Latest / What is Business Development? / Episode 158: “Relentless Sales Leadership” with Wade Wilson
Transcript
- 0:04Speaker 1: Welcome to the Business Development Podcast, brought to you by
- 0:07Speaker 1: the Global Business Development Association, delivering the strategies and tactics
- 0:12Speaker 1: to boost your career and corporate growth.
- 0:21Speaker 2: Hello, BD pros, and welcome to the BD Podcast. It's
- 0:25Speaker 2: the official podcast of the Global Business Development Association and
- 0:30Speaker 2: And today we're here with our guest, Wade Wilson. He
- 0:32Speaker 2: has a new book that I think many of you
- 0:35Speaker 2: will like to learn about. And one of the key
- 0:37Speaker 2: things we will talk about today is, have you ever
- 0:40Speaker 2: been as a business developer on a team where that
- 0:44Speaker 2: BD leader, he drives the team or she drives the
- 0:48Speaker 2: team purely based on fear? Whether it's pipeline reviews, whether
- 0:54Speaker 2: it's quotas, it's all driven by fear. And wouldn't you
- 1:00Speaker 2: like a better way? Wouldn't you like to be on
- 1:02Speaker 2: a team that does it better, where you really feel
- 1:04Speaker 2: a lot better at the end of the day, as
- 1:06Speaker 2: opposed to beat up and dragged down by fear? Yeah,
- 1:10Speaker 2: I bet you would. And we're going to talk about
- 1:13Speaker 2: that today with our guest author. But before we do that,
- 1:17Speaker 2: we're going to talk about something that will remove some
- 1:20Speaker 2: fear in business development. And that is the knowledge you
- 1:23Speaker 2: can gain from reading the Business Development Body of Knowledge.
- 1:27Speaker 2: It's available on Amazon. And then when you read the book,
- 1:30Speaker 2: go to the GBDA website at gbdassociation.org and learn how
- 1:37Speaker 2: you can get your business development professional certification. Okay, so
- 1:43Speaker 2: our guest today is Wade Wilson. He spent 30 years
- 1:47Speaker 2: building and leading enterprise sales teams at big companies like Oracle, Verizon,
- 1:52Speaker 2: and others. And he sold over a half billion copies
- 1:57Speaker 2: billion in complex IT solutions. And now he works with
- 2:02Speaker 2: chief revenue officers and DPs who are trying to do
- 2:06Speaker 2: the same thing. And he helps them build cultures where
- 2:10Speaker 2: reps actually want to work. And he helps them all
- 2:14Speaker 2: close bigger deals and help close those deals a lot faster. Now,
- 2:22Speaker 2: in Wade's new book, Relentless Sales Leadership, You learn how
- 2:27Speaker 2: to build a high-performing sales team and create predictable pipeline
- 2:32Speaker 2: and out-strategize the competition. Wow, wouldn't we all like to
- 2:37Speaker 2: be able to do something like that? Wade Wilson, welcome
- 2:40Speaker 2: to the show.
- 2:41Speaker 3: Thank you very much.
- 2:43Speaker 2: Wade, it's great to have you here. And I always
- 2:45Speaker 2: start off by asking the guest authors, how did you
- 2:49Speaker 2: get into the field of business development and why did
- 2:52Speaker 2: you write the book?
- 2:54Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. You know, I'm a third generation sales guy.
- 2:58Speaker 3: My dad, my grandfather. And, you know, I even told
- 3:01Speaker 3: him I wasn't going to be a sales guy, but
- 3:03Speaker 3: it's just in the blood. It's just what happens. But really,
- 3:05Speaker 3: from a business development perspective, I started in the late
- 3:09Speaker 3: 90s at a company called Rapid Dime. And we were
- 3:12Speaker 3: like it was the old school. It was a headset,
- 3:14Speaker 3: a book of business. And you just made phone call
- 3:17Speaker 3: after phone call. And I remember my boss telling me,
- 3:20Speaker 3: you're not going to see the sunrise and you're not
- 3:21Speaker 3: going to see the sunset. You're going to be dialing
- 3:23Speaker 3: for dollars the entire time. And we were selling IT services,
- 3:26Speaker 3: you know, projects and staffing engagements. And, you know, by
- 3:31Speaker 3: the time I joined, I was like the guy that
- 3:33Speaker 3: they would give all the crappy accounts to. Right. And
- 3:35Speaker 3: so I had to learn real quick that cold calling
- 3:39Speaker 3: wasn't very successful for me. You know, so I learned
- 3:42Speaker 3: a system that I called warm intro call. And I'll
- 3:45Speaker 3: go over that later. But, you know, it's the straight
- 3:48Speaker 3: cold calling was just it was dismal. It was it
- 3:51Speaker 3: was it was terrible. And so it had a very
- 3:53Speaker 3: low success rate. So over the course of my time,
- 3:57Speaker 3: I became one of the top three salespeople within the
- 4:00Speaker 3: first year of this company. And the next thing you know,
- 4:03Speaker 3: they're having me go to St. Louis where they couldn't
- 4:05Speaker 3: get in. And I built an office there. I was
- 4:07Speaker 3: managing director at 28 years old and no degree, no
- 4:12Speaker 3: experience managing people. And it was crazy. We were cashflow
- 4:16Speaker 3: positive in 11 months and we just blew out all numbers.
