Episode #57: Ideal Sales Support

Sales is a difficult world, but there are certain environments which lend themselves more toward making salespeople successful. If we are allowed to flourish, the chances are high that we will maximize our opportunities. Focusing outward on the competition is much better than having salespeople squabbling amongst themselves over commission splits or who owns the client. Giving salespeople enormous upside for success encourages greater commitment to the cause. Ross Perot was IBM’s most highly paid salesperson, until the senior executives took umbrage that he was earning more than they were. Their egos reduced his remuneration and so he left to start his own company Electronic Data Systems (EDS). If they had been a bit smarter, he would have kept earning the company huge revenues and they would have ridden the earnings wave. Does your firm embrace success or want to control it?

Before we get into this week’s topic, here is what caught my attention lately.

Kotaro Chiba started his Drone Fund in 2017 and it was oversubscribed. He is planning to raise two more funds. McKinsey predicts that in five to ten years, the skies will be filled with drones delivering goods and in ten to fifteen years we will be heading to work in flying cars. Does anyone remember The Jetsons cartoons from the sixties? Chiba says “its like a gold rush in the air and the first movers will reap the best results. The Japanese GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO CREATE THE LAWS AND INFRASTRUCTURE NEEDED TO PUT FLYING CARS INTO THE SKY IN THE NEXT DECADE. Drone startup Skyrobot predicts the Japan drone market could reach twenty billion dollars by 2025. Japan Post has successfully tested drone deliveries between two post offices in Fukushima nine kilometers apart in November. This was done completely remotely, with no visual monitoring, for the first time. Packages weighing up to two kilograms will be delivered in about ten minutes. In other news, the Japan Press Research institute found that TV is used by 92 percent of people in Japan as a news source. Japan is still quite unique in this regard. The internet topped the list of news sources for those up to the age of forty nine and for those over fifty, they preferred television for their news. Regarding the reliability of news, NHK earned seventy point eight points out of one hundred points, followed by newspapers at sixty nine point six points and the internet at forty nine points.

This is episode number fifty seven and we are talking about Ideal Sales Support. Soredewa ikimasho, so let's get going. “Public floggings and humiliation will continue until sale’s team morale and performance improves”. What are today’s revenue results, how much is in the pipeline, when will we get paid by the client, what is the run rate, will we meet our budget, what have you done for me lately - this is the lexicon of sales. The sales results are the end product of a series of processes. There is usually ample attention placed on sales processes but sometimes we need to step back from the detail, the mechanics, the techniques and contemplate the overall environment we have created for sales to flourish.

Your Japanese sales manager yelling at the sales team and berating them for under performance is usually not very productive, because the motivation drops and a vicious downward spiral kicks in. The client’s best interests are out the window immediately and in short order, the unnecessary brand “flesh wounds” start to accumulate. We need to redirect the team’s performance by moving things forward, rather than constantly combing through the bitter ashes of past defeats.

Here are five environment builders to boost the success of the sales team.

#Number One: Best Our Rivals

Sales can become very internally focused. The constant review of sales numbers and focus on existing clients draws us into a web of self-absorption. Salespeople compete with each other, rather than with their external rivals. We need to change our focus from inside to outside. Shifting the world into “us” and “them” can be great for focus and encouragement. Unfortunately, a lot of the “us” and “them” is often too internally focused. This is usually centered on the failings of Marketing or IT or Production or just about anybody outside of sales, who can be blamed for the lack of production of results. Better to focus this caustic energy on the competition. Intense rivalry is a motivator and beating the other sales team is a worthy goal that appeals to the competitive nature of sales people, so let’s focus them outward.

Number Two: High Income Factory

Having no limits on sales people’s earnings motivates. Pretty obvious! Sadly the ego of the President or the Sales Director can get swept up in this commission-based melee, especially when they realize that individual sales people are earning more than they are. Emasculating or ending a successful sales structure, because of ego or greed, is stupid but it still happens anyway as the Ross Perot example underlines.

Rather than reducing commissions, lets keep the no-ceiling attraction there to drive results and make sure it becomes a win-win for everyone. Japan rarely operates on one hundred percent commission, so there is usually a base/commission trade off. Why not one hundred percent? Because salespeople don't have to accept that much risk. They have many choices about where they will work and they are risk averse, so base and bonus is best, base and commission is second best. Keeping the unlimited income prospect in everyone’s sights is good business, because the corresponding base pay rates can be kept lower. Even if performance takes time to produce or is not being generated, then the actual fixed costs remain low. The more sales people succeed, the more attractive you are as the employer to the quality talent you want to attract and retain. What are some other things that work well?

#Number Three: Focus On Personal Development

The basics of sales can’t be neglected or truncated. Every high performance athlete or sports team goes back to the basics at the start of every season. Sales people should be no different – back to basics on a regular basis, eliminates or confines bad habits.

Your own presentation can become boring to you. The client usually only ever hears it once, but the sales person could be giving the same basic presentation 20-30 times a week. Short cuts emerge, bad habits surface, best practices are trimmed, inconsistencies pop up, complacency arises when sales people, even the good ones, find themselves immersed in dull routine. Stimulation to vary the presentation or to inject some fresh ideas into the sales conversation is needed. Training, attending sales rallies, industry related conferences and events, support for reading and on-line courses, are all magic stimuli for sales people. Are your people getting their fair share of this sales stimulation?

#Number Four: Self Directed

In the famous movie Glengarry Glen Ross, the sales “leads” are so valuable they are placed in the company safe. Ace sales guy, Ricky Roma, played by Al Pacino, is the only one who is not dependent on the company provided leads. Moral of the story - don’t let sales people become dependent on leads generated by the marketing department or from the web. Networking uncovers clients. Highly targeted cold calls creates new clients. Asking for referrals gets new business. Calling clients who have gone quiet gets new sales.

The best sale culture is one of accountability for production , independence and a will to achieve. Organised tenacity, creativity, freedom, self starter success orientation - should be the dominant attributes. Make it clear at the hiring point that “this is how we roll here”, because sales is a brutally honest results culture.

#Number Five: High Praise & Recognition Culture

It may be thought that self-directed sales people don’t need praise or approbation. Guess what? They want it anyway. Don’t ever underestimate the competitive nature of sales people and their appetite for having their egos stroked!

Successful sales leadership builds people and manages processes. Paying attention to the macro-environment, as well as the gritty detail, will help build a sustainable, high performance culture in your sales organisation. Is what I have outlined here doing a good job in describing your work environment? If not, take some initiative and push hard to change it to a success model, rather than let it continue as a blame model. If you can’t change it, then get out. Good salespeople are welcome everywhere and life is too short to work for idiots.

Action steps

1. Step back and take a good hard look at the sales environment that has been created to date
2. Make the competitive focus outward not inward
3. Provide “no ceilings” commission structures to motivate everyone
4. Invest in the development of sales success
5. Make organised tenacity, creativity, freedom, success orientation the dominant attributes
6. Don’t ever underestimate the competitive nature of salespeople and our appetite for having our egos stroked