I’ve been talking a lot lately about the need for salespeople to be memorable.  Last week, I was reminded of a funny thing that happened several years ago. I was in a business networking meeting, and we got to the point in the meeting where referrals were passed around. It’s a group of professionals from different (non-competitive) industries who get together once a week to network and further each other’s business.

To protect the innocent, I’ll not mention any names – but the insurance salesman turned to the mortgage broker and said, “I have a lead for you. One of my customers wants to refinance his home. He bought it a year or so ago, but he thinks his credit situation has improved, so he wants to see if he can get a lower rate. He didn’t know any mortgage people, so I gave him your name. Here’s his information.”  Comedy ensued.

Mortgage broker takes one look and says, “Hey, this is my lead to you! I passed this guy to you six months ago.” Immediately, there were two embarrassed faces and twelve laughing ones around the table. Most of us were glad we weren’t the mortgage broker right then. Turns out, he had written the customer’s home loan.

How does this happen? Six months ago, the mortgage broker had a relationship with the customer – or at least he thought he did. Now, the customer doesn’t even remember him. Is it possible for someone to forget the person that helped them get a home that quickly? Well, yes. In fact – as has been demonstrated numerous times – it’s possible for a salesman to think that he has had a “great” appointment with a customer, and the customer to not even remember the salesman’s name the next day!

Here’s a test you can try on your own. Next week, have someone else call back all the new prospects you met with this week. They should say that they are calling from the research department of your company, and they would like their help in gauging your company’s selling effectiveness. Ask your prospects if they remember meeting with someone from your company. Ask them if they remember the person’s name that sold to them. Ask them if they can remember anything specific about the meeting.

If you’re really good at your job, the answers will probably look like this:

• About 75% will remember meeting with someone from your company.
• Less than 50% will remember your name.
• Less than 25% will remember anything specific or unique about the meeting.

Sound depressing? Well, it is, but it isn’t. Remember, I said those are the numbers if you’re really good. For most salespeople, your numbers will be a lot lower. When I did this with a company I worked for some years ago, a few reps were remembered less than 10% of the time! What’s more amazing is that some of these reps were still making quota.

If this suggests a major problem to you, you’re not alone. Think, for a moment, about the old phrase that “sales is a numbers game.” Well, yeah. It is, kind of. The real equation of sales is this:

(Quantity of activity) x (Quality of activity) = Results.

Let’s say that, of every 10 prospects you see, you close one. Your closing ratio is 10% – probably about average. But, if only 50% of your customers remember you after your first call, that’s a pool of five, so your closing ratio is actually 20% when a customer remembers you. Therein lies opportunity. Make more customers remember you, and you’ll win more sales.

So, how do you make your prospects remember you? Since memory is individual, it’s not going to be enough to have technical mastery of sales skills, presentation skills, or your own product. You must truly tune into your buyer – and get your buyer tuned in to you. Here are a few good ways to get started:

• If your product lends itself to a hands-on, user participation demonstration, do that – and make it more fun and interesting than anyone else’s. If it’s not a hands-on product, come up with some sort of a hands-on game or activity that will get your prospect physically involved.  People remember being participants far more than they remember being spectators.
• Ask questions that are so radically different than anyone else in the industry that your prospect has no choice but to stop and think before answering. That won’t be tough – most salespeople are genuinely lousy questioners.  Remember that the Investigation phase of the Buyer’s Journey is about helping the Buyer discover his or her true needs, and this requires deep and incisive questions.  People remember what they are ASKED more than they remember what they are TOLD.  The standard questions “what would you change about your current service if you could?” have gotten so routine that clients can answer them in their sleep.
• Simple respect for the Buyer’s Journey sets you apart.  For instance, respect the Buyer’s progression through the five steps and don’t just blast sales messages.
• Use technology in innovative ways.  For instance, if a plant tour would be helpful to your sales messaging, but it’s hard to get prospects to your plant, why not create an engaging video tour?

The number one way to get a prospect to remember you is simple.  Make the sales call an enjoyable experience.  Most sales calls are pretty neutral for the customer – the “great” meeting tends to come from us, not from the customers.  Whenever you have a “great” sales call, ask yourself if your customer would call it “great.”  If they wouldn’t, you shouldn’t.

You get the idea. To start out, do the exercise and count the people that remember you. That percentage is your “memory index.” Then start working on making yourself – and your company – memorable. Keep taking your memory index every three months. Don’t let yourself become forgettable.

