On September 24, 2020, Women in Big Data hosted a sales workshop with Bucky Strong, as a part of our Entrepreneur series. Bucky is currently the Co-founder and CEO at Tohoom, a Stakeholder Lifecycle Management(TM) Salesforce ISV solution. Bucky is an executive sales leader with a proven record of delivering exceptional results and market share growth. Previously Bucky was the VP – NA manufacturing Industries at SAP.

In his talk, Bucky spoke about three important areas: Sales 101, Enterprise Sales and Value Based Selling. The talk covered sales from both an entrepreneurs perspective and sales people in general.

Sales 101

Companies don’t buy products, it’s people at these companies that buy your product. When selling, keep in mind that people are making decisions to affect their happiness. In the business world a lot of the happiness is measured in financial terms, i.e., decrease expenses or increase revenue.  The ability to persuade people is an important skill. Some widely used tools and influencing techniques to keep in mind (make sure to watch the talk for more context) are:

• Social proof
• Reciprocation
• Consistency and Commitment
• Liking
• Authority
• Scarcity

Marketers and salespeople use these tools of persuasion to tap into your natural tendencies. Emotion comes into decision making far more often that people are aware. People are persuaded to buy your product to be happy.

Enterprise Sales: Controlling the buying process

The salesperson should control the Enterprise buying process. There is tremendous process complexity:

• Buying committee – keeps getting bigger
• Customer’s internal buying process
• Managing up – your own company’s opportunity management process

 

Value selling

After we have established control of the buying process, value selling helps us with what we say to our potential customers. Some things to keep in mind:

• Tailor the message to the persona and industry of the buyer
• Translate features to value/happiness
• Provide ROIs from the start

Objection Handling

Objection handling is the final and the most important piece of the puzzle to being a great salesperson. If sales people don’t have the ability to handle objections live with the customer, it might lead to a lost deal.

For entrepreneurs thinking about this topic, Bucky recommends Influence – The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert B. Cialdini.

I would highly encourage you to watch Bucky’s talk!

Click here to view Bucky’s presentation.

Thank you for your time. Bucky!