Sometimes all it takes to differentiate from the competition successfully is to think past the first solution. In today’s episode of The Sales Evangelist, Donald is joined by the co-founder of Leaddelta, Ved Rasic, to learn how he launched a successful company after thinking past the first solution. 

Understand the main assumptions of a crowded market:

• If you’re in a crowded market, that means there’s a demand.
• The leading mistake salespeople make: they scan what others do and try to repeat it.
• Your goal should be to move past that first option (option A) and create option B.
• Understand how people arrive at the stage where they need your product.
• To do this successfully, know the pain points and goals of your customers.

Once you understand the why, how do you differentiate based on those pain points?

• For the small businesses that utilize full-cycle sale reps, you have several interactions with your customers. It’s cliche, but listen to those interactions.
• Don’t just listen for phrases you want to hear, but understand their problems and goals to determine how to help them best.
• Be curious. Let prospects talk more because that often leads to higher closing rates.

Leaddelta can be incredibly helpful in differentiation.

• The platform is essentially a table or CRM-style view of your first-degree LinkedIn connections. 
• This setup makes LinkedIn a better platform because it provides a spam-free, ad-free environment to add notes, tags and save time.
• Leaddelta has over 1400 users, and 50% are paid. And that’s what you can get from thinking about the option B perspective.

The typical salesperson collects LinkedIn connections like Pokemon cards. Instead, use those connections to create powerful relationships.

• Think about what customers talk about that makes them want a product or service. 
• Use storytelling to help you become a better sales rep.
• Follow Ved on LinkedIn and Twitter, and visit his company website at leaddelta.com for more information.

Join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow with on your sales journey.

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master sales fundamentals and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes by tuning in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, or Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

You can differentiate in more ways than one. In today’s episode of The Sales Evangelist, Donald is joined by Thomas Capraro to learn what he did to differentiate himself after decades in the industry, especially selling when competition is incredibly similar. 

Be prepared and be confident enough to ask tough questions.

• You want the prospect to be able to tell you that you’ve done your homework.
• Software like ZoomInfo, LinkedIn, and Salesforce help you understand a prospect’s background and learn more about them.

Treat your small clients just like your large clients.

• You never know who your clients are connected to. For example, one of Thomas’s clients once referred him to a huge IT company headquartered in Boca, leading to a substantial business transaction.
• Thomas wants his clients to be treated equally, so his company requires every customer to receive a visit every 90 days to ensure their needs are met.
• A human connection makes all the difference in the sales process. In an increasingly automated field, a personal connection can make all the difference.

People buy from people.

• Thomas has a certain cadence that he follows, which outlines what type of interaction he should do.
• At night he does what he likes to call administrivia
• Thomas completes reports and administrative tasks at the end of the day or on weekends, so he has the time to focus on his craft.
• As new ways of operating and selling come into play, do your homework. 

Know when to listen (which is most of the time.)

• Ask open-ended questions and make an effort to genuinely feel like you want to know the value as a person and friend before as a prospect. And that relationship will take time.
• The days of the one-call closes are gone.
• As soon as you leave a meeting, take notes and record them on your phone or write them down so the next time you talk to that prospect, you can recap the previous conversation.
• You can send them news articles or other pertinent information that they might like to show you were paying attention. 

Major takeaway: Do your research and come knowing more than the other person/ Be prepared, both physically and mentally, and be ready to ask the right questions (and listen to the responses.)

You can find Thomas on Facebook to learn more about his thoughts and experiences. Join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow with on your sales journey.

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master sales fundamentals and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes by tuning in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, or Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

A fundamental aspect of sales is communication (that much is obvious.) But no matter how good at communicating you are, if you’re speaking a different language than the prospect, your chance of landing the sale is slim. As we continue our series stressing the importance of differentiation, Donald is joined by the co-founder of FiveRings Marketing, Shaheem Alam, to learn how to speak like the prospect to make a lasting (and positive) impression. 

What does that mean to speak your customer language?

• It’s basic psychology: people buy from people they like, and people like people similar to themselves.
• There are tons of resources on mirroring body language, tonality, and matching behavior. But one of those key points is just speaking their language.
• Think of it like a teacher; everyone has different learning styles. By speaking your customer’s language, you’re helping them understand and educate themselves in the best way possible.

Shaheem learned this strategy by going straight to the source: his customers.

• When a customer is buying a product, they're buying it to do a job for them.
• For example, you might buy pizza at Domino’s or a fancy pizza place. But both restaurants serve different jobs. 
• Domino’s is for fast pizza to feed your kids for dinner. The fancier place might be for a date or the experience rather than just the food.
• So when Shaheem interacted with his past customers, he asked what jobs were they ultimately trying to accomplish.
• The answer, obviously, is to get more sales. But why? To attract investors and raise funds? To demonstrate product-market fit? 

The job is seldom just to generate more sales. 

• Figure out why your client wants to do that to understand your value and contributions.
• When speaking to a customer, Shaheem doesn’t tell them he’ll get leads or meetings or sales - he tells them he helps with customer discovery and product-market fit.
• Don’t sell yourself the way everyone else is; sell yourself in a way that demonstrates unique value and an ability to discover a prospect’s underlying needs.
• If a company tries to put you in a typical mold, say no and emphasize the unique value you bring to the table.

