Run a mental checklist over your client base right now.  Who fits into the ‘good’ client list and who falls into the ‘bad’ client list?

It all really depends on what you define as good and bad.

As we know not all clients are good for your business. Some clients are a wrong fit for your business but could be a good fit for someone else;  therefore in of themselves they are not necessarily ‘bad’.

However, others are just downright bad for your business.

It is important to consider how much your ‘bad’ clients are costing you in terms of time, money, frustration, people and product resources, lost productivity, bad press, angst, legal fees, and tarnished reputation?

If you have too many customers falling under the ‘bad’ column you need to ask yourself, “How did this happen?”

Have you set yourself up as a magnet for overly demanding, time consuming, nit picking, miserly clients who do not see value in what you do or offer and seem to want a slave rather than a legitimate business partner?

Have you set yourself up to be taken advantage of by unscrupulous and unethical people looking for victims?

It is difficult to focus on your best clients if you cannot shed your ‘bad’ ones.

For example, there has been recent media attention on the rise in Businesses Pheonixing; the act of Phoenixing is where a new company is formed to buy the assets, contracts, and goodwill of the failing business for a reasonable market rate. The legacy debt is left within the old business which is then liquidated thus allowing the new Phoenix business to trade on, debt free. Creditors and Suppliers to the old business are often left with unpaid debts which may in turn lead them to suffer their own financial difficulties.  I am sure no one wants to be put at the mercy of Businesses Pheonixing (‘bad’ clients) if they can help it.

Chasing the ‘easy’ or ‘quick’ sale may be more trouble than it is worth especially if the prospect or client is not properly investigated in relation to their legitimate needs or their intentions are clearly defined.

So, what constitutes a ‘bad’ client?

Besides the obvious impact of bad debts, there are other criteria which constitute ‘bad’ clients. Here are some examples:

• They are bad credit risks with a track record of always paying late or not at all – they can be checked out by using reputable credit agencies that keep track of people and companies’ credit ratings.
• They are a poor fit with what you offer and what they need thus leading to misunderstandings, poor relationships and confusion – this is usually due to a poor sales approach and not properly understanding your client and their needs in the first place.
• They are overly demanding on your QA or Customer Service departments – the ‘nothing is ever right’ syndrome and all they want to do is complain.
• They ask for expensive prototypes or very detailed proposals with little probability of a significant purchase – what is usually happening here is that they are siphoning you for your Intellectual Property at no cost to them so they can either do it in-house or get someone cheaper to implement your idea.
• They only want to deal with ‘you’ and expect levels of service that do not go with their purchasing level – they expect first class service when they are buying ‘no name’ or house brand products at very small volume.
• They complain loudly, often, and publically to anyone who will listen and usually only for ‘effect’ not fact.
• They do not keep their promises and break contract conditions regularly.
• They take your IP and claim it as their own.
• They say one thing and then another – you never know where you stand with them and they seem to play games, trick you or set traps.

Don’t be fooled by these types of clients they are not worth it, no matter how attractive they look on the surface and how desperate you might be to get a sale.  Unfortunately, when times are toughest we can fall prey to these types of prospects or clients which can lead to more stress and less return on investment.

An experienced business banker once told me a story about an entrepreneur and business owner who was looking for a new bank to work with. On the surface this individual and his business looked plausible, charming and sincere, but when the business banker did his investigation, he discovered a litany of evidence – failed businesses, bad debts, frequent changing of banks, poor staff retention and staff legal issues and a myriad of other things that did not bode well for this prospect becoming a valid business banking client.  As you could imagine the aforementioned business banker did not proceed with that prospect.

If these types of business people continue to behave in this manner they will eventually run out of legitimate business suppliers or partners to work with and sadly if they do, they will usually pull up stumps and go and find fresh victims to exploit.

Another tell tale sign is that they will not have a history of any longstanding, viable relationships of any value or substance.

Many people have slated the sales profession as being ‘shifty’ but in truth most sales people and their clients are out to do the right thing by each other.  So, it pays for the sales person to also be on the lookout for the potential ‘bad’ client and do proper investigations. So don’t believe everything you hear. Do your homework.

