Episode #319: Steve Jobs And The Death Of The Salesperson

Proprietary research findings, industry experience, thick product catalogues, detailed flyers were the currency of the salesperson, before the advent of the iPhone. The salesperson was an unknown quantity, so the only guarantee was their firm’s brand. The individual didn’t have a personal brand. Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone in 2007 and changed sales forever. That salesperson of old has been killed off by the technology. The client today has access to everything the salesperson has and they can access it from anywhere. In fact, they can know a lot about the salesperson before they ever meet and size them up accordingly.

Content marketing has flooded every field with knowledge, insight and experience. It is all free and literally within your grasp as you pick up your phone and plug into the internet. Someone I know here, picked up their phone, wrote this message and sent it out to their social media network – “Has anyone seen Mr. X, he owes me money?”. Mr. X had a business here in Tokyo and they were trying to sell us their services. Once upon a time the disgruntled businessperson could have told a few people about their issue with Mr. X. He could have easily evaded broad public scrutiny and kept going as before. Not now.

His name is mud and anytime someone checks him out, there will be a thick trail of brand destruction for all to see and so people will be wary of him. It is as easy as picking up your iPhone. The same thing can happen to any of us. If we are not doing the right thing by how we serve our clients, then public purview will be close behind. The well will be poisoned for other potential deals.

Another person I know here had a business dispute with the seller of a company they bought. The post deal elements became acrimonious and was waged in the Court of Public Opinion, courtesy of the internet as well as in the legal courts. They told me that subsequent to this issue going out to the internet, they had a lot of trouble attracting business partners, investors and buyers for their businesses. Research thanks to the mobile phone has become instant, cheap, easy and in some cases deadly.

On the flip side what positive things can clients learn about you before you meet? I was introduced to an executive of a major firm here in Japan over a lunch. The first thing the person said was ,”I checked you out on LinkedIn”. I was very cool, calm and collected when hearing that. This was because I have been making a constant effort that what he saw on LinkedIn would generate a specific reaction. What he said next was “it was very impressive” and that is what I wanted to make sure I heard. That praise from him was no accident, it was planned because anyone can check us our instantly with the minimum of effort thanks to Steve Jobs.

Knowing this, what are you doing about it? Your website can now house all of that information you used to have to carry around on client visits. You can access your own website and bring up information for the client using your phone and so don’t have to lug heavy items around anymore. That is very nice.

You can write articles on specialised subjects and blast them out through the internet to the world. Potential clients will be able to sample your fare before they buy it, to understand if you are trustworthy or not. If what you are writing is high quality, then the buyer will see you in the same way, before you meet.

The buyer can see if you are a cleanskin or not. If someone is complaining about your integrity or honesty and the service you provided them, that is going to be a deal breaker with potential new clients. I always talk about we don’t want a sale. We want the re-order, because the psychology behind that is totally different to going after a single sale. The way you think about the buyer is different. You are trying to become a trusted partner for the long term, with tremendous repeat business and lots of farming going on and not just running around hunting all of the time.

When potential clients grab their phone to do a search on you, what will they find? Do you know what they will find? If you don’t, you should be checking regularly to make sure you are happy with what is out there about you. And you should do the search on your phone, not your computer laptop, because that is most likely the medium the buyer is going to be using. Clients can also quickly fact check what you are telling them as well, so we have to make sure we are always being honest with the buyer. Lying to buyers is so far beyond stupid, I don’t even want to discuss it.

Steve Jobs has handed us all a powerful truth finder in sales. It isn’t going away and will only become more intense. We have to find ways of making this work for us when selling, to open up new opportunities and vistas.