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I think that it is common for people to think of a thought leader as someone who must be very highly educated, has won awards, or is a published author – perhaps a scientist or a famous writer. This might be true to a certain extent, but here is the rub: We are all capable of being thought leaders in our own right. Owning the title of thought leader means nothing more than making sure you are educated and passionate about something and being able to articulate that experience or expertise to a client or prospect. If you have expertise in selling your product and/or service, you can claim thought leader status.

As sales professionals, we must always be thinking about how to raise our profession and our sales community as a whole to new and unprecedented levels of respect. We can do that in many ways. For this article, I am talking about being known as someone who can speak with authority and intelligence about the field in which you sell. For example, if you are selling knowledge management systems to catalyze education, you need to know what is happening in the space, trends, and developments, the current thinking of the experts, the state of technology, and so on. You must be able to express an opinion and converse intelligently and authoritatively on your services beyond the clicks, bits, and bytes of the actual product. If you cannot have a discussion on theory and be able to hold your own with the experts, you are not a thought leader. You run the risk of being “just the salesperson” in the client’s eyes. Being a thought leader increases your value to the client. You get the appointments and the client’s time. That is money in the bank.

What Does It Take Be a Thought Leader?

Becoming a thought leader is not difficult. In fact, it is easy, and if you like to learn, it’s fun! Make it your business to educate yourself by reading, attending industry meetings, and networking! Know everything you can about your space. When I was selling online education, I made it my business to learn and understand how people learn and to know what the adult learning theory means. I talked to everyone I could and was able to really converse with the experts. My clients knew I took the time to learn and respected me for doing it. They trusted me to make sure I knew what was happening. The results were better relationships, fun sales calls, effective networking, and bigger deals.

Everything you absorb will help you know your space better; this empowers you to educate your clients and prospects. Elevate your sales calls to discussions on concepts, developments in the market, and futures. Take a dive into the cerebral pool with your clients. You will earn more respect, and this creates a more natural bridge to being a better sales professional. Being a thought leader shows you care about what you do and about your clients’ business and their passions! Being a thought leader in your own right means you can connect at a new and more exciting level.

So, go climb the knowledge mountain and claim your thought leader status.

What Is a Value Proposition?

A value proposition is a clear, concise statement that quickly describes what customers will get by using your organization’s products or services. Strong value propositions communicate how an organization’s products or services deliver measurable results, such as by boosting revenue, reducing employee turnover, increasing market share, and decreasing costs.

The value proposition must speak directly to your customers’ needs. In addition to solving their needs, you should also be crystal clear about what your organization does that’s unique compared to your competitors. It should also present the most compelling reason for customers to do business with you. For example, my company’s value proposition is: “We build sales culture to help organizations drive revenue.”

Value Proposition – Baseline Sales Tool

The value proposition is a baseline sales tool and the common thread of sales success in an organization. If all members of your organization truly understand the value proposition, they’ll become a valuable part of the virtual sales team. Their focus will center on fulfilling the value proposition and providing strong support to the sales team.  By establishing a unique value proposition and making sure everyone in your organization understands it, you’ll find your sales culture will come alive and deliver powerful results!

You will be surprised. The people of a sales culture include all of the organizational members who practice what I have defined as the essential selling skills of great sales professionals. Those skills are:

• Strong personal skills
• Strong relational skills
• Excellent business acumen.

When I present workshops and training to prepare professionals to grow in a sales culture, we include many people who don’t have “sales” in their job title. Some people are surprised to learn that they have a role in the sales culture and that they can develop their skills to make a greater contribution to their organization’s success.

Personal, relational, and business skills allow all the people of the sales culture to work together to create and leverage customer relationships. Most important, though, is the recognition that these customer relationships all depend on internal employee relationships. We all sell. The sales culture appears!

Good Selling IN the Sales Culture!

-Todd

I’ve known Mike for 28 years – we met in college and have been buds ever since. Mike is a great sales professional and sometimes he doesn’t even know it. Mike is also an inspiration to me and should be to all salespeople. He has learned to successfully sell his most precious asset – himself. Mike lost his job as a senior banking executive almost two years ago. A victim of the times, he was not at fault. It was just bad timing in an industry that was suffering. Mike left his previous employer with his head held high and subsequently spent the next 18 months “in search,” as the saying goes. He also left knowing that he had to become the best sales professional ever.

Following the Steps of All Great Sales Professionals

Mike filled his days with focused and energetic networking meetings, expanding his virtual team, following up, and perfecting his personal value proposition. He also kept busy with his other passion – teaching. Mike holds a position as an adjunct professor of business at a local university, which allows him an important outlet for his skills, as well as the opportunity to help others in career transition. When the topic of our conversations turned to the power of networking, he has said to me many times, “I get it now.” There’s no doubt that Mike got tired at times of the rigor of the job hunt; however, like all good sales professionals he kept up the pace and took good care of himself.

Mike became a great sales professional by following the steps of all great sales professionals:

1. He knew his plan.
2. He worked the plan.
3. He never wavered from the plan.
4. He never gave up and never blamed anyone else.

