The Salesby5 Blog

Last evening I was reading some of Ed Wallace’s Business Relationships That Last where he spoke of Max the Cab Driver. Max would pick Ed up in a British taxi in immaculate shape with bottled water and an ear ready to listen to Ed’s life stories. He would remember the little details such as Ed’s newborn, so he would gently tap on the screen door to not wake the baby. After Ed’s first ride with Max, he hoped to book him for the next week. Unfortunately, Max was booked typically booked two to four weeks out. Max explained that the extra little efforts he made were the same ones that people do for their friends. This was how he turned “fares into friends.” What do you do to enhance your personal brand or your company’s offering that is a small extra to make your customers feel as if they are getting a friend’s bonus? How has it paid off for you? Share in the comments!

photo by Caro Wallis

1. It’s easier to give advice than take it. Usually the advice I give is also meant for me.

2. Focus is extremely underrated. The most successful people I know have the ability to focus and get things done.

3. Jobs, places, and things come and go. It’s the people we meet that make life special.

4. It’s my actions that define who I am, not who I say I am.

5. Learning to start my day over was one of the best lessons I ever learned.

6. Humility is the greatest trait I can have as a leader, partner, husband, friend, and father.

7. Having humility is easier said than done.

8. The more I try to learn from successful people the better my chance at success.

9. The only person who can decide if I’m having a good day or bad day is me.

10. The more teachable I am the more I know. The more I know the more I can help others. The more I can help others the better my life, and that’s why I try to remain teachable.

11. Work hard when it’s time to work, but go home when you’re supposed to go home.

It is September 4th of 2003. (I wrote blog posts on paper then). My wife and I were checking into a Disney resort in Florida with my 3 year old daughter and 1 year old son. I was scared of a tiny room that I had reserved and asked about an upgrade. It was going to be a $250 per night upgrade and I asked what was included. I was told “it is a little larger” with a small bedroom and an attached couch bed. I was having a hard time swallowing the $250.00 per night extra and mentioned this. Within a few seconds, the price dropped to $175.00 and I reluctantly said yes as I was told I could get the smaller cheaper room if I did not like it. I really wanted this to be fun, special and relaxing, right?

We get to the room to see what we got for the extra $175.00 and we had been completely undersold. We had a full suite with a fridge, kitchen, 2 full bathrooms and a full living room. It was 2.5 times the size.  The room had a porch which overlooked views of the giraffes and gazelles. I am pretty happy at this point and the family was too as we had friends coming in to visit us for the day and now had plenty of space.  But, there is more. The floor we were on had a giant living area, kitchen, bar, and two people at a desk who turned out to be concierges. I found that because we had the suite, we also had free dinner, drinks, South African wines, desserts, breakfast, snacks, lunch, French water, cokes, free tickets to events, free transportation and a person to take care of all of our needs as part of the suite.

I almost said no to the $175.00 as it provided only “a little larger room” and the real overt benefits were never mentioned. I wonder how many upgrades don’t get sold because of what comes with the room. Later, I went to thank the lady who booked the room. She had never seen it and others had not either, yet there was a whole floor of suites. They did not know what they were selling but viewed it as a tiny benefit. If you ever go to a Disney resort, ask about the upgrade, it may just be the best money spent.

Is there anything you are marketing, selling, advertising that you are not articulating the real value, the real experience. Real matters and your customers should not have to dig to find it.

photo by DJ Riel

Today, many of you may have experienced either a delay in the use of your Google services including Google Reader, GMail and other Google services (Google claims that only 14% of users were affected).  In case you were wondering, Google is updating from an older standard of networking to the shiny, new IPv6 for a better and faster user experience.

Around noon today, Google sent out a tweet that they were aware of the issue, working on a fix and they would be releasing more information soon.  Then, at 2:15 PM CDT, they released a blog post, explaining the problem with 5th grade simplicity, apologizing for the downtime as well as including the reason for the downtime.  It’s great to see a company as large as Google recognizing that people rely upon them heavily and communicating in simple terms that everyone can understand.  How do you feel they did with their communications?

Yesterday, we talked about the importance of purpose—the why—in your organization. It is equally important to have the right people. Passion is something of great value in the workplace, but you should hire people who are passionate about your purpose. Simon Sinek’s insights say that candidates can be highly qualified, but unless they believe in your why, they will not fit. When your people are asked if they like their job, they should say they love it. That will let you know whether or not you have the right people. Bruce Chizen, former CEO of Adobe Systems, says that we all know if we’ve made a mistake within the first month of hiring and to pull the trigger quick if it’s not right. Don’t be afraid to take the steps to get the right people in the right places. A team that lives your purpose and core values will be worth all the effort.

