1. Ian Irving | BREESE

2. Strategic Issues for 2012 The Next “New” Selling Environment
Key Findings: 2012 Best Practice Study
Strategic Issues of the 2012 study
Social Media and B2B Sales
Attributes of a World Class Sales Organization

3. Welcome to “This Economy”
“Uncertain economy” | “Challenging economic times” | “Current economic conditions”

4. Bare Handed Selling Change How We Sell Provocative Selling
Provoke your client
Challenger Model
Challenge their knowledge
SPIN Selling
Situation, Problem, Implications, Needs Payoff
FUD Selling
Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt
Bare Handed Selling

5. Information Technology
Accelerates
Information
Communications
Data acquisition
Real time reporting
Amplifies
Mobility
Multi-platform
Synchronization
Collaboration
Illuminates
Data
Analytics
Transparency
Contribution
Data, Information and Intelligence

6. Technology Drivers: 2015 Social is Mainstream Limitless Bandwidth
Customers get smarter
Social sales community
Limitless Bandwidth
Skype, video chat, stream
Tele-Presence, virtual events
Life in the “Cloud”
Anytime, anywhere, anyone
Big Data
Transparency, predictive analytics

7. Sales Strategic Issues: 2015
Analytics: 3D Data
Measuring how we sell
Customer X.0: The Multi-Channel Customer
Smart, sophisticated buying
Collaboration: The Social Sales Community
Changing how we communicate
Revenue Marketing: Part of Sales
Demand gen., Enablement, Nurturing
Sales Technology: Sales Rep Automation
Beyond SFA: Sales Force Accounting

8. The Edge of Innovation 2012 Tablets/mobility
iPads: Touch.salesforce.com
Synchronization, Dropbox, The “cloud”
Social Selling
Prospects: search, seek, track & engage
Customers: community, knowledge and nurture
Marketing Impact
Creating Opportunity: Demand gen, content, campaigns, Account Based Marketing
Managing Opportunities: Enablement, Message, Tools
Managing Relationships: Nurturing
Collaboration:
Chatter, Jive
Social Sales Community, Customer collaboration
Social Enterprise, Social CRM
60x and 300x images of mouse retina using Laser Scanning Confocal Microscopy

9. 2012 Miller Heiman Sales Best Practice Survey
World’s largest annual study of sales performance best practices
Over 27,000 participants to date
Reveal trends, issues, opportunities in today’s selling environment
2012 Study: 1,200+ responses, 15 verticals
Participate for 2013, survey opens November 2012

10. World-Class Sales Organizations?
Salesperson Productivity
Quota Achievement
Account Acquisition
Account Retention
Lead Growth

11. Key Findings Sales Best Practice Survey
Understanding Your Customers Front-line Sales Management Priorities Technology’s Role in Improving Business Results
Speaker: Joe
In reviewing the data from this year’s study, 3 distinct pictures emerged.
These are three areas where we will focus in developing articles, newsletter content, keynotes and other messaging throughout this year.
You will notice these are key areas of focus in the Executive Summary of this year’s research.

12. Understanding Your Customers
Leigh
Add customer story
Clearly defining the attributes of the ideal customer profile:
Allows salespeople and teams to better develop their account strategy and prioritize their efforts.
Allows salespeople and teams to more prescriptively qualify based on the collective experience of the sales organization.
These organizations react quickly when changes occur in the sales cycle thus allowing their salespeople to spend more time on deals they can win.
Allows for improved prospecting and higher wins rates; it also results in higher retention.
Best practice activities in this area have helped World-Class Sales Organizations increase customer retention by 19 percent over other organizations.

