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Why They Won’t Show You the Money

April 2, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Are you wondering why customers and investors aren’t clearing out their calendars to meet with you to discuss your venture or your company’s products/services/platforms?

Perhaps you are boring them to pieces. Perhaps you are fading into the wallpaper. Perhaps you are being perceived as a commodity.

Any way you look at it, they don’t have time for you.

Even if you are a university researcher, student entrepreneur, technical sales person, consultant, or engineer.  I’m sure I left somebody out of this list. If so, consider yourself included: you know who you are.

It’s not only that they don’t have time for you. They don’t have time. Period. For anyone, including themselves.

We know all about lack of investor and customer time in the sales world. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales & Engineering Collaboration, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

3 Tips for Developing Business, Not Busy Work

March 28, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Are you an engineer who now sells? How about the CEO of your start-up? OK, I’ll open this up to sales people as well. It may be news to you that your first order of business is to understand your company’s business model, the way strategic goals are leveraged, and how money walks through your organization.

It’s an easier roadmap for selling if you understand the terrain before you start out on your business development journey.

All you thought you had to do was problem-solve or relationship-build. Leave the high level stuff up to the boss. Not in today’s globally competitive economy. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales & Engineering Collaboration, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

You talk. They think. Anyone listen?

December 7, 2012 By Leave a Comment

This is not another post about why you need to shut up and listen. Not all of us talk all the time. Some of us tend to be quiet, because we are thinking. That’s how we process information. However, the quieter we become, the more you talk. Nature abhors a vacuum. And if you are talkative, you can’t stand the silence. It doesn’t matter whether you are a gregarious engineer or a left-brain sales person or sales engineer.

So you fill it with yakity-yak, hoping you’ll get some attention to whatever it is you have to say.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Angels, Venture Capital, Private Equity, Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Professional Development & Social Selling, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , ,

It’s All Sales Blah-Blah-Blah to Engineers

October 12, 2012 By 4 Comments

If you feel speaking with engineers is like having a root canal without anesthetic, don’t flatter yourself: engineers feel the same way about talking to sales people. Either way, this conversation isn’t really much of a dialogue at all, in the majority of status quo conversations. Is it?

Engineers tend to be specific and direct in the type of knowledge they are asking about and in the nature of answers they expect to receive. Words are very important to technical professionals: a word translates into a design specification or outcome. If you, as a salesperson, don’t know your stuff and are throwing around technical buzz terms like they are confetti, I don’t have to tell you that technical professionals will have no mercy in making you feel like an inferior life form. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Angels, Venture Capital, Private Equity, Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , , ,

8 Tips for Deploying Your Tech Team To Sell

October 2, 2012 By 2 Comments

Ever think about letting techies loose with your customers? Learning how collaboration with your technical colleagues can positively impact your sales process and close ratio.

After you overcome your reluctance to collaborate with “them,” that is.

I’m not advocating grabbing the nearest available engineer and running out ready-fire-aim to talk to a customer. Do some planning. How will this strategy complement your sales process, skill set and, ultimately, career path and revenue stream?  

Here are eight strategies to kick-start deploying your tech team to sell – either with you or on their own. Your tech team remains at the cross-roads of customer conversations and revenue growth, once the business is won and brought in house.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , , ,

Did you ever learn how to develop business?

October 12, 2010 By 1 Comment

Regardless of where you sit around the table, your “function” may involve more than what you think you were hired to do. All of us struggle to define our value to ourselves, our companies and our customers.  And if you are finding yourself worrying the least bit about retaining your customers, then you are engaged in business development and sales. Yes, that’s right. Even if you are an engineer, IT professional or technical staff member.

Ah. Sales. Business development. What “loaded” words carrying such responsibility!  Well, they should be. These words, and the actions we devote towards them, fund our jobs and our careers. How else to you think those invoices get paid?

When did you learn to develop business? When did you learn to sell?

