WHAT SETS TOP SALES MANAGERS APART FROM THE REST?

LEARN HOW TO dOubLE yOuR iNcOME

NZ’s e-mag for sales leaders

SALES FOREcASTiNG Part 3: Turning your sales reports into a Sales Action Plan

NZSALESAUGUST 26Th 2009 / ISSUe 28

uSiNG THE RiGHTWORdS TO SELL

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 2

AUGUST 26Th / ISSUe 28

THiS WEEK’S MuST REAd

WHAT SETS TOP SALES MANAGERS

APART FROM THE REST?

Learn the one consistent thing

the world’s top performing

sales managers do.

WOuLd yOu LiKE TO

dOubLE yOuR iNcOME?

You can achieve your

income goals.

NZSM cALENdAR

MiNd yOuR LANGuAGE

Choosing the right words can

help you sell.

SALES TRAiNiNG diREcTORy

RESOuRcE cORNER

STOP biTcHiNG, START PiTcHiNG

An essential guide on how to give

yourself the best shot at securing

that lucrative contract.

THE cLOSE

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NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 3

I caught the train home from

Wellington the other day and

noticed an advertising poster in the

carriage. The message from a fitness

training company said ‘Those who don’t

find time to exercise will have to find

time for illness.’ how true, I thought.

It is a phrase where the words ‘exercise’ and ‘illness’ can

be replaced with other words to make equally meaningful

statements. In sales, maybe we can say that ‘those who

don’t find the time for personal development and improving

their sales skills will have to find time to work longer to get

results.’ The influences of information and communications

technology, globalisation and trust (or lack of), has changed

and will continue to change, the way customers buy.

Changing the way we sell requires constant time and

attention.

So if your sales results are looking a bit sick, have a look in

this issue at performance expert John Shackletons article,

‘Would you like to double your income?’ which asks three

questions that will exercise your mind!

Happy Selling!

Paul

ABOUT /

Short and sharp, New Zealand Sales Manager is

a free e-magazine delivering thought provoking

and enlightening articles, and industry news and

information to forward-thinking sales managers,

business owners and sales professionals.

eDITOR / Paul Newsom

ART DIReCTOR / Jodi Olsson

GROUP eDITOR / Trudi Caffell

CONTeNT eNQUIRIeS /

Phone Paul on 04 586 4733 or email

pauln@nzsalesmanager.co.nz

ADVeRTISING eNQUIRIeS /

Phone Richard on 09 523 4112 or email

richardl@nzsalesmanager.co.nz

ADDReSS / NZ Sales Manager, C/- espire Media,

PO Box 137162, Parnell,

Auckland 1151, New Zealand

WeBSITe / www.nzsalesmanager.co.nz

New Zealand Sales Manager is an

Publication

NZSM / JULY 15Th 2009 / 4

T h I S W e e K ’ S M U S T R e A D

Paul Newsom is the editor of NZ Sales Manager and helps sales professionals and sales managers

to compete and win in complex sales. You can visit Paul’s website at www.salespartners.co.nz.

WhAT SeTS TOP SALeS MANAGeRS APART

fROM The ReST?Learn the one consistent thing

the world’s top performing sales managers do.

By Paul Newsom

Sales managers have a multitude of tasks and responsibilities. Hiring, training, planning, reporting, admin, motivating,

selling, fire fighting, managing performance – any sales manager will readily add to the list. But what sets the top sales

managers apart from the rest?

Typically these tasks and responsibilities fall naturally into one of four areas of what I call ‘the sales management spectrum’.

• Command and Control

This sales manager is the administrator. Their day

revolves around day-to-day admin, operating mission

control mostly via their email, measuring and

reporting, and filtering out all the clutter so that sales

people are not distracted.

• Sell, and Solve CuStomer ProBlemS

This sales manager enjoys selling more than

managing. They get involved in all the big deals

and building relationships with clients. Typically

they will have been the top performing sales person

prior to becoming the sales manager. In fact they

might sometimes be better remaining as the top sales

person, rather than a sales manager.