13. Front-line Sales Management Priorities
Leigh
Add sales mgmt
Front-line sales managers typically have several hurdles to work through before they reach a position of high performance.
They nearly always have the characteristics of a top-performing salesperson, but the biggest gap continues to be the lack of the attributes of an effective sales manager.
There is more pressure to perform, more responsibility, and more at stake for poor performance.
But even with this increased visibility, many companies still do not invest much in sales management training and development.
The fact is sales managers who are effective in coaching consistently deliver more value to their organizations.
They understand the timing differences between providing sales call feedback and providing real sales coaching.
It is a smart area to invest. So, how do you support sales managers so they can drive a greater return for the organization?

14. CRM Confidence is Growing
Speaker: Joe

15. 2012 MILLER HEIMAN SALES BEST PRACTICES STUDY
How do you improve demand generation and prospecting performance?
How are buyer behaviors affecting successful sales cycles?
How do you improve customer
retention, satisfaction and
loyalty?
What is your strategy for talent management?
The strategic issue our annual research seeks to answer is: what were the activities that World-Class Sales Organizations applied more frequently to differentiate themselves and produce superior results? A strategic issue is a question that requires thought, data, perspective, knowledge and context for the chief sales officer to be able to answer.
Workshop:
Consider sharing a few of these elements in a workshop format: Need flipcharts – one per group, or, for a larger group, an 11x17 sheet for each table printed with two column: what’s working/what’s not working?
Introduce the Strategic Issue and ask what’s currently working in this area and what is not working?
Ask participants to draw a line down the center of the flipchart page and label the top of each column “Working” and “Not Working”
Allow about 15 minutes for group discussion.
Debrief what’s working and not working and ask how some of these activities are currently being measured.
Next, share the best practices for each element where World-Class Sales Organizations are out-performing.
The following slides build to allow you to reveal best practices at your own pace.
How do you utilize analytics
to manage and drive your
business?
How do you create and
support a culture of sales
collaboration?

16. How do you improve demand generation and prospecting performance?
We have a formalized value proposition that is very compelling to our prospects.
We consistently follow a standardized process to qualify opportunities.
Qualified Lead Growth
Slide Guidance: Build one activity at a time while discussing the key points for each.
Speaker Notes:
Improving demand generation that will result in viable new opportunities is essential to good funnel health.
How do you improve demand generation and prospecting performance?
What’s Working: Involving marketing in Win/Results, better understanding who we are targeting (universe), screening and measuring inquiries for quality (rather than quantity), identifying “fast lose” situations,
Not Working: Never say “no” to a lead, not applying an Ideal Customer Profile to lead qualification, being a “victim” of not getting leads – lack of proactive effort.
Measurement and follow up questions: How is management providing coaching in this area? How is sales mgmt measuring prospecting activity? How is salesperson prioritizing their time? In companies where sales and marketing are aligned, this is not as likely to be perceived as an issue. Is lead migration through the funnel being measured? Is there clear definition for funnel stages? How is mktg measuring results of efforts? Lead quality?
At the top of the sales funnel, the creation and continued growth of new opportunities is essential to maintain funnel health. These are the two activities that have the strongest cause/effect relationship to qualified lead growth among World-Class Sales Organizations.
Formalized value proposition
Knowing why customers are buying and what truly differentiates you in your customers eyes and working w/marketing to craft the way your messaging.
Making sure you have enough data about your ideal customer and have enough data to market to that group, based on why they buy from you.
Very good prospecting segmentation
Not generic, very good data-driven prospecting activity.
Standard process to qualify opportunities
Applying an Ideal Customer Profile against every opportunity allows organizations to move past the enthusiasm of a new opportunity and have discipline in pursuing opportunities that are aligned with growth objectives.
93%
39% WC
All
91%

17. Strategic Issue: Create Opportunities
How do you improve demand generation and prospecting performance?
What is the Marketing contribution to the sales pipeline?
What is the account based marketing strategy?