Because, when you think about it, you’ve been “developing” and “selling” yourself for years. How else did you get into college or technical training school?  That letter of acceptance didn’t just arrive in the mail on its own. You “heard” (aka, “prospected”) about an institution or training facility, you researched that facility (e.g., performed  business intelligence research), you took the entrance exams and “applied” (aka, you marketed your credentials) and you were accepted (e.g., you “closed” the deal or consummated the sale). So you developed yourself.  That institution or technical school “invested” in you. And they expected a return on their investment.  And you graduated and you delivered.

What makes you think that the business development and sales process within your company isn’t simply an extension of this scenario?  It’s not some mystical club that only the sales guys and gals or the technical guys and gals can join. No secret handshakes. Developing business should be an extension of who you are and what you offer to the marketplace.

And once again, you need to do your homework and determine what that marketplace may be. The marketplace involves being comfortable walking the walk and talking the talk with individuals who are just like you and, then again, NOT just like you.

If you have a compelling story to tell, who wouldn’t want to hear what you have to say? Because a compelling story has meaning and significance to the listener.

So where in your technical or sales training did you lose the ability to tell a compelling story that “speaks” to your  targeted constituents and decision makers?  Where in your technical or sales training did you become dependent on techno-spiel or sales jargon? Nobody likes to listen to gobbly-gook.  However, everyone enjoys a well-told story that speaks to them, their needs, their mindset and their context.

You know, there’s an anthropology to business development and the sales cycle that can be fascinating, engaging and a complete learning exercise for everyone involved. Establishing context of the decision, and the historical and cultural factors influencing decision making, makes all the difference in the world in terms of getting your point across and “connecting.” That’s all it takes. The time to research and establish the context for your discussion. And tell your story in plain language.

And I don’t feel the sales guys and gals have a leg up on this one.  Engineers, IT professionals and technical staff pay so much attention to details that you should be all over this approach.

But you aren’t.  And business development is perceived as being right up there with root canal.

We simply make this discussion with our customers and prospects far more complicated than it needs to be.  They want a story they can relate to and we give them some overblown features and benefits presentation.  They want a message that underscores we “understand” their context and we provide facts and figures and far too many details.

We have lost the ability to be succinct and simple and to the point – with anyone regardless of their training or mindset.  Even though these folks are the guys and gals who Own the companies we are prospecting or currently working with.

It’s just a story.  Well told. To an engaged and empathetic ear.

Think about it.

Filed Under: Angels, Venture Capital, Private Equity, Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales & Engineering Collaboration, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , , ,

If you were a stock, would your customers invest in you?

September 2, 2010 By Leave a Comment

OK, I don’t want to hear about the stock market or investing in stocks vs. mutual funds vs. bonds vs. money market accounts vs. just stashing cash under your mattress (which has its appeal from time to time).

You know what I’m getting at here.

We ask our customers to put their trust and confidence in us daily. At least that’s what we should be doing.  And we need to be earning that trust and confidence on a daily basis.  And, news flash here, folks: if this isn’t your primary strategy in providing value to yourself, your customers and your company, then you need to rethink your engineering career path.

When you think of the business environment in which you work, constantly responding to the peaks and valleys of the global economy, you are the mainstay for providing consistent service quality delivery on behalf of your customers. Your customers are experiencing the same fluctuations in their business environment, having to dodge and parry in response to the curves the market is throwing at them.  They invest in you: as the physical embodiment of the value that your engineering, service or manufacturing company, or brand, represents. Now that’s a loaded sentence.  And a big professional responsibility.

Keep this thought on your mental back-burner the next time you are working with your existing customers: every time they work with you, you must reinforce and reward their choice for contracting with your company. And these are not easy choices in this economy. With skepticism rampant and confidence going up and down with the markets, you’re a lighthouse for them on turbulent seas.

Whether you are a Boomer, Gen X or Gen Y, there are no fast-tracks to managing client relationships. And these client relationships are basically like your own business-engineering portfolio.  They are slow to win and need constant attention to develop.  You can never assume a client relationship will be permanent or that either you or your company is a “given” for upcoming projects.  Business acquisition and client relationship management are investments of your time as well as your client’s time as well as your company’s time. After all, your employer has invested in you as well, in terms of salary, benefits, materials, training, etc.. Yes, you are an important investment for your company, regardless of the current role you play in their organization. Providing a return on investment rewards your company for having chosen you as an employee.

