JULY 15th 2009 / IssUe 26

NegotiatioN vs HaggliNgincreasing sales through negotiation

Zero toleraNce For Poor PerFormaNce

sales management tips from singapore

NZ’s e-mag for sales leaders

sales ForecastiNg Part 3: turning your sales reports into a sales action Plan

NZsM / JULY 14th 2009 / 2

JULY 15th / IssUe 26

tHis WeeKs mUst reaD

NegotiatioN vs HaggliNg

Adam sands on the difference

between negotiation and haggling and

increasing sales through negotiation.

Zero toleraNce For

Poor PerFormaNce

sales management lessons

from singapore.

NZsm caleNDar

sales ForecastiNg Part 3

The final part in Michael Taplin’s

three part series on how to create a

simple and accurate forecast for

your business.

sales traiNiNg DirectorY

resoUrce corNer

First, BreaK all tHe rUles

this amazing book explains why

great managers break all the rules of

conventional wisdom.

tHe close

8

4

8

10

11

14

15

15

4

1115

ABOUt /

short and sharp, New Zealand sales

Manager is a free e-magazine delivering

thought provoking and enlightening

articles, and industry news and

information to forward-thinking sales

managers, business owners and sales

professionals.

eDItOR / Richard Liew

ARt DIReCtOR / Jodi Olsson

GROUP eDItOR / trudi Caffell

ADVeRtIsING/CONteNt eNQUIRIes /

Phone Richard on 09 523 4112 or email

richardl@nzsalesmanager.co.nz

ADDRess / NZ sales Manager, C/- espire

Media, PO Box 137162, Parnell,

Auckland 1151, New Zealand

WeBsIte / www.nzsalesmanager.co.nz

NZsM / JULY 14th 2009 / 3

After 26 enjoyable issues of

NZ sales Manager, this is my

last issue as editor and I’m

happy to be able to pass the editorial

reigns over to the even more capable,

knowledgeable and professional Mr

Paul Newsom, from the next issue

on. Paul’s understanding of selling in

the modern world is second to none, and with his passion

for helping New Zealand develop a world beating sales

culture, will ensure NZ sales Manager continues to go from

strength to strength.

In Issue Number 1, I wrote, “It has always struck me

as odd that the sales profession does not have its own

magazine.” I’m glad to say that since then, I have heard

from hundreds of passionate sales and business people

throughout New Zealand (and the world) who have said

the same thing and who have responded so positively to

NZ sales Manager.

A big thanks to all the fantastic sales professionals,

managers, business owners and entrepreneurs I’ve met,

interviewed, helped and learnt from, through NZ sales

Manager. thank you also to all our contributors and

experts for being generous with their knowledge and their

willingness to help New Zealand businesses get ahead –

our readers appreciate it!

And an especially huge Thank you to our art director

Jodi who took the vision and ran with it - apparently she’s

even learnt a thing or two about selling!

the purpose of NZ sales Manager is to promote learning

and development in the sales profession so before I sign

off I thought I would take the opportunity to share a few of

the lessons I have learned and that have been reinforced

for me in my time as editor:

the good ideas have not all been done already.•

Where there’s a will, there’s a way – but only if your •

will is strong enough.

there are heaps of people out there who are only too •

happy to help – but you must be willing to ask for

help first.

those who need help but are not ready to ask, •

usually can’t be helped.

Deadlines and targets are your friends not your •

enemies.

There is nothing you can’t learn if you want really •

want to. Remember, our results in life are a reflection of how much we’ve learnt and have applied. Get clear on what you want, keep learning and taking action on it, and you can achieve anything. happy selling!

Richard

NZsM / JULY 15th 2009 / 4

T H I S W E E K ’ S M U S T R E A D

NeGOtIAtION Vs hAGGLING

increasing sales through negotiationBy Adam sands

A common negotiation mistake made by many

sales people is thinking that negotiation is about

persuading the other guy that he wants what you’re

offering and then making some sort of concession on the

price in return for an order.

There is a flaw in this logic – firstly, the term “negotiate” is

well overused. Often, when sales people say, “We’re just

negotiating with the client” they actually mean, “We’re

just haggling over the price”. haggling is not negotiating.

haggling is about offering your product for a reduced

margin – you’re simply making price concessions until the

buyer says yes.