18. Marketing Transformation
Corporate Marketing
Brand, PR, Comm.
Product Marketing
Product, Solution, Vertical
Field Marketing
Lead Generation
2002
Marketing
2012
Change
Catalyst
Social
Media
Corporate Marketing
Reputation
Social Engagement
Revenue Marketing
Demand Creation
Buyer 2.0
Inbound - Outbound
More Informed
Buyer
Content Marketing
Product, Solution, Vertical
Buyer/Sales Enablement
Transparency
Marketing Operations
Data, Metrics, Technology
Measurement

19. Growth in Account Acquisition
How are buyer behaviors affecting successful sales cycles?
Our organization is highly effective in allocating the right resources to pursue large deals.
We clearly understand our customers’ issues before we propose a solution.
Growth in Account Acquisition
Slide Guidance: If time is tight, focus on one of the activities.
Speaker Notes:
As organizations have moved well past cost-cutting to operational efficiency, effective resource alignment has become imperative.
How are buyer behaviors affecting successful sales cycles?
What’s Working: Understanding the modes of the buying influences, buy/sell alignment - properly identifying and appropriately allocating tools and resources to the stage of the buy/sell process, conducting business reviews throughout the sales process, defined sales steps that include buyer actions, forecast accuracy based on buying process, securing buyer action commitments.
Not Working: Misaligning resources too early in buying process – wasting resources, not following ICP, misalignment of sales and mktg, not getting cross-functional participation at appropriate stage of buying process
Measurement and follow up questions: Scorecard, circle back to value prop during project mgmt
These are the activities where you should focus regarding managing how opportunities are won. These are the two activities found to have the strongest relationship to account acquisition.
Resource allocation
All opportunities are not created equally. World-Class Sales Organizations are nearly 3x more likely to effectively align resources with opportunities.
Understand customers
The role of the salesperson has evolved to be a resource in helping customers navigate the volume of information available to them. To be able to effectively provide solutions, an understanding of the customer must first be established by the salesperson.
92%
34% WC
All
93%
48%

20. Strategic Issue: Manage Opportunities
How are buyer behaviors affecting successful sales cycles?
How do multiple buying influences change the decision making dynamic?
Are customers becoming better at buying?

21. More information, from more sources = Buyer Chaos
Buyer 2.0: Buyer Chaos
More people = more complex decision process
A more formalized process = more activities for the buyer to execute
More information, from more sources = Buyer Chaos
View of Mt. Everest from Base Camp 1
“…. 57% of the buyers journey is complete before engaging with a sales rep”
…….Really?

22. Buyer 2.0: Knowledge Acquisition
Break
Status Quo
Shape
Concept
Sales
Execution
Decision
Activity
Phase
Buying Process
Awareness
Status Quo
Shopping
Research
Market
Options
Evaluation
Engagement
Provider Capabilities
Justification
Selection
Solution
Knowledge
Base
General

23. Buying/Selling Process Alignment
Break
Status Quo
Shape
Concept
Sales
Execution
Decision
Phase
Buying Process
Status Quo
Shopping
Evaluation
Selection
Awareness
Research
Engagement
Justification
Activity
Sales & Marketing Process
Account
Management
Sales
Prospecting
Demand
Creation
Sales Cycle
Content
Marketing
Customer
Marketing

