Coaching for Success

Leading a team of sales professionals that knows what it should do and one that does what it knows, are two very different things. What can you do to help your team reach its potential and consistently adopt desired selling behaviours? Socrates may have had the answer when he said, “I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think”.

In my work with Directors and sales managers, I’ve noticed that coaching results in more autonomous, proactive and high performing sales teams. Coaching is defined by The International Coach Federation (www.icfsingapore.org) as ‘partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential’. Here’s how you can apply the following coaching skills in the context of working with sales professionals:

Establishing the Coaching Agreement

Help your team feel comfortable about coaching, explore their initial concerns and come to a common understanding of the agenda for each coaching session. Reach agreement about what they want to work on, what issues need to be addressed and measures of success.

Create a safe, supportive environment that produces ongoing mutual respect and trust. Let your team know it’s a safe place for them to share and that they’re free to be themselves. Collaborate with them as equals to design a change agenda that is focused on them.

Coaching Presence

Be fully conscious and create a spontaneous relationship with your team, and employ a style that is open, flexible and confident. You’ll need to possess the skills, behaviours, non-verbal communication, and body language needed to create a strong coaching presence.

Active Listening

Are you distracted by incoming emails and SMS messages or are you focused completely on what the team is saying and is not saying? You need to hear their concerns, goals, values and beliefs about what is and is not possible. Are you attending to your team’s agenda or your own?

Powerful Questioning

There are different types of questions in a coaching conversation that evoke discovery, insight, or a commitment to action. Use questions to create a thinking space for them to generate new perspectives such as, ‘How do you feel about using these presentation materials versus not using them?

Direct Communication

Useful skills would include reframing, the use of metaphors, constructively challenging your team and managing the conversation at crucial moments. Try to avoid the trap of giving advice, but if unavoidable, keep your perspective to one succinct sentence and use language like ‘What worked for me may not work for you, so just take what makes sense and leave the rest.’

Creating Awareness

Using tools to integrate different sources of information can help your team gain awareness. In my work with sales managers, I use tools including 360* feedforward to enable clients to create a new awareness and focus on problem solving so that they move forward towards their goals.

Designing Actions

The coaching conversation needs to move your team towards taking action that will move them towards their goals. Use brainstorming techniques to help them develop options and then use filtering mechanisms so that they define actions they will be committed to. You could ask them, ‘What actions will you take as a result of our conversation?’

Planning and Goal Setting

Designed actions must be crafted in goals that your team feels confident in attaining, so understanding the principles of planning, goal setting and time management techniques is important. You may also suggest tools and resources for learning to assist your team so long as they aren’t forced on them.

Managing Progress and Accountability

Now that your sales team has designed actions and set goals, they now have the responsibility of sticking to the plan. They may stumble on the journey so you’ll need to support their self-discipline and maintain their accountability. You could ask them questions like, ‘What accountability structure would work for you?’ or ‘How will you hold yourself accountable?’ Reassure them that by sticking to the plan, you’re positive they’re going to succeed.

As a result of coaching, your sales team will experience fresh perspectives on challenges and opportunities, enhanced thinking and decision making skills, enhanced interpersonal effectiveness, and increased confidence in their day-to-day selling activities.

STRATEGY 1: CREATING SCRIPTS FOR SCHEDULING APPOINTMENTS The reality is that without some kind of a structure or plan, you leave too many things open to chance and can lose control of the call.
STRATEGY 2: CREATING A NEEDS ASSESSMENT Beginning with the end in mind allows you to prepare a written proposal based entirely on the answers to the needs assessment.
STRATEGY 3: ENGAGING PROSPECTS EFFECTIVELY You need to treat prospects, customers and clients very differently. Each needs to be engaged to move through your sales funnel.
STRATEGY 4: MAKING COMPELLING DEMONSTRATIONS Risk causes prospects to hesitate. Proof devices help your prospects reduce their perceived risk of buying.
STRATEGY 5: CHOOSING YOUR TOP THREE CLOSING TECHNIQUES If you havenʼt sold your prospects on the “yes”, then they have sold you on the “no”. Regardless of who has been paid, a sale has been made.

