Sales mindset, techniques and tools fit for the 21st Century.

It seems an age ago that we first heard rumours of pandemic, heard about the possibility of lockdown, wondered how it could work and if it would apply to us. 

Fast forward to now and we are totally transformed to digital, online and social.  An average day for us at Crux starts on Slack, heads onto LinkedIn and Twitter, onto Teams or Zoom, back to Slack, swinging into Passle, onto YouTube, into WhatsApp, Facetime, into Hootsuite and so on. Connecting, expanding, watching, interacting, sharing, learning, storing, selling, delivering….all on internal and external social channels.

Social for work, communicating, problem solving, shopping, quizzing - I was even invited to an online Whiskey tasting the other day!

This is time for real reflection as to what "works" in the world of sales and marketing today. If you are just thinking about this now you are late to the party but, it’s not too late.

I had an interesting conversation with a colleague last week where we tried to remember the last time we sent an email to a client during the sales phase - we couldn’t remember. Yes, there has been the odd email firming up on contract elements or an outlook invite to a video call but, the position of email has changed and now has a place at the end of the transaction rather than the beginning. When I hear someone say “send me an email” these days, it feels old fashioned.

On another call, I shared this view with a senior team member at a client. They disagreed and said “the more emails our sales people get out now the better, that’s what everyone else will be doing so we cant and wont be last…”

I don’t know about you, but I’m flooded with emails from sales people right now, to the point where I am actively blocking them. We are a small company, imagine what its like for the big clients, the mass volume of email traffic from people trying to book a meeting or tell you about what they do.

Social media has changed communication, it has changed sales and marketing, it has changed business as we knew it.

The Marketing evolution / revolution

Marketing as we know it today started in the 1930s with advertising. A consumer was interrupted by an image which was broadcast in the hope that it would catch attention and encourage a positive outcome, a sale. 

We opened newspapers and magazines and the idea was that a brand was right there in front of us and, as buyers we said "… I’m going to buy one of them".

We know, it doesn't work like that anymore but let's say it did….What would you do as a buyer? You see the advert but you cant walk into a shop right now, so you go online. The product that advertised is now suddenly competing with all the other brands that are present and active on social.

From my own experience, I recently decided to buy something online. I knew what I wanted and where to get it. 15 minutes after following some online reviews and threads on the thing I was going to buy and finding a tech community thread discussing what was the best option….I bought something else. I learned that buying process for the thing I wanted was overly complex, they took ages to deliver it and the tech support was dreadful. Social media allowed me to connect with a community, read, learn, change my mind and alter my buying decision, all from my living room. 

Mark Schaefer, one of the world’s leading authorities on marketing asked in an recent article "Is the pandemic driving a new marketing rebellion?"

"Nobody believes ads. Nobody wants ads, ...... The world is demanding a new, more human-centred approach to marketing and this is also accelerating now. I’ve contended that small companies are ideally positioned to be “the most human company” in their communities, but large brands are too locked into obsolete ideas about marketing and agency relationships that prevent them from adjusting to new consumer realities. They’re asleep."

It's true, we are bombarded with thousands of messages everyday. You might have the best photography and the best copy but you are just one of those ‘thousands of messages’ and you simply blend into the noisy background.

Interrupt and broadcast - #thecoldcall…

In the 1980s, cold calling was invented, anyone and everyone in sales has lifted the phone at some point since then, taken a breath and cold called a client.

“Hi, you don’t know who we are but we do things better than our competitors, we are super special at what we do and we want to show you how we can do our magic for you…..”. The classic Interrupt and broadcast.

These days, unless you close the transaction right there on the call, your interruption will drive the individual to look you up on LinkedIn, look your company up and... your competition (remember my personal buying story earlier?).

Globally renowned research and advisory company, Gartner, found that modern customers are more than halfway, 57%, through the purchase process before they have the first meaningful contact with a seller – they cut out the interruption. 

"The traditional approach to selling doesn’t work today. Deals are increasingly complex, and customers have access to more information earlier in the sale. As a result, customers are buying in new ways, delaying initial contact with suppliers and requiring greater consensus to move forward".

Today’s customers don’t need sales reps in the same way as in the past — customers now wait until they are 57% through the purchase process before contacting a rep. Buyers do independent research and set their own purchase criteria, all before the first seller interaction.

So, our customers are coming into sales interactions with preconceived ideas about what products and features they want to buy and, how much they’re willing to pay – they cut out the need for broadcast. In this environment, sales professionals must deliver a purchase experience that transcends product features and benefits to win sales and retain business, or risk becoming irrelevant.

Ask yourself and your team how emailing and cold calling with features and benefits is working out for demand generation today…?

How do we possibly market and sell in the 21st century with 20th century mindset, methods and tools…?

Advertising, email and cold calling is all 20th Century origin, not only have we advanced in years, we are in the middle of an economic change cycle, the likes of which we have never seen.

Stéphanie Genin, vice president of global enterprise marketing at social media management firm Hootsuite

“After weeks of adapting to Zoom parties, video appointments with doctors, online schooling, social distancing and tapping into social media for virtually everything, will people be happy to go back to their old ways of working and engaging with each other?” she asks. 

“The answer will be no. Social media has been holding communities together and organisations will need to assess how to manage the new normal.”

Modern Selling

So, we now know that our customers are not waiting for us to interrupt them or, for us to broadcast at them with advertising, email and cold calling. Modern Selling enables your salesforce, in fact all your employees to prospect (social marketing), to take employees through the sales process and for you to close them. This doesn’t mean you don't have phone conversations or zoom calls, but your social is the beating heart running all the way through the sales process from opening to closing. 

Insight – A sample ‘Modern Selling’ Business Case

Let’s look at how your team should use ‘Social Media' as a highly effective programme to drive brand attribution, at the lowest cost. Creating reach, and enabling you to be found on social, as well as being able drive revenue through your passive and active social.

The key is an internally aligned ‘Social Strategy' and, its cost doesn’t increase as your reach and engagement aspirations grow, as they do on 'paid media'.

For example:

• A company has 50 employees, includes all areas of the company, everyone.
• Each employee has an average of 500 connections on LinkedIn.
• You encourage them how to write (subject matter) content, stories & conversations that reflect your company & brand (all in their own style) including all relevant keywords that are important to ‘why’ you do what you do.
• Make sure they are not selling - this isn't an old time ‘Interrupt and broadcast’ marketing campaign on social media.
• Get all (including you and your board) to do that (consistently) twice a week each month for 6 months.

This is where leadership comes in…

• Your reach = 600,000 (this does not take into account your networks network)
• Imagine if they then interacted with comments, conversations & made new connections which grew that network even bigger?
• Finally, make sure you have enough people to answer all the pre-qualified ‘inbound sales enquiries’.

This would transform your business to digital, it would strip out a lot of the cost and waste of your current analogue marketing and give you a plan that will engage with the modern buyer.

'Low Risk - High Gain'

I am a trained associate of DLA Ignite, pairing a 30 year history in Oil and Gas, Energy and construction with the very best strategy and techniques in Modern Selling. DLA have been transforming companies with social for years. By using social you can get twice the output for half the cost of legacy sales and marketing methods. 

It's time for your own innovation in sales and marketing. You know the old ways don't work. You know you have limited time and cash. You know, as a leader you need to do something to stop the waste and cash burn.

Lets connect and talk it over.

Eric Doyle

Crux