- 4:20Speaker 3: And then it just from career just went from there.
- 4:23Speaker 3: And And that's kind of where all the beginning came from,
- 4:25Speaker 3: where a lot of this knowledge that I have that
- 4:27Speaker 3: I'm putting into the book was a lot of things
- 4:30Speaker 3: where I failed and a lot of things where I
- 4:32Speaker 3: learned that not to do as being a sales leader
- 4:35Speaker 3: and how to really grow people. So that's the genesis
- 4:39Speaker 3: of where we are.
- 4:40Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
- 4:41Speaker 2: And that whole foundation in your first job of you
- 4:45Speaker 2: won't see the sunrise and you won't see the sunset.
- 4:50Speaker 2: As we used to joke in the Navy, we would say,
- 4:53Speaker 2: The beatings will continue until morale improves. Yeah. Well, and so, yeah,
- 5:01Speaker 2: there's a lot of that fear mechanism that's built into
- 5:03Speaker 2: a lot of sales methodologies. And a lot of sales
- 5:07Speaker 2: leaders were raised in those types of environments. So it's
- 5:10Speaker 2: great to have you on the show. And again, folks,
- 5:12Speaker 2: we're talking about Wade's new book, Relentless Sales Leadership. So Wade,
- 5:18Speaker 2: let's talk about key tactic number one from your book
- 5:22Speaker 2: you would like to share with everybody.
- 5:25Speaker 3: Yeah. So to really kind of go with that warm
- 5:29Speaker 3: intro calling that I did, where it basically came from was,
- 5:33Speaker 3: you know, you would call people up and you'd have
- 5:35Speaker 3: a script that everybody would use. You use the script
- 5:38Speaker 3: and everybody knew and basically you'd hang up on you. Hey,
- 5:42Speaker 3: I don't want your time. Take me off the list.
- 5:44Speaker 3: All those things. So what instead what I would do
- 5:47Speaker 3: is I would call everybody around that person. So there
- 5:50Speaker 3: would always be a key decision maker. I'd call the secretary.
- 5:54Speaker 3: I'd call the IT manager that was on the side
- 5:56Speaker 3: that nobody ever called because he didn't have any requirements.
- 5:59Speaker 3: He didn't have any business. And I would learn about
- 6:02Speaker 3: the person I was going to talk to. I learned
- 6:05Speaker 3: what projects they were engaged in. I learned all the
- 6:07Speaker 3: things that they were doing. And then the great about
- 6:10Speaker 3: this is I would ask them, well, can you transfer me?
- 6:13Speaker 3: That'd be great. And so they would do an internal transfer.
- 6:16Speaker 3: And of course, when they looked at the phone, it
- 6:18Speaker 3: didn't look like an outside caller. It looked like somebody
- 6:20Speaker 3: transferring them on the inside. And so it was very
- 6:24Speaker 3: easy for me to say, hey, John, how's it going? Hey,
- 6:27Speaker 3: I just was talking to Phil. He's the one that
- 6:29Speaker 3: transferred me. And so you already had a warm intro.
- 6:33Speaker 3: Even though you didn't really technically have one, you had one.
- 6:36Speaker 3: And so I would say my success rate from cold calling,
- 6:41Speaker 3: which was 3% to 5%, when I would do the
- 6:43Speaker 3: warm intro call would go all the way up to 20%.