So why not have a conversation with your sales team and run your collective eye over your client base to see if you do have any of these types of ‘bad’ clients on board?  Then work out a strategy to let them go, learn from your mistakes and don’t get mixed up with these types again if you can help it.

Maybe it’s time for a client spring clean.   It might just free up your time to find and work with more productive clients

Remember everybody lives by selling something.

Sue Barrett is Managing Director of BARRETT.

It’s time to get back to basics.

I don’t know about you but recently I have found myself getting more and more distracted by the latest trend and fads, especially the social media phenomena. My reason for this is that I have been trying to get my head around social media and specifically, the impact on the sales profession.

As you may have gathered, I like to keep on top of what is current, what is emerging, and what is still an idea. This is why I make time each week to do research as it helps me navigate my way around the present and into the future. However, I am finding there is so much to read, so much to get my head around, and so much to integrate into my business that it can take up a lot of time… and it only seems to be increasing.

I read recently that 20 years ago information was doubling every 5 years, 10 years ago it was doubling every 18 months and today it is doubling every 9 minutes.  There is a plethora of information – the trick, however, is knowing the right information to access.

For example, getting your head around the social media space and how Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, and other online groups impact on the sales profession is a big job. This is why I think it is timely to stop and review the information I have gathered so far, make sense of it (where possible), and determine whether it can be of value to me and my business moving forward.

This is why I want to get back to basics.

As I wade through all of the information on social media, I predominantly want to get answers to a few simple questions:

• How can it help make us more and better quality sales?
• How can it help forge better relationships with our clients?
• How can it help us be more effective and competitive in the market place?
• How can it help our competitive advantage?
• How can it support our business strategy and make our lives easier (work smarter not harder)?
• How can it support our brand and increase visibility?

From my observation, there seems to be a great deal more written about social media and the Business to Consumer (B2C) space (simpler, transactional sales) than has been covered in the Business to Business (B2B) space (more complex sales interactions). As is my nature, I am usually the first to want to incorporate new things into my business and learn how it can add value, however once all the hype and excitement boils down it is important that we weigh up energy expended and value added.

From our discussions with other businesses, I am finding that I am not alone in my enthusiasm for social media or alone in my reflection of the time spent. Now, I am not proclaiming that we should go back to the Dark Ages pre the internet and shut out social media rather that we take a moment and consider how we can integrate the regular sales activities such as prospecting, face-to-face meetings, building real long term relationships and social media

While there are fantastic benefits to social media, many of our B2B clients are reporting that their sales teams are getting distracted and ignoring the tried and true tasks required to grow sales.

Getting back to basics in the B2B sales space means:

• Defining what type of clients you want for your business
• Knowing: WHO you need to be in front of? HOW you need to make contact with them for? HOW OFTEN you need to do it?
• Use your networks (where appropriate) to research and target specific referral sources, prospects and industry contracts
• Prospect, prospect, prospect for new business opportunities– for most people that means picking up the phone and calling both new-to-business and existing clients directly to make an appointment and secure a meeting
• Meet the client or prospect– find out what they really need and how they want to work with you
• Deliver on what you say you will
• Follow up with a blend of purposeful phone calls, face-to-face meetings, emails and other valued add support that they can benefit from
• Don’t make assumptions– speak to people directly and regularly communicate in person
• Use resources such as Linkedin, social media and a CRM with purpose to help you forge meaningful connections and networks

Getting back to basics does not mean throwing the baby out with the bath water, it just means that while we integrate new methods into sales, we need to make sure we are still doing the necessary ‘basics’ to keep the sales momentum going. At this point, some of the main things we see social media adding great value in are building networks, getting a message out, getting access to information and opinions, getting your brand out there, and stimulus response activities.

But as yet (and quite possibly never), do I see social media as a replacement to purposeful prospecting, purposeful client meetings, and purposeful business relationships.

