Your GPS for More RMR: How to Craft a Comprehensive Sales Process Template that Acts as a Roadmap
If you missed the ESX Education Rewind Webinar – Enhancing the Sales Process to Close Faster and Maximize RMR – you can still benefit from the key takeaways of this RMR-centric session. They’re highlighted here in this Education Rewind recap. Leverage them to put your sales into fast forward mode and reap more RMR than ever before!
This session was presented by Quentin Gunther, President of Resideo’s Premier Security Dealer Program, Tracy Larson, President, WeSuite, Josh Davis, Vice President of Security Central, and Chuck Robinson, Director of Sales and Marketing for Prevention Security.
Tailored specifically for organizations looking to improve their commercial sales effectiveness, it explored how crafting a comprehensive sales process template can act as a roadmap that leads to a more consistent plan for RMR growth.
Sales is a subject that all these presenters are passionate about. The insights they share here can help you parlay your sales passion into more coveted recurring monthly revenue.
Increasing revenue can begin with enhancing the sales process itself. As Gunther points out, “If you have a process, hopefully it’s going to help you get customers to ask for the order.” Having a process in place keeps a sales force on track and leads to faster growth. “What do salespeople love to do? They love to close business because it just goes right to their pocketbook, and that means happier salespeople and a happier team. So again, increased sales efficiency equals increased revenue,” Gunther says.
Larson adds that it’s important for companies to identify a sales process that each of their salespeople can understand. “When people understand something, they tend to be able to enact it much more effectively,” she says. “The biggest thing is saving selling time. It’s precious and it costs you a lot of money if you don’t have enough of it.” And, as Robinson points out, “Consistency is key, and not just consistency with your customer, but also with your team. If they know what the process is, it’s going to enhance efficiency every step of the way through the process.”
Davis offers an analogy that equates it to athletes you see in sports. “Look at an NBA player doing free throws. He does the exact same number of dribbles every time. He may have the same tick with his body. He does it the same way every time because when everything else around him is crazy, the game, the crowd, everything else, that’s how he centers himself. Same thing with a sales process. That is how you center yourself and make sure you’re going through the right steps to get to that end result you want.”
Setting GPS Coordinates to Create a Successful Roadmap to More RMR
COORDINATE #1 – How asking the right questions can exponentially move a sale along
What exactly is the role of a salesperson? As Davis notes, “We always tell our people, you are educators. You are there to educate the customer, sometimes on the equipment, how it works, what it does, but also the solution that it can provide for them. That’s where we start. We are educators for our customers.” Larson adds that you can look at it two ways. Salespeople are akin to healers, she says. “Like a doctor, you’re trying to figure out what’s going on. So, you’re helping that person who knows what their problems are but may not be able to verbalize them well. But you’re asking them questions to really understand what is going on with them and how you may be able to help. And that really helps you understand what their needs are and move into the next questions to find the right solutions for them.”
Robinson points out that it’s important for the buyer to understand that their salesperson needs actual intelligence of what their problem is. They need to convey what the challenge is so a solution can be proposed for them.
COORDINATE # 2 – Negotiation techniques that navigate objections and secure deals with confidence
Robinson believes the sales process doesn’t need to be long and drawn out. Trying to compress it and making sure that your team understands can get you from Step One to Step Four in one meeting. “Encourage your team and teach them to have an agenda when they go to these meetings. Don’t just go unprepared into a meeting and sit down and start off-the-cuff trying to ask questions because you’re going to miss something. You’re going to waste that buyer’s time. Some of the most successful sales my teams have had in the past weren’t because we had the best product, it wasn’t because we were necessarily the best company, but we were the most careful of the end user’s time. Time is money. The better we can compress that and the more efficient we can be, the higher your close rate is going to be.” He also advises salespeople to ask the question ‘What does the buying process look like for you as a company?’ You need to know right out of the gate if it’s got to go through several cycles or if it’s got to go in front of a board, because that’ll dictate how the process is going to look moving forward.
COORDINATE # 3 – How to adapt your commercial sales process template for handling new business and existing customers, enabling you to address needs, pain points, and priorities with effectiveness
Growing a company takes a team effort and requires ongoing dedication to serving existing as well as new customers. Communication across departments is vitally important. Salespeople should talk to their operations, installation, and service people. They’ll tell you exactly what you should and shouldn’t be doing. As Larson echoes, “Talk to Ops, because they have to be certified to install it. There’s a lot of training there. They have to go and support it. There’s a lot of expense that salespeople may not understand or realize. It’s better to get all on board, and that’ll close gaps in the organization, too.”
Every company has its own unique culture and processes. But all share a common goal – growth and profitability. Investing the time to enhance the sales process is enabling forward-thinking companies to close faster and maximize their RMR.