“Do your customers like your business model?” is the most important question of 2024.  It’s always been the most important question, really, but too many business owners ignore it.  The reality is that many companies – and indeed, some entire industries – are built around sales models that their customers either grudgingly tolerate or actively dislike.  I’m going to tell you a story about an industry where this question was actively ignored, which led to that industry literally no longer existing in the 21^st century.  It’s long but worth the read, and then I’ll give you some guidelines to analyze your own sales model.

In 1993, I had a job as the Sales Director for a regional magazine and book wholesale distributor.  I got this job – which I probably was too young and inexperienced to deserve – because I was the newly minted son-in-law of the president of the company.  My business experience to that point had been in the hypercompetitive world of car sales. A more dog-eat-dog business is hard to find.  That’s why the dynamics of this industry were so foreign to me.

In 1993, when you picked up a magazine from the rack at your local grocery or mass merchandise store, it had been delivered on a route truck from a regional distributor like the one that employed me.  In the larger stores, the route driver had done the “put up,” meaning that he had taken down last month’s issue and put up this month’s issue, and removed the returned magazines for credit.  Smaller stores just received tote boxes of magazines, and a store employee did the put up.

There were over 300 of these regional distributors.  Here’s what got me.  There was no competition.  This industry worked on a huge network of informal “gentlemen’s agreements” to not intrude on each other’s territories. The only way to expand your reach was by buying another adjacent distributor – which we did twice in the three years I was employed.  Nearly all of these businesses were multi-generational family businesses, and by 1993, were run by people who had never experienced a highly competitive market.

We also grew by “fighting the shelf wars,” or working to expand publication space in stores.  That’s what I did.  And I was good at it.  I had a lot of fun, met some great people, and gained some experiences that stick with me to this day.

The regional distributors bought through national distributors who rarely distributed any physical product.  Most of the publications were shipped direct from the publisher.  But the national distributors took their cut.

There were a couple of other small national distributors who worked outside this system, but they distributed small-circulation magazines to bookstores.  They were also the primary book vendors to bookstores, and they just shipped direct to the bookstores.  They didn’t service mass merchandise retail.

In late 1993, I went to my first industry convention.  I met other distributors.  I met people from the largest retailers.  And I met people from the publishers.  There were a number of presentations, but the one that stands out to me was from a representative of a major publisher who excoriated the industry for its business model because it was inefficient, and didn’t meet the needs of either publishers or customers.  This, of course, just made people angry.  It should have been a warning shot.

Also, the largest retailers didn’t like our model and were talking about vendor consolidation for efficiency (it cost them quite a bit to manage 300 vendors).  This was pretty much ignored.

Most of the regional distribution people were very genteel and very content.  I did notice that there were two who seemed to be taking a different look at the industry. Not coincidentally, they controlled two of the largest regional distributors and had a lot of power in the marketplace.  I spent quite a bit of time talking to them. I was mildly reprimanded for this – these guys were somewhat considered outcasts in the business, and my father-in-law didn’t want me to get a bad reputation.

When we got home, my father-in-law asked me to create a white paper on my observations of the industry and its future.  I wrote a two-page report which can be summarized thusly:

“You are all nuts. This industry is ripe for the picking.  All it’s going to take is one person (and I predicted the two most likely) who’s ready to be a complete pariah in the business. He can go to one of three large retailers and offer to take over their whole national business, maybe giving them an extra percentage point or two.  They’ll jump on it.  Then, he’ll have trucks running into everyone’s back yard with one of the top customers as an anchor.  He can send out salespeople to take more accounts.  The distributors won’t be able to fight him off, because they don’t know how to compete anymore.  They’ll be forced to either close or sell, because their business models only work if they have all the accounts in their territories.  He’ll roll up the industry like a cheap window shade.”

“Alternatively – WE can be that pariah.  We’re already one of the top 20 distributors in the country. Put me on the road.  I can win one of the big three accounts, and then I’ll be the guy going and selling the regionals.  Yeah, people will be mad at us, but we will survive and thrive.  Others won’t.  And all this will happen in the next 3-5 years, guaranteed.”

Well, my father-in-law, and other family members, patted me on the head and told me that I just didn’t “get” their business quite yet, but I’d learn.  Two years later, I was divorced and out of there (no regrets).

At about the same time that I left that business, the distributor in Dallas – one of the two I had highlighted – signed a national contract with Wal-Mart.  The rest played out exactly like I had forecast.  Two years after that, my former in-laws sold the company to him for a small fraction of what it had been worth.  They still did well financially, but not nearly as well as if they’d sold in 1994.

