Account Based Selling - Tactics

[00:00:20] Hello everybody, I am coming to you early in the morning, earlier than I thought in Toronto.

[00:00:26] And I'm Scott.

[00:00:28] Good morning, Scott.

[00:00:31] I am Andy coming to you from the United Kingdom where it's already halfway through the day.

[00:00:37] I don't know what happened when I clicked record there, it caught me off guard.

[00:00:40] It's good to see you, Andy, as always.

[00:00:42] You forget you were recording a podcast today.

[00:00:46] It's all good.

[00:00:47] We got there.

[00:00:49] This is Tea and Timbits.

[00:00:50] You know what I forgot?

[00:00:51] It's who, which one of us was doing the intro.

[00:00:54] This is Tea and Timbits, a podcast on global perspectives on business development to help you prosper.

[00:01:01] We're going to continue our series on account based selling.

[00:01:04] We're going to get into more tactical stuff, some specifics on how we execute these strategies and concepts.

[00:01:10] This for me is definitely going to be do what I say, not what I do kind of an episode Andy.

[00:01:17] So before we...

[00:01:19] Maybe I will learn some things from you and you can maybe learn from me and we will be able to

[00:01:23] compare some notes and gain some skills that we can adopt in our own lives.

[00:01:28] Why not?

[00:01:29] We'll give that a try.

[00:01:32] Did you have a reflection to share with us before we get into our topic today?

[00:01:35] I did actually.

[00:01:36] It was a recent experience I had with the company I was working with and I went in and they had

[00:01:44] a smaller sales force than a company of their size would typically have.

[00:01:49] And the reason for that is that they worked through agencies and local representatives in

[00:01:55] different countries.

[00:01:57] So one of the things that was important for me to focus on was to understand

[00:02:03] who they were...

[00:02:04] Bear with me, sorry.

[00:02:08] Sorry my microphone just died in my headphone so I couldn't hear anything.

[00:02:15] So yeah.

[00:02:16] All right.

[00:02:17] Yeah.

[00:02:17] So anyway, I needed to go into this company and then just understand how they were

[00:02:21] working with these agents, what the agreements were like and so on.

[00:02:24] And it turned out that all of their agreements were legacy agreements.

[00:02:27] So they were things that the current sales force, none of them had been involved in

[00:02:33] actually signing up or agreeing to.

[00:02:36] And even the management had just inherited these when they came in.

[00:02:40] And it turns out that these companies were just riding on working a lot or having this

[00:02:45] big brand name as part of their portfolio and they were using that as a door opener.

[00:02:50] But none of them were really selling their products.

[00:02:54] Right.

[00:02:54] So one of the key things was to speak with these agents and understand why they were doing that,

[00:03:02] but also speak with the sales force and understand why they haven't done that process.

[00:03:07] So we put in a program to get the sales team out to spend time with these agents,

[00:03:11] get to understand what they're doing, get to try and coach them into actually

[00:03:16] selling their products.

[00:03:19] And it turned out a lot of the time it was down to understanding of what the product

[00:03:23] were, fully understanding how they could sell them, who the target customers were,

[00:03:27] and feeling very detached from the actual main business.

[00:03:31] So what they've done is they've put in this process and they're going to evaluate those

[00:03:36] agents as they go on now.

[00:03:39] So it's a relatively new thing and I don't have an outcome from this.

[00:03:43] But ultimately, it is very important that if you are going to work with agents or partners

[00:03:47] or so on, that you don't just give them a contract and say, here you go.

[00:03:51] Now you can use our brand name.

[00:03:53] You've got to work with them, just like you would your sales force or sales team.

[00:03:57] You've got to coach them.

[00:03:58] You've got to support them.

[00:03:59] You've got to follow up on them.

[00:04:00] And you've got to have some accountability as well,

[00:04:02] where they've actually got to deliver on doing something in return for having the right

[00:04:08] to sell and represent the brand.

[00:04:12] My mind was racing with a parallel world that I live in and having

[00:04:16] software partners and channel partners that's different from what you're talking about

[00:04:20] and perhaps a story for another time.

[00:04:23] Thank you for sharing.

[00:04:24] Wonderful.

[00:04:25] Like I said, getting into some of the tactics about account based selling here.

[00:04:33] I think in my mind we had this on the list so that we weren't just talking about

[00:04:38] hypotheticals that we could get a few thoughts out there about specific things that

[00:04:45] are steps along the way or

[00:04:50] contributions that actually help you get some of this work done instead of just sort of the idea

[00:04:55] behind it.