- 6:47Speaker 3: And so it was just, you know, it was just
- 6:49Speaker 3: really for me, it was a way to get out
- 6:51Speaker 3: of doing cold calls. Because as soon as we had
- 6:54Speaker 3: enough successful calls, we were out of having to do
- 6:57Speaker 3: the cold calls. So it was just a very good
- 6:59Speaker 3: tactic that worked very well for me. And really, to
- 7:02Speaker 3: be frank, I think it really helped the people I
- 7:04Speaker 3: was calling because they weren't feeling like they were being sold.
- 7:07Speaker 3: It was a conversation that I already knew information. They
- 7:10Speaker 3: didn't have to explain it to me. For them, I
- 7:13Speaker 3: think it was beneficial for them as well.
- 7:16Speaker 2: Yeah, I really like that concept of warming things up.
- 7:20Speaker 2: It's a warm lead at that point because you are
- 7:23Speaker 2: talking to stakeholders, champions, influencers, all those folks that do
- 7:28Speaker 2: sit in a buying committee, or maybe the folks that
- 7:32Speaker 2: are not on a buying committee, but they do have
- 7:34Speaker 2: the relationships. They do have that information, that situational awareness
- 7:38Speaker 2: that they can share with you, and you know, there's
- 7:41Speaker 2: that automatic credibility that somebody referred you from inside the organization.
- 7:48Speaker 2: And so that's great that you kind of stumbled onto
- 7:50Speaker 2: this tactic early on. So let me ask you this then,
- 7:55Speaker 2: would you try to go direct into that decision maker first?
- 8:01Speaker 2: And then if you got blocked somehow, maybe by the gatekeeper,
- 8:05Speaker 2: you know, who's probably the secretary, especially back then, you know,
- 8:08Speaker 2: you had human secretaries, executive assistants, whatever title you want
- 8:13Speaker 2: to use for them, they would kind of screen the
- 8:15Speaker 2: calls for executive decision makers. And that was always the
- 8:18Speaker 2: tough thing is how do I break past the gatekeeper?
- 8:22Speaker 2: Would you try that first? And then if you did
- 8:24Speaker 2: not succeed, you would then try and make your calls
- 8:27Speaker 2: into the other folks or you started.
- 8:29Speaker 3: With the others? No, no. I would start with the
- 8:31Speaker 3: other folks. The reason why is that exact reason. You
- 8:34Speaker 3: got to the gatekeeper and her whole job or his
- 8:37Speaker 3: whole job was to stop you from getting through, right? So,
- 8:40Speaker 3: you know, if you were talking to other people within
- 8:43Speaker 3: the company and I would even talk to them, right. They,
- 8:45Speaker 3: they knew what restaurants they liked. They knew what football game,
- 8:48Speaker 3: you know, football, they knew stuff that, you know, uh, and,
- 8:51Speaker 3: and so a lot of times people, when you say, Hey,
- 8:54Speaker 3: can you help me? You'd be surprised at how much
- 8:57Speaker 3: they would help you. You just ask. Uh, and so
- 8:59Speaker 3: I'll give you an example. I had one guy that I,
- 9:02Speaker 3: you know, you just couldn't get into, uh, you could
- 9:04Speaker 3: call him a thousand times. And so I finally called the,
- 9:06Speaker 3: this is how I stumbled on it by the way.
- 9:08Speaker 3: I finally called the IT manager and I said, hey,
- 9:11Speaker 3: he picked up right away. And I said, hey, I
- 9:13Speaker 3: just want to talk to you. You know, why don't
- 9:14Speaker 3: do SAP? And I said, OK, but, you know, does
- 9:18Speaker 3: this guy still do SAP? And he goes, yeah, that's
- 9:21Speaker 3: the guy you want. And so it was crazy at
- 9:24Speaker 3: the moment. I literally said, well, you know, I can't
- 9:28Speaker 3: get a hold of him. And he goes, well, he
- 9:30Speaker 3: never picks up the phone for vendors ever. And I said, OK,
- 9:33Speaker 3: I said, what can you help me? Can you can
- 9:35Speaker 3: you transfer me? Can you set up a call for me?
- 9:37Speaker 3: And he said, yeah, yeah. And he did it. And
- 9:40Speaker 3: now I, you know, I got in, we sold a
- 9:42Speaker 3: $ 3 million, you know, SAP project there. And I knew
- 9:46Speaker 3: that guy would never get another competitor's phone call because
- 9:49Speaker 3: they never, he never picks it up. So it was
- 9:51Speaker 3: my way of getting in the door, but yeah.