So, the guy in Dallas is fat and happy today, right?  Wrong. He addressed the vendor consolidation issue on the part of the main retailers, but there were still inefficiencies in the supply chain.  You still had national distributors taking a cut without really adding value, the cost of all those trucks and employees sucked up margin dollars, and the publishers and customers still didn’t love the system – even with one main vendor.

Remember those small specialty distributors that shipped direct to bookstores?  One of them figured out that he could do the same thing, only with mass market retailers, and split the margin savings three ways – some to the publisher, some to the distributor, and some to the retailer.  Ten years after dominating the industry, the guy in Dallas found himself out of business.  And to this day, that’s how magazines get to the mass market.  An entire industry of regional wholesalers is GONE.

So what happened?

A bunch of people ignored their customers and now they’re out of business.

Every day, I talk to business owners who extol the virtues of their “business models” and their “sales processes” in terms of the benefit to the business.  However, many of them find it much harder to articulate the benefits of their business model to their CUSTOMERS.  I think they just assume that the customers don’t have a choice – that their customers will continue to have to buy from them.

I’m here to tell you that this isn’t so.  Remember that everything in my story happened before the Internet and before information became so readily accessible.

All it took was one disruptor – and then another.  Someone with the guts to step outside “the way we do it” and instead focus on “the way my customers want it to be done.”

As we roll into 2024, here are five questions that you should be asking yourself.

1. Do my customers enjoy the way I do business with them?
2. Does my sales process mirror and match my customers’ Buyer’s Journey?
3. Are my people communicating with my customers in the technological platforms that they need to?
4. What parts of my business model would my customers eliminate, if they could?
5. How is my business and/or industry ripe for disruption – and can I be the disruptor?

The pace of change is such that you should be periodically reviewing these questions at least every six months.

Do your customers like your business model?  If the answer is “no,” or “I’m not sure,” it’s time to make some changes.  Don’t be like the people who ran the magazine distribution industry.

If I can help, let’s talk.

Right now, most companies have already developed their sales forecast for 2024.  Many of them will be fatally flawed, because they only take into account changes in their own marketplace and offerings, but not changes in the sales profession itself.  That’s what I’m here to talk about today.  I’ve talked about the changes in selling. I’ve done a webinar on what I see as the top four trends in selling.  Now, I’m going to humble myself just a tad.

I don’t have all the answers.  I have most of them, and I’m learning more all the time, but I don’t have all of them.  What made me realize this was an experience I had a few days ago.  At the request of one of my clients, I put together a recommended prospecting blueprint for his new sales hires (and no, you can’t have it unless you’re a coaching client of mine).   That used to be an easy task.  It’s not anymore, because prospecting, like many aspects of our great profession, is something of a moving target right now, along with others.  What I’m about to tell you about sales in 2024 is done with the knowledge that I don’t have every answer – but anyone who tells you that they do is full of it.

Big Change #1:  Prospecting must evolve.  Prospecting used to be very linear.  You dialed the phone from a quality database X amount of times.  You would get a contact (a voice to voice conversation with your target decision maker) about 1/3 of those dials.  A good prospecting talk-track would get you an appointment on about 1/3 of your contacts.  So, you’re getting an appointment on about every 9^th dial. A salesperson can dial the phone about 20 times an hour, so an hour gets you 2-3 fresh appointments.  That was pretty nice.

Now, as I’ve noted before, the contact to dial ratio is about 1/8, and everything else flows from there.  Contact to appointment ratios are about ¼, which in my opinion is because people get so many messages that they are more skeptical.  Now you’re getting an appointment on every 30^th dial.  That means that we have to redefine and rethink prospecting in order to succeed, incorporating multiple channels of contact.  That’s the topic of my next Webinar.

Big Change #2:  Customers expect more.  Your customers are carpet-bombed with information every day, and they expect you to use information to make better use of their time.  Showing up, talking about football for 30 minutes, and walking out with an order is a thing of the past.  Your customers expect you to have expertise about your product or service and to use that expertise, coupled with knowledge of their situation acquired through your great questioning skills, to help them improve their condition.

Big Change #3:  Customers expect less.  Wait, WHAT?  I said what I said.  While customers expect more from you in your use of their time, they also expect less of some things.  Customers want less meaningless pressure, less of the old sales tactics, and fewer “donut calls” to just “check in.”  Those things are for YOU, not for them.  Customers are all about their own Buyer’s Journey, and if you don’t know what that is and how to make it work for you, customers will have less of you, and you’ll have less of their business.