We know that cultivating and nurturing relationships is the best way to gain and maintain great clients. Jim Cecil, the “Father of Nurture Marketing,” and author of Nurturing Customer Relationships, tells us that our goal should be to get customers to call us first. Instead of cold calling and pushing consumers to buy, they call you when they are ready to purchase your products or services. 

The Nurture Selling Process is:
• the core engine for true one to one marketing
• more encompassing than simply “relationship marketing”
• a series of automated Action Plans that easily cultivate and nurture multiple personal one-to-one business relationships simultaneously
• designed to continually reinforce and enhance your top-of-mind presence
• a true Cure for the Common Cold Call

And the results are:
• Shorter selling cycle
• Reduce turnover
• Increase sales productivity
• Increase customer satisfaction

What would it to do the morale of your sales teams if you eliminated the cold call?  If you need help learning to nuture your customer relationships, join us at the Gazelles Sales and Marketing Conference!

The rules of marketing and PR have changed, according to David Meerman Scott, who has made it into the Marketing Sherpa Viral Hall of Fame twice, in 2006 and again in 2007. He shows us that the old ways of marketing and PR are outdated; you don’t obsess about being “on message,” break the bank with expensive advertising nor do you beg mainstream media to write about you. Instead, you tell your story directly to an interested market.

With all the tools we have to connect with one another—Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Plaxo, to name a few—it is much easier to reach an interested audience. These money and time saving tips are more relevant than ever. To learn more about David Meerman Scott, join us at the Gazelle’s Sales and Marketing Conference!

We are on the road back from Alpine, Texas. We spent a few days with great people and great surroundings. The great people I am talking about are the people that live there. From Steven at the Gage hotel, to the countless that wave you to cross the street instead of just driving through the intersection, to the waitresses at the Riata who wanted to know all about where we were from and what we did, these people made an impression on us. This is just a tiny glimpse into a small town with real heart. It is a great place to visit and those who live there seem to love it.

The key: These people are selling, and it feels like it is from their heart. The next time you do business with a restaurant, hotel or store, check the pulse of the culture and see if it feels real or fake.

I was talking to one of my best friends today. He sells insurance for a company that shuts off the phones during lunch and at 5pm (they stay there later). He said he got his biggest accounts ever due to answering the phone during lunch. Can you imagine shutting things down in sales during lunch and after 5pm? I freak out when there is a message on our answering system that has not been attended to in minutes.

I talked to three different people last week that had made a call regarding sales but had “not gotten a call back yet, so they were waiting.”  Other times, they had not gotten a “return e-mail.”

Here are a few tips on what not to do:

1. Don’t assume that people care. Hope they do, but facts can show you yes or no.
2. Don’t stop after the 8th phone call. End at 12 instead.
3. Don’t be afraid to let your prospects know that it is ok to say NO! I love to add that to my requests, as gives them an out or a reason to stay engaged!
4. Don’t think people care that you need lunch or are off at 5pm. We do! This is not like it used to be (except in West Texas) where you must eat lunch between 11:30am and 1:30pm due to restaurants closing.
5. Don’t think people will change and conform to your old ways. This is the new normal. You will hear about technology, you will think it does not apply to you, and you are right if you live on the Moon.

Recently we had a meeting with Alan Weinkrantz, Ryan Kelly and Steve Patti.  During our discussion, we were talking about how important it is for companies to live their brand on the inside of the organization before taking it to the public.  This ensures that everyone is on the same page as far as what’s being sold, what’s been promised and what the experience should feel like.  Steve put it into his words by saying that the gap the customer feels between the brand promise (what the customer expects) and the experience (what the customer actually receives) is what ends up affecting the perception of the brand.  The closer the brand promise and the brand experience are to one other, the better the client feels about having done business with the company and the more likely they are to return.  Conversely, the further the gap, the more damage is done to the brand.

Consider if you went to Wal-Mart (low prices) and you purchased an item, then later found that Target actually had lower prices.  What if you were to go to a Ritz-Carlton Hotel and not experience remarkable, world class service?  These experiences would clearly cause a disconnect between the brand promise and brand experience.

Have you had a similar experience or the complete opposite experience, where you expected less and got more?  Share with us in the comments.

photo by dustin