Future-Proof Selling

World renowned Corporate Storyteller and Pitch Alchemist Donna Griffit has helped over 1000 startups, corporates and investors raise hundreds of millions of dollars and accelerate their sales with a personal touch and unmatched messaging savvy, in any industry, at any phase. “The hardest thing for a company is to explain to people what they do and why it matters. I see startups spending tens of hours – if not weeks and months – struggling to get the right words out – and ending up with messages that simply don’t get the desired results. With investors, customers or partners – you only get one shot! You must make it a good one.  I’m here to help you make it a GREAT one! There’s nothing I love more than helping a company cut through their bits and bytes, cracking the DNA of their story and turning it into captivating messages that wow. Let’s make some messaging magic happen for you.” - Donna Griffit, Corporate Storyteller   Key Points of our Discussion Why there's such a buzz about storytelling How and why storytelling was born The importance of structuring your messaging The “deconstructed user story” Building metaphors into your structure and storytelling The importance of listening in long complex deals Researching your customer before a meeting To learn more about Donna and her company visit her website https://www.donnagriffit.com/ and you can find her here on LinkedIn

Scott Leese is one of the top startup sales leaders in the US. Through domestic and international consulting as a strategic advisor, he has trained an army of salespeople and sales leaders thousands strong. Leese puts his nearly two decades of sales and leadership experience to use as the CEO/Founder of Scott Leese Consulting, Surf & Sales, and Thursday Night Sales. Scott Leese Consulting was founded with a concentration on companies scaling from $0 – $25m ARR. Armed with years of industry experience and a proven track record of success, Scott focuses on a scalable approach to: sales strategies, processes, people, and infrastructure. Based in Austin, Texas, Scott is a 3-time winner of the Top 25 Inside Sales Professionals by the American Association of Inside Sales, 3-time author, and a highly sought-after consultant, advisor, leader, and sales trainer. While learning both the fundamentals and higher strategy of sales, Scott Leese’s students come away motivated and empowered. He has helped create many successful organizations and has shaped thousands of individuals into highly sought after sales leaders. His areas of expertise include: sales and leadership seminars, consulting and coaching, public speaking events, conferences, sales training, and more! Today we discuss the themes behind Scott’s new book - More than a Number: A leader’s Guide. Key Points of our Discussion Scott’s new book - More than a Number Scaling a founder-let startup The approach leaders should take going in to a new role The seldom talked about underbelly of being the VP of sales Managing the pace and pressure of sales leadership Hiring and nurturing sales talent Personal branding and networking as a great recruitment tool Sales ops and sales enablement To learn more about Scott and his company visit the website scottleeseconsulting.com and you can find him here on LinkedIn

Kasey is a personal branding authority and growth strategy coach who helps Founders harness the power of what makes them unique, in order to build high growth businesses with impact.  Her expertise is in early-stage growth strategy, demand generation, personal brand growth and relationship building at scale. Attract ideal customers, impress potential investors, and connect with other industry influencers. Kasey began her affinity for the startup life by working on political campaigns where she realized she thrives in chaos, and loves the challenge of being perpetually in over-her-head. “I founded A Better Jones with a mission and a dream to help founders build successful, high-growth businesses. And over the years, I’ve learned that my specialty is in helping founders and their teams leverage what makes them different to develop smart, scalable growth strategies that play to their strengths in every way. For years, my winding career journey made me insecure. It made me believe that my story, my work, and my expertise weren’t as impactful or impressive as those with a straight path. Bullsh#t!  I’ve learned to harness my unusual story and my personal triumphs to build a more authentic, impactful, and inspiring personal brand that connects with my audience and builds my business. And now, that is what I help other founders do.” -  Kasey Jones Key Points of our Discussion The role of personal branding for salespeople Building relationships and trust at scale The cost of failing to build your digital presence Company brand vs personal brand Targeting senior executives via LinkedIn Hooks in your LinkedIn descriptions and about section Using social media to better understand your prospects How to approach it if you feel like personal branding is “Bragging.” To learn more about Kasey and her business visit her website abetterjones.com and you can find her here on LinkedIn