Big Change #4:  Hiring is different.  If you’re a sales manager, you’re probably dealing with smaller candidate pools and less responsive candidates.  That’s a simple function of supply and demand.  While the supply of quality salespeople has decreased, the demand has remained constant – which means that you have to employ more competitive practices to hire good salespeople.  I can help with that through my Hiring Assistance programs.  Your hiring must be more marketing-centric than ever, you must be responsive to good applicants, and when you have good applicants, you still have to employ a quality hiring process to vet the candidates.

You might not be excited about all of these changes – prospecting, for instance, is much tougher and more challenging – but you should embrace them.  Salespeople that embrace them will quickly gain separation from their competitors.  And if your sales forecast for 2024 doesn’t take account of these changes, you might need to revise it.  Might I suggest a Sales Audit?

Now, what hasn’t changed?  Well, there are a few things.

Questioning remains the primary sales skill.  In my 33 years in the sales profession, the most important skill is to ask great, incisive questions that make the customer think.  In fact, I teach in my Elements of Sales training that 80% of your chance to win or lose the sale depends upon the questions you ask.  Still true.  In fact, great salespeople are constantly refining and learning.

In-person sales interaction remains king.  Much like Mark Twain, the rumors of the demise of in-person interaction (face to face sales calls, networking events, trade shows, and conventions) are greatly exaggerated.  Customers still like to see YOU.  Networking events and trade shows are still big.  Some, in fact, are even bigger than they were in 2020.  Keep a focus on generating face to face sales meetings.

You can still benefit your customers.  Most of what you sell can be bought without the intervention of a salesperson – but that doesn’t mean that it should.  Your role – if you are a good salesperson who is a student of your profession and your customers – is still viable.  In fact, it might be more viable than ever, given the amount of white noise that’s out there on the Internet.  Great salespeople help their customers solve their problems by separating the wheat from the chaff.  That can and should be you.

The Overall Outlook For the Sales Profession

The old saying was, “If you keep doing what you’ve always been doing, you’re going to keep getting what you’ve always gotten.”  That’s no longer true.  My sales forecast for 2024 is this:  Our profession is changing quickly enough that if you keep doing what you’ve always been doing, you’re going to get less than what you’ve always gotten.  In times of change, some companies go backwards and others go forwards.  Embracing the changes in selling, while honing your skills on those fundamentals that remain viable, is a way to gain more separation from your competitors than you’d have thought possible just a few years ago.

Now is a time to either win big or lose big.  I’ll be here to lead the way.  You’ll read about new developments as they come up.  As I learn, you’ll learn – and I’ll keep providing articles on my blog and videos on my YouTube channel to help.

And, if you’re the owner or manager of your company, maybe it’s time to take advantage of my complimentary Sales Strategy Review session.  Let’s have a great 2024, together.

Apparently, the old “How to overcome cold call reluctance” techniques are making their rounds again.  I’ve gotten three webinar solicitations in the last two weeks for webinars like these, and looking at the outlines, it’s the same old crap about managing rejection, stress handling techniques, and the like.  Those are great techniques for salespeople who are cold calling – in 1993.

What I’m about to say is a change in my own viewpoint, so if you attended one of my seminars on prospecting a year or more ago, don’t say, “Hey, wait a minute, that’s not what you said then!”  You’re right.  It’s not.  Sales is evolving, and we (I) have to evolve with it.  It’s time to redefine what cold-call prospecting really means – and along with that redefinition, we can realize that it might be even MORE important now.

There’s an old saying:  “If at first you don’t succeed, redefine success!”  Well – conventional cold-call prospecting still succeeds, but at a much lower numerical rate than in the past.  But maybe we can redefine it and modify it to help our numbers, and in so doing, help some of you overcome cold call reluctance.

30 years ago, the numbers looked like this.  If you were calling from a good database, not doing the “person who” call, and using a strong introduction, you would generally get a contact (speaking to the person you wanted to talk to) on about one of every three times you dialed the phone.  Then, if your introduction was strong, you’d get an appointment on one of every 2-3 contacts.  Hence, if you were doing it right, you’d get an appointment on one of every 6-9 dials.  That’s a pretty good number.  Most of the time, salespeople working from a good database could average 20 dials per hour, so an hour of focused cold calling got you 2-3 appointments.

Of course, there were other techniques like “schmoozing the secretary” that came into play for when you didn’t get a contact, or when you needed human help to get to your person.  Technology has pretty much made those techniques obsolete.