[00:04:57] So I'm hoping people just take away some of those specifics or a new idea that can help

[00:05:01] them execute this kind of work with more efficacy.

[00:05:06] Sound good to you, Randy?

[00:05:07] It sounds great to me and like I say, hopefully I'll learn some tips and some ideas from

[00:05:12] what you've done.

[00:05:12] I would show you mine but I typed it on the screen.

[00:05:17] That is a notebook and I wrote down some of my tactics.

[00:05:21] I'm going to let you kick it off though and see what you've got first on your list

[00:05:24] and I'll see if I have to cross it off mine.

[00:05:28] Well, the first tactic which I wanted to share which I think is one that is quite rare

[00:05:33] still despite there being abilities to do it out there and it becoming more and more common

[00:05:38] and that is to do video cold calls.

[00:05:43] What I mean by that is not randomly finding someone on Zoom or

[00:05:49] teams and then clicking on their name and trying to sell them something.

[00:05:52] I mean actually sending someone a personal message but as a video message on an email

[00:05:58] attaching that to that.

[00:06:00] So the important thing is first of all, so here we go into the specifics of the tasks

[00:06:04] and how to do this.

[00:06:06] First things first invest in some video software.

[00:06:10] So the one I like is CoVideo but there are many others.

[00:06:18] Vidyard is quite good but I believe that they've gone a little bit too far down the AI rabbit hole.

[00:06:25] Oh no, okay I was using that one before but I just felt they were so focused on trying to

[00:06:34] avoid you actually creating real content yourself and that they would just create an

[00:06:38] avatar of you and then you just put in some themes and it will randomly generate lots of

[00:06:45] videos of you talking and I felt that that was wrong.

[00:06:48] It's you know you're moving too far away, you wouldn't just get an AI to record your

[00:06:53] voice and then get it to randomly call people so why would you do that with a video

[00:06:57] and I think that was that was a wrong approach from them.

[00:07:00] CoVideo have sort of not gone that way yet they might do but they have

[00:07:05] When we do this we record right into LinkedIn.

[00:07:07] Exactly yeah that's very good as well.

[00:07:09] But we have the I thought you were going to go down the equipment front so just making sure that

[00:07:14] you're not doing nothing but your AirPods.

[00:07:17] No well that's the thing I mean I think there's a balance to be had between having you know

[00:07:23] professional microphones like this and headphones and good cameras with actually feeling authentic

[00:07:30] and genuine so you know recording it as you're walking along and you have a thought you go oh

[00:07:34] you know hey Bob I know we had this thing or we met at this event I just wanted to send you

[00:07:40] this quick video call to say thank you it was really nice to meet you these are the thoughts

[00:07:45] based on our conversation that we had and I'm recording this as I'm walking back to the hotel

[00:07:49] that's more genuine you know and that's okay right but I think again if you're trying to

[00:07:54] promote something or sell something push it forward then there is a balance to be had

[00:08:00] between it being bad quality sound and bad quality video with it being too professional

[00:08:05] and seeming too polished and therefore not engageable.

[00:08:09] We've stayed on this first topic for a few extra moments but I think it's good.

[00:08:14] I think what's important though is that you can be heard that you're not recording in a busy

[00:08:20] room you're not walking back to the hotel and stopping on a busy connection to it

[00:08:25] that it is it comes through click clearly and it's not annoying but it's speaking of coming

[00:08:32] through clearly I mean that's that's the other task as well is that you've got to write a script

[00:08:36] so know what you're going to be saying know what you're going to be talking about and make sure

[00:08:41] that you don't come across as you're rambling or that you're just speaking you know

[00:08:49] off the cuff and not actually getting anywhere you've got to make there make sure there's a

[00:08:54] something that people want to buy into and you've got to make sure that there's a purpose

[00:08:58] and a reason for them to carry on listening to you unlike what we're doing now on the podcast as you

[00:09:03] So we do this a lot this is a big part of how we do our outbound first touch and it is

[00:09:14] very effective if somebody can tell me about a more effective way I'm all in but rather than

[00:09:19] sending an email or calling them on the phone this is has for us been so much more effective than that

[00:09:27] and you say you do it through LinkedIn does that mean that you record it directly into

[00:09:32] LinkedIn and send it through LinkedIn as a LinkedIn message yep it's an embedded message

[00:09:37] there's a button on LinkedIn I think you might have to use the mobile app to do it

