?? “Selling with a noble purpose: How to drive revenue and do work that makes you proud” by Lisa Earle McLeod.

Do you have a noble purpose or do you just sell stuff? I should start by saying I absolutely loved this book because it addresses the very important topic of having a purpose from the perspective of goods and services companies. It provides very practical tools and ideas to be applied with sales teams, it’s almost like a manual for sales leaders but in a non-traditional way, instead, through a really innovative approach.

The concept of working with a noble purpose has several important elements that are addressed in the book, but today I want to focus on one: ??Impact. The author invites us to articulate the goals and needs of our users (no matter what industry we work in), with our products and services in a meaningful way that generates a positive impact on those users.

Lisa invites us to put profit into perspective by placing a Noble Purpose at the heart of the operation; that way all the key areas (people, processes, products, promotion and profit) are balanced, and profit is used more as a measurement of well we are performing against that noble purpose.

“Noble purpose does not eliminate sales targets: it puts them in context. They are the result of the impact you have on customers”.

Lisa says that the questions leaders ask their salespeople become the questions salespeople ask their customers. Sales teams should fully understand five critical categories of customer information:

1?? Customer environment: What’s going on inside their organization and their market?

2?? Customer goals: What are they trying to accomplish?

3?? Customer challenges: What are the business challenges they face internally and externally?

4?? What does success look like for the customer?

5?? What does luck of success look like for the customer?

There is a question at the heart of this selling with Noble Purpose approach that leaders should ask their teams permanently, in every conversation or coaching session, in every meeting where users are discussed, in every one on one:

How is this customer going to improve as a result of working with us? In other words, how are we going to impact their growth?

I found it to be a very powerful question because it guides all the teams' actions, not only to satisfy the needs of potential clients, but also to help them improve and move forward. There is a mission or noble cause focused on that path of helping others.

There is serious data supporting the idea that focusing on improving people’s lives and having a clear noble purpose drives more growth and profits than focusing solely on making more money.

I’d like to end this article with one of my favorite quotes: “Having a Noble Purpose requires you to link the customer’s goals and your solution in more meaningful ways. It requires a clear articulation of the impact you have on the customer”.

A great book. Super recommended!