“It’s not just about being better. It’s about being different. You need to give people a reason to choose your business” – Tom Abbott

Published in the April & May 2009 Issue of Make it Business (Canada)

Stairway to Success

by Chelsea Bowles
Originally published in the April & May 2009 Issue of “Make it Business” (Canada)

Is hiring a business coach your path to success? For Rob Thompson (right), it was. In six months, Soho Sales Coaching’s Tom Abbott guided Thompson of Cornerstone Technology to a 300-per-cent increase in revenue.

Impatience is a virtue. At least it was for Rob Thompson. Six months after launching Cornerstone Business Technology in 2008, Thompson felt his on-demand I.T. service company wasn’t growing fast enough. He was also overwhelmed by the amount of information and work involved in running a business. Thompson needed someone to guide him, while offering him objective perspective and encouragement.

He knew he needed a business coach. Working with Tom Abbott of Soho Sales Coaching, Thompson propelled Cornerstone to a 300-per-cent sales increase. And those valuable lessons have kept his company growing, even in this tough economy.

“I’ve had success in the past with coaches on the personal side and I expected that on the business side. After we started working together it confirmed it was the right thing to do,” Cornerstone’s president says.

During his six months coaching Thompson in late 2008, Abbott helped triple Cornerstone’s clientele and revenue by clarifying the business focus for services, target customers and branding. As well, Abbott taught Thompson to better utilize his strengths and build relationships.

Abbott’s coaching involves building trust, asking tough questions and providing tools. He starts by gauging expectations, goals and challenges. He holds the mirror up to find a business’s weak areas, then assesses how to quantify and reach goals.

To gain clients, Thompson first needed to clarify his ideal customer. Conversations and Abbott’s Niche Detector tool helped him decide to focus on smaller offices with a network of four to 49 computers, such as accounting and engineering firms. Now, Cornerstone’s team of four services the North Shore,  downtown and immediate surrounding areas, rather than all of Vancouver.

Having clarified the target market, Thompson then had to tailor his message specifically to them. “One of the key challenges was how to be more effective in marketing,” he recalls.

Abbott reviewed Thompson’s presentations, helping him communicate more concisely to the people who already needed his services. Abbott also taught Cornerstone’s president that it’s about sharing customer benefits, not touting bells and whistles.

Through a survey, Thompson’s abilities came to light. Next he had to learn how to use them. “There were things I wasn’t doing that I was good at, like talking with people. Tom told me to spend more time on that.”

Thompson was initially hesitant. He had to overcome his misconception that sales are about convincing people to buy what they don’t need. “Tom isolated that once you I.D. who needs your services, all you have to do is inform them about your service, and convey confidence to deliver it.”

Cornerstone’s founder believes that entrepreneurs, like athletes, need coaches to succeed. “Coaching helps you understand how to be present in your business genuinely rather than artificially. Instead of trying to impose something somebody else recommends, I find something I have myself and channel it and use it.”

There are many myths about coaches, namely that they have all the answers and do all the work. In reality, you do the work. A business coach helps you do the right things with the right tools.

There are many terms for business coaches, and many areas of specialization, but it boils down to someone who will give you the tools and clarity to move forward successfully.

“A coach is someone who will help your business grow,” says Abbott, whose area of expertise is sales. Ten years ago, led by passion for small business and a love of the entrepreneurial drive, he started his company
to help others work on their businesses, not in their businesses.

“At its core is a series of guided conversations,” Abbott says. He also offers content, such as sales strategies
and business tactics. He coaches over the phone and via e-mail, so while most of his customers are in BC, he
can offer his services worldwide.

Abbott coaches by modelling behaviour he wants his clients to adopt, and by using a structured, proprietary
program created based on his experience. Abbott’s program, outlined below, is called the Soho Sales  Fundamentals: Five Pillars of Personal Selling. The five pillars are:

Customer Strategy: Who’s your ideal customer? What’s important to them? What are their buying habits? How do you qualify prospects? Product Strategy: What solution do you offer? What makes you unique? How do you match your offering to meet clients’ needs? How do you brand and position your company?

Presentation Strategy: How do you assess communication styles? What questions reveal a prospect’s needs? Which opening/closing techniques work for you? What does non-verbal communication tell you? How can you project confidence? How can you get proof devices (testimonials, guarantees, references)? How do you handle objections?

Relationship Strategy: How do you build and nurture relationships with the four key groups (team/support staff, partners/investors, customers and secondary decision makers)? How do you turn gatekeepers into ambassadors? How can you improve yourself? How do you improve customer  touchpoints (e-mail, website, voicemail, etc.)?