- 9:55Speaker 2: That's right. Yeah. You had, you had exclusivity in that relationship.
- 9:59Speaker 2: That is so funny. That's great. Well, and you know, and,
- 10:02Speaker 2: and what was great too, is you, you were thinking
- 10:04Speaker 2: outside the box, nobody taught you that you just kind
- 10:07Speaker 2: of figured it out. And you know, those, this call
- 10:11Speaker 2: screening is now a lot more widespread than before. We
- 10:14Speaker 2: have a lot of the automated call screening that takes
- 10:17Speaker 2: place on mobile phones and whatnot. So great tactic and
- 10:23Speaker 2: it demonstrates empathy. It demonstrates the fact that you want
- 10:25Speaker 2: to learn more about the organization first before you have
- 10:28Speaker 2: that first conversation with the decision maker. So great. All right, Wade,
- 10:34Speaker 2: let's roll right into tactic number two. And again, folks,
- 10:37Speaker 2: we're talking about Wade's new book. It's called Relentless Sales Leadership.
- 10:44Speaker 2: All right, Wade, what's tactic number two?
- 10:47Speaker 3: So tactic number two is something that I had to
- 10:49Speaker 3: build over a long time. One of the things that
- 10:52Speaker 3: I've made the mistake, and I still watch other people
- 10:56Speaker 3: make this mistake, is they ask the question, what is
- 10:58Speaker 3: your budget, right? What's your IT budget? What's your project budget?
- 11:03Speaker 3: And of course, the inevitable answer back is, I really
- 11:05Speaker 3: don't feel comfortable telling you that right now, right? And
- 11:08Speaker 3: you've got the awkward feeling back and forth. And so
- 11:11Speaker 3: I've learned that there's a lot of questions across the
- 11:14Speaker 3: board that are asked at the wrong time. And so
- 11:18Speaker 3: I built a rapport system. And so it's a system
- 11:20Speaker 3: that I've built that I have from one to 10
- 11:22Speaker 3: and I have a color coded. And basically I map
- 11:25Speaker 3: out the accounts and I, and I actually put where
- 11:28Speaker 3: I'm at with each person on a rapport level. And,
- 11:31Speaker 3: and what happens is, is I don't ask stupid questions.
- 11:33Speaker 3: I'll be frank that are going to get me in trouble. Right.
- 11:37Speaker 3: Before I have a certain level of rapport. Now, The
- 11:41Speaker 3: other thing you don't do is you don't ask questions
- 11:43Speaker 3: like that in a public setting. Like if you're in
- 11:46Speaker 3: a RFP call, you're in a whatever, you don't ask
- 11:48Speaker 3: questions that they're never gonna give you the answer to
- 11:51Speaker 3: because they're gonna look bad in front of their peers, right?
- 11:54Speaker 3: But this system that I've created is very important is
- 11:56Speaker 3: that not only are you supposed to not ask certain
- 11:59Speaker 3: questions at certain times, but you need to know where
- 12:02Speaker 3: you stand with that person. And so you build rapport
- 12:06Speaker 3: by having lunch, building trust, and... just doing what you
- 12:11Speaker 3: say you're going to do. I cannot explain to you
- 12:13Speaker 3: how many times I've had salespeople say, well, I'll get
- 12:16Speaker 3: that to you on Friday. And they don't. And they
- 12:20Speaker 3: get it to them the following week or I'll follow
- 12:22Speaker 3: up tomorrow and they don't. And so, you know, just
- 12:25Speaker 3: having that level of constant rapport building where there's little
- 12:28Speaker 3: micro transactions of trust that get built over time and
- 12:32Speaker 3: that builds that rapport level up. And then you can
- 12:34Speaker 3: start like when they get to what we call purple
- 12:37Speaker 3: or we call it coach or ally level. we get
- 12:39Speaker 3: to that point where we can start asking some really
- 12:41Speaker 3: deep questions like who's our competitor? What was their bid?
- 12:45Speaker 3: How did, you know, how do we win? Right. You
- 12:47Speaker 3: can start asking the more difficult questions, but you cannot
- 12:50Speaker 3: ask those questions when your rapport level's really low. So
- 12:53Speaker 3: really understanding where you stand with your clients is very important.