Negotiation though, is about getting something of equal or

higher value, in return for any concessions you make.

For example, getting a buyer to place an extra order in return

for giving them a slightly lower price.

secondly, to enter into a negotiation, all parties need to

believe it is in their interest to do so. how often have we

found, as salespeople, that we believe we have a product or

service which will help the customer, but the customer doesn’t

seem to see it that way?

I’ve spent many hours, over many years, sitting beside

salespeople during sales calls. I’ll see the sales person begin

to come to the realisation that even though the benefits to the

customer seem obvious, the customer’s just not ‘getting it’.

All too often the next step by the sales person is to start dropping

the price in the mistaken belief that in doing so, the customer will

NZsM / JULY 14th 2009 / 5

suddenly realise that there is indeed some benefit in the product

or service and decide to buy it. The sales person thinks they’re

negotiating but in reality they’re in a one sided haggle with

someone who doesn’t want their product...

People only realise that is in their best interests to negotiate

when they perceive that the costs associated with saying

“No” are unacceptable.

so what can you do to help a prospect to go from a “No” to

a “Maybe” - something you can build on?

Research your prospect to find out what difficulties they a.

might be facing;

Ask questions to help the customer to think about these b.

difficulties and what they are costing them - ideally in $

terms; and then

Ask the question that helps discover what it might take to c.

shift the prospect from the status quo – the ‘Under what

circumstances?’ question.

Under what circumstances would you consider committing

to an un-budgeted spend of $4000 this side of year end?

Under what circumstances would you be able to give me

commitment this week?

Under what circumstances would your director normally

agree to this?

Under what circumstances would you be able to do this?

If your prospect tells you that there are circumstances, under

which they’d agree, then they are now a provisional “Yes”

and you are now able to negotiate.

If there aren’t, then you know not to waste your, or their,

valuable time now by exploring the issue further, and you

can agree to revisit at a later date.

A good sales process is underpinned by a strong negotiation

process. Negotiating skills are the oil in the machine.

the difference between seller and buyer interactions that

work, and those that don’t, is trust. Not necessarily the trust

that takes five years to create, I mean the trust built up over

a short period of time (sometimes in just a few minutes) by

a good use of skill and process, and most importantly, an

attitude of openness and sharing of information.

the question every seller should be asking themselves is

not, “How can I sell my stuff to this customer?” it’s, “How

can I give this customer what they want, on terms that are

acceptable to me?”

NZsM / JULY 14th 2009 / 6

adam sands is a principal consultant for negotiation experts scotwork following a successful career in B2B sales,

sales management and sales coaching. visit www.scotwork.co.nz for more info.

Be well prepared.•

Prepare some great questions, which will help •

you to uncover the real commercial issues

facing your customers organisation, and also the

issues of concern to the person you’re dealing

with.

A long, and comprehensive list of items you can •

ask for, which (in the event you need to make a

price concession) will recover, or even improve,

the overall deal for your company.

Be cooperative•

the easiest way for you to get what you want, is •

to find out what the other party wants, and give

it to them... but on terms acceptable to you.

An attitude of openness will build trust – trust •

is the differentiator between seller and buyer

interactions that work, and those that don’t.

Get creative•

the more variables there are in a negotiation, •

the more opportunities there are to keep re-

packaging your offer to meet the needs of the

customer, and your own organisation.

Develop your negotiating skills•

A strong sales process gets your customer •

motivated to buy – negotiating skills gets you

a deal that will actually make you and your

organisation money. Both skills are important, but

anyone can give it away.

tIPs FOR BetteR NeGOtIAtIONs:

http://www.businessmentors.org.nz

NZsM / JULY 14th 2009 / 8

By Rob McKay

sales Management lessons from singapore

Recently I was in

singapore delivering

an address at the

annual symposium for the

Contact Centre Association

of singapore. singapore is

an impressive country. It’s

the size of lake taupo with

the same population base as

New Zealand. Many people

refer to this city as the switzerland of the east. this is an apt

analogy as the city is so efficient and the financial hub of

Asia. What really struck me were the low crime rate, genuine

honesty and politeness of its citizens.

singapore has a zero tolerance on bad behaviour. they

achieve this by being tough on those

who break the rules. the phrase

“political correctness” is non-existent.