24. Growth in Account Retention
How do you improve customer retention, satisfaction and loyalty?
Our organization regularly collaborates across departments to manage strategic accounts.
We have relationships and dialog at the highest executive levels with all our strategic accounts.
Growth in Account Retention
Slide Guidance: Build one activity at a time while discussing the key points for each.
Speaker Notes:
Strategic accounts are recognized as corporate assets among World-Class Sales Organizations.
How do you improve customer retention, satisfaction and loyalty?
What’s Working: Being proactive, segmenting, operationalizing customer satisfaction surveys/councils and acting on results. Follow up with clients regarding issues and resolution.
Not Working: Not reaching senior executive levels, not talking to detractors, not showing action in response to dissatisfaction
Measurement and follow up questions: Buy-Sell Hierarchy can provide measurement guide
Your largest accounts are under attack as competitors seek to grow their business. If you are not connected at many points and have a finger on the pulse of your customers’ business, you will lose. The strategies to protect these assets must be customer driven, one size does not fit all. The top-performing organizations are not only seeing better results in account retention, they are also successful in driving year over year revenue growth.
What are 3 things you should always know about your customers?
Why have they chosen to do business with you?
What are you helping them accomplish, fix, or avoid?
Do you have senior contacts within those accounts who understand why your company can uniquely service them?
Need to know this at all times… not just when you want to sell them something new!
New product intros often fail to ramp up as quickly as companies plan for – partly related to lack of strength of key relationships. Sales must take ownership and not blame Product development.
Make a note of these and go ask you people if they know the answers – you may be surprised.
1. Our organization regularly collaborates across departments to manage strategic accounts.
When it works it is the definition around SA/ not over engineering the process., start small,
Definition, leadership and ownership- everyone who touches the account , start small
Those who are breaking through the product level silos- getting results ,Most are still really struggling w/their silos; need to play nicely together, not collaboration,
Know how their customer are structured and how that is changing and align strategy around that specific group and can start to remove the silos and build a robust account plan
Understand how customers buy and break down silos---need leadership involved
Started w/cross sell better need to remove the silos and build appropriate account plans
Eliminates single point of contact relationships – reduces risk of account loss
2. We have relationships and dialog at the highest executive levels with all our strategic accounts.
Partnering rather than “selling to” the organization.
Client org understand the value you bring to the organization.
Decisions are being made together to drive the client’s business
Get visibility to issues you may or may not be able to solve
Avoid surprises by having greater access at multiple points.
91%
42% WC
All
96%
38%

25. Strategic Issue: Manage Relationships
How do you improve customer retention, satisfaction and loyalty?
What is the connection between satisfaction and revenue?
What is your large account management strategy?

26. Buying/Selling Process Alignment
Break
Status Quo
Shape
Concept
Sales
Execution
Decision
Phase
Buying Process
Status Quo
Shopping
Evaluation
Selection
Awareness
Research
Engagement
Justification
Activity
Sales & Marketing Process
Account
Management
Prospecting
Sales Cycle
Sales
Marketing
Customer
Marketing
Demand
Creation
Content
Marketing

27. Customer Lifecycle Management
Buying Process
Status Quo
Customer Service
Billing, support, service
Reputation Management
Branding, social monitoring
Awareness
Sales Process
Account
Management
Accounts / Contacts
Buying influences, coaches
Customer
Marketing
Nurturing
Account based marketing

28. CRM: Customer Relationship Management
CRM System
Buying Process
Status Quo
Customer Service Systems
Reputation Management
Awareness
Sales Process
Account
Management
Sales Force Automation
Customer
Marketing
Marketing Automation

29. Growth in Salesperson Productivity
What is your strategy for talent management?
Our process for getting new hires to full productivity is highly effective.
When we lose a high-performing salesperson, we always know the reasons why.
Growth in Salesperson Productivity
Slide Guidance: Build one activity at a time while discussing the key points for each.
Speaker Notes:
Top performers want to be on a winning team.
What is your strategy for talent management?
What’s Working: Measuring for skills gaps (180/360), developing a profile of success attributes and align with new hire and career development, robust and on-going on-boarding process, coaching to business metrics.
Not Working: Undeveloped managers, mgmt skills not cultivated or supported, no roadmap to exit – continuing to invest in C performers.
Measurement and follow up questions: Is talent being managed or is the comp plan managing talent? How are candidates selected? Industry experience or alignment with business needs? What tools are in place to enable success? Sales process, pipeline definition, technology tools, access to mentors? Is there consistency in coaching session content across mgmt team? Retention metrics, new hire productivity, # of ride alongs/coaching sessions
People can be in the neighborhood of 75% of a sales organization’s budget. This is a smart area to have a strategy.
Salesperson productivity is the metric that can be most significantly affected when focus is placed on leveraging and effectively coaching the people on your sales team.
Formal process for ramp up.
2. Knowing why top performers leave. Be proactive - Get ahead of knowing why they leave and determine why top performers stay.
80%
17% WC
All
85%
33%

30. Strategic Issue: Management Execution
What is your strategy for talent management?
What are the behavioral attributes that predict success in our organization?
How much time, energy and resources do we invest in improving our sales team?