• CoaCh and develoP

This sales manager spends high quality time with their sales people,

truly helping them to develop into top performers. They are excellent

at identifying and recruiting talent. Sales managers of large teams who

truly focus on coaching and developing will spend a large proportion

of their time building the capability of the team.

• BuSineSS/market management

This sales manager is the strategic thinker and tactician who

works on the big picture, building value in the business. They are

looking for strategic alliances, and work closely with marketing

on changing trends and opportunities. In smaller companies,

they will be the strategic marketing department, driving product

development based on market intelligence and research, as well as

being the sales manager.

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 5

The best sales managers are effective across the spectrum.

however, many sales managers have an individual style

which favours just one or two of the key areas.

Indeed, many sales managers tend to spend their time on the

command and control. So is one area of the spectrum more

important than others?

The most important job of the sales manager is to help their

sales people succeed. As a sales manager, if your sales

team is successful, then it stands to reason that you will

be successful. Building the capability of the team, through

training where needed and consistent coaching, has to be

the primary focus for the sales manager.

Most importantly, as a sales person, there was one common

trend with the command and control managers that I have

worked for - I didn’t learn much from them. They were not

helping me to be successful.

Recent studies all point to the fact that the one consistent

thing that the world’s top performing sales organisations do is

that their sales managers are highly effective coaches.

For example, here are the findings from three trusted sources:

‘The most important skill is that of the sales manager who coaches

and develops the sales person. however, most sales managers are

more administrator than coach. Sales people who receive ½ day per

week 1:1 with their sales manager are twice as productive as other

sales people.’

Source: HR Chally Group world class sales excellence report 2007

‘Top sales performers work for managers who create a culture of

development, recognition and coaching.These teams were 38 per

cent more productive, and had 27 per cent higher profitability.

Consistently superior results depend on the manager.’

Source: Gallup Organisation, survey of 250,000 sales people,

1 million customers, 80,000 managers. 2003

‘The manager activity most closely

associated with sales rep success is

coaching. however, of the skills that

managers possess, an ability to coach

individual sales reps is relatively the

weakest.

The SEC findings are that the world’s

best sales managers provide, on average,

three-five hours coaching per person per

month. Teams who did achieved 107

per cent of target. Teams who did less

than two hours per month achieved 90

per cent of target.’

Source: Sales Executive Council – world

class sales coaching 2007

Some sales training works, but quite often it doesn’t. When

it does work, the part the sales manager plays in reinforcing

the training, after the training has been done, is key to the

success of the training, and particularly the business results.

When training doesn’t work a primary reason will be that

there is nothing in place to reinforce the training - to turn

learning into performance.

Old habits die hard - people carry on doing what they have

always done.

The SeC, who represent over 500 of the world’s leading sales

organisations, report that: ‘reps fail to recall 87% of what

they have learned within 30 days of receiving training. When

training is complemented by in-field coaching, productivity

is quadrupled, increasing from 22 per cent to 88 per cent.’

You have probably seen similar statistics before on classroom

training. They are somewhat scary if you invest in the

training, but have nothing in place to follow up. Sustained

coaching is vital to derive the benefit and value of most sales

training and help the team to apply the knowledge and use

the tools they have learned in the class room.

We do have a centre of excellence here in New Zealand.

Late last year, the SeC ranked the Waikato Management

School based Gen-i Sales Academy as world leading, and

one of the most effective they have seen. Sustained coaching

is identified as one of the top five contributing factors.

Coaching is often not well understood. Giving direction and

orders, showing someone how to do a task, or persuading

that person to do something are common examples of

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 6

what I see when managers think they are coaching. These

are necessary elements of teaching and managing but

are not coaching. The best teachers and managers are all

great coaches. They understand and guide the sales person

through the learning process until the desired results are

being achieved.

