Thank You Customers! 7 Lessons I learned by listening to you

One morning, after months of repetition practicing my sales pitch and having countless live customer conversations, I woke up laughing hysterically. I had delivered my pitch in a dream. Like most sales people, I was trained to perfect this pitch, leaving no stone unturned, covering all angles to the point where only the most stubborn audience would not find value. At that point I was convinced that nobody could resist this effective persuasion that I had been taught. My hard work had paid off. I had made it as a salesperson.

I was wrong. After I gained more experience through repetition, my canned delivery became increasingly monotonous. The results were Ok, but Ok is like everyone else. It just meant my company had a great product that solves a problem or two. These customers would have bought from an automated system, and when I first started, that’s exactly what I was: An automated order taker. My customers wanted a better sales experience, and I wanted to learn how to deliver just that. In order to learn, I decided to cut the crap, shut-up, and listen. What I found by listening to my customers was an education in sales that could never be taught in a classroom. What I learned from my customers cannot be trained.

The more I took myself out of the equation and adopted a customer first mentality, the longer engagements became at every level of the cycle. Longer engagements gave more opportunity to build credibility and rapport. This allowed me to dig deeper, uncovering stones that may lead to value building, problem solving conversations. These conversations led to my professional growth. A static pitch deck is not going to evolve with customers building advanced modern applications. I learned something new with each meeting. And I learned to adapt. These experiences have been invaluable to help me assist in the growth of my customers, my company, and ultimately myself.

With that, after almost 3 years as a sales rep here, it is my responsibility and pleasure to recognize the contribution my direct customers have made to my personal and professional growth. I would like to thank the customers we have humbly earned as loyal partners. I can only hope our time together was an inkling as valuable for you as it was for me. I am so grateful to you all for speaking up when your experience was positive or negative. Your candor helped me understand the art of listening in order to deliver valuable, relevant conversations at the proper moments. I personally gained individual mentors, a lifelong network, and lifelong friends.

Here are 7 lessons I learned as a direct result from engaging with customers over the last few years:

1.    Cut the crap.

Customers don’t need to hear a Power Point presentation meant to cover all the nuts and bolts. Most of that deck doesn’t apply to each individual’s need. Some of these decks are made for a high-level decision maker, aligning company visions and business goals. That’s great! You need to have those conversations in every sales cycle (eventually). That’s not going to apply to the people that are going to help you get to those executives most of the time. People need a strong reason to put their name on the line to provide that intro if necessary. Explore their personal value (ref. @Visualize - Inc) to find individual motivations for going to bat for you when you can’t be there. You won’t uncover this in a power point deck.

Have a conversation and find out what’s relevant before wasting anyone's time. Engaging with a back and forth discussion, uncovering problems, and then covering specific parts of a deck that may apply will build credibility. Credibility allows a sales person to be prescriptive later on in the cycle. That back and forth engagement will also keep the customer interested. All too often, especially on a phone call, sales people go on long rants while the customer is on the other end catching up on email. You may as well be pitching to a brick wall. After several of these meetings turn into lost Opps from no momentum, you’ll want to put that brick wall to good use and bang your head against it.

2.   Learn to Shut-up

Listen! @HubSpot is a great resource for customer prospective sales statistics.

69% of buyers interviewed in the article Creating a Positive Sales Experience said their sales experience can be improved quite simply by the sales rep listening to their needs.

When we, as sales reps, talk more, we risk complicating what is likely a simple scenario where the buyer has reasonable needs/demands. Simplicity is the key to brilliance (and give reps more of their single most valuable asset: time). With that, there’s nothing more to say here on this topic.

3.   Customers don’t want to be sold

Persuasion is a form of coercion; nobody wants to feel forced or pressured. Customers will make their own decisions on their own timeline. Sales organizations need to be able to scale their sales force by enabling reps with repeatable models that outline a path to consistent success. What can’t be taught in sales orgs is deviation. The customer doesn’t care for universal language that applies to everyone as this shows a disingenuous attitude towards actual needs. It’s insulting to their acute analytical process of making buying decisions.

I had a contact at an Org in Albany, NY who repeatedly said,

Just show me a demo.

I could hear the gut wrenching agony in his voice. Another sales pitch. He didn’t want to hear it. He wanted the facts. I was trained to push back; be a challenger (ref. @Brent Adamson co-author of The Challenger Sale). I asked him, “If we don’t have a back and forth conversation, how do I know what’s relevant to show you in the demo? I don’t want to waste your time.” He told me he can glean what is and what isn’t relevant, and if we go down the wrong path, he will simply tell us to move on. Against my will, we gave the customer what he wanted.