- 12:58Speaker 2: Yeah. I like a couple of things I want to
- 12:59Speaker 2: unpack from what you just said there, Wade, because I
- 13:02Speaker 2: think there's a lot to take away. First of all, you're,
- 13:05Speaker 2: focusing on trust. I really like what you say about
- 13:08Speaker 2: that because in the first section of the business development
- 13:12Speaker 2: body of knowledge, we established that trust is the foundation
- 13:15Speaker 2: of all business development. No deal ever gets done without
- 13:18Speaker 2: an ounce of trust. So that trust building is so
- 13:21Speaker 2: important because in the 90s, when we were learning sales,
- 13:27Speaker 2: our business development is that no like and trust. And
- 13:30Speaker 2: I think so many people focused on the like part
- 13:33Speaker 2: so much and people don't need another buddy. What they
- 13:36Speaker 2: need is that trusted advisor, somebody that can really help
- 13:40Speaker 2: coach them, provide them that value at no cost. But,
- 13:44Speaker 2: you know, I also liked what you said about don't
- 13:46Speaker 2: ask the dumb questions. Don't ask them in a public environment.
- 13:49Speaker 2: And be informed. What would you do? Like the point
- 13:54Speaker 2: that you brought up, like asking somebody how much budget
- 13:57Speaker 2: they have. Would you try and figure out, like estimate
- 14:00Speaker 2: how much budget they should have and then kind of
- 14:03Speaker 2: work into it? But that specific piece, how did you
- 14:06Speaker 2: work that?
- 14:08Speaker 3: Yeah. So the key part about asking what I would
- 14:11Speaker 3: call a complicated or difficult question like that. Right. is
- 14:15Speaker 3: that you probably have an idea. Most people know, okay,
- 14:18Speaker 3: their budget's probably between here and here. But when you
- 14:21Speaker 3: actually are trying to win a deal and you really
- 14:24Speaker 3: need to know, are you outside the budget before you
- 14:27Speaker 3: send the proposal in, you've got to build those levels
- 14:30Speaker 3: of trust to get to that point so that you
- 14:31Speaker 3: can ask that question. And so there's other ways to
- 14:35Speaker 3: kind of, you know, you could do it some soft ways, right?
- 14:38Speaker 3: You could say, well, what do you think of this number, right?
- 14:41Speaker 3: You give them a number and you kind of wait
- 14:43Speaker 3: to hear them back, right? But that isn't always successful.
- 14:46Speaker 3: And that's not always right. It's always good if you
- 14:48Speaker 3: can ask the blunt question. But that blunt question needs
- 14:50Speaker 3: to be in a private setting with somebody at a
- 14:53Speaker 3: high enough rapport level where you can really, you know,
- 14:57Speaker 3: ask that question and feel comfortable they're going to give
- 14:59Speaker 3: you an answer. And even then, the best thing to
- 15:01Speaker 3: do is, you know, is to say, you know, I've
- 15:05Speaker 3: done this where I said, OK, here's my proposal before
- 15:07Speaker 3: I submit my proposal. What do you think of the number?
- 15:10Speaker 3: Is this a good number? And they will tell you,
- 15:12Speaker 3: generally speaking. But yeah, there's different tactics to get in there.
- 15:16Speaker 3: But the main course is just making sure you have
- 15:18Speaker 3: the right rapport level to trust before they can give
- 15:22Speaker 3: you that answer.
- 15:25Speaker 2: All right. All right. I love it. I love it. Okay. Well,
- 15:27Speaker 2: we're going to move right on to tactic number three.
- 15:30Speaker 2: And again, folks, Wade's new book is called Relentless Sales Leadership.
- 15:36Speaker 2: Go grab your copy. And okay. Wade, let's jump right
- 15:41Speaker 2: into tactic number three.
- 15:43Speaker 3: Yeah, so I'm going to give a real core example
- 15:45Speaker 3: of this one. I was actually leading a sales team.
- 15:49Speaker 3: We had solution engineers, and we're all scripted, ready to go.
- 15:56Speaker 3: We're showing the demo, and people are on their phones.
- 15:59Speaker 3: They're on their laptops, and I'm looking around, and I'm
- 16:02Speaker 3: seeing nobody paying attention to the presentation, right? So I
- 16:05Speaker 3: immediately stopped. I said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I said, guys,
- 16:08Speaker 3: is this what you're wanting to see? And they said, no.