You talk on your cell phone in a car; you lose the phone

and $500. You eat on the train and there goes another $500.

Drop a lolly paper on the ground and that will cost another

$500, all of this compliancy and not a policeman in sight.

Zero toleraNce For Poor PerFormaNce

I only saw two policemen over the week I was there. I am told

that 50% of taxi drives are working policemen. What a novel

idea – cheap taxis and crime fighters in one package! But then

again singapore is full of novel ideas that make this city so safe

and prosperous. The place is run like an efficient organisation.

Why, because Singapore has an over-riding policy of ‘zero

tolerance for poor performance and bad behaviour’.

We have become so PC in this country that people are too

afraid to do anything for fear of repercussions from fringe

groups and individuals. this permeates into our work

force. Managers are constantly accepting below average

performance – why?

In many cases the manager has hired a person who does

not ‘fit’ the job and once hired they try to “fix” the problem

by embarking on a treadmill of coaching and training, or

a mixture of other ‘touchy feely’ processes. Let me tell you

straight up, if you have hired a person who does not have the

innate personality, mental ability and attitude (this can only be

measured through psychometric profiling) to do the job, no

amount of training will make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. You

might as well toss the training budget - and the six months of

your time pandering to the situation - out the window!

Poor performance must be addressed immediately. the

longer it’s left, the worse it will get. Then one morning you’ll

will wake up and decide, enough is enough, go to the

office and deal with it in an inappropriate manner that will

probably cost you an expensive personal grievance claim.

NZsM / JULY 14th 2009 / 9

rob mcKay ma(Hons) cmct is a

Business Psychologist and Director

of assesssystems aust/NZ ltd.

visit his website at www.

influenceatwork.co.nz

Usually you will find three kinds of employees – have a look

around your team now – you’ll see people who were born

to perform well, some who have the capacity to perform

well and those who will never perform. Jack Welch, CeO of

the world largest company Ge, used to grade his team into

A’s, B’s and C’s. The A’s were groomed for high things. The

B’s were trained to maintain, or fill the A slots and C’s were

targeted to be managed out.

Often managers take work off the C’s and lump this work

onto the A’s because they can be trusted to do quality work

without a fuss. So the C’s get rewarded for bad performance

and usually get the same take-home pay as the A’s. Here we

see motivation working in the negative. there is motivation to

perform bad because you get paid to do nothing!

It’s time to get tough – ‘zero tolerance for poor

performance’ should be your new mantra. Don’t allow

the C team the luxury of passing off their responsibility to

perform – set goals, introduce targets, measure output –

ride hard, reward well.

Usually when the pressure to perform comes on, these

slackers fold like a deck of cards and leave – your goal

is achieved. But be aware when you are looking for the

replacement, the next candidate lining up to work for you

could be the joker who was dealt off the deck of the last

company because of poor performance.

As organisations we have three opportunities to do

something about our people performance. The first is at the

front door – hire the right people first time - hire for attitude,

train for aptitude.

the second opportunity is training and coaching your current

people – ideal for your A and B people, but a huge waste

of management time and money if you never got the first

opportunity right.

And finally, show the poor performers the back door –

almost impossible to achieve in today’s litigious employment

environment. Getting rid of poor performers is a long morale

sapping, customer killing, bank balance denting process.

singapore is not perfect and there

are huge human rights issues

with entry-level workers, but their

‘zero tolerance’ policy is a living

demonstration of how it can drive

productivity and efficiency.

People are the only lasting

competitive advantage you have, so

here’s another mantra - hire tough

and manage easy.

It’s time to get tough – ‘zero tolerance for poor performance’ should be your new mantra...set goals, introduce targets, measure output – ride hard, reward well.

People are the only lasting competitive

advantage you have, so here’s another

mantra - hire tough and manage easy.

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sales PlanningDavid FormanChristchurch

sales DevelopmentDavid FormanChristchurch(10-13 August)

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Leadership With ResultsGeewizWellington

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Personal Planning & time ManagementZealmark GroupAuckland

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Cold Calling & Prospecting Workshoptop Achievers sales trainingAucklandAdvanced serious sellingGeewizAucklandsales Leadership skills Workshoptop Achievers sales trainingAuckland

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NZsM / JULY 14th 2009 / 11

In the last issue we looked at how to start building a

simple forecasting system that will provide enough notice

that your team is falling behind for you to take corrective

action well in advance.

today we look at how you can use those reports not just as

historical records of what’s happened but to drive each sales

reps actions and activities for the month ahead.