31. Talent Management Profile Assessment New Hire Performance Professional
Hiring
Best Practices
Top Performers
Development
New Hire
Performance
Time to Prod.
Sales Process
Market-Product
Accounts
Professional
Development
Business Acumen
Grad. Degree
Technical
Cross-function
Employee
Retention
Turnover
Tenure
Recognition
Financial

32. Growth in Salesperson Productivity
How do you utilize analytics to manage and drive your business?
Our sales performance metrics are aligned with our business objectives.
Our sales management team is highly confident in the data available from our CRM system.
Growth in Salesperson Productivity
Slide Guidance: Build one activity at a time while discussing the key points for each.
Speaker Notes:
World-Class Sales Organization’s chief sales officers adapt their sales performance metrics to ensure they match up with the goals they have set.
How do you utilize analytics to manage and drive your business?
What’s Working: Defined analytics to measure desired results, implementation of behaviors corresponds to analytics, less is more (KISS), “Single Source of Truth”
Not Working: Inadequate measurement of progress toward proper behaviors, lack of resources to measure progress, inconsistent or reactionary coaching, multiple data systems (Excel, multi-CRMs), inconsistency of reporting format and info sharing, too many metrics, lack of communication of key metrics.
Measurement and follow up questions: What does your dashboard look like, how is it reviewed? How often is it reviewed? How long has it been in place? Who contributed to what should be included on the dashboard? How are you taking action on the info on your dashboard?
Greater confidence in CRM data leads to smarter decision making as managers are supporting more people and need effective ways to improve forecast accuracy, identify coaching opportunities, and determine which deals they should be involved in.
1. Our sales performance metrics are aligned with our business objectives.
Starts w/ leadership; knowing strategic goals, easy to understand, leading ; leading indicators…..
What do you have in your organization that will drive the business and the team can understand it;
Not just measure, looking at leading indicators to update strategy and activities….to impact results.
They know what to do when that metric is below
2. Our sales management team is highly confident in the data available from our CRM system.
We have build the process, discipline and strategy and use the CRM to leverage the communication
IT & Executive lead on information they wanted…versus the data that makes the sales person more effective.
Took 2 or 3 years that to figure it out it and then automate it.
Early adopters not getting good results…….and upgrading or changing strategy
Process fits/CRM second.
Tie into Good to Great (Jim Collins)……..it is not about the technology….it is what you understand about your business, then add technology.
The second generation the sales leader is driving the decision/ business leader driving the situation.
Push versus pull - the data is important to the salesperson and executives….Ask Dana to expand. (SECOND GENERATION…. SFDC….. their focus was also on the salesperson productivity and providing them value…why it worked)
Smart companies give the account & relationship management tools
In last year’s study, we noticed a significant shift in confidence in CRM data among World-Class Sales Organizations. It was like a switch was flipped compared to prior years’ numbers, year-over-year confidence in CRM data among World-Class Sales Organizations jumped by 50 percent, while other organizations remained unchanged. Nearly all the World Class Sales Organizations reported their organizations have clearly defined the activities required for each stage in their sales funnel, where only 30% of others have taken this step. This precision and consistency in how World Class Organizations communicate about opportunities and funnel movement drives the confidence in data coming from the CRM. In the current year’s results, a 3x gap remains between the World-Class Sales Organizations and others. World class companies are definitely getting more leverage out of CRM technology.
93%
45% WC
All
81%
25%

33. Strategic Issue: Operations and Enablement
How do you utilize analytics to manage and drive your business?
What is the ROI of our CRM system?
How consistently is your sales process used and understood?