The key word here is purposeful. Social media is most effective in sales when it is applied with purpose and in context of a bigger picture and plan. So as we go back to basics, I think we need to question ourselves as to the purpose of our actions. For instance, with more people accessing Facebook and Linkedin are we building business networks that will lead to better business opportunities via qualified contacts or are we just building networks for the sake of showing off a large number of contacts i.e. I have the most number of ‘friends’ syndrome.

So, I ask you these questions:

• How purposeful are your social media activities to your business?

• How can we make social media work for us in business rather than becoming a slave to it?

• How can social media enhance or hinder the sales efforts of business, especially B2B?

The social media phenomenon reminds me somewhat of the early days of the dot.com boom and how businesses were jumping in and riding the wave only to come crashing down, some learning a great deal, others worse for the experience.

I am not suggesting this will happen with social media but perhaps we should hasten slowly and make sure we do not throw out good, sound business practices for the sake of the new.  I urge sales people to continue with the fundamental, basics that still give a real return and begin to integrate, where appropriate, these new tactics into sales push and pull strategies.

Does this mean ignore social media? No, not at all but it does mean that we need to put it into perspective. So, let’s get back to the basics that make us real sales, real money and real relationships with the clients we want to work with.

And remember, everybody lives by selling something.

Sue Barrett is Managing Director of BARRETT.

First of all what does CRM stand for?  CRM = Customer Relationship Management.

The concept of CRM has been around for a long time. The original form of CRM was a manual card system kept by a sales person that usually sat on the sales person’s desk or alongside them in the car.  These client cards sets were very valuable to the sales person as this is where they kept important customer information such customer contact details, key contacts in the company, a running commentary on their activities, personal and product preferences, buying patterns, business connections and so forth.  Each card was a dossier on each client.  To successful, well managed sales people, their client cards were gold.

However, often times, this vital data resided with the sales person alone. The company, the sales person worked for, did not have ready access to this important information and when the sales person left the company more often than not so did the client information, client relationship and sales did as well.

The ‘softwarising’ of CRM for businesses is seen as a major breakthrough in being able to capture important client information and better manage client relationships.  CRM promises faster customer service at lower costs, higher customer satisfaction, better customer retention and ultimately customer loyalty and more sales.  However many companies still believe that CRM is simply software, or technology and the full benefits of CRM are not being fully realised by business.  CRM is much more than just a data-mining tool.

CRM is not (just) technology.

CRM is a business strategy!

Your CRM has the potential to and should be your corporate memory.  It can be the  archeological record of your business.  In fact, if introduced and applied correctly, one of the most significant benefits of having and using a CRM in your business is being able to fully realise and map the true value of your clients as company assets.  Besides the obvious benefits to you and your business, if ever you chose to sell your business, having a CRM with all this valuable information tracked and mapped can be valued and sold for premium.

This trail of information becomes a real asset in itself. A potential buyer can see your business in real client terms and understand the value of the client relationships to the business.  Therefore instead of the wisdom and knowledge going out the door with the previous owner it can be captured and retained with the new owners to be further cultivated and developed.

NB: Not  all data is good data. You must make sure you have the right information in place.  Too many CRM’s are filled with rubbish data and the wrong stuff making them a liability not an asset.

As a CEO, you can’t make the right decisions if you don’t have the right data/information foundations in place.  If you are going to get the best benefits from a CRM strategy and CRM tools you need to know how to you are going to align your key business objectives between your clients, sales people, suppliers and the rest of your business so every piece of relevant information and action adds value to the client fulfillment process.

The interconnectedness of clients to your business can begin to be truly mapped and you will then see how everyone in your business can affect the retention and growth of your clients, not just your sales people.

According to Mark Parker, MD of www.SmartSelling.com and expert in CRM’s and Customer Systems:

“Sales reps often represent the “face” of your company. In order for them to do their part in driving outstanding sales results, they should be empowered to put their best foot forward when representing their company. To do this, a Sales Automation or CRM needs to be in tune with their needs.  Putting their best foot forward is going to mean many things.“

Further to this I would like to add that a CRM should also be in tune with your customers needs helping them have the best experience they can have with you.

What does an effective CRM system look like?