Now (in most B2B industries), you’re lucky if you get a contact on one of every ten dials.  From what I see, the contact to appointment ratio has dropped as well, but not as drastically – now it’s more like 4 contacts yield one appointment – most likely because one-size-fits-all messaging isn’t as effective.  What that means is that now, doing it the old way, it takes about two hours of focused cold calling to get one appointment.  That’s frustrating – and it feeds into cold call reluctance.  Nobody likes to fail – and these numbers mean that you’re failing 39 of 40 attempts, as opposed to 5 of 6 attempts 30 years ago.

HOWEVER – when I have done cold calling training with my clients, I’ve noticed a curious phenomenon.  When salespeople leave a strong voice mail (more on that in a minute), their LinkedIn profile views go up in the next couple of days.  Who’s viewing them?  You guessed it – some of the people that they tried to call.  That means that whatever they said to the prospect interested the prospect enough to check them out, even if they didn’t return the call (even 30 years ago, returned calls from voice mail ran about 10-20%, so that’s never been a strong lead generator).

That is a success.

The purpose of cold calling is simple.  We want to find people who could buy from us but don’t know we exist, and spark interest in them so that they might buy from us, now or in the future.  If prospects are interested enough in what you said that they type your name into LinkedIn and look you up, you have sparked at least some interest in them.  Next, of course, you should request a connection on LinkedIn (I outlined a LinkedIn strategy a couple of weeks ago).  The idea is to get on their radar screen, and stay there.  And, if you can pick up 3-4 new LinkedIn connections from an hour’s worth of prospecting, you’ve won.

In redefining prospecting, we need to think of creating awareness that you exist as someone who can solve problems for your customers.  The old cold calling strategy held that any call that didn’t result in an appointment was failure.  In fact, I used to teach that salespeople should make three attempts to reach a prospect by phone before leaving a voice mail.  That’s obsolete – the voice mail should now be considered a messaging medium, just like social media or LinkedIn, with the objective of creating awareness.

With that in mind, here’s my recommended new prospecting process:

1. Start with a good database. The data you begin with still matters.  You should have a database of targeted prospects using whatever demographics work for you.  I normally recommend searching by geography, type of business, and size of company.  If you know what they do, where they do it, and how many people they have to do it, you can usually get a good database.  This database should include contact names and titles.  Most quality databases do.
2. 3 minutes of research. Yes, I said research.  I used to recommend against this, because in the old “only an appointment is success” model, extensive research slowed down the process and cut into the number of quality dials.  Now?  Your message – whether delivered voice to voice in the case of a contact, or by voice mail if not – must be personalized.  It should speak directly to your prospect, his/her position, and the company’s anticipated needs.  2-3 minutes on their website and the person’s LinkedIn page should get you there.
3. Call. When you call, be prepared to deliver a great and short, impactful introduction about how you can help the prospect with a possible need that you spotted.  Remember – attention spans are short, and your introduction should be.  The numbers say that you might get a contact only 1/10 of the time, but you’d damn well better be prepared for that call.  Some industries will do much better than that 1/10, and if you’re there, that’s a good thing.
4. Leave a voice mail. Again, this is a departure from the past.  Leave a short, impactful voice mail about how you can help, with multiple ways of contact.  Invite your prospect to call, text, or look you up on LinkedIn.  Leaving an email address is fine IF it’s simple and comes across well in a message. Mine is troy@troyharrison.com, so that lends itself to a voice mail.  If yours has dots, dashes, and is complicated, you might want to skip this.  Remember, though, the first sentence must hit hard.  You want to capture interest before they hit the delete key.
5. Watch your LinkedIn views. As I said before, you’re likely to get LinkedIn views from those you prospect. When you do, reach out, connect, and take a long-play approach to messaging them.
6. If nothing happens, wait a couple of weeks and call again, varying your message.

Is it as immediately gratifying as the old, one appointment out of six dials, method?  Nope. But I don’t think those days are returning any time soon.  And this method still allows you to take control of your destiny, which is what cold-call prospecting is all about.

So, if you are experiencing cold call reluctance, think of it as spreading your message.  After all, that’s really what cold calling is all about, and always has been.  We just have a different path to motivating people into their Buyer’s Journey now.

When should you stop training your salespeople?

If you answered, “never,” you got the right answer. Training never stops.  Effective training for your salespeople should cover your products, your services, and sales technique, and it should be ongoing.  In fact, I recommend that you do at least a small training exercise at each weekly sales meeting (you ARE doing weekly sales meetings, aren’t you?).