The secret for the sales manager lies in knowing

when to coach, how to coach and what to coach. The

‘what’ requires a clearly defined sales process and the

appropriate sales tools. Otherwise it will be like coaching

a team of footy players to play ‘no rules’ football or

coaching someone in the finer art of cake baking with

no bowl, scales or mixing spoon (tools) and no recipe

(process). You will get a pretty messy outcome.

When I think back to the two best sales training programmes

I participated in as a corporate account manager, it surprised

me at the time that the senior sales leaders did not attend

the training. Needless to say, they made no contribution in

helping the team to success following the training.

Recent research confirms my observations:

‘Many organisations do not have a ‘coaching culture’,

and managers worldwide, who have direct reports and

therefore by definition are team leaders, currently struggle

to understand what coaching really is, let alone reap the

rewards that coaching can deliver’.

NZATD People & Performance, June-July 09, The Coaching

Conundrum Asia – Pacific Executive Summary

So before you embark on your next sales training

programme, start with developing and honing your own

coaching skills, or get help from someone who can assist

with this. You will need to figure out how to coach the

process, using the tools and techniques introduced in

the training. for the sales manager who has not done

any professional development in sales coaching, then

this should perhaps be the biggest priority in your own

personal development.

http://www.businessmentors.org.nz

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 8

By John Shackleton

Believe it or not, you can!

In November of last year I set an income goal for myself

and by the end of April I had achieved that goal – so

as long as I keep doing what I’ve been doing I should

continue to increase my income. how? Well the answer

involves two elements which are closely related – the way I

think and the way I behave. I’ve got three questions that will

help you apply this process.

The first question to ask yourself is: Are there people who

do what I do, that earn twice what I earn? Now, the answer

to this question is almost certainly ‘yes’. however for the

few of you that can’t answer yes to this then you may like to

consider doing something additional or something else to

earn more. If there are people that earn twice what you earn

then let’s consider a few other questions. Do they work twice

as hard as you do? Do they put in twice as many hours as

you do? Are they twice as smart? Do they have twice your

experience or double your skill level?

In my experience the top earners in any profession don’t

work harder or for longer than the average earners. They

don’t necessarily have more skills or more experience and

they aren’t usually super smart either. The difference is in the

way they think. So what this tells us is that if you think the

same way the top earners do then it’s possible to earn twice

as much as you currently do.

Now we need to consider belief and the next question

you should be asking yourself is: Do I believe in myself

enough to earn twice as much as I am currently earning?

Don’t just quickly answer yes – first consider this

experiment that’s been done many times: If we placed an

exciting job advert in the paper stating the complete job

description and showing a salary of $65,000, we could

expect to receive many applications. If we took the exact

same advert and placed it in the same paper the following

week but this time said that the salary was to be $650,000

how many applications do you think we would receive?

Most people would love to earn that salary but very few

people actually believe that they are worth that amount of

money and therefore they wouldn’t apply.

So now we know that in order to double our income we

need to change what we believe we are worth. Just a quick

note here: many people make the false assumption that

their self worth is determined by what others think. In other

words they are only worth what someone else decides to pay

them. It might be an interesting exercise to ask an employer

(not your own boss!) how much they are prepared to pay

their staff. Some business owners will give you the answer

that they’ll pay as little as they can get away with, which

is understandable as that way they get to keep more of the

business’s profits.

WOuLd yOu LiKE TO dOubLE yOuR iNcOME?

John Shackleton is an international speaker, coach, author and performance expert.

Visit his website at www.johnshack.com for more information.

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 9

The starting point to doubling your income is to believe that

you are worth that much and the only way to do that is if you

are giving a better product, a better service, doing more and

going further than the next person.

Now we need to ask ourselves: What do I need to change

about the way I work that could help me double my income?