An effective CRM system should be what your strategy needs and wants it to be.  These days you can get access to open source CRM software where you can configure what you want in your CRM so you do not have to be tied to proprietary CRM’s that cannot be customised to your needs.  Also CRM’s do not have to be prohibitively expensive either. Many people have put off getting CRM’s in the past due to their high cost and focus on big corporations.  But now good CRM’s systems are available for SME’s and home based businesses at very cost effective rates.  For instance we use SugarCRM at Barrett which is an open source system we can configure to suit our business needs.
This means you need to think carefully about what you want your CRM system to do and be and who you partner with to make it work for you.
A good place to start is to:

1. Know your business  strategy and key outcomes you want to achieve and work backwards from there.
2. Know your customer, their needs, wants and motives and your path to market
3. Appreciate the length, width and depth of the relationships between the customer and your organisation
4. Understand how you properly manage of all interactions with your customer
5. Know what your sales and service people need to do make sales happen in your business.
6. Aim to build a business system that manages prospects, clients and projects.

Look at what data, behaviours, and outcomes you want to track:

• Client data, sales person activity data, product sales data, effectiveness of marketing initiatives including your website, direct mail/email campaigns, etc.
• What behaviours do you want to encourage and reinforce in your sales and service teams as well as your clients and prospects?
• What do you want to measure by way of lead and lag sales indicators?
• How do you want to communicate data internally and externally?

Important point: you do not want you CRM to turn your salespeople into glorified desk jockeys.  We need to make sure any CRM is easy to use, doesn’t take necessary time away from vital interpersonal sales activities.  If you think your CRM can replace your sales team you will fall short in your efforts.  If your business needs to be in personal contact in some way with your clients you need your CRM to enhance these relationships not replace them.
Here are some ways a CRM system can serve you well:

• Provide immediate insight into prospect and customer leads originating from any channel
• Provide deep visibility into the sales pipeline and opportunity details which quickly produce accurate sales forecasts.
• Allow for a consistent, informed, and personalised customer communication approach i.e.  automated emails relevant to the specific customers
• Give sales people and everyone in your business access to a consolidated view of the customer across your organisation – this will allow everyone in the organisation to know how they can help play their part in taking control of every opportunity and managing it to a successful conclusion
• Encourage, enforce and track best-practice sales methodologies you want in your sales  teams i.e. logging of Lead Indicator Activities such as: # of prospecting calls made, # of client meetings had; # of real deals in the pipeline, # of sales made: # of cross sales made, # of sales made with new clients, # of sales made with existing clients, # of follow customer service enquiries, # of service calls, etc.
• Encourage, enforce and track best-practice service methodologies you want in your customer service and support teams i.e. logging of Lead and Lag Indicator Activities such as # of follow customer service calls made post sales, # of service calls made, # of customer service calls and complaints received, etc.
• Monitor and map effectiveness of have automated sales and marketing activities that are specific to the customers and markets
• Steamline and automate those customer activities that can go online i.e. confirmation emails, automatic emails sent out at periodic intervals for things like renewals for instance
• Map work in progress with clients and staff allocated to client projects
• Have the ability to integrate with your website and keep track of web activity
• Support your entire frontline sales and sales lead management team with the right information they need to quickly and efficiently fulfill all of their daily requirements.
• Deliver knowledge at the point of action
• Keeps vital customer data in the business whether the sales person stays of leaves thus creating a valuable company asset.

Word of caution: Before you even think about integrating Twitter or Facebook into your data mix and CRM, which is a hot topic at the moment, make sure your current data is clean and relevant because if it is not then you will be piling more garbage on an already big garbage heap and there’s no value in that.

Remember CRM systems are tools that should support, enhance and grow the customer relationship by giving your sales team and others in your business access to vital information they can act upon with purpose and in the easiest manner possible.

A CRM should not be an imposition on anyone, a CRM should be a part of your vision to continually improving the relationships with your customer, your sales team and everyone in your business.

CRM is a strategy and way of life not a piece of technology.

Remember everyone lives by selling something.

Happy selling.

Sue Barrett is Managing Director of BARRETT Pty Ltd.

Now is the time to rethink your sales strategy and your sales force.  Design the sales force your business needs and get great results.