Because we treated him differently than any other sales rep, he introduced us to all the stakeholders. Before each meeting he would call me for a quick pep talk. “Lanny, just remember - no sales talk.” I could hear his smile through the phone. He asked us to introduce him to a partner of ours and told me to ask them to give them the “black and white only.” I did just that, but 25 minutes into a slick, fast-talking sales pitch, he cut them off and said they had heard enough to make a decision. Candidly, our Albany friend called me and said he would give me another chance, but I had lost a little credibility for not being able to choose the right partner that could deliver the message they wanted to hear.

Finally, at the end of the sales cycle, we’re meeting with the CIO and CFO for the final finance discussion. Sure enough I got a call 5 minutes before this important meeting. “Lanny,” (I interrupted). “I know, I know,” I said, “Give it to them straight.” He laughed and we went ahead to close a 3 year deal that was the biggest TCV in mid-market company history. More importantly, our Albany friend became the best champion I have ever had as the main point of contact - he would pitch us everywhere internally, at conferences, to friends, etc… I basically didn’t have to do any more work on this account; he would do it for me. It was his way, and we conformed to the way he wanted us to deliver.

Notes:

Lose the tactics and influential language. Keep it factual, black and white, and relevant to how we solve specific customer problems, then shut-up. Customers sell themselves as highly intelligent, successful, and analytical individuals if your product truly solves their specific need.

4.   Step away from your own interests

Stow your selfish interests and personal goals in order not to let bias deter being prescriptive. The rewards will come later. Trust the law of reciprocity. Human nature takes over when you are selfless. Show genuine intent to help others without any expectation of future return. If you have a truly genuine, valuable, selfless offering, customers will go above and beyond for you in return without question.

Here are some of the benefits I have experienced only to realize later why it happened:

·     Introductions: With rapid shuffling from company to company these days, each customer engagement offers an opportunity to access their dense network if you treat them right.

·     Timing: Close a deal in the near future. If the timing is not right, tell the customer if that’s what you truly believe. They may come back whether it’s at this company or the next.

·     Gain respect: When you are respectful, customers respect you in return and look forward to the next conversation (i.e. they show up to meetings).

·     Gain credibility: Having the confidence to step out of your own interests will exude confidence in your offering.

·     Future employer or reference to an employer: Every customer engagement could be a future employer and/or colleague. Some of my colleagues are like family, so why not treat your customers as such if there’s that possibility?

·     Indispensability: A champion may take you anywhere he/she goes in their career for an endless revenue stream. You could have business on day 1 at any future job you land.

5.   Negotiate for a Win/Win

·     The entire sales cycle is a negotiation at every stage. We negotiate to borrow the time of a prospective client. We negotiate to get information. Every ask deserves something in return. Be prescriptive and creative with this. As an example, offer pricing early in the cycle - the earlier the better. It’s not worth anyone’s time if there is no current budget. The Org we speak with will appreciate getting pricing out in the open for multiple reasons; that’s the give. The ask would be for us get information on who makes the decision and what’s the decision process (ref. @Sales Meddic Group), as well as asking for time with that person who signs off. The customer will appreciate the diligence. Your internal team will appreciate the legwork building confidence their time will be spent on a well-qualified opportunity.

·     Don’t negotiate by starting high with the intent on ending the negotiation to meet in the middle on price. You convey a commoditized product with this type of strategy by taking the attention off the value. You likely went through a lengthy value building evaluation. Don’t ruin it in the end by creating doubts in the value. Don’t focus on price. Instead focus on absolute deal breakers for the customer (ref. Negotiation, Professor @Holly Schroth, Ph.D., UC Berkeley). Too often sales reps get hung up on price, which may be the last thing the customer was thinking about. Ask questions, get all items on the table, repeat responses, and confirm that there is nothing else to uncover (ref. @Jacco vanderKooij @Winning By Design)

6.   Don’t do anything unnatural

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Customers sense the desperation and that makes them nervous. Nervousness is the antithesis of confidence. In a sales engagement, if a customer gets nervous, they will back out of a deal right away. Months of work you have done building rapport, credibility, confidence, and trust has the potential to go out the window. In my business of SaaS sales, switching costs are low and a customer, with the snap of their fingers, can go to a competitor if they get a bad feeling about the deal. Remember, their job could be on the line by making a bad vendor decision. You are a stalwart for your prospects/customers; remain a bastion of tranquility and service; don't risk losing a deal by pushing your own agenda!