Some people feel that this would involve a massive change

which would be too big or too scary to take on. Just consider

the following story:

Two identical yachts leave the Bay of Islands on the same

day and both captains decide that they are going to sail due

north for a week until they make landfall in fiji. Now they

sail at approximately the same speed and experience very

similar weather but one of the yachts has a one degree error

in its compass readings that it is not aware of. for a while you

wouldn’t see any difference between their paths but after a

few hours you would start to see a gap building up between

them and by the end of the first day they would be a few

kilometres apart. Seven days later one of the yachts would

happily make safe harbour in fiji. A couple of months later the

other yacht would run aground on the coast of Alaska. Do you

sometimes feel you want to be on a path towards sunshine,

but it seems to takes you ten times as long to get there as it

should and when you arrive it‘s the wrong place anyway!

Very often the changes that we need to make to improve

our results are very small, but if we consistently apply those

changes over and over again we can achieve some great

results. These alterations might be as simple as changing the

questions you ask people when you start to work with them.

Perhaps it is offering your product or service in a slightly

different way. It could even be as simple as selling to a

different type of prospect.

In November of last year I made some very simple changes

to my business model and decided to stop chasing my

clients for business on the telephone and concentrate on

marketing through my newsletter and by email contact.

This approach wouldn’t work for everybody but for me the

results have been wonderful, including having a smaller

phone bill! My whole attitude has improved as I no longer

experience the frustration of not being able to speak to

people because they are away or in meetings and I think

I’ve probably stopped chasing some people away by being

too pushy.

Now I’m sure some people would respond better to a

phone call rather than an email so I expect I’ve missed

out on some business but the net result to me has been

very positive. Not only have I doubled my income but I’ve

reduced the stress in my life and increased the time I can

spend with my young family.

I’ve achieved all that just by making a few tiny changes to

the way I’ve been selling and I’d love to tell you that it’s been

easy but it hasn’t. I’ve found myself falling back into my old

habit of telephoning on a number of occasions and when

I do my stress levels rise and my free time disappears. I’ve

had to work really hard on not feeling guilty because I’ve not

been on the phone for 4 hours a day. Now I understand that

for some of you that may sound really stupid but I’ve been

spending half a day on the phone for the last 20 years and to

me it feels normal. If I don’t do it my brain tells me I’m being

lazy and ineffective and therefore I won’t be successful. The

new approach is simpler, easier and more effective but my

old habits are difficult to break.

Change is never easy especially when you are trying to alter

habits that you’ve had for years but the results of making

these small changes can be spectacular.

So, let’s summarise those three questions that you need to

ask yourself in order to double your income.

Are there people who do what i do that earn twice 1.

what i earn? (The answer to this one is almost

certainly YeS).

do i believe in myself enough to earn twice as much 2.

as i am currently earning? (Be honest with yourself

and if the answer is no then you need to work on

your self worth. You could start by reading Psycho

Cybernetics by Maxwell Maltz – the best book I’ve

ever read on self image).

What do i need to change about the way i work that 3.

could help me double my income? (You are only

looking for small changes but ones that you can apply

on a consistent basis. The problem for most of us is

overcoming the old habits).

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 10

Consultative Selling NZIM CentralWellington

Sales Skills 3eMAAucklandAdvanced Sales DevelopmentDavid foremanWellingtonKey Account ManagementDavid foremanWellingtonSales Skills 3eMAAuckland

Sales ManagementDavid foremanWellington

NegotiationDavid foremanWellington

Sales Skills 2ZealmarkAuckland

Sales DevelopmentDavid foremanAuckland

effective Proposal Writing David foremanAuckland

Sales ManagementDavid foremanWellington

Sales DevelopmentDavid foremanAucklandTelephone SalesZealmarkAucklandAdvanced Serious Selling Richard GeeAuckland

Consultative Selling NZIM CentralWellington

Telephone Selling SkillseMAAuckland

effective Proposal Writing David foremanAucklandAdvanced Serious Selling Richard GeeChristchurchSales ManagementDavid foremanWellington

NegotiationDavid foremanWellington

ProspectingDavid foremanAucklandSales Skills 1eMAAuckland

fRI 25 SePT

MON 21 SePT

TUeS 15 SePTMON 14 SePT

WeD 9 SePT

Advanced Sales DevelopmentDavid foremanWellingtonKey Account ManagementDavid foremanWellington

