4 steps to mastering the virtual sell

COVID19 has accelerate how we live, work, do business and interact with each other. In fact, it has become the biggest accelerator of digital transformation for many organisations who had been struggling with the concept.

In reality, it is not just about digital transformation, it’s whole business transformation. We are in a more digital and dispersed world and, arguably, the human touch is more important than it ever has been. 

This is also true for how sales is evolving – We are moving into the era of social selling, remote engagement of customers and having to negotiate, convert and build business virtually. This is as important for sales managers, as it is for sales pros. If you are a sales manager, you can also read my related article here: 3 tips for remote sales managers here

Of course, our next normal will allow for face to face interactions, but many organisations are finding they can do more business remotely, as long as their customer facing teams are equipped with the new knowledge and skills they need to do it well. Companies as varied as McKinsey, Gucci, Twitter, Unilever and many more, are all gearing up to develop their teams to be more effective remotely – when interacting both internally and as customer facing professionals.

Those organisations successful in mastering virtual selling have one thing in common. They are focused on getting the new essentials skills in place that provide the strongest platform for success. This often means re-purposing existing sales skills as much developing new takes on communication, collaboration and remote management skills.

I call it Sales AHEAD - something I've been studying and working on with my colleague Anne Boisier-Fouche - you can see more here

We uncovered 4 essential sales skills emerging from high growth companies in 2020, that will help your teams sharpen their remote selling techniques:

1)    De-prioritise and focus on the highest value must-do’s

> Time compression is one of the biggest challenge for remote sales pros. 

Having maybe 15 or 30 minutes for a meeting means that messaging has to be compressed. Removing the noise and de-prioritising the ‘nice-to-do’s’ means that 1 or 2 key topics can be on the agenda – max with clearly defined objectives shared upfront and mutualised, high value outcomes understood. It’s more collaborative, efficient and move the sale to conversion quicker. 

It's a subtle mindset shift away from traditional Eisenhower time / task prioritisation into focusing more on removing what is not needed and considering instead EFFORT / IMPACT 4-box model (high to low on both Y & X axes) - Enabling a clearer view of relative effort effort required for maximum value (on the customer and on your business!)

2)    Planning and preparation is more demanding – Plan in the time.

> Make the time to prepare yourself for the meeting in terms of:

a) Agenda and presentation points (with or without slides) you need to get across

b) Practicing your communication and body language either as video meet or audio meet (Top tip! Record the practice session with a colleague role-playing the customer and share with your manager for self-critique, feedback and advice)

c) Ensuring the customer is comfortable with the agenda and are prepped with anything they need to bring to the meeting

d) Agreeing up front with the customer to use video (important for the human connection) and spend the first few minutes of the meeting with more informal discussion, prior to heading into your ‘must – do’s’ - this will further compress your time, so critical your agenda is tight and focused

e) Post-meeting: Ask your customer for feedback following the meeting in terms of agenda, approach, interaction and engagement. This will help you evolve you approach going forward

3)    Your communications skill-set needs to sharpen for remote impact

> Be focused on tightening up your essentials skills such as:

a) Questioning for insight – creating your top 3 killer questions to extract meaningful data from your customer

b) Active listening as THE skill for remote selling

c) Voice – tone and pitch

d) Body language (if video meeting) – Eyes to the camera, remember to smile, use movement sparingly, demonstrate empathy (active listening + emotional intelligence and response on both informal and formal points)

4)    Lead the agenda and the customer through to a mutually agreeable outcome

> Building meeting-management skills are key to success in mastering the virtual sale. You are managing the environment, tech and human interaction and you need to be prepped well to do it and be in control of the meeting from start to finish (see point 2!). Including having a plan b.

To do this effectively, seek guidance from your line manager on supporting facilitation skills (particularly if you are in a group selling situation), time / agenda management and ways to create / communicate value which has the desired impact with the customer. This of course brings in existing skill-sets like defining features, advantages, benefits and creating statements that influence and convince your customers through compelling and personalised value.

In reality, in the virtual sales world, you have more to manage that just the sell. So developing the habits to prepare yourself, re-tuning your skill-sets, leading the agenda and meeting-management, become your ‘must-do’s’ for success. 

Connect with me to continue the discussion!