- 16:11Speaker 3: We would have gone through that entire presentation and it
- 16:14Speaker 3: was nothing what they wanted to see. So the tactic
- 16:17Speaker 3: really comes down to is don't be afraid to stop
- 16:21Speaker 3: and don't feature sell. Feature selling is what really kills
- 16:25Speaker 3: us in this industry. We're more about what they are
- 16:28Speaker 3: looking for. What do they want? So I took that
- 16:30Speaker 3: whole conversation and I moved it to a conversation of
- 16:34Speaker 3: what can I do to help you be more successful
- 16:37Speaker 3: in this project, right? And we went through space by pace.
- 16:41Speaker 3: There was cybersecurity. We went through it very, very clearly
- 16:44Speaker 3: what they wanted. And then at the end, they were
- 16:46Speaker 3: thanking us. Thank you so much for stopping the meeting
- 16:49Speaker 3: and explaining this in detail. And at the end, we
- 16:53Speaker 3: stopped the PowerPoint. We threw the PowerPoint away. I'll be honest,
- 16:56Speaker 3: the solution engineer had a red face. He wasn't very
- 16:58Speaker 3: happy because he didn't get to do his whole speech, right?
- 17:01Speaker 3: But at the end, the customer bought from us. They
- 17:03Speaker 3: were happy. They got what they wanted. But the key was,
- 17:06Speaker 3: is we stopped talking features. We stopped talking functionality. And
- 17:09Speaker 3: we started listening to what the customer was wanting and needing.
- 17:12Speaker 3: And then that actually led to the solution that they
- 17:16Speaker 3: purchased eventually.
- 17:18Speaker 2: Yeah. And that's a great example of demonstrating empathy. You
- 17:23Speaker 2: were listening to their feedback or you were watching their
- 17:26Speaker 2: body language. You could tell that they were disengaged.
- 17:30Speaker 3: Right.
- 17:32Speaker 2: It was great that you called the audible. You decided
- 17:34Speaker 2: to stop and get the feedback from them on what's important.
- 17:39Speaker 2: And it was great that you had that focus on empathy,
- 17:44Speaker 2: that cognitive empathy to realize this isn't what they're looking for.
- 17:49Speaker 2: We need to pivot and we need to have a
- 17:51Speaker 2: candid and frank discussion. And you invited them to be
- 17:55Speaker 2: truthful with you, which I also think is very powerful
- 17:58Speaker 2: because trust matters. is proven by neuroscience to consist of purpose, empathy,
- 18:04Speaker 2: and truth. And so you wanted that truthful feedback from
- 18:07Speaker 2: them to know that you were right on the right
- 18:10Speaker 2: path so that you could be more empathetic to their
- 18:13Speaker 2: needs and understand ultimately what their purpose was. And so
- 18:17Speaker 2: I think that's a perfect textbook example to kind of
- 18:20Speaker 2: show how all three of these tactics culminate into really
- 18:27Speaker 2: building that trust with your prospects and then with your customers.
- 18:31Speaker 2: And I know we have a few more minutes here
- 18:34Speaker 2: on the show, Wade. And before the show, we were
- 18:37Speaker 2: talking about one of your tools that you have available
- 18:42Speaker 2: on your website that folks can use. Can you talk
- 18:45Speaker 2: a little bit about that? I want to spend some
- 18:47Speaker 2: time talking about that. And so can you elaborate a
- 18:51Speaker 2: little bit about what the tool does and how it
- 18:53Speaker 2: can help folks? Absolutely.
- 18:55Speaker 3: So over the years, and I know other people listening
- 18:58Speaker 3: to this are going to agree with this one, is
- 19:00Speaker 3: they get the quota. The quota comes down and generally
- 19:04Speaker 3: it's a ridiculous quota. It's so high it's not even
- 19:08Speaker 3: capable of reaching or there's just no what I call
- 19:12Speaker 3: the golden path to get there. So what I have
- 19:15Speaker 3: built is actually a quota system that actually uses real
- 19:19Speaker 3: business metrics and Like what's the average sales cycle? What's
- 19:22Speaker 3: the average size deal? What's your win rate ratio? And
- 19:25Speaker 3: you add all these things in, you input them all in,
- 19:27Speaker 3: and it actually gives you your quota. It's called findyourquota.com.