34. Measuring Productivity
DATA
Revenue Value by Sales Phase
Revenue Forecast
ANALYTICS
Velocity by Sales Phase
Conversion by Sales Phase
Ideal Customer Attributes
Factored Pipeline

35. Growth in Quota Achievement
How do you create and support a culture of sales collaboration?
We leverage the best practices of our top performers to improve everyone else.
In an average week, our sales force definitely spends sufficient time with customers.
Growth in Quota Achievement
Slide Guidance: Build one activity at a time while discussing the key points for each.
Speaker Notes:
Recognize that best practice sharing may seem easy on the surface, but long-term adoption is as hard as any other change.
How do you create and support a culture of sales collaboration?
What’s Working: Culture is clearly understood – it’s “how we do things”, pride in culture, demonstrated by mgmt, rewards/consequences for adhering to culture, team approach vs silos, MBOs: clear expectations and measured, regular group meetings to address issues, mentoring
Not Working: Acquisition with no plan for culture transfer, acquisition doesn’t fit culture, turf/territory culture, fear of making mistakes, no conflict mgmt process
Measurement and follow up questions: Turnover among top performers, ISO 9000
What would is look like in your organization if more of your salespeople hit their quota? Half of organizations (50%) in our study reported a year over year increase in quota achievement, but more than ¾ (78%) of World-Class Sales Organizations saw growth in sales force quota achievement compared to the previous year.
These activities were shown to have the strongest relationship to quota achievement.
1. We leverage the best practices of our top performers to improve everyone else.
First, they have identified the best practices. Openness of leadership to assess and validate year over year. Knowing what the best practices are, they have tools, resources and coaching to support that.
Best practices that have the most impact. How to support it.
Fail because they are one dimensional. Top performers weave best practices into business….webcast, management review, comp, drives business results.
Replicable, and drives results. Not just communicated……executive led, strategy to roll into business activities.
Not enough to leave it up to the salespeople to figure out how to leverage it.
Top performers often will not be able to articulate (or don’t know) what they are doing differently that makes them successful, managers need to help both identify and leverage these best practices.
2. Spending time with customers.
In an average week, do you think your sales force spends sufficient time with customers? 85% of World-Class Sales Organizations believed their people are consistently spending time with customers, compared to just 27% of other organizations. I have several more points from our annual study that supports how WCSO are staying close to their customers and how it is affecting their retention rates.”
81%
25% WC
All
85%
27%

36. Strategic Issue: Management Execution
How do you create and support a culture of sales collaboration?
Where do sales people go to access information or access resources?
How do internal resources swarm to large, complex deals?

37. Social Technology: Selling and Sales
Social Selling
Buyer 2.0
1:N to 1:1
Social Collaboration
Virtual Knowledge Network
Social Platform

38. Social Selling: A New Way to Prospect
Search
Internet
LinkedIn - Facebook
Social Communities
Pursue
Research
Monitor
Triggers - Alerts
Connect
Approach
Messages
Metrics

39. Sales Rep Sources of Information
Social Collaboration
Sales Rep Sources of Information
What you know
Who you know
Who they know
Who we know
Knowledge Network

40. The Social Sales Community
Sales Reps
Sales Management
Subject Matter Experts
Marketing
Sales Communities
Regions
Vertical Markets
Competition
Products

41. Attributes of World Class Sales Organizations
Standardized process to qualify
Understanding customers needs
Leveraging Social Media
Gain access to decision makers
Allocating the right resources
Disciplined process
Criteria to define strategic accounts
Jointly set objectives with accounts
Review results with accounts
Getting new hires effective fast
Professional development
Knowing why best are best
CRM is effective
Improve quality of work
Sales & business metrics are aligned
Spend sufficient time coaching
Clearly defined activities
Leverage best practices

42. DISCUSSION Implications for YOUR Organisations?