[00:09:42] we just set your phone up on a tripod or tripod or on a stand and do it that way

[00:09:49] you have a higher likelihood of them actually watching it and consuming it as opposed to when

[00:09:55] you send a video and they're like what's this they don't necessarily trust the link and yeah that's

[00:09:59] what not so do you um have the ability to then track the open rate and engagement and so on the

[00:10:06] LinkedIn uh well you're sending a one-on-one message so just like any email you can see

[00:10:11] you know that it's been opened or read or whatever I'm pretty sure and anyway

[00:10:16] the only the only metric that matters to me is whether they reply back so

[00:10:22] whether they watch or not doesn't really matter as long as they actually respond yeah

[00:10:26] yeah so I want to go like one step earlier in the process which is I find a lot of times you can

[00:10:34] be somewhat paralyzed by knowing who to who to send my video phone message to so I don't even know

[00:10:40] who to talk to um and that can be somewhat paralyzing sometimes um and so it's a this might seem like

[00:10:48] the most ridiculous simple obvious tactic but book a brainstorm put the people on your team in a room

[00:10:56] with you two three four people um and just start knocking around some names everybody pull up the

[00:11:01] computer we work for all these companies help me find you know people in our network or um

[00:11:07] or in the same industry I mean um but oftentimes getting the list of who you want to reach out to

[00:11:14] is the biggest hurdle so um so uh I think that um the thing there is yeah it actually takes some

[00:11:24] intention and consideration and oftentimes collaboration to come up with that list

[00:11:32] how do you when you're creating a script for those um how do you approach it do you

[00:11:38] do a general one or do you tailor it specifically for the individuals for for doing a brainstorm

[00:11:44] no for the actual video um I would say that um it is around a certain theme so after we do the

[00:11:53] brainstorm it's like oh we're gonna target you know accounts in a in the financial service space

[00:12:00] and the next step is like well what what is the message what does the enticing offer

[00:12:05] in the in the message and sometimes it's as simple as we just finish this you know project for so and

[00:12:11] so and we thought you you might want to you know learn a little bit about the new heights we were

[00:12:18] able to help them achieve and um and and you know here's a link to that story happy to you

[00:12:25] know answer any questions to give you more details if you're interested you know get back in

[00:12:28] touch um and so it's it's less specifically scripted but more sort of themed it's like here's the

[00:12:36] here's the call to action or here's the offer um and it's not the offer isn't like offer our services

[00:12:41] the offer is what's the um value or contribution we're going to make to their to that of the

[00:12:46] person's day um to show them that we're nice people and good to get to know and then um

[00:12:52] maybe they don't call us back now but at least um you know they they know who we are and they see

[00:12:59] us like as a connection and um we keep up the cadence of the rest of our content and they will

[00:13:04] reach out um you know they're more likely to reach back out when the time is right do you

[00:13:09] think many people are actually doing this i mean i know we've we've labored this first

[00:13:13] point quite a bit but i you know certainly in the companies that i go into it's incredibly rare

[00:13:18] yeah i i get a lot of solicitations myself um from you know whatever we all do right it's

[00:13:28] relentless um and i've never gotten a video call no no exactly so there you go it does set you apart

[00:13:36] uh what else is on your list on my list okay well we can stick to me that's fine i'm

[00:13:42] to be honest brain is one of the ones that was on my list so i okay okay fair enough

[00:13:46] well then uh it's about having a structure and a process so um making sure that you're mapping out

[00:13:53] and documenting your entire sales process from prospecting to closing and ensuring that each

[00:13:59] step is clear and repeatable right um so we have had an opportunity nurturing process for several

[00:14:12] years um and so when somebody basically sticks up their hand and says you know i'd like to know more

[00:14:19] because i'm interested in solving a problem that i think you can help with like that's a qualified

[00:14:23] opportunity they've said they need something um and they have some urgency behind it so now

[00:14:29] they go into our um opportunity based sales process and here are the calls that we're

[00:14:35] going to have to figure out if we're a fit and if there's economic value together um and

[00:14:40] what the shape of that um engagement might might might take and and so on and then there's a proposal

[00:14:46] and a contract and it's all outlined what we didn't have and still don't have formally is

[00:14:54] the prospecting part which you okay um and and what are the um steps you're going to take

[00:15:03] when you're working through your lead list straight from like stranger to um uh familiar right and and

[00:15:13] and then qualify them uh over into the opportunity process so um we'd always sort of just let everybody