Maximizing your growth potential within the parameters of your job allows you to provide value to yourself, your company and your organization.  As I’ve discussed before, coloring within the lines and simply “doing your job” and hiding in “cubicle mentality” is not sufficient. That’s the status-quo.

Increasing your value involves growing your areas of expertise within your organization, learning more about the dollars and cents of how your company operates, and determining whether your interests and skill sets allow you to enhance the value of non-technical work teams within your organization.

And, quite frankly, why wouldn’t you be interested in expanding your breadth and depth within your current organization?  You can maximize what you bring to the table as well,  which has positive ramifications for what you bring to your clients’ tables in return.

The next time you have a conversation with your clients – or are asked by the sales guys to participate in a business development discussion – think of yourself as an additional stock option that just has been added to the client acquisition portfolio. With that being the case, how do you see your role? Will your perception change how you participate in these discussions?

How do your actions translate into the investment clients make in your company… and in working with you?

Think about it.

Filed Under: Angels, Venture Capital, Private Equity, Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , , ,

How about Trading Places in your organization?

August 25, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Here’s a thought.

What would your day be like if you traded places with the sales guys? Or the Director of Business Development? Or the customer service guys and gals? What if these folks “took you to work” and you shadowed them for a day? Participated in their meetings, answered their phone calls… as a sales guy/gal and not as an engineer?

You know, sort of like when your kids take Mom or Dad to school for show and tell. Except this is for big people.

What would your company be like if your sales guys spent a day in engineering? And answered your phone calls? Or at least your phone calls became conference calls so they could hear the conversations you deal with during the day. You know, have your business development / sales folks become junior engineers for the day.

Another version of this idea is Monday Morning Musical Chairs.Everyone meets in the Board Room and circles the table.You can even play music and everyone can sit down when the music stops. Except there is always a chair for everyone. And then look under your chair for a piece of paper with the department / position to which you’ve been assigned for the day.

Question: why does cross-training need to be made into a game in order for everyone to accept it? Be honest with me. When you were reading the above paragraphs, your mind kind of opened up, didn’t it? You became a bit child-like and went back to “that place:” the place in our minds where our childhood still exists and where we liked to play with the other children.We were open to new ideas and a constantly changing playing field on the playground at recess.

It’s just a thought. And it adds a light-hearted quality to our passion and dedication towards our jobs.Perhaps trading places is a way of bringing back humor and an out-of-the-box perspective to our careers.

What if you, personally, traded places once a month? Do you think you might find out a complementary career path you could pursue? Perhaps you will unearth some new talents, different perspectives and a fresh way of communicating with your colleagues.

You know, I used to “sign myself out” in a former corporate life and spend a day with the venture capital guys.It was pretty amazing. I learned stuff like how not to fall asleep due to a post-lunch food coma during those 1 PM meetings under fluorescent lights dominated by lengthy PowerPoint presentations. I learned about watching the dynamics of body language during meetings, and how it worked or didn’t. I learned there were a lot more departments floating around than I knew about. I visited the Ops folks and fell in love with prototyping and ramping up to full production runs. And the machinery! Oh the machinery! (I travel with safety glasses at all times in case any prospect or client invites me to walk around the plant).

I realized I had something to share with folks who normally were outside of my typical interdepartmental contacts. I learned who were the movers and shakers. I identified the guys and gals who would make the best skunk works new product development team. (And by the way boys and girls, I actually got to work with these folks on a new product that is still top of category.) I learned there were people in my organization who were just as frustrated as I was but had learned how to work across silos and disciplines for at least part of their day. They were the true leaders and teachers. It was revelatory. And I am who I am today and what I am today because of all of these folks and the hours we spent interacting and brainstorming and learning from each other.