That means that 52 times per year, your salespeople get some level of new knowledge and professional development.  Since “inadequate training” is cited as the reason about 70% of the time that salespeople change jobs, good training retains salespeople.  I think that the reason that sales managers don’t do much training is that the task seems daunting – to come up with new topics every week is seen as a significant demand on the manager’s time.

It doesn’t have to be.

Here’s an exercise that I have always found to be effective, and it’s simple.  For a given unit of time (say, 8-10 weeks at a time), each salesperson must come into the meeting with a NEW question that they have created.  This question should be one that customers and/or prospects can be asked on every sales call.  Notice that I said, “new.”  The point of this exercise is to get your salespeople to THINK about selling, and to think about new ways to get knowledge about your customers that could benefit them in making more sales and building better relationships.

In my opinion, about 80% of your chance to win or lose the sale is determined by the questions you ask – so if you’re asking more and better questions than your competition, you give yourself a big edge on outselling your competition.  Challenging your salespeople to be the ones to come up with new questions also involves them and engages them in their own training.

Here’s how this works.  On week 1, tell them that for the next (however many) weeks, your focus is going to be on becoming better questioners.  In fact, you are going to become the best questioners in your market.  Tell them to take five minutes and come up with one potentially-great question that they have never asked a customer.  After five minutes, they present their question to the group.  They should explain why they think it’s a good question and what they think they will accomplish by asking it.

During this time, you should instruct your team to suspend judgement on the questions – this is a criticism-free zone to try things out.  Once everyone has presented theirs, then everyone on the team must ask each question the following week at least once (preferably more), and then report back at the following sales meeting how well the questions worked.  Take a vote – the good questions become part of your boilerplate questioning structure (again, you do have one of those, right?), and the ineffective ones get discarded.  Then repeat the exercise, except that this time, they should already have a new question when they arrive at the meeting.

Do this for at least eight weeks, and your team’s effectiveness at questioning and discovery will go up significantly.  How significantly depends on their openness to new knowledge and their creativity in creating questions.  You can also take a vote each week on which question worked the best, and whoever came up with it gets some sort of a prize – a restaurant gift card, perhaps.

There are a few things to remember about this program to make it a success.

First – no matter how badly you want to – don’t supply your own questions or criticize theirs before the team puts them into real-life action.  For this program to succeed, they have to be the stars of the show (not you), and they have to be the ones that are taking the risks.  If you supply your own questions, then it’s just the boss ramming things down their throats.  Besides, given room to work, you’ll be amazed at the quality of questions they come up with.  As my friend and fellow trainer Ed Tate likes to say, “Often, the answers are already in the room.”  This is one of those times.

Second – make the emphasis be on NEW question creation, not a regurgitation of what’s already being done.  As soon as a salesperson says, “Here’s one I like to ask,” thank them for the contribution but tell them that you want them to dig into their heads and come up with something new.  Your salespeople are smart; this respects their intelligence and creativity.

Third – you should be doing ride-alongs as the program progresses to see that the new questions are really being asked in live sales calls.  This program only works if it’s being put into action, and not just discussed in meetings.  The whole idea is to improve their SELLING skills, not their MEETING skills.  So, as they say, inspect what you expect.

Fourth – be prepared to discard some questions that your salespeople used to ask in favor of newer and better ones.  In fact, this might be a topic for weeks 6-8.  “Since we have these new and more effective questions, what ones can we, or should we, jettison?”

If you do this, by the end of eight weeks, your team’s questioning skills will have gone up exponentially, which means that their sales will go up.  You should repeat this exercise at least once per year, to continually refine the questions and skills.  Besides, market conditions may dictate that questions get modified or discarded over time.

“Troy, all these gosh-darned younger buyers want to do is text!”  That’s a complaint I hear quite frequently when I speak at conventions.  And it’s true. Sales communication methods have undergone a significant transformation. The rise of younger, tech-savvy buyers is one of the Four Key Trends in selling – and it has brought about a preference for text messaging over traditional communication channels like calling or emailing. While this trend might pose challenges for some seasoned salespeople, selling by text messaging is a powerful tool can help you win new customers – and keep the ones you have.

Here’s the key to remember:  this trend isn’t going away.  The people who are moving into positions of buying authority came of age when they were marinated in technology, and communications technology in particular.  The rotary phone isn’t coming back.  Will some of these buyers be open to more traditional means of communication, such as incoming phone calls or even walk-in cold calls?  Perhaps, but that’s probably not the way to bet.  Sales is about meeting customers where they are – and where they are is in a place where your texting skills aren’t just an asset, they are mandatory.

