A Brief Debrief For The Sales Engineer

 

How To Improve Your Sales Calls in Five Minutes

 

/TLDR: Our recent Professional Skills training has highlighted that most sales teams are not routinely debriefing and asking each other for feedback. Here is a simple, quick process you can use to get tips from your colleagues on how you can improve for the next sales call.

 

 As we’ve been delivering our Professional Skills training throughout our client base in 2021-21, we’ve taken the opportunity to informally ask a number of questions.

 

One question is “how often do you debrief with the FSR after a customer sales call?”

“We always debrief” is the common reply.

“What do you cover in the debrief?” we respond.

“Oh, we agree on Next Steps and Account Strategy!” says the SE.

“What about discussing what happened during the call? The good, the bad and the ugly?”

            “Well, we hardly ever make time to talk about that. There’s always another call..”

 

We believe you are missing out on a wonderful opportunity for improvement. Just a 5-minute investment into a true call debrief can make a major difference in your overall team performance and personal productivity.

 

The T3-B3-N3 Process.

 

The process is simple. You ask the FSR (and anyone else who sat in on the call) three simple questions. Adjust appropriately for culture and title.

 

T3 – Top 3	What are the top three things I did in the sales call that I should repeat every time I am in that kind of situation?
B3 – Bottom 3	What are the three things I did in the sales call that I should never ever do again?
N3 – Next 3	What are three things I did not even do in the sales call that I should consider including next time?

It’s a non-threatening collection of positive reinforcement, constructive feedback and new ideas mixed in with a little “don’t do that”. Now you need to take notes, try to get specific examples (my example: “When you interrupt the customer before he finishes asking his question it shows a lack of respect and professionalism. Next time pause and count to two before you answer”) and if appropriate, put a plan in place to fix or to reinforce the behavior. Then follow-up with that person within a few weeks – that way they will give you some more feedback once they know you are listening to them.

Feedback is a gift, and together with learning more about your own solution, it’s the #1 way you have of improving. You may not always like what you hear, but it is still a gift.

Advanced T3-B3-N3

 Substitute “we” for “I” in the previous set of questions. As in: “What are the top three things we did in the sales call that we should repeat every time we are in that kind of situation?”

 Master Level T3-B3-N3

 Ask the FSR – “would you like to hear your T3-B3-N3 list?”

 Sales Engineer Manager Call To Action

 85% of Sales Engineers (to use the generic term) across the globe report that they want more feedback from their Manager. 65% of Manager’s feel that they give sufficient feedback. Get engaged, speak up and make a difference.

Summary 

After the next sales call – if you want more than “you did good” or the truly terrible “it was fine”, try the T3-B3-N3 approach and see what happens! You will be amazed, and a little scared, by the responses you receive – especially once you’ve established some trust with that individual.

 

The Challenger SE Part 2 - Don't Call The Baby Ugly!

The Challenger Sale has really had an impressive impact on the high technology salesforce. More than 50% of my clients have either formally or informally adopted it as an overlay on top of their current sales process. Yet looking back at implementation over the past two years I’ve noticed one persistent problem in both the sales and pre-sales utilization of the “Challenge” – and that is what I now label as “Calling The Baby Ugly”

The Ugly Baby

You would never, ever, tell parents that their baby is ugly. You always look for something positive to say and provide some form of complement. Yet sales and presales alike, emboldened by the Challenger Sale, quickly launch into a description of why a customer’s processes/personnel/strategy/implementation is wrong (i.e. ugly) and then offer to fix this ugliness. Customers have invested their time, money and resources into their current situation and take pride in their work – so a full-frontal attack on the status quo rarely works.

 Customer Reaction – The Three “D’s”

 Sales takes the Challenger Sale and tries to disrupt the customer and their thought process, which can be a very unpleasant experience. You more directly you challenge, the more you need to be 100% accurate and on-point. Customers can react negatively in one of three ways:

1.    Defend – they defend the status quo and why things run the way they do. This is an almost guaranteed way to ensure that “Do Nothing Inc.” gets the deal. Nothing will happen and the harder you try to push your Challenge the stronger the defense will become.

2.    Deny – they will deny that there is a problem. Remember the rule that “it is not a problem until the customer says it is a problem”. Denial and defending tend to go hand in hand.

3.    Destroy – they will destroy your ideas and also destroy your client relationship. There is no upside to following this path.

In all of these cases you need to make a decision how to react when you start to get some pushback or objections – in almost all cases you need to proceed with caution.

Asking Better Questions – The Three Customer “C’s”

 

Companies invest a lot of time and money teaching their salesforce how to ask better questions – the problem is that the customers don’t play along.

1.    Customers rarely follow a script and allow you to follow a pre-determined line of questioning, no matter how well you prepare.

2.    Customers don’t always know what they want. So sometimes that voyage of self-discovery just gets them lost, dazed and confused.

3.    Customers don’t always tell you everything you need to know and you cannot get the whole story. Sometimes that is accidental and sometimes deliberate.

So What Should A Sales Engineer Do?

In Part 1 of this series I explained how customers believe that the SE offers more value than anyone else from the vendor organization and detailed some ways to capitalize on that. The key is to approach the customer with some humility and deference. (Sometimes you have to approach the challenge head-on and directly – possibly with the classic Wall Street Managing Director or the Executive who says you have two minutes – but let’s say for now that is a corner case and not the norm). How do you take this approach?

Step 1 – Will The Customer Listen To Me?

 

Many SE’s use that Trusted Advisor term, which in this case means will the customer listen to, and accept, my advice? We’ve all been in the position when we have given someone really good advice and they have ignored us. If you have that T/A relationship with the customer, life is easier. If you don’t, you are explicitly going to have to ask permission. As an extreme, contrast the Global Account SE who lives and breathes one large client, compared to the inside SE who may deal with 8 clients a day!