Management Strategy: How do you run your business/its records? How do you manage yourself and others?
How do you manage your time and stress? What are the qualities of good managers? How do you create an effective system? How do you maintain self-discipline and direction? How do you recruit and train? How do you assess productivity?

Abbott’s pillars have brought success to him and his clients. The common struggle for all his Soho business
clients is sales. One challenge Abbott believes entrepreneurs face is creating systems that can be replicated for training, making sales or taking vacations. Another is target market ambiguity.
“It starts with who you’re going after. Your messaging comes from that,” Abbott says, noting that knowing the
interests, attitudes and values of your target market is essential. With a 100-per-cent success rate and a  willingness to coach anyone willing to work, Abbott says, “Coaching with me works if you work it. If you do what I say, you’ll see results.” Most clients see results quickly, but Abbott warns no one is going to turn their business around after one session. Most of his clients need coaching for three to six months.

With the economic downturn, Abbott’s clients are increasing. They realize that now is the time to gain the
market advantage, while other companies cut back on advertising.

A client at a crossroads
A business coach isn’t just for entrepreneurs, but also for those at a crossroads, debating the transition
from employee to entrepreneur. Alice Shin was one such person. With a management background and
insurance licence, Shin didn’t know what direction to take in a large industry.

“Even though I’d been in the insurance industry for almost three years, I couldn’t get myself to put my energy
forward. I didn’t know where to put it,” Shin says. “It kept coming back to: What are my values? What do I  want? Whom do I resonate with?”
Shin says coaching is about taking action and overcoming challenges. One of her challenges was sales.

“I discovered a natural market among women and business entrepreneurs. Tom then taught me a communicative approach to marketing and helped me with my pitches. My self-imposed barriers fell.”

During her three months with Abbott, Shin got her mutual funds licence and completed her branch manager course for mutual funds. She’s now working on becoming a certified financial planner. Abbott helped Shin determine how to develop her business and earn a six-figure financial target.

Since her coaching ended in late 2008, Shin has begun the transition by letting half her salary go. She’s running
her new financial and consulting business, structuring employee benefit plans for small businesses and corporations, providing employees with retirement and pension planning and setting up income replacement
for business owners.

She believes coaches can help Soho business owners just as they help corporate executives, providing objective advice and clear focus. “They give us a road map for how to build.”

Abbott affirms this. “I worked with a coach during 2008. He helped me in the same ways that I help my clients.
It gave me the client’s perspective.”

With the competition hungry and aggressive, it’s crucial to have clarity
about your business and an effective sales strategy to ensure success.

As Abbott says, “You have to be doing the right things. Working hard doesn’t guarantee success.”

Published in the 2011 Issue 2 Marketeer Magazine (Malaysia)

A great salesperson does not equal a great sales manager. It seems natural for the best performing salespeople to become promoted to positions of sales managers. However, many sales managers struggle in that role because they lack the knowledge, skills, and/or abilities to fully support their sales teams as they should. What makes a sales manager the most effective is knowing how to COACH sales professionals, focusing less on sales techniques and more on accountability, goal-setting, and time-management techniques. In my work with Directors and sales managers within SMEs and MNCs, we focus on the following step-by-step process for building a high performance sales team:

Becoming a sales coach

Share your vision with your sales team and encourage them to contribute so they can take ownership of the organizational vision. As a great sales manager you focus on the “what” (vision and objectives) and leave the “how” (tactics and implementation) to your sales team. Great sales managers are great team supporters providing their teams with the resources necessary to realize the vision. Coaching your sales team also includes rewarding them for achieving the objectives and helping them come up with solutions to their challenges. Your sales team performance should always be measured against clearly defined (and clearly understood) objectives.

Improving compensation plans

Sometimes it helps to differentiate between existing accounts and new accounts. It’s important to compare the value of each sale dollar produced from existing accounts to new accounts. You could also look at the effort needed to maintain existing customers versus acquiring new customers. Do your existing accounts essentially take care of themselves or are they high maintenance? If your sales team must continue expending effort in order to maintain accounts, their compensation must be commensurate with their effort.