Trading Places is sort of like an internal apprenticeship. It’s not just for the white collars or the blue collars or the MBAs or the new hires fresh out of some college.You don’t know until you get there and you won’t get there until you decide to sign yourself out for a day and trade places.

Or convince management to have those once-a-month “musical chairs” Trading Places meetings.

Just some food for thought. Think about it.

 

Filed Under: Professional Development & Social Selling Tagged With: , , , ,

Do you provide simple solutions for your clients?

July 19, 2010 By Leave a Comment

You know the saying as it relates to engineering. Some variation of: “Don’t ask Jack/Jill what time it is. He/she will build you a clock.”

 

You probably engineer some pretty awesome clocks. But how do you get from the conceptual clock (e.g., what the client wants) to the outcome (e.g., what the client needs)?

It all depends on how simple and how RELEVANT you keep the process, including your explanation of the pathways towards the solution.

Ask yourself these questions:

 

  1. When my customers ask me for an answer, I provide one answer encompassing all the possible ramifications of a solution that I can think of.And I may call them back with even more solutions once I really start to think about things.
  2. When my customers ask me for information on a project, I provide them with the full breadth and depth of data available that support the project.
  3. When my customers ask me for a timeline, I provide multiple dates related to the multiple possible ramifications of the proposed solutions based on the full breadth and depth of data available that support the project. Whew!

If you answered YES to any one of these questions, let alone more than one, no one will ever accuse you of providing a simple, relevant solution for your client.Ever.In fact, your customers may perceive that working with you is the equivalent of trying to clean out their garage. Too complicated and too overwhelming.

Regardless of whether you are talking to a peer or a decision-maker, keeping things simple – and relevant – is the goal. Who has time anymore to ponder the logic and profound nature of all the glorious information you are providing to them?

I’m not proposing that you dumb-down your responses or omit important information. However, why choke your clients on information overload when you can feed them bite-sized chunks? And probably get your point across a whole lot better since you aren’t cluttering their minds with information perhaps only you feel is important – or relevant.

Question #1: When customers ask you for an answer, provide a simple answer that addresses the issues that are most important to them. Make it easy to work with you. Your customers may be The Company Decision Maker or the Lead Engineer or the Technical Support Person or the Summer Co-op. Determine to whom you are talking and what types of issues are important to them. Find out what’s relevant and what’s not. Give them the answer that addresses the scope of their responsibilities and the context of their query. And then ask one more critical question: is there anyone else you need to be discussing this issue with? In other words, to whom are they handing-off the information you provided them? Because things will get lost in translation.

Question #2: When customers ask you for project information, provide succinct responses.In order for you to be responsive and succinct, you need to determine what the real issues are behind their questions. Establishing the context – and the relevancy – of their question and your response may uncover unaddressed needs, additional project opportunities and gaps in the current scope of the project. But you will never find out this information if you are providing a broad-based doctoral thesis defense type of response to their query for project information. It’s not about you and what you know. It’s about them and what they need.Make it easy to work with you. Make it understandable to work with you. That’s how clients learn and become loyal, repeat customers.

Question #3: When clients ask for a timeline, provide a simple answer with a caveat that covers your – and their – ability to meet the proposed timeline. Having an extensive “if-then” type of timeline is perceived as waffling. If they propose an unrealistic timeline, find out the reasons behind this timeline. “Their” timeline may have nothing to do with the project as much as it has to do with other issues they have to deal with, outside the context of your project. You’re not an order-taker. Arrive at a set of deliverables, collaboratively.

Building a clock and providing your client with straight-forward, succinct, simple, relevant information along the way is a powerful tool for customer retention.

Don’t forget to keep things simple and relevant any and every time you have a chance. It’s a great way to gradually change how you communicate with your peers, colleagues and, most importantly, your customers.

Think about it.

Filed Under: Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , ,

What if all of your customers were like your “best” customer?