Sales PlanningDavid foremanWellingtonSales SkillsZealmarkAuckland

NegotiationDavid foremanWellington

Sales DevelopmentDavid foremanAuckland

TUe 8 SePTMON 7 SePTfRI 4 SePT

fRI 18 SePT

SUN 20 SePT

SAT 19 SePT

SUN 13 SePT

SAT 12 SePTThU 10 SePT

SUN 30 AUG

SAT 29 AUG

SUN 27 SePT

SAT 26 SePT

NZSMCALeNDAR

MON 31 AUG

ThU 27 AUGWeD 26 AUG fRI 28 AUG

ThU 3 SePTWeD 2 SePTTUe 1 SePT

Sales PlanningDavid foremanWellington

Territory Management,Richard GeeAuckland

Sales DevelopmentDavid foremanAuckland

SAT 5 SePT

ThU 17 SePT

TUe 22 SePT WeD 23 SePT WeD 24 SePT

SUN 6 SePT

fRI 11 SePT

WeD 16 SePT

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 12

Are you using the right words to excite your clients, or

to show that you can fix their issues? Often slightly

changing how you describe a product or service can

completely change how people view the service.

Keep it professional. There’s no need to swear and curse – as

my father always says ‘people that use foul language in business

discussions have no grasp on articulation and delivery of a

message’. Funny thing, my Dad is bang on!

Using well-constructed language that reflects you and your

company’s goals is critical for the elevator pitch and the

discussions with clients and prospects. Language is just as

important as marketing or branding. In the game of sales

one of the greatest tools is the language of positives. This

is simply speaking in positives so the message is always

encouraging and exciting.

An easy example of this is: “that’s no problem to do” can be

rephrased to “Yes we can absolutely help to achieve this for

you”, the same wording but avoiding using the double negative

of NO and PROBLeM. Simple changes like this can have a

huge impact on your results – and the motivation of your staff!

A further example of how to use language in sales is to

simply listen to their issues then adjust your language and

how you describe your product or service to include the key

“trigger” words that the client uses, and the sales process will

be much smoother.

I had great success with this when I was working for Calcium –

the way the sales team was told to sell the product was on the

merits of its marketing ability – these were fantastic solutions

to problems most people did not know they had. After asking

a number of prospects what issues they had with email, then

changing the language I used to describe our services to include

their trigger words, clients instantly understood how the tool

could help them and sales took off!

MiNd yOuR LANGuAGE By Tom Reidy

T W O M I N U T e T O P U P

Tom Reidy is a consultant specialising in strategies for Sales, Social Media and email marketing for business. visit his website at www.catalyst90.com

“Sales is not the art of making people buy, but the art of conversation”.

MID STRENGTHFULL FLAVOURFULL LIFE

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 14

NZSM / AUGUST 26Th 2009 / 15

It’s all about winning. Not about victory over opponents. It’s about winning the contest with your own potential to achieve all you can in life.

Michael Dell

“ “

Have you subscribed to New Zealand Sales Manager? It’s free!Simply visit www.nzsalesmanager.co.nz to get a copy of New Zealand Sales Manager delivered

straight to your inbox every third Wednesday!

frank, revealing, motivating and humorous, Stop Bitching outlines

self-styled advertising gurus, Marty Kellard and Ian elliot’s nine step

programme to success. An essential guide on how to give yourself

the best shot at securing that lucrative contract.

Editor’s note: The authors’ experience is predominantly in selling

advertising, where the ‘big pitch’ style of presentation selling is somewhat

more predominant than many other industries. however their underlying

principles of getting the edge on your competition in the preparation stages

by understanding your customer and their problem and knowing what it will

take to win rather than guessing, are essential to anyone in a complex or

consultative sale.

STOP biTcHiNG,START PiTcHiNGBy Marty Kellard & Ian elliotPublished by Pier 9

$33.98 from

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