Sales Pipeline Radio

Storytelling is a compelling way to build interest, get to know prospects, build trust and create connections. Paul Smith is THE utlimate storytelling coach. He's a best selling author of three books on this topic. Learn this tool to put everyone at ease, give you more enjoyment from prospecting and building relationships and make you more memorable.

Some of the questions Matt will be asking Paul Smith:

1. What exactly is a sales story? How is it different from a sales pitch and can you give us an example?
2. Why do you think stories are so effective? 
3. What separates a great sales story from a simply good or average or boring one? 
4. Would you share tips on how to choose the right story to tell, and how to determine the right time to tell it?
5. You suggest in the book that great stories -- even great sales stories -- have a surprise ending. Why is that necessary? And how do you create a surprise ending in a story that isn’t surprising?
6. How long should a sales story be?
7. One of the questions you asked professional buyers when you interviewed them was, “What is it that makes a sales pitch sound like a sales pitch?” How did they answer that question? And how can you avoid sounding like that?
8. What are some of the most common mistakes you see in storytelling?
9. Is it okay to make up a sales story? Or does everything in a story need to be 100% true?    

About our guest:

Paul Smith is one of the world’s leading experts on organizational storytelling. He’s a keynote speaker, storytelling coach, and author of the books Sell with a Story, Parenting with a Story, and the bestseller Lead with a Story already in its 8^th printing and available in 6 language around the world. Paul is also a former consultant at Accenture and former executive and 20-year veteran of The Procter & Gamble Company.

As part of his research on the effectiveness of storytelling, Paul has personally interviewed over 250 CEOs, executives, leaders, and salespeople in 25 countries, documenting over 2,000 individual stories. Leveraging those stories and interviews, Paul identified the components of effective storytelling, and developed templates and tools to apply them in practice. His work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Inc. Magazine, Time, Forbes, The Washington Post, PR News, and Success Magazine, among others.

Paul delivers professional workshops and keynote addresses on effective storytelling for leaders and salespeople. His clients include international giants like Hewlett Packard, Ford Motor Company, Bayer Medical, Abbott, Novartis, Progressive Insurance, Kaiser Permanente, and Procter & Gamble.

James Muir, the author of The Perfect Close. He's an accidental salesperson. Started out in operations assisting the sales team. He was drafted without knowing how to advance a meeting to the next stage. He created this method as an outcome of his own experience.

Statistically, what happens is no question is asked to advance the sales. 50-90% of sales meetings end without a salesperson asking for any commitment, depending on the industry. This number is way higher than those who ask "incorrectly" - at least they ASK.

What is it in the psychology of sales or people that prevents them from asking for the sale? If salespeople are not comfortable with the method they've been taught - manipulative - they won't do it at all.

Teach them away that is in alignment with their personal values, there is no difficulty asking

Visit puremuir.com - free report - 7 Deadly Sins of Closing

In this episode, James Muir covered:

1. Fear of asking too early or being pushy.

2. Fear of the "No".

Both of these involved in feeling manipulative or moving the process too fast. You need to have an idea of your ideal outcome of the meeting, but you should also have a couple of positive alternatives.

Catch this full episode for more tips and check out James' site - puremuir.com 

Host, Robert Pease welcomed Justin Johnson, CEO LeadMethod. This is about the challenges and opportunities of a scaled distribution model - through partners, resellers, distributors, outside reps.

Some of what LeadMethod tackles is the fundamental challenge unique to channel partners distribution vs. opt in, direct method. To get the critical feedback to better understand who is where in your pipeline. This is a challenge they tackle to add to your efficiency.

There are so many different elements that companies are creating in order to come together to collaborate and communicate that sometimes it falls apart.

How do you get enough data to draw conclusions on what is actually working with partner networks? It becomes a black hole of information.

Engaging the distribution group and collecting the critical feedback --THIS is key.

You have to look at why CRMs were built. Understanding what the the customer bought, who they bought it from; and then it morphed into a lead management system. But they take a lot of training.

Listen to more of the clarification and reasoning behind channel sales enablement in this episode.

Our guest is Lara Shackelford of Altify. Altify sells to sales professionals. With their software, every sales rep can sell like your BEST sales rep. More reveals followed at DreamForce as it ties to AI and Einstein.

Our guest today is Joe Chernov. He's VP of Marketing @InsightSquared. He also lends a hand to startups and wildlife causes when he can. Diving right in, he says, "It's unbelievable what you can get done if you don't care if you get fired!" Talking about his experience at Eloqua, "If we were to publish something that is valuable, we could edge our way into deeper coverage by the media." 

Nationally respected business etiquette coach, Arden Clise is our guest for this episode. She has just published her book, "Spinach in your boss' teeth" available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and on her site:  CliseEtiquette.com . This is a great gift for your team or for you. Many of the tips SHOULD be obvious, but perhaps you weren't paying attention when your mother tried to clue you in. She covers dining, online etiquette, business tips to make your value shine. Her specialty is assisting clients to confidently and comfortably navigate business situations.