Tip: It’s all in the thinking and planning that happens before the execution.

To help you start your thinking and planning here are two case studies from our work files where the businesses got it right.

Story one: Transform your current sales team into a new sales team

“The Sales Culture transformation and competency project we worked on with you in 2008 has been such a great success for our team.  The culture is now fantastic and the morale of the Sales Team is very good.  We aimed for the culture we wanted and got it.  People have settled into their roles and are working out fantastically. It was the planning and thinking behind it that made it work.  The Competency work has, without a doubt, made a difference. The Sales Competencies are ‘Gold’. We refer to them all the time and the Sales People are using them as well to develop themselves and have clearer, more accountable, performance reviews.  The competencies helped our team realise how responsible they need to be in their roles.”

This is what can happen when you design your sales force to deliver your strategy.  This quote comes from a Sales Director of a business we have worked with for many years.  They had the same sales force structure over the last 15 years and a very stable sales force to go with it.  The team and structure had worked very well, however the market was changing and the business and its sales people needed to adapt and evolve to ensure they were current, fit and productive.

In 2008, this Sales Director realised she needed to develop a new strategy moving forward and with that needed a new sales culture and team to deliver it.  But she didn’t want to get rid of the current sales team.  They were good operators with great industry knowledge and experience.   She knew it would be foolish to start from scratch with a new team and she didn’t want to create confusion or unnecessary unrest or anxiety in her existing team.

Her concerns rested around getting buy-in from the team regarding the new strategy and, in particular, their need to adjust their roles somewhat.  Despite not wanting to lose people she was prepared to do so if necessary.

What did she do?

• Developed her sales strategy and then presented her strategy to her sales team, inviting feedback and explaining ‘why’ they all needed to move in this direction using a well researched, evidenced based approach.  The team knew what was happening in the market place so it came as no surprise to them that they needed to shift.  That is fine intellectually, however we knew the challenge would be in actually getting them to shift in real terms.
• To get the real shift happening she then engaged her team in the development of the new Sales Roles by engaging in a ‘job design’ process with us.
• Out of the ‘job design’ process we developed the right Sales Behavioural Competencies (DNA) and ‘ideal’ role/person specification matched to sales strategy, product and customer base.
• Sales Behavioural Competencies were then linked to the Sales Team performance management reviews and are now being used in coaching, recruitment and succession planning processes.
• Sales Behavioural Competencies were mapped to measurable sales metrics
• The Sales Behavioural Competencies now act as a pivotal reference point in all their work.

As mentioned, the Sales People are using Sales Behavioural Competencies to develop themselves, have clearer, more accountable, performance reviews and better role clarity which means they know how they need to perform to achieve their strategy goals.

Story two: Design the sales team you want from scratch – green fields

A Divisional Manager of a large Australian corporate came to us because they didn’t want to hire people from their industry as they didn’t think they were competitive in the current market. They wanted to refresh the gene pool and bring in fit sales people who were not tarnished by the industry mindset and its way of doing things.  They knew that in this over commoditised marketplace their sales people were their competitive edge.

They were on the right track but didn’t know where and how to start.  So here is what we did together to find elite sales performers:

• Reviewed sales strategy, path to market, and products being sold
• Developed the right Sales Behavioural Competencies (DNA) and ‘ideal’ role/person specification matched to sales strategy, product, and customer base
• Built a structured sales recruitment process and kit
• Targeted industries the new breed of sales people could come from and went to market to find them
• Built and implemented the right sales induction training program matched to sales strategy, sales competencies, product, and customer base
• Had new sales team present their ‘go-to-market’ action plan to senior management before they went to market
• Implemented a sales management support system
• Followed up with infield training and coaching
• Mapped and measured sales metrics

The results were stunning from a sales initiative perspective.

The ‘new breed’ of elite sales performers achieved a sales closing ratio of 4:3 within 2 months against an industry average of 3:1 and sold the annual sales budget within 5 months.

Feedback from the sales people was that this was the best sales recruitment and sales induction process they had ever been through.  In all their sales careers, and many came from big name companies, they have never been set up so well to succeed.  They felt confident, proud, and capable to really deliver.