The Shift Towards Text Messaging

As technology continues to shape how we communicate, the preferences of buyers are shifting, and sales professionals must adapt accordingly. Younger generations, raised in an era of instant messaging and social media, have developed a strong affinity for texting as a means of communication. It offers them a level of convenience, efficiency, and informality that traditional methods often lack. Sure, there’s the old joke about two people sitting next to each other on a couch, texting each other instead of talking – but texting is our reality.

Embracing the Change

For many seasoned salespeople, selling by text might seem daunting. I’ll be honest – I’m not the biggest fan of thumb typing, either.  However, the benefits of integrating text messaging into your sales approach are undeniable. Texting allows you to meet buyers where they are, respecting their communication preferences and building rapport on their terms. By embracing this change, you position yourself as a modern sales professional who is not only willing to adapt but also committed to providing exceptional customer experiences.  That perception is going to wrap itself around every aspect of your customer interactions.

When I get the question referenced in the opener of this article, my response is, “So, how good are you at writing a persuasive text?”  Most of the time, I get blank looks.  It doesn’t have to be this way.

The Art of Selling by Text

Crafting a persuasive text message requires finesse and strategy. Unlike longer emails or phone calls, texts demand concise communication that captures attention and drives engagement. Your texts need more “power per word.”  Here’s a roadmap to writing compelling text messages:

1. Know Your Audience: Just as in any sales interaction, understanding your audience is crucial. Research your prospect’s needs, pain points, and preferences to tailor your message accordingly.
2. Personalization: Start with a personalized greeting to show you value the individual you’re reaching out to. Reference past interactions or shared interests to establish a connection – but again, do it CONCISELY.
3. Get to the Point: Text messages have limited space, so cut to the chase. State the purpose of your message upfront, whether it’s introducing a new product, requesting an appointment, addressing a customer need, or offering a solution.
4. Highlight Value: Clearly articulate the value proposition of your offer. Explain how it can solve a problem, enhance efficiency, or fulfill a need. Keep the benefits concise and compelling.
5. Engage with Questions: Engage the recipient by asking open-ended questions related to their needs. Encourage them to share their thoughts, challenges, or goals, fostering a two-way conversation.  Once you get a two-way conversation going, you can request an appointment.
6. Concise Language: Use concise and direct language, avoiding jargon or unnecessary filler words. Each word should contribute to the message’s impact.
7. Embrace the Informal Tone: Text messages are inherently more informal than emails or calls. While maintaining professionalism, feel free to adopt a slightly casual tone that resonates with modern buyers.  That said, don’t tell them how you ‘wnt 2 b’ in front of them.  “Informal language” still uses WORDS.

Overcoming the Challenges

For sales professionals accustomed to traditional methods, the transition to text messaging may present some challenges. Here are a few tips to help navigate those hurdles:

1. Training: Invest in training programs that teach the art of persuasive text messaging. Equip your sales team with the skills they need to excel in this new communication landscape.
2. Practice Makes Perfect: Encourage your team to practice crafting persuasive text messages. Provide feedback and offer guidance to refine their approach over time.
3. Feedback Loop: Foster a culture of learning and improvement. Encourage your team to share their experiences and insights from text messaging interactions, enabling everyone to learn from each other.
4. Measure and Adapt: Use analytics tools to track the effectiveness of your text messaging efforts. Analyze response rates, engagement levels, and conversion rates to refine your strategy.

The bottom line is this.

Mastering the art of persuasive text messaging is a critical skill for modern sales professionals. By adapting to buyers’ texting preferences, you can build stronger relationships with buyers and drive higher engagement. Embrace the change, refine your strategy, and equip your sales team with the tools they need to succeed in today’s dynamic sales landscape. As the saying goes, “Adapt or be left behind.” I don’t want to be left behind – do you?

Today, I want to address a pressing issue that’s been eating at me for far too long. It’s time to debunk the excuse of salespeople who claim they aren’t “tech-savvy” and turn up the heat on those who rely on this feeble justification for their lack of progress. Being “tech-savvy” is a choice.  Staying relevant in the sales profession is a choice.  And nowadays, if you’re choosing to not embrace technology, you’re choosing to see your relevance fade away.

Look, I get it. Change can be daunting, and technology is advancing at breakneck speed. Some of you are still fighting CRM (welcome to 25 years ago), and now we’re talking about AI.  But let’s be brutally honest here: being “tech-savvy” is not some condition you’re born with or an elusive talent only the chosen few possess. It’s a CHOICE. Yes, you heard me right. Being tech-savvy is a mindset you embrace, a journey you embark on, and a battle you fight every single day.  Your customers are embracing technology and information.  If you’re not, you’re putting your own expiration date on your career.