Recruiting and retaining the best talent

Great sales managers must also become great human resources managers in order to recruit and retain the best talent. In recruitment, it’s important to create a list of the knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs), candidates must possess, as well as those which are desirable. Something else to keep in mind when recruiting the best talent is the difference between aptitude and attitude. Aptitude refers to components of competency, that while essential, can be increased through proper orientation and training. Attitude on the other hand, refers to a person’s beliefs, values, and work ethic, which are unlikely to change. When in doubt, hire attitude and train aptitude.

Assessing productivity and profitability

Your sales team must be assessed according to clearly defined (and clearly understood) objectives. As a great sales manager it is your responsibility to communicate your objectives as far as sales volume, sales revenue, profitability, return-on-investment, market penetration, and market share. Be specific. Set deadlines. Coach your sales team by rewarding them for achieving the objectives and helping them come up with solutions to improve the results from their activities.

The Singapore Marketer Jan-March '12 Issue

At the National Sales and Marketing Congress 2010, I spoke on ‘Sustainable Selling – Are You Getting Enough Referrals?’ and shared how your customers are hurting you…and you don’t even know it. How exactly are they hurting you? They’re not referring new business to you. More on how to overcome that challenge in a moment.

A salesperson can compete on the basis of product, price and service but still lose the sale because of the relationship between the customer and a competitor’s salesperson. It’s no surprise that people buy from people they know, like and trust. Your likeability and your ability to form strong relationships quickly will be more effective than all the credentials in the world or even having the lowest price.

Partnering Relationships

With the increased competition and greater product and service complexity of today’s marketplace, there is a need to adopt a relationship strategy that emphasizes the lifetime customer. Instead of viewing prospects as transactional customers that you sell to once, you view them as partners in a long-term selling relationship.

When I’m speaking with an organization about delivering sales training and coaching, I discuss not only the date of the upcoming training for their sales team, but also how I can partner with them to help all the sales teams and their various offices around the world, throughout the year and in years to come. Partnering can be defined as a strategically developed, long-term relationship that focuses on solving the customers’ buying problems. Partnering is the highest quality selling relationship.

There are three keys to a partnering relationship: the relationship is built on shared values; everyone clearly understands the purpose of the partnership and is committed to the vision; and the role of the salesperson moves from selling to supporting. By demonstrating over time how you can support your customers in solving their problems, you will never sell another day in your life.

Getting Referrals

The great thing about referrals is that they don’t cost anything and they come with a high level of trust built in. Referrals also carry a high degree of credibility.

While most business people and salespeople say they would prefer to receive customers through word of mouth, many of them haven’t created a strategy around getting referrals. So they end up waiting by the phone or checking their email in hopes of getting referral business. Hope is not a strategy.

So what can you do right away to get more referrals? Ask your current clients. Ask your former clients. Ask prospects who turned you down. You might be wondering why I’m telling you to ask prospects who turned down the opportunity to work with you. Well, they may have declined to hire you for any number of reasons—perhaps they couldn’t afford you, they didn’t have the budget at the time, the timing wasn’t right for them to proceed, or their priorities changed. But they could still see value in what you offer. And in fact they may know two or three companies that actually are in a position to move forward with you and could benefit from your services.

Part of developing your strategy is sensing the right timing. No one likes to be surprised or put in an uncomfortable position by being asked aggressively for referrals. It’s useful if you can set the stage during your initial conversations or meetings with prospects to let them know what to expect. Try saying something like, “Now that you are looking into our services, you’ll probably start noticing a lot of other businesses that could benefit from this sort of service. In the same way that you came to my business through a referral from a good friend of yours, I would like to ask you from time to time if you know of two or three people who could benefit from my service. Would that be all right with you?” That sets the stage early. And they may even have a couple of referrals for you right away!

Then be sure as you’re working with them in the weeks and months that follow to ask them again if they know of two or three people who could benefit from your service. It’s especially effective to ask this after a customer has had something nice to say about how you have helped them. Tell them you’re happy to hear that and then pop the question.

You always need to be asking for referrals. Remember that establishing, building and maintaining partnering relationships with clients contributes to your overall success and your success in personal selling.

Take Action

Your task is to get more testimonials and referrals. Start asking customers for them at the onset, throughout and after the sales cycle. This will help you achieve a consistent flow of testimonials and referrals and to build your business through word-of-mouth marketing.

This article originally appeared in the January – March 2012 issue of The Singapore Marketer

During the show they cover:

• The real reason presenting is always a problem for salespeople
• Why the audience zones out and how to wake them up
• How to use a “proof device” in a presentation