 

Step 2 – Asking Permission

 

Customers accept negative news much better when presented in a positive manner. That means keeping the results and outcomes in mind, rather than focusing entirely on the current problems. My preferred approach is to preface the Challenge with a softening or even self-deprecating statement. Set-up examples might be:

“Can I share something with you about how Customer “X” dealt with a similar situation? I’m sure it’s not an exact match as I still have a lot to learn about your company, but I think you’ll find it worthwhile”

“Can I ask you something off the record?”

“I understand the company has a lot of time and effort vested in this current process and its serving you well. Would you be interested in learning about some ideas..”

“How about we take a break, go grab some tea/coffee, as I’d like to run a few ideas by you about alternative ways to..”

Step 3 – Make The Challenge

The challenge needs to be made from a twin basis of success and facts. That means speaking about how other customers have overcome similar obstacles and the results they achieved rather than diving down into the details of all the current issues. You also need to be clued into the non-verbal signals from the customer. Often the best approach is to get them out of a “sales environment” by moving to the cafeteria, or at least closing down the laptop.

The more people you have in the room, especially once you get past five, the lower the probability of Challenge success. That may sound counter-intuitive as you’d think your spark would have a greater chance of catching fire, yet mass psychology takes over and audiences conform to the norm. So the Challenge works better in small groups and one-to-one. Note that Rep + SE versus a single non-executive customer also isn’t a good situation as that also leads to defense.

Step 4 – Support The Challenge

Once the customer opens up to the Challenge, provide specific examples (evidence and impact) and back that up with numbers (usually time, money or headcount). Remember you are trying to spark curiosity and get a “tell me more” response and not trying to close the deal or stun the client with your intelligence!

Summary

 

The introduction of the Challenger Sale presents a great opportunity for the SE team to reassert themselves back into the customer relationship and break away from being a technical resource. There is a crisis in sales right now as reps struggle to cope with the better educated buyer, to ask more insightful questions and to truly provide value , so ….

“Never let a good crisis go to waste..”

-      Rahm Emanuel, Mayor of Chicago

It's Not A Problem Until The Customer Says It Is A Problem, Unless ...

I had a very interesting experience this morning, listening in to a sales call initiated by one of my customers with one of their customers. My role was to quietly observe, and provide feedback on the entire process. I always enjoy these type of engagements as I get to learn about a new piece of technology, see buyer and seller behavior in action - plus it is great research and consulting material.

This call had a twist. After a little prompting the customer (a Senior IT Director) readily volunteered a couple of business issues that she had, the economic and political pain they were facing, and why they had to do something. In essence, she gave the sales team everything they needed to hear for some great Business Value Discovery.
 
"Not a problem", said the eager salesperson, "we can fix that for you".
 
(Now that surprised both me and the Sales Engineer on the call as neither of the problems were really in the sweet spot of the vendor. AND the IT Director knew that was the case.)
 
 Before the SE could jump in and qualify that response the customer replied:
 
"Wow. That is fantastic. Just to be sure, can you describe my problems to me in your own words?"
 
She was actually trying to help him, which was more than I would have done as a former CIO.  The rep didn't get the hint and plowed ahead with DESCRIBING HIS SOLUTION. Some amazing cloud-driven big-data social thingamabob technology.

She answered, "Yes, but what exactly is my problem?"

Common sense prevailed, I heard the SE typing a message in the background to the rep which said something along the lines of "Be Quiet!".

The SE took over, and gave a really nice paraphrase of the customers problems. You could hear the customer smiling on the other end of the phone. Things went much better.

The moral of the story? There are two.

1. "No problem" is a dangerous phrase and probably not one the customer wants to hear from you. At least not immediately.

2. It is a great exercise to paraphrase the key business issues back to the customer so that they know that you know.

 

You Might Be Wondering ...

Yesterday I sat in, as a “dummy guest”, on a remote demonstration and presentation that my newest client had set up. As part of my Discovery process I often like to listen in on a typical sales call. This call was going wonderfully, to the point where I was wondering what I could contribute as feedback other than a few minor cosmetic changes. The team had performed an admirable job of discovery, had identified two painful key business issues of their prospect, and had tailored their pitch to solving those problems and showing the economics of their solution.

There was budget, there was pain, and there was an agreed-upon approval process. I was seeing a deal leap forward in the sales cycle towards a successful close. The pre-sales engineer executed a masterful finish and handed back to the rep.

Who then said “you might be wondering..”

Everything fell apart because the salesperson decided to answer a question that had not been asked about deployment and support. The question was NEVER going to be asked because the customer was in “lets-go-mode”. The entire atmosphere of the call changed into suspicion and uncertainty over this late revelation, and ended with the dreaded “Thanks - we’ll think it over.” Disaster. Deal gets de-committed from the quarterly forecast.

Two lessons learnt from this call.

1.       It’s not always the Pre-Sales Engineer who opens his mouth at the wrong time and supplies too much information.

2.       There is a place for a rhetorical “you might be wondering” when it logically leads onto the next topic of conversation, and it is early in the sales cycle. But never at what was essentially the solution proposal phase.

Beware.

The Best Time Of Day For A Sales Call?

Now there's a question that had been debated throughout the ages. This isn't about cold calling, but about what time of day, and even which day to choose, for a sales call with the customer. it may or may not include a demo or presentation.

That's the subject of this month's Ask John question. The executive summary of the response is make it first thing in the morning, or over lunch (on the basis that the best sales call of all is usually when your laptop stays in the car). As a postscript to the answer, I should also add that Tuesday-thursday seem better than Monday or Friday.

Thoughts?