- 19:31Speaker 3: And the great part is, this is part of the
- 19:34Speaker 3: whole book concept is that we got to stop using
- 19:37Speaker 3: these old sales tactics, these old leadership tactics that really
- 19:41Speaker 3: hurt people that are in both the trust of the
- 19:44Speaker 3: salesperson and the sales leaders. And generally, a lot of times,
- 19:47Speaker 3: this is a good way to really get a synopsis
- 19:49Speaker 3: of hey, is my quota even in the right range?
- 19:52Speaker 3: And can I actually hit my quota? I mean, it's
- 19:54Speaker 3: using real math. It's like, how many deals am I
- 19:57Speaker 3: actually doing? How many deals can I actually work on concurrently?
- 20:00Speaker 3: And what's the average deal size and what's my win rate?
- 20:03Speaker 3: It's a math. It's all math. And it comes out
- 20:05Speaker 3: and it says, hey, your quota should be $ 3 million.
- 20:08Speaker 3: And if you've got a $ 5 million quota, you know
- 20:11Speaker 3: mathematically it cannot be accomplished. So I'm surprised that this
- 20:14Speaker 3: hasn't came out earlier. But this is a system that
- 20:17Speaker 3: I've used as a sales leader. Before I give a quota,
- 20:21Speaker 3: I wanted to make sure that person can actually hit
- 20:23Speaker 3: their quota. And so that's the whole system that I've
- 20:27Speaker 3: created for it. So it's a great tool. It's really
- 20:29Speaker 3: made for for both sales leaders and salespeople that want
- 20:33Speaker 3: to really kind of investigate whether that's a number they
- 20:36Speaker 3: can hit.
- 20:37Speaker 2: Yeah, there's nothing more demoralizing to someone to have a
- 20:41Speaker 2: goal that they cannot achieve. Like cognitively, you can calculate
- 20:45Speaker 2: that it is not achievable. So why are you giving
- 20:49Speaker 2: me a quota that's unachievable? That will just demoralize people
- 20:53Speaker 2: and you'll probably have a high turnover rate on your team.
- 20:58Speaker 2: Not to mention, you'll have some other negative consequences occur
- 21:02Speaker 2: because of that with your culture and whatnot. It's better
- 21:06Speaker 2: to establish these feasible goals and show people, show people
- 21:09Speaker 2: the math. As you just indicated, show people the math
- 21:14Speaker 2: and show them it is feasible. And then when they
- 21:16Speaker 2: do accomplish those goals, and then you can start to
- 21:20Speaker 2: increase the quota. Because Now you're really dialing into, as
- 21:24Speaker 2: a leader in an organization, you're also starting to learn
- 21:27Speaker 2: what works. And if somebody was unable to hit a
- 21:30Speaker 2: feasible quota, why not? Was there something broken in the process?
- 21:34Speaker 2: What can we do to fix that? And if we
- 21:36Speaker 2: can get everybody right synchronized on the formula that works,
- 21:43Speaker 2: well then, theoretically, you should be able to increase that
- 21:46Speaker 2: every year. But again, it will all be based on
- 21:49Speaker 2: feasible goals. Well, and that's available on your website, right, Wade?
- 21:55Speaker 3: Yeah, so that's actually it's www.findyourquota.com. My website is wadewilsonconsulting.com.
- 22:05Speaker 3: But this is easier.
- 22:07Speaker 2: It's long.
- 22:07Speaker 3: I wanted something smaller. I wanted something very direct. So
- 22:10Speaker 3: this is really my book website, findyourquota.com. I'll also have
- 22:16Speaker 3: other tools that my book has. So that whole tool
- 22:18Speaker 3: about putting the color coding and all that, all of
- 22:21Speaker 3: that's going to be available as tools. So when you
- 22:24Speaker 3: get my book, you'll actually be able to use the
- 22:26Speaker 3: real tactics in my book right straight into a tool
- 22:29Speaker 3: that you can then immediately use. So that's the goal
- 22:31Speaker 3: and intention of these two things together. Everything's interactive now, right, Tony?
- 22:36Speaker 3: So we're trying to get to that point. I just
- 22:38Speaker 3: didn't want to create a static book that people read
- 22:41Speaker 3: and then put away. I want something that they can
- 22:43Speaker 3: use and actually help them on their daily life. So
- 22:46Speaker 3: that's the accomplishment I was trying to make.