I assume that each of your sales people now uses the forecasting

model we created in the last issue to give you a monthly report,

in a simple excel spreadsheet that looks something like this.

sales ForecastiNg Part 3: turning your sales reports into a sales action Plan

Part 3 of a 3 part series by Michael taplin

You can see at a glance the status of each prospect, and its

current value to the business. how has the status of each

prospect changed in the past month? the bottom line shows

you today’s value of the work in your sales funnel.

the total at the bottom of the “expected Value” column is the

one that counts.

If the salesperson has been working effectively throughout the

month you can expect:

that the status code for each prospect has changed positively

from last month. If not why not?

the probability of banking the cheque has improved.

the total expected Value has increased.

the total Job Value of work in the pipeline has increased.

the expected Value as a percentage of total Job Value has

increased so your sales effort is more effective.

Prospect/ Name stage in sales process Job value Probability of Winning expected value timing m/Y

ABC Company 3 $10000 10% $1000 sep-09

DeF Company 4 $21400 25% $5350 sep-09

GhI Company 2 $25000 5% $1250 sep-09

JKL Company 2 $15000 5% $750 sep-09

MNO Company 7 $22750 70% $15925 sep-09

PQR Company 6 $14990 60% $8994 sep-09

stU Company 8 $17450 80% $13960 sep-09

totals $215580 $91147

Part 3 of a 3 part series by Michael taplin

NZsM / JUNe 3RD 2009 / 12

michael taplin is a business mentor and strategy consultant with special expertise in sales forecasting. You can visit his website at www.bizlearn.biz.

You can now sort this spreadsheet and calculate the expected

Value for jobs won each month. this is sales forecast for each

rep for the month and you can compare this against your

sales budget.

You can also quickly assess the status of each significant

prospect and decide what action to take to move each

prospect to a higher stage in the sales process and increase

the probability of banking the cheque. Inevitably this will

involve work on behalf of the sales person!

You can also expect the salesperson to add to their report

what action they plan to take for each prospect and if

they have a problem you have real information to provide

guidance for them.

this means you can take action before the issues become

impossible to resolve - it’s starting to look mighty like a Sales

Action Plan to me!

Your people will be motivated by clear guidance on their

own performance and by compiling this report for you

each month they will improve their own ability to manage

their work.

Most importantly, as a manager, you can rely on the

information because it is impossible for your salespeople to

fudge this type of report two months in a row!

If you have followed the step-by-step process I have set out

in the three articles in this series you should now have a

simple, reliable and proactive forecasting system operating.

I wish you good fortune in making your sales forecasts

deliver the results you need and if you run into difficulties

please don’t hesitate to contact me.

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NZsM / JULY 15th 2009 / 15

“ “

A goal is something we reach for. A standard is something we settle for. Roger Hamilton, Social Entrepreneur.

Have you subscribed to New Zealand Sales Manager? It’s free!simply visit www.nzsalesmanager.co.nz to get a copy of New Zealand sales Manager delivered

straight to your inbox every third Wednesday!

Great managers do not help people overcome their

weaknesses. they do not believe that each person

has unlimited potential. they do play favourites

and they break the ‘Golden Rule’ book everyday.

this amazing book explains why great managers break

all the rules of conventional wisdom. the front-line

manager is the key to attracting and retaining talented

employees. No matter how generous its pay or how

renowned its training, the company that lacks great,

front-line managers will suffer.

Great managers are the heroes of this book. Vivid

examples show how, as they select, focus, motivate

and develop people, great managers turn talent

into performance. Finally,

the authors have distilled

the essence of good

management practice into

twelve simple questions

that work to distinguish the

strongest departments of a

company from all the rest.

this book is the first to present this essential

measuring stick and to prove the link between

employee opinions and

productivity, profit,

customer satisfaction, and

the rate of turnover.

First, BreaK all tHe rUles By Marcus Buckingham & Curt Coffman

Published by Pocket Books

$26.96 from

R e s O U R C e C O R N e R