Adam Rubenstein is a serial entrepreneur, salesman, and sales manager. As an entrepreneur, he has centered all of his businesses around sales. While he will always use CRMs he wanted a better way to capture what matters most in sales — the human interactions. The conversations, the phone calls, the lunches.   Adam is Co-Founder and CEO of Traq365. A company that leverages AI to effortlessly convert sales conversations into objective buyer insights, improving sales processes and revenue projections, while accelerating B2B sales.  “I wanted technology to help my teams master the sales narrative. So I got my developers together and built a new sales tool for the future of sales. A system for mastering the human narrative in sales. Traq365 starts with a place to store your notes and emails, files, and recorded conversations. Then Traq365’s AI scans for opportunities, risks, tasks, highlights — things that are actionable, things that matter. And marks them as Insights.” - Adam Rubenstein Through machine learning, the more you work with Traq365, the smarter it gets. The Insights you create with the AI build a map of the narrative you create over time - with each prospect, for every sale...the ones you win, and the ones you don’t.” - Adam Rubenstein Key Points of our Discussion Overseeing sales conversations in a remote selling environment Reaching the buyer through over-crowded channels Getting more creative in prospecting and process Culture and professional development Some of Adams fundamental tips encouraged within his team How time-poor sales leaders can easily monitor sales calls AI and machine learning to gain valuable sales insights Creating more accurate forecasts leveraging AI Identifying and comparing characteristics of win/loss conversations Sales as a science vs sales as an art To learn more about Adam’s company, visit his website www.traq.ai, and you can find him here on LinkedIn

Frank Cespedes teaches at Harvard Business School and for 12 years was Managing Partner at a professional services firm. He has worked with many companies on go-to-market and strategy issues, and has been a Board Member at consumer goods, industrial products, and services firms.  He has written for numerous publications, and is the author of six books including Aligning Strategy and Sales which was cited as “the best sales book of the year” (Strategy & Business), “a must read” (Gartner), and “perhaps the best sales book ever” (Forbes).  His newest book is Sales Management That Works: How to Sell in a World That Never Stops Changing (Harvard Business Review Press, 2021). According to Frank, business development and growth are core leadership responsibilities. But the impact on sales activities of new buying processes, e-commerce, big data, and other megatrends is often misunderstood.  We discuss how to separate signal from noise and the implications for hiring, training, performance management, and relevant sales models. Key Points of our Discussion Examining the non-linear buying process The important and often misunderstood changes in sales management Selling in the omni-channel buying world  The data and metrics we SHOULD be tracking Sales hiring and cross-functional interviews Specialisation and the division of labour The poor ROI of sales training and development Leveraging inside sales Busting pricing myths. Framing value with pricing To learn more about Frank, visit his website frankcespedes.com, - where you can also pre-order his new book. For more great insights you can find Frank here on LinkedIn

David Ledgerwood is Managing Partner of Add1Zero, who provide lead-to-close sales execution for B2B tech-enabled services companies ready to leap from 6 to 7 digits of revenue. His career sales have topped US $40M, with an average deal size in excess of $150,000. David has sold software and services for more than a decade and helped several companies grow into the mid-7 figures. David headed up Sales and Services for Gun.io for three years, during which time he booked staff, oversaw more than 100,000 hours of development, and helped 10x sales. David’s career began in professional services at PwC where he carved out a niche as a Bash developer. If you've received a package or deposited a check, there's a pretty decent chance some piece of code David wrote was somehow involved. It was pre-web, and they were saving the world from melting down in Y2K. David then moved into private media for a major publishing company right about when Web 2.0 started to eat newspapers and periodicals for lunch, which gave him a front row seat to disruption and honed his taste for entrepreneurial pursuits. In 2007, David moved from New Jersey to Nashville to start a company. They got to a $500K run rate before the Great Recession “chewed them up and spat them out.” He never lost the startup bug. David moved into EdTech and built his business development chops. He moved into a COO role, consulted, mentored, and coached. In 2015, I joined Gun.io. David is back in the Founder game for his (lucky?) 13th startup. Key Points of our Discussion The typical challenges for B2B services businesses trying to scale How David and his team at Add1Zero provide lead-to-close sales execution Effectively identifying your core business in a consultancy/agency setting Separating out software reselling and consulting services Smart sales hiring to support a sustainable scaling process Multi-channel outbound marketing and prospecting The importance of sales enablement materials and content Building systems to maximise call time, not proposal writing time To learn more about David, visit his website add1zero.co, and you can find him here on LinkedIn

John Smibert is a B2B Sales Specialist, Change Agent, Challenger, Coach, Trainer and Speaker. John has led sales teams to success for over 20 years. He achieved 25 annual Sales clubs with IT Multinationals selling to large banks, telcos, Federal & State Government and the manufacturing industry. “I work with companies who recognise the old way they sell is no longer effective and they are seeking to transform to new, more productive sales models. I strive to be one of the most switched on old heads in the rapidly changing world of B2B sales. Specifically I help my clients to stop selling products and services and start leading their customer to positive change that enables them to reach valuable new horizons.” - John Smibert _____________________________________________________ Wayne Moloney works with businesses and salespeople to increase revenue and profits, and gain competitive advantage. With the rapid changes occurring in the way buyers engage with sellers, companies need to adapt their sales and business strategies, and how they engage with their customers to be successful. Through one-on-one mentoring, coaching and online training, Wayne helps to develop and implement strategies and sales models utilising Lean principles that improve efficiencies and increase profits. John and Wayne join me to discuss the themes found in their new book “The Wentworth Prospect,” which is a very unique and informative sales book written in the form of an engaging and entertaining novel. Key Points of our Discussion John and Wayne’s new book, The Wentworth Project Sales Management: The required approach Sales Process and NOT selling the product Discovery and disruption Effective customer engagement Talking in the customer’s language Developing appropriate content along the sales process Tackling “No Decision” by identifying hidden decision makers and influencers To learn more or purchase the book visit their website EDVANCE here https://edvance.sale/ For more great sales insights and content you can find John Smibert and Wayne Moloney on LinkedIn.

