Read an Excerpt
INTRODUCTION
But I’ve Only Got Four Minutes!
You’ve just returned from your sales kickoff meeting, inundated with products, tools, systems, and technical information on your company.
You got to party with your field partners, and agreed that you guys would kill your numbers this year. It was exciting to see the inside teams get acknowledged for all their work last year—but with that acknowledgment came a new, higher quota from your manager. So
here you are, back in your cubicle, with a laptop, high-resolution monitor, whiteboard, your Blackberry, and a phone. You are pumped a psyched, and ready to get out there, but—no one is answering their phones or responding to your e-mails, and your pipeline is looking pretty bare. When you do manage to connect, all you hear is, ‘‘No
thanks, we’re set . . .’’ or ‘‘Call me at the beginning of next quarter.’’
And even though you think you only have about four minutes to spare, you decide to open up this book.
Congratulations! You’ve already taken your first step to becoming a smart-selling inside sales pro ready to be transformed into a savvy
Sales 2.0 warrior who is ready to take on today’s opt-out busy crowd.
Reading this book will help you survive and thrive through your sales messaging: You’ll learn how to craft introductions that get prospects talking, how to get out of the No-Po zone and align with power buyers a how to make presentations that have real selling power, how to field objections and turn them into opportunities, and how to build a healthy—and accurate!—sales forecast.
FINALLY! A BOOK WRITTEN JUST FOR YOU
Whether you are in inside sales, telesales, lead development, lead generation a lead qualification, renewals, or are basically spending fiftyplus hours a week calling on distracted, risk-averse business professionals who only give you four minutes of their time, this book is written for you.
If you are one of those time-crunched managers meeting with your inside team each week wondering what’s holding them back from hitting their numbers, this book is for you.
If you have an inside organization contributing to your sales numbers or qualifying leads for you, and you’re wondering how they can get some skills training fast, this book is for you.
And if you find yourself wondering what the plastic golf sets and huge trophies filled with candy are doing in some people’s cubicles a and why other sales reps’ names are on the ‘‘wall of shame,’’ this book is for you.
This robust and comprehensive ten-step sales system includes ten essential skills inside sales warriors must have in order to effectively sell by phone and online in today’s Sales 2.0 world. Inside salespeople are riding the crest of the wave of change in the way sales are made.
This book gives you the robust skills you need to master this sales transformation right now.
SELLING IN A SALES 2.0 WORLD
Less than a decade ago, customers expected to receive an in-person visit from their field sales rep. Today, veteran field reps are scrambling to keep up with the new B2B stars. Inside salespeople, once the
‘‘neglected stepchildren’’ of sales organizations, have changed the way sales are done. Businesses now rely on inside sales teams to generate up to 50 percent of their revenue. Inside salespeople prospect and manage customers at the highest levels: cold-calling directors, VPs a and C-level decision makers within some of the largest companies in the world. They are bright, educated, culturally diverse, sophisticated a and extremely well-paid professionals who sell complex solutions worth millions of dollars over the phone and online.
Today’s market, economic, and competitive conditions have created a more complex and less predictable sales cycle. And that means more of everything. As companies provide more tools, technologies a and systems to help speed up the sales cycle and increase efficiency and productivity, only sales reps who can seamlessly integrate the necessary tools, technologies, and systems into their sales process can earn the right to be called inside sales warriors.
Think about it: Inside salespeople average two hundred new outbound calls and e-mails per week, risking rejection on an hourly basis.
As a salesperson alone with your phone in a warren of cubicles, you may feel isolated and unmotivated. This book is your true friend and companion as it sits inside your cubicle with you and helps you make some simple changes—such as crafting a new opening statement, creating an original e-mail template, or generating fresh questions—that transform hang-ups and rejections into new prospects and closed deals.
WHY I WROTE THIS BOOK a know inside sales from the inside out—literally, from inside the cubicle to the mind of the customer. And I understand inside sales warriors well enough to know that they are tired of training sessions geared for field reps and books that just don’t get it. They are annoyed when people misunderstand them and believe they are ‘‘smile and dial’’ phone jocks who just ‘‘churn and burn’’ through calls. This book reflects the whole spectrum of my work: as a trainer who knows the skills inside sales reps need; as a coach who knows how to get up close and personal to figure out where the rep is going wrong and how to set it right; as a consultant who has performed many inside sales audits; as a thought leader who predicts trends and forecasts in the industry; as an advocate for inside sales who believes they are the most talented sales group; and as a former inside sales rep and an entrepreneur who has single-handedly grown her own organization by walking her talk.
For fifteen-plus years I’ve owned TeleSmart Communications, a
San Francisco–based global training organization specializing in inside sales training, coaching, and consulting. Our TeleSmart 10 program is the ten-step skills program that continues to be chosen as the flagship methodology for global fast-growing inside sales organizations.
For more than twenty-five years, I’ve carved a niche with some of the most talented and progressive Fortune 1000 high-tech companies in the world. I have certified 10,000-plus teams and managers on
TeleSmart methodology.
I have also spent 5,000-plus hours listening to calls with a training
Y and observing inside sales reps on the job, hearing both sides of the conversation. I know your side—how you work, your self-talk, what motivates you, what you are fearful of, and how you can unknowingly sabotage your success. And I know your customers’ or prospects’ side—
the people who are sitting at their desks reading e-mail, looking at their caller ID, and not picking up the phone when they see a vendor calling. I also know how the Sales 2.0 landscape has changed everything a including the old selling rules.
This book is not homework: I know you don’t have extra time!
It’s designed to be read and digested on the job—your daily drip of tactical skills and solutions that you can test out immediately. I know you are impatient and will want to speed through it—or maybe just go straight to Chapter 9, ‘‘Closing’’—but I encourage you to read it from beginning to end. Why? Because each skill builds on the one before it exponentially, resulting in big changes. Each chapter is packed with tons of useful tips, fresh ideas, trend info, and insights into why you do what you do and why your customers do what they do. It also includes both phone and e-mail tips, as these are the dynamic duo for inside sales warriors today.
So shut off your IM buddy list, stop texting for a few minutes a turn off your e-mail, find the nearest conference room that you won’t get kicked out of for a few hours, and go hang out with this book.
Welcome to the inside sales warrior club! You have arrived!