Shaheem’s major takeaway? Do everything you can to understand your customers. Learn how they behave, think, and speak, because that’s who buys and pays for your product.

Visit his company website to get in contact with Shaheem or connect with him on LinkedIn. You can also visit his company’s LinkedIn page for more information. Join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow with on your sales journey.

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master sales fundamentals and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes by tuning in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, or Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

Email, cold calls, and LinkedIn messages are all great avenues to connect with your prospect.  But perhaps the most underutilized component of the sales process is (spoiler alert) the proposal itself. Whether you’re a newly established business or one of international renown, an enticing proposal dramatically helps your business efforts. And today, Donald is joined by co-founder and CEO of Proposify, Kyle Racki, to learn how sales leaders and teams can understand the power of the proposal.

Your proposal is a unique space to differentiate yourself from the competition.

• When a prospect asks for more information, typically a salesperson sends a google doc with raw numbers, small print, and terms and conditions. In other words, you’re missing a critical marketing touchpoint where you can tell your story.
• The result? Your proposal will be dumped in the (virtual or physical) trash.

Create a proposal that isn’t just a series of words.

• You’re pitching to a person, not a machine. There’s a thought process behind it that can lead to a better and more personal proposal.
• Proposals that include images close at a higher rate.
• Nobody will read a 10-20 page document, but people will skim a proposal for the highlights. Framing your text with images will make it far easier to read.
• Including images and video makes for a more engaging and interactive experience that communicates the experience of actually working with the company.

Other overlooked proposal elements: 

• Sometimes people will accept the first proposal they get, regardless of pricing or offerings. And even if there are discrepancies, there is a positive correlation between the speed of proposal delivery and closing rates.
• If you make a prospect wait two weeks for a proposal, they’ll have already solved the problem or found a different solution. 16% of proposals are won within 5 minutes of it being sent, and 42% within 24 hours.
• If your prospect opens it twice, they’re interested. But if they open it four or more times, the chance to close goes down.
• The great thing about the proposal file is that you can see proposal open rates and how many times people click through it.
• Proposal reviews, whether over-the-phone or in-person, with the prospect, lead to better closing rates because you can clarify points and directly address potential objections.

Kyle’s major takeaway? If you put more effort into sending a fast proposal (and still put effort into it) you’ll edge out most of the competition.

Check out proposify.com to check out the platform and their blog, which contains helpful sales and proposal information. You can also connect with Kyle directly on LinkedIn. Join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow with on your sales journey.

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master sales fundamentals and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes by tuning in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, or Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

When it comes to sales, standing out from the competition often comes down to how successfully you differentiate yourself from competitors. But how can we do that? Today on The Sales Evangelist,  Donald is joined by Mark Harari, author, podcaster, and VP of Remodelers Advantage, to discuss how you can position yourself to stand out in a crowded market. 

The one thing you should do to differentiate yourself:

• The one thing Mark recommends (and he discusses further in his book) is to identify what makes you unique.
• You’re facing other people, products, and platforms just as good as you who do the same thing. So what sets you apart?
• What sets you apart and differentiates you can be what leads to a prospect selecting you over someone else.

Differentiation is critical.

• If you don’t have that differentiating factor, the selection comes down to price, which isn’t good for anybody. Instead, make yourself the obvious choice.
• A common barrier to differentiation is targeting an entire area of people rather than focusing on a specific section of people you can connect and interact with.
• To find your ideal target group (if you’re an existing company), go back to your past client list and identify the best types of people you worked with. 
• For new businesses, there might be trial and error. But try to identify who you think would be the ideal fit for your company and adjust as you continue to grow and develop.

The six parts of a successful positioning statement:

• Identify your target
• Identify their unmet need (which your service or product solves)
• Frame your competitors
• Find your point of difference: What makes you unique 
• Reasons to believe: Statements that empower and prove the point of difference.
• Brand personality

Discovering that unmet need:

• There are two components to an unmet need: functional and emotional.
• People rarely have a personal functional need. That means capitalizing on your unique value to address the emotional need is where you can stand out. 

Mark’s major takeaway? Identifying your unique selling proposition can be challenging. To find yours, try thinking backward. What goes wrong when a company works with a bad seller or product? How could you prevent those bad things from happening? That could help you identify where you differentiate in the process.

Connect with Mark on LinkedIn, and check out his book at bethelobster.com or find it on Amazon. Then, join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow alongside!

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master sales fundamentals and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes by tuning in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, or Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

As we kick off our latest series on the importance of differentiation from competition in the sales process, Donald is joined by Tim Pollard to learn more about message building. As the CEO of Oratium, he’s learned the importance of messaging that delivers results and makes an impact on its audience.

The most common messaging problems:

• There is no differentiation. Differentiation has to be embedded somewhere. Otherwise, you will not be memorable.
• Three toxic mistakes characterize the way we structure messaging:
• • We pack too much into messaging. Forty-slide decks are overwhelming, and nobody pays attention to them.
  • Most modern sales messaging is too confusing or has an unclear value proposition.
  • Almost all messaging is self-oriented. It’s about the salesperson or their company instead of relating it to the client.
• This leads to two problems:
• • The initial sales meeting isn’t compelling. 
  • Most messaging fails the retellability test.