At one point in my career, the holidays were coming. I wanted to buy some nice things for my daughter and make it a special Christmas so I posted a financial goal on my desk to look at everyday. Come November, things were not looking good. I didn’t have any contracts in procurement. I got desperate and started offering discounts to prospects if they would speed up the process. I lost all respect and credibility. Not only did I have the worst quarter of my career that Q4, I lost those would be customers for Q1 and had to scramble into mega prospecting mode to add more pipeline.

I still had a special Christmas with my daughter. Goals are great to have but what I learned is that short-term financial goals made me do unnatural things and put myself before the customer. Long-term financial goals are healthier in my opinion, because it’s more of a mechanism to generate pipeline looking far ahead and has less influence on grinding out a short-term sales cycle.

7.   A healthy relationship is built on unwavering trust

We had the opportunity to be the first evaluation in a three vendor competitive situation with a 2016 @Fortune Magazine top 25 fastest growing company. Early on, I recognized a gap that we have as a developing product in a start-up environment. Not all products are meant for all people. We were getting there but we were in beta and 6 to 12 months out of fulfilling most of their needs. I informed my contact there that we may have a work around, but it will take several hours of work on both sides. We were willing to do the work. This Org was a great, important logo for my company's quest to be brand name. We did some mock-ups and spent a lot of time on the evaluation focusing on not burdening the customer to spend much time, which proved our work ethic. My technical counterpart, @Zachary Quiring, was attentive to their every need. We were consistent, followed through on our word, and did not over-promise as we were honest with the timing of our shortfalls. During this evaluation, I confidently told them our competitor can do this and I can help you evaluate them when the time comes. If I’m going to be a thought-leader in this industry, I cannot let bias enter the equation. He appreciated that.

What happened really was astonishing. What our champion said in the end (after delivering some conditions that needed to be met) was that in his 8 years in this industry, he has never experienced so much attention, consistency, and follow-through in a pre-sale evaluation period. “If this is the way your company does business, I don’t need to waste my time evaluating any other vendors.” He wanted the attention and relationship; all else would fall into place in his eyes. I confirmed we would deliver on our promises. Even after this account grew rapidly to the point that I had to pass off to another rep, I would check-in periodically with our champion to be sure everything we said that would happen is still happening. We became a true partner. Later, his exact words to us were,

I will take you with me wherever I go.

Some important notes to think about here:

·     Consistency: Deliver the same message throughout each engagement. Be honest.

·     Follow- up and follow-through: Do things you say you will do diligently as a loyal partner. Punctuality is important. Taking notes and recapping in an email is showing an attentive relationship.

·     Promises: Never break them. Over-promising and under-delivering may be the worst thing you can do in a sale. Don’t be afraid to say, “we can’t do that.” Ask if it’s a deal breaker. If so, there still may be a workaround. If not, then there wasn’t a fit anyway.

·     Fail fast: Qualify out sooner rather than later. You will be appreciated in more ways than you know – relationships will still progress.

·     Bridges: Never burn them. You never know when it may need to be used.

·     Greed: The root of all evil (Don’t do anything unnatural)

·     Integrity: The antidote to self-interest. A foundation of integrity is a building block to success. When you are unsure, always fall back on your strongest values that have built your character over the years.

Conclusion

These lessons I learned from my customers are invaluable. You can’t script real life lessons from industry professionals. I thought I had made it when I memorized a pitch deck. I’ve realized looking back today that experience trumps all, as long as I can retain what I learned and always execute with a customer first mindset.   

The last piece of advice from my lessons learned is to always be on. While riding in an elevator to a meeting in NYC, I elevator pitched a CTO/Founder of a top target in the same building (A true elevator pitch!). He told me who he was when we arrived at his floor and asked me to email him. This turned into an intro to his DevOps team, and we began our evaluation. I followed my lessons learned, went through a few meetings over a couple weeks but the timing was off. However, this turned into an introduction to the Vp of Engineering at a DIFFERENT Org. Wow, all of that for an intro to another company! Well, it went a long way. The deal size we closed at the referred Org was very healthy, but most importantly, that Vp became a friend and a mentor who I text with on a frequent personal basis. You never know what all of this effort will get you but the network is a beautiful thing. Keep the integrity, always keep it about customer's best interest, and always be on.

Thank you again to all the customers I have worked with and grown along side! I hope I can work with you all again in the next phases of my career.

Special thanks to @Zachary Quiring for his technical partnership and @Bret Williams for his support