Feedback from the client:  “We worked in partnership to develop an end-to-end model for a new innovative sales team. The approach was unique in that they worked with us across recruitment, training, needs analysis, pitch planning and the end delivery. They added huge value to any sales process.”

By designing your ‘ideal’ sales force blue print you can build and achieve the following in your business:

• Change your culture by creating the sales culture you want
• Design the ideal sales force you want
• Recruit the sales force you want / your strategy needs
• Refresh your thinking, ideas, actions and results
• Develop career paths and succession planning
• Clear performance expectations
• Clearer, more accountable, performance reviews
• Provide a framework for identifying what a high performing sales person looks for your business
• Profiling of the core sales capabilities / competencies for sales managers/ sales people for use in recruitment, performance management, training, coaching and succession planning.
• Provide a framework for assessing the calibre of candidates as defined by core competencies and values;

As you prepare for the next financial year and are developing your sales strategy take time to reflect on what your ‘ideal’ sales force blue print should be.

Do not underestimate the value of taking time to think and plan, ultimately it could make you a lot more money.

Sincerely, your advocate for selling the  right way.

• Are you finding that you are over servicing your existing clients and not bringing in new business?
• Are you running out of time each week to do the important sales jobs such as prospecting?
• Are you at risk of not meeting your sales budget?

In my many interactions with sales people I have found that many find they have problems prioritising their week.  They often get caught up in activities that do not produce revenue, leaving them vulnerable.

Let’s look at the key activities that should feature as priorities in most sales people jobs:

Revenue Generating Activities
Direct

• Prospecting (phone calls, etc.)
• New business client meetings (with new prospects and existing accounts)
• Account management
• Proposal development, submission and pitch
• Proposal follow-up
• Referrals

Indirect

• Advertising
• Networking
• Pipeline management

Support Activities

• Customer service
• Sales meetings
• Internal meetings
• Administration
• Professional development

Where are you investing your time?

Without a systematic method of finding clients you will rarely produce outstanding sales results.

In order for a sales person to be successful in their role they need to organise their week and their time.

This concept quite simply is called an ideal week.

An ideal week is designed to help sales people be more focused and more productive by chunking key tasks together.  For example, in many ways it makes sense for sales person to be in the office in the morning followed by appointments with clients in the marketplace in the afternoon.  This means that all administration and prospecting activities are out of the way early, leaving the afternoon to really focus on clients’ needs.

There is no one ‘right’ ideal week, however having a structure and focus in how to set up your appointments, administration, and prospecting time will be one of the keys to you becoming rapidly successful.

Experienced sales people may need to come back every 3 to 6 months and review their ideal week to ensure that it’s delivering a great result.

A Systematic Method

A systematic method of finding clients is critical for a Salesperson’s success.

We need to ensure that time is put aside each day to prospect, so that we can continue to feed our pipeline of new clients.   Importantly, we need ensure that we have a consistent and ongoing focus on finding new clients.

Our ideal week needs to include personal time, finding time, and selling time, so that our time is filled with $ productive activity.

Example of an Ideal Week 1

In this example the sales person has chosen to have three days in the marketplace with Monday and Friday being focused on setting up for the current and coming weeks.   Monday is reserved primarily for prospecting and Friday is reserved for planning, administration, research, and catch up, as well as some sales management support*.

Example of an Ideal Week 2

In this example the sales person has chosen to have mornings in the office and afternoons in the marketplace. examples can and will work well.

Both of these examples can and will work well.

The key is having an ideal week and using this as a benchmark for faster decision making.  It’s important to understand that the week will probably never work out 100% like this, but it gives us a benchmark for how to structure our week for maximum productivity.

* Sales Management Coaching and SupportIt is unlikely that an experienced sales person would have a one-on-one coaching session every week, especially highly experienced sales people.  However, do not forget to spend regular time (say once a month at least) with an experienced sales person as they too can benefit greatly from personal development.Whereas, new sales people should be having a one-on-one coaching session every week to get them up to speed as quickly as possible.

Sincerely, your advocate for selling the right way.