[00:15:20] figure out their own leads and nurture them and and and engage with them and figured that

[00:15:27] whatever that process looks like at some point you know they'll find somebody who

[00:15:33] is is a qualified opportunity and then we have a great process for for nurturing that

[00:15:38] anyway we've we've now modeled um an actual formal lead prospecting process as well

[00:15:47] and it was um really fantastic it's not a process that says um here's where you find

[00:15:55] people it but it must say when you find them here's how these are the steps to follow in order to

[00:16:02] yeah engage with them and and where your decision points are and when to move them out of that

[00:16:08] process went to advance them through that process um and i'll be honest i don't think we could have

[00:16:14] come to the definition of that process if we had not done a little bit of just um ad hoc uh for a

[00:16:23] little while to go like well what what you know what steps are helpful what reactions do we get what

[00:16:31] objections um do we need to account for um so that we can build uh an effective you know lead

[00:16:39] prospecting process do you then have a checklist or like a flow chart to to make sure that you're

[00:16:46] on track and to know where these points are yeah so that's the part that that hasn't been

[00:16:51] established yet um and so like i said we we actually have it mapped out like we have a flow

[00:16:56] chart diagram of like this is how we'd like this process to to flow and and here are the decision

[00:17:02] points and here's how we know if somebody is a hot lead versus a cold lead um and what do we do

[00:17:10] with them along the way um like so we have the workflow diagram we just need to convert that into

[00:17:17] a more formal process and set it up in our CRM so that it's an actually actually a managed

[00:17:24] process that we have some accountability and visibility onto yeah okay okay speaking of CRM

[00:17:30] speaking of CRM systems though i mean do you also find that a lot of companies don't actually have

[00:17:36] CRM systems because i am finding more and more recently that that's actually not a thing you

[00:17:42] know that people are still at the stage even big companies they're at the stage of going

[00:17:47] we're about to implement a CRM system yeah you don't have one at the moment right so this this

[00:17:55] yes i do i find that all the time i also find often that they've got a CRM um and have had

[00:18:03] one for a while but they're not using it exactly yeah that's the other that's the other way

[00:18:08] we're setting up a CRM um they may actually already have and it may just be a refinement

[00:18:14] but i was in a call um at a at a prospects office um recently like in the past couple of weeks and

[00:18:23] and i asked that question and i said well you know how is this going to tie into your CRM

[00:18:28] and this was a client who had been a former client and had drifted away and has now

[00:18:33] come back to ask us um if we can help them again and we were actually involved in that

[00:18:40] is probably not the most um glorifying story uh but you know and we were we were involved in

[00:18:46] helping them get a sales force setup okay well there's been turnover and they sort of said

[00:18:55] well thanks for the setup and they took the management of the platform on internally and

[00:19:00] and now it's been probably five or six years and they're and they've come back and

[00:19:07] and they're like oh no we don't have a CRM i'm like what yes you do

[00:19:12] and anyway so it it was not used and the the now you got me going about CRMs it was um

[00:19:20] um it was not seen as a useful uh tool and that's the biggest pitfall with CRM

[00:19:29] implementations is that understanding and education well it's that the leadership

[00:19:34] says they want it or somebody says oh it's going to support our process and so it gets

[00:19:40] enabled and and configured and turned on from a from a leadership or a process first

[00:19:46] mentality it it will fail if it's not done from a sales rep uh perspective so you you

[00:19:54] you have to walk a line because you want the tool to enable the process but it first and

[00:19:59] foremost top priority is it has to be for the people that need the data in definitely if it's

[00:20:05] not done that way um there's a certain amount you can kind of insist on and that's what

[00:20:10] we're paying you a salary for um so we need it to happen and you can enforce it um but the

[00:20:16] enforcement gets a heck of a lot easier when the people doing that work also have um c value get

[00:20:21] some information exactly make actionable data all that kind of stuff agreed well there you go

[00:20:27] we probably could have put a few more things on our yeah or for other days hopefully a few of

[00:20:33] those little tactics um are helpful to the rest of the audience um I I think that was good

[00:20:41] uh yeah I think as as a summary there use video mm have a CRM system but make sure you got a process

[00:20:51] yeah yeah and get in a room uh you know workshop who you're going to reach out to with uh with

[00:20:56] your colleagues there you go thanks Andy if you uh want to get in touch with us uh you can find us at

[00:21:05] tandtimbits.com and we'd love to know that anybody's listening thank you very much thanks Andy