I’m bringing in Deb Calvert for the second time in TSE history. The last time we had Deb on the show, we spoke about DISCOVER Questions™ that teach sellers to become better in their sales career. Today, we talk about how you, as a seller, can Stop Selling and Start Leading and how that can have a tremendous impact in making buyers respond more.
Deb revolves around two worlds – selling and leadership development. She is the founder and president of People First Productivity Solutions, a company that seeks to help people become effective through putting people first.
Here are the highlights of my conversation with Deb:
Why people aren’t making their quota:
- Lack of confidence
- A feeling of defeat.
- They don’t feel they inspire somebody.
- Lack of skills
- Lack of authentic dialog, not just asking the questions on the piece of paper given to you.
- Have a script but don’t be scripted.
The concept behind the movement Stop Selling and Start Leading!:
Leaders have 30 behaviors that if they choose to act in these 30 ways more frequently, they will become more effective. The same applies to sellers.
How Sellers Can Behave to Make Buyers Respond Positively:
- Align your actions to your core values.
Don’t deviate from what you truly, internally believe. Be guided by those principles to do the right thing. This will help develop trust more readily with the seller in the same way that sellers stay on track, bringing integrity to the buyer-seller relationship.
- Have confidence.
Have a core belief in what you’re doing to inspire the buyers.
A Forrester research demonstrates that only 19% of buyers rate conversations they have with sellers as valuable while the other 81% of buyers think that conversations with sellers is a waste of time.
- Create an experience.
Buyers want to have an opportunity to participate in creating what they want. Give buyers the experience and engage them in using the product or in understanding how the product fits them in a custom way. Get them to collaborate with you to come to the solution so it’s not robotic. Lead the buyer instead of selling the buyer. Create and extend value.
How to Create a Unique Experience in Each Call:
- Ask quality, thought-provoking questions.
- Help the buyers get some insight about their own business.
- Ask enough questions that will get clarity in their decision criteria.
5 Exemplary Practices Sellers Can Utilize to Transform Themselves Into Leaders:
- Model the way.
- Align your actions with core values.
- Make sure people believe in you by being consistent.
- Inspire shared vision.
- Lead your buyer by helping them achieve what they’re looking to achieve.
- Understand what they’re looking for.
- Engage and excite the buyer by giving them inspiration.
- Challenge the buyer.
- Get buyers to experiment and take risks.
- Get them to think in a bigger way about the kinds of opportunities if they put themselves out there.
- Go out of their comfort zone and stretch a little bit.
- Enable your buyers to be co-participants in co-creating insights.
- Encourage them.
- Bolster the courage and commitment of your buyers to make them more enthusiastic and make them feel good about the decision.
- They see the value which is reflected back to them.
- “Encourage” means to pour courage into.
Deb’s Major Takeaway:
- Read the book, DISCOVER Questions Get You Connected.
- Sign up and join the movement to Stop Selling and Start Leading! Stay engaged and find out more by participating in their research and case studies.
Deb would like to hear your perspectives. Connect with her on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
Episode Resources:
Check out Deb’s interview on TSE 034: MASTERING THE ART OF DISCOVER QUESTIONS™ WITH DEB CALVERT.
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