO group, a work group, client group, etc.

In short you need to be using twitter and understanding what it is and how to use it correctly. Your company should have a profile, you should have a profile (if not multiple) and you should be using it to its full extent. Follow me on twitter and watch me talk about marketing, and the startup community @msweezey.

Your thinking with all that free time I could, wash the car, go to Hawaii, hike K2, or swim across the Atlantic. You can do what ever you want with that time, and I want to work. Crazy, I know. If I am not working for someone, I am working for myself, or working on my house, or working to come up with something to work on. Its called ADD, and yes I have it too. Why is “Work” such a 4 letter word. I was raised on a farm with a father who was a shop teacher. Work is what I was taught to love as a kid, because I had no other options. If you were not working in a shop, you were working outside, or working on some way to get out of work to go have some fun. Either way your always “Working” and it is not bad.

Here is my idea, first off what he calls “Work” are things he doesn’t want to do. So I really have no idea how much time he puts into his business. I love to work on my businesses and if that is not “work” because I love it then I guess I only “work” 1 hour a week. But really, I have to say I get depressed if I am not working all the time. Don’t take this to literally I also love to sit my ass on the couch and watch TV, when I am done working. Granted I love to do things other than work, and I have a life. But the fact is I am built to be an over achiever, I feel like I am wasting life if I am not working to better, myself, my business, or the life I have.

So if I was only working 2 hours a month, I would just solve that by starting another business, or finding someone else to work for, and then go back to working the normal 80 hours a week. Oh and those of you who are married, with children who are reading this it is obvious I am neither. My views on time might change when those days come. Lastly Jason Ho said, “Check out my new product” which means he works 2 hours a month on ClockSpot and then puts in 80 more on his other ideas. So if you want to make it learn 80 hours is the norm, and love what you do, or you whole life will be “Work” in theh 4 letter sense.

What is a Mentor? Simple someone who knows more than you who you earnestly want to learn from.

How to get one? Ask!

• And not just an email. Email is impersonal and will get over looked, remember you are asking someone to give time, which is very expensive to give up. Email will get you pushed aside and not looked at again.

How to Ask? This is where it gets complicated. This is where asking has to be more than just an email, and persistence. Lumpy Mail is the best way!

My tactics: Lumpy Mail (once again). I will research who I want to learn from, then research who they are and what they like. Then I will send them a lumpy mail packet made just for them. Lumpy mail must be made for that person, and tailored to your objectives. It is a marketing packet for you and your mentoring program.You can read my other posts about how to do a lumpy mail marketing packet.

• Remember you have to sell them on mentoring you. Why should they waste their time to help you out? Lumpy mail answers that with “WOW, this person is serious about having me teach them, and they respect me so much to go out of their way to do this amazing thing to get my attention”.

Some examples:

• When I wanted to learn about Real Estate Development the lumpy mail package I sent was a contractors box, with a engraved brick and a packet of what I wanted to learn.( The brick still sits in his office)
• When I wanted to learn about starting my own business I sent Michael Kogan of Definition 6 a lumpy mail titled “Can I pick your brain”. The box was filled with tons of little squishy brains.( Got a call back that week)
• For startup mentoring I sent Scott Burkett a “Mission Impossible” lumpy mail (because he was in the ARMY). (He still tells this story when he gives presentations)

What to ask? This is key, when you want to learn, you have to know what you want to learn. This seems stupid, but if you ask somebody to give time to help you, you better know what you want to learn from them. If not your just a star struck kiss ass with no idea why you need help from them other than they are “famous” and your hoping to leach off of their success. They will see this and not help you. If you want help you have to really care, know what you want to learn, and make them see that you are worth the time it will take.

• Create a time line, (Usually 7 months, we meet once a month) and make sure they have the topic before we meet so they can prepare what we are going to talk about. Let them know meetings will be 1 hour long (usually last much longer but just because discussions get so engaged). Suggest a lunch time, and a local place where they can meet you at.

• Create a curriculum (i’ll send it to you if you ask) of what I want to learn. Break it into 7 bite sized meetings, with topic headings and then 7-10 questions in each meeting to cover. Do your home work, and if you can answer the questions on your own don’t ask them. You”ll be wasting your time with your mentor.Make sure to send this to them with an explanation that this is what you want to learn from them. This shows forethought and is very impressive.

Getting a Mentor is something everyone should do. NO matter what age, and job experience you can always learn more. If you think you know it all, God save you because your going to get passed by someone younger smarter and eager to learn and do more.

Good luck and read my other posts on Mentors and Lumpy Mail for more information.