September 9, 2009 By Leave a Comment

In this economy, engineering firms have bids tied up in engineering projects contingent on economic stimulus funding, which is slow to trickle down. There’s a lot of engineering work being promised as timelines for contract awards get extended further and further.Some engineering and design firms have been forced to transfer their business mix predominantly to public projects, which often end up being a low-ball bid “beauty contest.”And then there’s the accordion-like expansion and contraction of the construction engineering workforce which was the norm prior to the economic meltdown and is now combined with the contraction of the work week as well.

So where are you looking for new business development opportunities?Are you simply filling your pipeline with anything you can get your hands on? In these tough economic times, this situation is simply “the way it is.”

Regardless of how you are “getting by,” ignoring what you do best, and for whom, is not an option as we move toward the new economic business paradigm.

Who is your best customer? What makes that company your best customer? Are they a good customer simply due to the volume of repeat business awarded during the year or profitability of the work awarded? Is the work awarded a multitude of small jobs, with less-than-inspired-engineering, brought to you at the last minute, with expectations of rapid turnaround? Or is this engineering and custom design and fabrication work profitable because you understand that customer’s mindset and requirements and they have trust and confidence in your ability to take the time to deliver well-thought out, collaborative engineering solutions?

What if all of your customers were like your “best” customer? What if you took the time to understand the persona of your “best” customer and developed a set of specifications for what a “best” customer brings to your table? How’s that for turning the tables and creating a different type of business development strategy for your company?

As we head towards the new economic paradigm, engineering-intensive companies who have used their slow periods and downtime to take a good look at what they do best and for whom are going to be ahead of the curve in terms of business development.

Most companies have a mixed bag of customer types. Take a look at all of your customers and gain a handle on what makes the “best” the “best.” Instead of being all things to all people, what if your company targeted the “best” types of companies with whom to do business in the future?

What would the economic impact on your company be if the majority of your customers fell into the “best” customer category?

Ask yourself these questions:

1.Who are your customers? Do you truly understand who they are?

2.Are your best customers your target customers? Or did you just “fall” into them?If your best customers simply “happened” to your company, it’s time to find out what makes that relationship work so well.

3.What are the strengths, weaknesses and gaps in your company in terms of successful business development practices? Is business development endless response to RFQs or a result of relationship building, knowledge management and long term, multiple phase projects?

4.What skill set is required for you to target “best” customers? How many individuals in your organization currently have this skill set?

5.Is your company the “best” vendor of your “best” customers? Why or why not?

6.If the majority of the customers you served were in the “best” customer category, would your production runs be predictable with longer lead times? How might that situation impact quality, productivity and scheduled maintenance… let alone cash flow?

7.If the majority of your customers were “best” customers, could you allocate certain lines or a percentage of capacity for rapid turnaround projects for “other” customer types while devoting greater resources to your “best” customers?

8.How could you shift the percentage of your customer base to “best” customers within the next six months and what would the impact be on personnel, equipment and once again, cash flow?

Targeting “best” customers requires some work on your part. You will need to identify the types of discussions with the types of customers resulting in the best return on investment for your company. You will need to identify those individuals within your company who already have the skill set which allows them to be “naturals” at these types of discussions. And you will need to make an investment of time and, yes, cash, to develop these skill sets in other individuals who may have the potential for developing business with “best” customers.

Having someone pick the short straw and telling them they are now a “sales engineer” – without the benefit of training – is no longer an option. And for small to mid-sized companies, this practice has been the norm.

The new business paradigm requires different habits and attitudes for engineering-intensive companies:  Sales Aerobics for Engineers, if you will. Engineering-intensive companies need to recognize the gaps in their current palette of offerings.  Enlightened engineering and industrial manufacturers, distributors and service companies should be willing to re-train and cross-train themselves and their staff to incorporate sales questions into engineering discussions. These types of companies will be at an advantage vs. their competition.

Using the economy as an excuse to do nothing is no excuse at all. It’s time to regroup, retrain and redeploy. If your company has made it this far, you are well-managed. Now take what you do best and add the skill sets to your engineering staff to make your company better, even “best.”

You don’t need more customers. You need more customers like the ones you do your best work for.

Find out what makes your “best” customers, well, “best.”

 

Filed Under: Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , ,
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