- 22:47Speaker 2: I love it. I love it. And, you know, the
- 22:49Speaker 2: tactics you share with us today will help people with
- 22:51Speaker 2: their daily BD lives. And let me just summarize what
- 22:54Speaker 2: we talked about today. Tactic number one is warm up
- 22:57Speaker 2: that first call to the decision maker. Talk to the
- 23:00Speaker 2: other folks on their team. You know, maybe it's the influencers,
- 23:03Speaker 2: maybe it's the champions, maybe it's just somebody who knows
- 23:06Speaker 2: the person and they're inside the organization. They understand how
- 23:08Speaker 2: the person thinks. and what's important to them. And then
- 23:12Speaker 2: the second tactic that you shared with us is really
- 23:16Speaker 2: building that trust with your prospect. And that means being truthful,
- 23:21Speaker 2: delivering truthfully, delivering on time, sharing information that's valuable with them,
- 23:27Speaker 2: asking the right questions, and then them sharing information with you.
- 23:33Speaker 2: It's all part of that trust building process And then
- 23:37Speaker 2: the third tactic is being empathetic. It's just being clued
- 23:43Speaker 2: into the body language, the way they're talking, what they're saying,
- 23:49Speaker 2: and knowing, okay, are we on the right path? Are
- 23:52Speaker 2: we taking you toward the purpose that you want to accomplish?
- 23:55Speaker 2: Because if not, we'll pivot and we'll work toward what
- 23:58Speaker 2: you need.
- 23:59Speaker 3: That's right.
- 24:00Speaker 2: And you gave us so much of what we needed
- 24:02Speaker 2: here in our community today. Wade, today, you know, this
- 24:06Speaker 2: pivot away from this fear-based management methodology that some still
- 24:15Speaker 2: in the profession may use and really moving towards a
- 24:19Speaker 2: rational approach that's also very positive and can really boost
- 24:24Speaker 2: growth for a lot of organizations. And finally, Wade, how
- 24:27Speaker 2: can folks find you on LinkedIn? I don't think you
- 24:30Speaker 2: mentioned your LinkedIn profile.
- 24:32Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's really just Wade Wilson. It's pretty
- 24:35Speaker 3: simple on LinkedIn, but you can definitely see me on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram.
- 24:42Speaker 3: I've got them all. But LinkedIn is definitely the place.
- 24:46Speaker 3: WW Consulting is the company. And yeah, it's all there
- 24:51Speaker 3: on LinkedIn and definitely can get on me there. You
- 24:55Speaker 3: can get on the website, wadewilsonconsulting.com. Findyourquota.com will take you
- 25:00Speaker 3: to the website as well. So whatever you want to go,
- 25:03Speaker 3: I mean, you can reach me at any time. You
- 25:05Speaker 3: can email me, you can call me. I mean, I'm
- 25:09Speaker 3: pretty available to help my fellow BDs, right, out there
- 25:13Speaker 3: doing business development. I'm really here to help them and
- 25:17Speaker 3: the leadership specifically because a lot of people focus on
- 25:21Speaker 3: the salesperson, but they don't focus on the frontline managers
- 25:24Speaker 3: who are managing those salesperson. Tony, how many times have
- 25:27Speaker 3: you heard of salespeople being promoted as sales leaders? with
- 25:30Speaker 3: no sales leadership training, right? Oh, yeah. Frequently. Yeah. It's
- 25:35Speaker 3: a very common thing that occurs. Hey, you hit your number.
- 25:38Speaker 3: You're number one. We're going to make you a sales leader, okay?
- 25:41Speaker 3: And they don't know how– they don't have any– I mentor.
- 25:44Speaker 3: I help build those people so that they have the
- 25:46Speaker 3: tools and capabilities they need so they can succeed as
- 25:49Speaker 3: a sales leader as they did as a salesperson. That's
- 25:52Speaker 3: really what my goal and intention is for my consultants.
- 25:55Speaker 2: Yeah, well, that's great. And thank you so much for
- 25:58Speaker 2: sharing the three tactics today. Folks, go out and get
- 26:01Speaker 2: yourself a copy of Wade's new book. And Wade Wilson, again,
- 26:05Speaker 2: thank you so much for your contributions to the business
- 26:08Speaker 2: development profession.
- 26:10Speaker 3: No problem. Thank you. Thank you very much, Tony.
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