What If Nobody Cares About Your Company?

A friend of mine relayed a story about how she worked at a number of enterprise software giants over an 8 year period and used the same company presentation at each company, the only thing that changed was the logo.

Presentation went something like this:-

1. Company size - Photo of head office and probably mission statement
2. The slide with the graph that goes up - Revenue? Profits? Floor Space?
3. The "number one / market leader slide" or certainly the market positioning
4. Organisation chart
5. List of Products or where we think our products will help you.

All of these things have one thing in common, they are all self congratulatory, inward looking and all about the you.

Now, if I met you for a beer one night and talked by myself all night, I doubt you would meet me for a beer again. Assuming you didn't talk about yourself all night :) I would hope we would have a conversation. Yes?

The Website Test

Starting a business 7 months ago I have been researching companies via the web and have come to the conclusion that pretty much all websites are the same or have the same layout.

So take the test! - Go to any website and imagine it had your logo on it, could you pass it off as your website? Let me know in the comments below.

Sales Transformation

"You never get a second chance to make a first impression!"

So what can we do as sales and marketers to make sure that we are equipped so that our meetings with clients are insightful, dare I say educational and get us the next action?

First Meeting Excellence

At a previous company we created a program of first meeting excellence where sales people were suggested they drop the power points and they used a "whiteboard" and storytelling technique. This enabled the salesperson to stand out, but also offer insight and complete a discovery all at the same time.

In most situations we are selling transformation and we found this method created a far better way to show a customer journey in the project rather than power points.

Tip: Make sure you certify salespeople with this method. It's amazing how many people have got "lazy" giving the same old, same old and thinking it will do.

What are your Unique Selling Points (USP)?

First thing about USPs is that they need to be unique, there is no such thing as being "almost unique". It's binary, it is or it isn't.

Everybody in your company should be able to explain your USPs, why are you different? All too often we can become part of "internal group think" and believe we are different when we are not.

Have we Done our Social Homework?

Before we go to any meeting, we need to have done our homework on social. Who is it that we are meeting? What is their background? What points of commonality do we have? Both cycle for charity etc.

We also need to check, are all the people that need to be invited to the meeting, have they been invited? Can we meet other people before or after our session?

LinkedIn gives us options for this, we can also check out people's networks on Twitter. With CEB stating that there are on average 6.8 people that are involved in any complex B2B sale, are we talking with at least 7 people in an account?

Have we researched and do we know who the changemakers / mobilisers are? (Again, Twitter is a good place for this.)

Social Homework (Advanced)

If you have access to a marketing automation tool, this should (I've only had experience of and trained sales people on Eloqua) then you can see who has been to your website and what whitepapers they may have downloaded.

In DLA we use Brandwatch and this is a great way of seeing who is engaging with your target company.

We also use Leadfeeder at DLA as another way of checking out, who's checking you out! - Leadfeeder uncovers companies visiting your site who didn't leave any contact detail.

These are just some of the ways we can "stand out" from all of the noise out there, if you have any suggestions for readers I would love to hear about them in the comments.

We are a Social Media Agency. We do three things: Social Media Strategy, Social Selling and Social Media Management. Drop us an email and let’s talk about how we can make an impact on your organisation. 

Want to know how to sell to the modern, connected buyer?

If you're interested in a blueprint to help you in your move to digital and social then I recommend my book. “Social Selling - Techniques to Influence Buyers and Changemakers”. Written in a workbook style, it's designed to help you implement a Social Selling strategy across Sales and Marketing. 

To order follow this link to Amazon there is also a Kindle, eBook version.

Still undecided, then follow the link and read the 5 star reviews!

About the Author

Tim Hughes is co-founder of Digital Leadership Associates a company that provides support and guidance in all areas of Social as well as Social Selling. He has been called "an innovator and pioneer" of Social Selling and in the recent Onalytica list of the most influential Social Sellers globally, Tim was named as number 1.

Tim can be contacted on Twitter @timothy_hughes where he has some 187,000 followers or [email protected] 

Digital Leadership Associates 

Digital Leadership Associates is an agency to help companies move to digital and social. Set up by Social Media guru and bestselling social media author, Adam Gray @agsocialmedia and myself. 

Digital Leadership Associates is a team of world-leading Social Media experts. We bring a breadth of experience honed by working with some of the world’s biggest brands to you, delivering a shortcut to your social journey. We help you to achieve your key business goals through three unique programs; Social Strategy definition and implementation, Social Selling training and mentoring and Social Presence management. We will help you define a Social Media strategy and whole-business understanding of your social vision, we equip your sales team with the tools and knowledge to become skilled at Social Selling and we offer deliver partial/whole management of your social presence. 

DLA provides advice and guidance to companies, given by actual Social practitioners, that is people with actual experience in social media, social and digital transformations.  Check out our website or contact me at [email protected]