The Power Of Marginal Gains To Win Sales

Understanding The Power Of 'Why' & The Impact Of Your Personal Brand

Have you considered what would happen if you got 1% better at everything you do in your life – what kind of life would you have, what experiences would you enjoy more, what would you accomplish that you’re not achieving now?

In 2012, Dave Brailsford, the then performance director for British Cycling, brought to our attention the process of marginal gains – “The whole principle came from the idea that if you broke down everything you can think of that goes into riding a bike and then improved it by 1%, you will get a significant increase when you put them all together”.  

As of 2018, a British cyclist has won 6 out of the last Tour de France races!

Applying The Marginal Gains Effect To How You Sell

How effective are your salespeople at prospecting, how about following up potential clients and business proposals? When they arrive for a sales meeting, are they always on top form or does their motivation and inspiration waiver on occasions?

For every aspect of your sales process, behaviour or attitude that doesn’t work as efficiently as it could, you reduce your potential for success. But imagine, for a moment – what if you could make a 1% improvement to each of these traits and then you added all those marginal gains together – how much impact would you make on the achievement of your sales goals?

“Success is about doing all of the simple things, extraordinarily well” 

In this article, we’re going to take a look at two specific areas of sales competance: 'Understanding Why' and 'The Impact Of Your Personal Brand'. 

Marginal Gain Number 1 - Understanding Why

What is your own personal values statement or your company’s mission - does either one actually exist in your business at all? It’s easy to be somewhat dismissive of Mission Statements, after all most sit on the office walls of company directors and are rarely seen, let alone experienced, by the company's employees.

What if, prior to every sales meeting, a salesperson stopped for a moment to reflect on why he/she does what they do – their purpose, the value they add to a prospective client?

Equally, what if they better understood your customer’s why – their higher goals and ambitions, the things that often keep them awake a night? Would that salesperson simply present your company's latest product or would a keener sense of purpose and values encourage them to work out how they can help your customer achieve their higher aims and in doing so, potentially secure a more profitable sale?

Marginal gain = Greater clarity of purpose will help your salespeople articulate your value proposition more clearly.

?Marginal Gain Number 2 -The Impact Of Your Personal Brand

A personal brand is made up of all the experiences and associations people make, whenever they encounter you. How you dress, walk, talk, the car you drive, how you present yourself, the way in which you respond to challenging situations. Almost every way in which you communicate verbally and non-verbally will provide others with an impression of who you are and what you represent. The same applies to your salespeople.

Here are 8 marginal gains to enhance a salesperson's personal brand.

One: Be authentic – work hard to be yourself. That sounds all wrong doesn’t it? However, from my experience, too many people arrive at sales meetings trying to make an impression and in the process they fail to come across as being authentic.

Two: Be consistent – Apple sells electronic devices, predominantly computers big and small. If tomorrow they started selling fruit and vegetables you’d be rightly confused – they would have suddenly delivered an inconsistent brand message.

People need to know what to expect each time they meet you. If you suddenly behave differently, this confuses your client. You must also follow through on your promises – if you agree to call the customer on Friday at 9:30am, then do so.

If you promote your personal or company brand online, then don’t simply post content one week and then nothing for the next 4 – be consistent. Consistently do the right things for the right reasons.

Three: Share Your Story - Why you do what you do and your background and credentials are important to your customer, especially if they are to trust you. On many an occasion, I have been asked by a client or prospect, how I ended up doing what I do for a living-where did it all begin?

Have an inspiring and authentic story prepared, so that, when required, you can share it to help build trust with your customer.

Four: Be Positive - Would people say that you are a glass half-empty or half-full kind of person? Customers like to deal with positive salespeople. Often, it’s a pleasure to sit down and talk to a positive salesperson, if only to avoid spending time with a negative work colleague.

Customers should look forward to your visit, because they know they’ll feel all the better for the experience. However, there are going to be days when you simply do not feel positive but remember, part of a strong personal brand is consistency.

If you don’t feel positive, then at least look it! Stand upright, put a smile on your face, make good, steady eye contact, give a firm (not too firm) handshake and listen attentively. These are all actions you can affect, no matter how you’re feeling at the time. 

Five: Position Your Expertise - Today, there are so many opportunities for you to promote your sales and industry expertise. Your personal brand reputation may be determined by the depth and breadth of your sector knowledge and also by how people experience your expertise.

Does your LinkedIn profile clearly demonstrate that you are an expert in your sector, do you regularly post articles or blogs, such as this one and do you comment on relevant discussions in online forums or groups?

Most industry sectors have recognised publications, both online and hardcopy. Have you reached out to them and asked them what kind of editorial content they are frequently looking for – most editors and journalists are desperate for interesting business content to share with their readers and subscribers.

Six: Be Visible - As mentioned above, it’s important that you maintain a top-of-mind presence with your prospects and customers and wider networks.  

Consider all the different ways you can maintain high levels of visibility with your ideal target audience. This could include being active on LinkedIn and other social media platforms, attending local networking events or national conventions and conferences. You might choose to send regular useful and impactful insights to prospects until they’re ready to make a decision or send similar information to your customers and add value to their businesses.

People often buy when they’re ready to and not when you’re ready to sell. Ensure that when they reach that buying moment that you are the supplier who’s top of their mind.

Seven: Have A Clear Value Proposition - A strong brand knows how to quickly and succinctly get across how its product, service or experience will positively impact on the lives of those who engage with that brand. If you attend a networking event or conference and someone comes up to you asks ‘What is it you do?’ Do you simply give them your job title, ‘I’m an account manager for XYZ company’ or do you reply ‘I help my customers make average annual savings of 30% a year’?

Your value proposition is how you make a difference, your job title is a label given to you by the company you work for.

Eight: Build Your Networks - Your personal brand’s ultimate success will come from the online and physical networks you build and engage with. Your networks include; prospects, existing customers, suppliers, external business partners, influencers (PR), internal colleagues and other team members, referrers.

How you engage with these networks tells them whether or not you care about them. Only when they know how much you care, will they care how much you know.

What Next?

Consider how you currently present your personal brand, in respect of the points I’ve included in this article. Where are there opportunities for you to make improvements?

Note the opportunities down and then create a plan to make small, incremental gains in each area. Implement your changes and in one month’s time, perhaps you’d like to come back to this post and share your story about the gains you’ve made and how these have impacted on winning new sales.

If you found my article useful then you might want to read Part 2 of The Power Of Marginal Gains To Win Sales, where I cover a further 2 elements of my marginal gains training, which are; How To Create A Customer Buying Persona and How To Build Resilience, to help to deal with those tough selling periods.  

#Selling #Sales #SalesTraining #MarginalGains #WinningBusiness

Many thanks for viewing my post and would you please share it with anyone you feel would benefit from the advice provided.

If you have any private questions on the subject matter you can connect with me on LinkedIn and send me a message, or else you’ll find my contact details on my LinkedIn profile (https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/stevephillipsocialselling/)

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