The goal shouldn’t be first meeting success; it should be second meeting success.

• You should tell your story in that first sales meeting. But It’s even more about that person’s ability to retell your story and solution in their private meeting with a decision-maker later on (AKA the second meeting.) 
• Sales messaging has an important goal: retellability. You can’t speak just to the interest of the person in the meeting, you have to talk to the interests of that next meeting.
• This is even more difficult when virtual. It’s more complicated than remembering to wear pants; it’s moving a social practice to an asocial environment.

Think about the clarity and specificity of your message.

• If you have too much information, you have even less chance of keeping attention.
• The loss of feedback and social cues when virtual can be a barrier to success.
• It’s a paradox of communication - we do things we hate to experience ourselves.
• We go back and do the things that don’t work - it’s out of habit and it’s easy to continue to do it. And nobody has ever given a workable model.

The true key to breaking bad habits is to teach a workable and different solution.

• You’ve got to know your story. If you’re reading from a deck, you won’t succeed.
• To learn how to develop better communication habits, check out Tim’s books The Compelling Communicator and Mastering the Moment.
• Oratium has a ten-lesson e-learning for designing and executing a sales conversation, designed specifically for a virtual environment, on their website.

Tim’s major takeaway? Many people try to whittle down their messaging by cutting a deck from 50 to 25 slides. Just stop using the deck altogether! Instead, fundamentally restructure your communication to no longer use a failed model. Create an aligned messaging structure based on what works. Connect with Tim on LinkedIn.

Join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow with!

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master the fundamentals of sales and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes, tune in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, and Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

Today’s episode kicks off the latest Sales Evangelist series: differentiating from your competitors! As we move into this series, it’s time you learn three easy ways you can stand out from the competition. (Best of all, the majority of sales reps aren’t doing these things.) 

But why is differentiating critical?

• You have so many other salespeople to compete against. 
• When one person stands out from the other, they’re more likely to land the sale (even if your products do the exact same thing.)

1. Be curious.

• Most salespeople go into a conversation and ask boilerplate questions. The problem? Everyone asks those questions, so you aren’t getting any more information than your competition. 
• Sales reps should come to the table with information that leads to better questions, which means finding the right intel. Not only what the prospect and their company are doing, but why they’re doing it. 

2. Stay one step ahead.

• Determine how you can be one step ahead of the competition. 
• Have an agenda when you go into the meeting. Send a recap email once you’re finished. If a prospect sees those things, they’ll see the effort and understand that you want to make positive changes for their organization.
• Especially when you have a meeting with a business executive, they might have 15 meetings a day. Sending an agenda shows these business professionals that you mean business.

3. Be creative.

• Think outside the box! Find ways you can do something other people simply don’t do.
• Find some way to personalize a message. Handwrite a note. Send a small gift. Just try to make yourself stand out, and the prospect will notice.

And of course, a bonus tip: make them look good:

• Make the prospect look good, either internally or externally. 
• Maybe you write a nice post on LinkedIn talking about them, adding a quote they said to show you were paying attention. 
• Mention an article they published or were posted in, and share that with your audience. They’ll certainly appreciate the sentiment!

Join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow with!

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master the fundamentals of sales and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes, tune in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, and Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.

Today’s plan is simple: Donald is sharing his number one productivity strategy for sales. What is it? Find out on today’s episode of The Sales Evangelist. 

Focus on one thing at a time. (Earth-shattering, I know.)

• This idea might not be crazy, but the results that come of it sure can be.
• Only 2.5% of people are able to multitask successfully. (That’s a very slim number of people.)
• That means you probably can’t respond to clients, check your email, and prospect on LinkedIn while maintaining the standards you would for just one thing.
• But even if you can, no matter how productive you are, it isn’t as efficient as focusing on one singular task at hand.

How does this affect our productivity?

• You get an email. You leave your current task to check your email. That email leads you to check your availability for a get-together. You check Facebook for information about the get-together. You start to watch videos while on Facebook. Before you know it, an hour has gone by, and you still haven’t finished the task at hand. Sound familiar? 
• Donald’s advice? Close the tabs and remove the distractions that aren’t conducive to the task at hand.
• Even you’re one of the 2.5% who can actually multitask, do what you can to ensure you’re giving your best to the task at hand, and only do one thing if you find yourself slacking or not performing your best.
• Create the proposal or update the CRM. But close ESPN, Facebook, and those 15 different google docs. 
• Remember, the more productive you are throughout your day, the more tasks you’re able to check off.

Do you have a productivity hack? Share it in Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers! (But don’t do it while working on something. We’ll be here when you’re done.)

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.

But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.

This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master the fundamentals of sales and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes, tune in on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, and Spotify. You can also leave comments, suggestions, and ratings for each episode you listen to! 

Read more about sales or listen to audiobooks on Audible and explore their huge online library. Register now to get a free book and a 30-day trial.

Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder written by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.