His consistent research and networking produced an even and robust pipeline of employment opportunities. He took each interview knowing how he would succeed, and he was excellent at articulating that vision. He closed every meeting with a suggested action plan and he called shortly afterwards to ask for the job. Mike built his own “sales culture” and made it work for him. The final result – Mike started his new job on November 29th!

As we’re about to embark on a new year, we should all take a lesson from Mike. No matter what obstacles get in our way, we need to continue nurturing our networks, building our own sales culture, and, most important, moving forward with a positive attitude.

I have my health and amazing friends. I am dedicating this blog entry to one of my best friends, Michael.

I have known Mike for 28 years – we met in college and have been buds ever since. Mike is also a great sales professional and sometimes he doesn’t even know it, so I am going to remind him right now! Mike is also an inspiration to me and should be to all salespeople. He has learned – better than others – to successfully sell his most precious asset – himself. Mike lost his job as a senior banking executive almost 2 years ago. A victim of the times, he was not at fault; nor did he do anything wrong. It was just bad timing in an industry that was suffering. Mike left his previous employer with his head high. Mike spent the next 18 months filling his time “in search,” as the saying goes.

Mike filled his days with focused and energetic networking meetings, expanding his virtual team, following up and perfecting his personal value proposition. He also kept busy with his other passion – teaching.  Mike holds a position as an adjunct professor of business at a local university, which allows him an important outlet for his skills as well as helping others in career transition on a regular basis. He stayed in the community and as he has said to me many times “I get it now” when the topic of our conversations turned to the power of networking.

Mike became a great sales professional by following the steps of all great sales professionals. He knew his plan, he worked the plan, and he never wavered. His consistent research and  networking produced an even and robust pipeline of employment opportunities. He took each interview knowing what and HOW he would succeed, and he was excellent at articulating that vision. He closed every meeting with a suggested action plan AND he called shortly afterwards to ask for the job. Mike built his own “sales culture” and made it work for him. The final result – Mike is starting his new job on November 29th!

Mike – thanks for showing us all how to sell! I am proud to know you and be your friend.

-Todd

Fox School of Business, Temple University
Established in 1918, the Fox School of Business, Temple University, has a distinguished tradition of preparing business leaders, professionals and entrepreneurs for successful careers. Today, it is the largest, most comprehensive business school in the greater Philadelphia region, and among the largest in the world, with nearly 6,500 students, 155 full-time faculty and more than 52,000 alumni. For more information, visit www.fox.temple.edu and www.fox.temple.edu/iei (Innovation and Entrepreneurship Institute).

SalesLeader LLC and Todd Cohen
SalesLeader LLC advises and builds high-per¬formance sales teams that produce outstanding results.  The firm also provides strategic oversight for sales teams and provides executive sales coaching and advising to clients ranging from small, rapidly growing start-ups to well-established, large corpora¬tions.  SalesLeader LLC bridges the gap between the sales training you may already be doing and your next level of sales performance, firmly built on a sales culture designed to multiply your results and magnify your invest¬ment in traditional sales training. Please visit www.toddcohen.com for more information.

I see examples of effective virtual teams and sales cultures everywhere I go. I see a lot of examples, but still not enough to think that the sales culture practices are commonplace and clearly understood by sales organizations. When the sales professionals thoroughly understand what they have to do and know how to engage people, the organizational managers say, “Yes, go to work and be on the team.” No distractions on competing priorities are presented by different levels of functional bosses.

The virtual team members’ biggest challenge might be time management. Balancing functional responsibilities and virtual- team responsibilities to the customer can be tricky. One way to bring clarity to this challenge is to think of the customer and his needs first. What will help satisfy the customer? How urgent is the customer’s need for my service? What works best for the customer? How can I help to move the sales campaign to a successful close?

Functional managers and sales professionals who are leading the virtual teams can help team members prioritize their work in ways that contribute to customer satisfaction and company success. Whatever affects a customer comes first.

Organizational managers can look at activities in two categories: customer issues and internal issues. If the environment or culture of the company is one that prioritizes the customer before all else, then everyone knows how to manage his or her time according to these guidelines. The internal issues need to be managed to best respond to the customer issues.

A sales professional should see every situation as a unique opportunity to reinforce a sales culture. The sales professional needs to recognize the different needs in each sales opportunity to build his sales culture and success. Money in the emotional bank account comes first. This account is built by developing relationships with customers and virtual team members, who can help with the customer relationships.

Shhhh, don’t let anyone hear me tell you this, but you are IN sales! It’s OK, don’t panic. Take a few deep breaths. It’s true. It does not matter what you do, whether you are employed or in a career transition.

Intriguing to me is when people think that sales is a “5-letter word” and we all sell. In my work lecturing at companies and helping build their Sales Culture, the one consistent thing is that when we show people how much of what they do has a selling component to it, it’s easy to see how we all sell. It’s exciting to then understand how your role in a sales campaign enhances your ability to impact the bottom line and increase professional security. In other words, when you help a sales campaign become transparent to all in an organization, you are selling and are on the “A” team.

So, if sales is a 5-letter word, I would like to suggest that that word is “success.” Ok, that’s seven letters – but I am sure you get my meaning!
Good Selling!

-Todd