Robert Danger Workman is a 40-year veteran in face-to-face, day-in and day-out selling. He has published numerous sales training/human development programs and spoken to thousands of sales reps nationwide and internationally. His consistent track record as #1 in sales includes Top Producer titles from companies with 800, 300 and 100 reps, but also includes being fired while producing consistent superlative results – for making too much money. Robert has gone from having his phone turned off and his gasoline card seized at gas stations to purchasing Ferraris by writing a single check. Robert’s highly anticipated second book, Hired Gun II: Both Barrels, is a sales bible and an entertaining journey through the highs and lows of an outrageous and hilarious successful professional career in sales.  Robert’s latest book Selling - The Most Dangerous Game, provides step-by-step advice and the wisdom salespeople need to ensure that adversity and politics don’t destroy a high-performance sales career. Key Points of our Discussion Roberts latest Book “Selling - The Most Dangerous Game.” Worrying hiring trends in startup B2B sales companies Robert’s take on “The Hired Gun” How salespeople can become indispensable Personal development to future-proof your career Robert shares some examples of closing big ticket deals Robert’s latest book “Selling - The Most Dangerous Game,” offers the step-by-step advice and the wisdom salespeople need to ensure that adversity and politics don’t destroy their high-performance sales career. To learn more about Robert, visit his website hiredgun.us, and you can find him here on LinkedIn

Celebrating the 100th Episode of The Future-Proof Selling Podcast!!! Very pleased to welcome Tony Hughes back to the show - fitting as he was my very first guest 99 amazing episodes ago. This time he is joined by the brilliant Justin Michael for a value-packed discussion on technology, AI and taking a glimpse into the not-so-distant future of B2B Sales. Together Justin and Tony have penned a unique new book “Tech Powered Sales”, which is a mindblowing read from two of the industry’s best. Tony Hughes Tony is an international keynote speaker, best-selling author, professional selling educator, award-winning blogger and the most read LinkedIn Author globally on the topic of B2B sales leadership. He is co-founder of Sales IQ Global and also ranked by Top Sales Magazine as the most influential person for professional selling in Asia-Pacific. With 35 years of sales and business leadership experience, Tony is an experienced CEO and company director having served as Director of Sales for public corporations, and as the Asia-pacific Managing Director for a number of tier-one global technology companies. He teaches 'modernized selling' within the MBA program at the University of Technology, Sydney and has taught for other universities. Justin Michael Over the last 20 years as a top producing technologist and consultant, Justin developed word-of-mouth only methods that have made him one of the most sought-after talents globally. Currently serving as a Futurist for Tenbound and Vendor Neutral, he is host of podcasts Quantum Leap and Beyond Sales Development. Justin is Co-Founder of HYPCCCYCL, the first B2B Esports community focused on go-to-market cross-training™️. Through invite-only competitions, members participate in active learning which is proven to increase hard skill retention to 90%. Key Points of our Discussion Tony and Justin’s book “Tech Powered Sales.” Failure rates and challenges in enterprise sales Adapting to today’s technology in order to succeed The danger of misusing automation technology Setting up a sales team from scratch today The essential technologies for B2B sales A day in the life in the future Intent data and the advanced stack Calling (phone) automation technology Advanced targeting via “trigger events.” Both Tony and Justin are very active on linkedin, follow them for more great content and insights for modern sales success now, and into the future. Tony Hughes LinkedIn Justin Michael LinkedIn

Stu Heinecke is a hall-of-fame nominated marketer, famous Wall Street Journal cartoonist, bestselling business author and the father of contact marketing. His Book “How to Get a Meeting with Anyone” was a huge hit, and more recently he has released a book called “Get the Meeting.” Contact marketing is a fusion of marketing and selling in which bold and original forms of marketing are used in support of high-level sales approaches to VIP accounts and prospects. Stu has a lot of incredible methodologies around getting in front of key decision-makers. Stu has won meetings with Presidents, CEO’s and Celebrities. Key Points of our Discussion Stu’s marketing and cartooning background Stu shares a campaign that’s getting 100% response rate “Get the Meeting” through retargeting The “pocket campaigns” Contact marketing examples getting 6 figure deals Profile scrapes and deep personalisation ROI and record-breaking campaigns Stu’s online course How to Get a Meeting To learn more about Stu, visit his website stukeinecke.com and you can find him here on LinkedIn