Now, let me address the managers out there who accept this excuse from their sales teams. It’s time to shake things up and demand better. Your role as a leader is to inspire and push your team to greatness, and get the most from their talents. When you accept artificial limitations, you are selling your salespeople, yourself, and your customers, short. It’s time to hold your salespeople accountable and challenge them to rise above their self-imposed limitations.

So, how can you break free from this technophobic trap? Let’s dive into some actionable steps that will help you shatter the glass ceiling of excuses and propel your sales success into the future (which, by the way, is happening NOW):

1. Embrace a Growth Mindset: Stop seeing technology as an obstacle and start viewing it as an opportunity. Every new tool or platform is a chance to enhance your sales skills and reach new heights. Embrace the mindset of continuous learning, experimentation, and adaptation.
2. Seek Out Learning Opportunities: Attend webinars, workshops, and conferences to stay abreast of the latest sales technologies and strategies. Dive into online courses, podcasts, and industry blogs that provide insights and practical tips. Make learning a habit, not an occasional afterthought.
3. Leverage Your Inner Circle: Surround yourself with tech-savvy individuals who can mentor and guide you. Build relationships with colleagues, attend networking events, and join sales communities where you can tap into the collective knowledge and experience of like-minded professionals.
4. Get Hands-On: Don’t just observe from the sidelines; immerse yourself in the digital realm. Experiment with new tools, apps, and software. Learn how to navigate social media platforms, harness data analytics, and leverage CRM systems. Embrace the power of automation, AI, and other emerging technologies that can assist your sales efforts.  You might even enjoy it!
5. Take Ownership: Own your personal growth and development. Don’t rely solely on your company’s training initiatives or your manager’s guidance. Take the reins and invest your time and resources in honing your technological skills. Remember, the onus is on YOU to stay relevant in this fast-paced world.

So, what tech tools are being used by the well-prepared salesperson these days?  I’m not going to attempt a comprehensive list, but here are a few basic categories:

1. CRM.  The most basic tool in the tech stack. CRM is great because even if you forget, it doesn’t.  Today’s CRM apps are much easier and user-friendly than the old ones (trust me – I had to use Goldmine in the 90s).  They have mobile apps and will do much of the work for you.
2. Social Media. Your customers are (depending on your business) on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, and maybe even Threads.  Are you?  Good salespeople go where their customers go.  What are the preferred platforms of your customers, and are you interacting with them there?
3. Communication tools. More and more customers these days want to communicate by video – and if you sell nationwide, like I do, video is a definite upgrade from a phone call.  Being a salesperson today means understanding Zoom, Teams, maybe even Google Meet.  Can you jump on a video call at quick notice?  If you can’t, your competitors probably can.
4. Sales intelligence tools. One truth of business is that change begets change.  Sales intelligence tools let you know when change happens with your customers and prospects, so you can get in the middle of the change and perhaps use it to your advantage.  Google News Alerts are essential, and LinkedIn Sales Navigator (catchy name) is a big help, too.  While you’re at it, do you have a Google News Alert for your own company?  Do you know what your company’s Google Reviews are, and when a new one is posted?  Your competitors might – your prospects probably do.
5. AI. How long does it take you to create a persuasive email, blog post, or article?  ChatGPT can do it in just a few minutes, if you know how to prompt it.  That gives you time for other, more important tasks.

Look, sales is about learning, and you’ve learned a lot.  You’ve learned your products, your services, your company’s value proposition, your customers, and other key issues.  Yes, the tech stack I posted above seems like a lot – but it’s really not.  Most of it is automated and will actually be a time-saver.  In fact, if you get good at the tech, the result will be more time for the thing about sales we all love.  Face time with your customers.  And that’s the big win here.  You can do this.

In conclusion, the excuse of not being “tech-savvy” is a cop-out, a self-imposed limitation that hinders your progress and undermines your potential. Let me be clear.  Anyone of average intelligence can learn these tools, no matter their age or experience level, if they choose to do so. The choice is yours—will you evolve with the sales profession or succumb to mediocrity?

If you’re a manager, it’s time to light a fire under your team’s collective behinds and eradicate this excuse once and for all. Challenge, support, and empower your salespeople to be the best versions of themselves. Technology is an intrinsic part of the future.  In fact, it’s an intrinsic part of the present.  Get on board.

Stay hungry.

Stay current.

Make the choice to stay relevant.