Online Learning
Focus Videos
Get the most from our opportunity management software. Videos, tools and slideshows to teach you our methodology and tools.
Latest Videos:
See all Focus Videos
Testimonials
Steve Lewis
Sales Director
"[firstborder] has come up with a great way to encapsulate what it is to be a professional sales person... providing excellent coaching for both sales and sales management on utilising the tool and the methodology to deliver a more predictable result."
Sales Tools
Introducing...
Sales professionals have 3 basic tasks to perform - they need to fill their pipeline with real deals that can be won, they need to be able to manage their pipeline to make sure they are working on the right deals at the right time and they then need to close the deals to maximise their commission.
Do we really need a sales methodology? It's not as though we can't sell.
Companies that do not have an appropriate, well implemented and utilised sale methodology are probably not rewarded with consistent and predictable sales success. If there is not one single methodology in place, there are probably several and therefore by definition your processes and results will not be consistent - you will have nothing to benchmark success against, no way to share best practice and limited scope to improve performance. It sounds harsh, but from many years of experience, Firstborder has seen the results that both no methodology and a good methodology bring sales organisations.
However, sales methodology is a not a one size fits all. It has to be right for your organisation, it has to be right for the way that you sell and above all it has to be right for the way that your customer's buy; work out how your customer's buy, before you work out how to sell.
Firstborder's methodologies, processes and tools are for sales professionals who operate in a business to business sales environment who sell solutions and manage a portfolio of accounts and different sales opportunities with close dates across several months, quarters or even years.
We work on the basis that as a sales professional your greatest value to your customer is not what you know about your products, but the questions that you ask. Ask great questions and you will get invited back. However, if all you are is a walking talking brochure then you are not adding any real value. To be able to ask great questions you need to understand the whole territory in which your sales efforts are being played out. Therefore, our Sales Methodology is not designed to teach you to sell, rather to help you Think, Question & Communicate.
At the end of the day there is only one measure of success for the sales professional - they have to hit their number. However, they are not in sales to be able to say I've hit my number - they are in to earn money - and through our tools we show the impact of their decision making process on their commission - we get them to forecast their commission and they learn how to maximise it by balancing the activities of Fill, Manage and Close.
I've tried methodologies before and sales people don't really use them.
The biggest single problem with implementing a sales methodology, or even CRM for that matter, is compliance - how do you get the sales team using the methodology on a consistent basis?
Sales methodologies started back in the 1970's and the 80's saw a number of the big and well known methodology providers come to the market. Many are still with us today, doing the same things. These methodologies are very robust and when implemented in a disciplined way they work well, but have to rely on strong sales management and often they are implemented incorrectly as a 'stick' to discipline the sales professional.
The implementation of sales methodologies and tools are often seen as a way of creating visibility for the senior executives to show that sales are in control - the stick. If this is the case, then sales professionals mistakenly believe that these methodologies and tools deliver marginal productivity gains to the people that matter - themselves. The sales professional invests his/her time, but receives 'no takeaways' that raise their productivity. For example deal plans are written as justification of why the deal should be pursued, rather than as a method of helping to assess, manage and improve the risks involved in selling – risk being you putting your energies and company resources in to a deal that won’t close rather than a deal that will.
These traditional methodologies and tools provide one way process flow when viewed from the desk of the salesperson. Thus, the salesperson supplies minimal data... just enough data to keep their job.
To be a success and to gain maximum benefit across the organisation the sales methodology, processes and tools have to deliver the greatest value to the sales professional, with secondary benefit to the sales manager and sales executive management team. Achieve this and you will have compliance; with compliance comes great results. Firstborder delivers the greatest benefit to the sales professionals and that is why our customers achieve great results.