The Modern Selling Podcast

Maximizing Your Success Rate: The Art of Selling to Sellers with Tom Rowe #229

What's the formula for building a hyper growth organization? This has been a hot topic for debate in many business circles. Because the key to tapping into accelerated growth often starts with understanding your audience, your market, and where you can enable your teams to exploit competitive advantages. All of this is easier said than done, but when done right, building in the key pieces you need to unlock hypergrowth can empower your sales teams to close more deals and transform passive buyers into lifelong superfans. In this episode of The Modern Selling Podcast we explore the concept of hypergrowth enablement, what it is, how leaders can effectively spark it within their organizations, and what specific strategies are needed to build a hypergrowth focused company. Our guest for this episode, Jerry Brooner, is the leading thought leader in this space and has worked with top technology companies to help them tap into incredible, exponential growth – while also serving their customers well. Jerry Brooner is the President of Global Field Operations at Enable, a collaborative rebate management platform that helps manufacturers, distributors, and retailers take control of their rebate programs and turn them into an engine for growth. He has over two decades of experience as a high-growth global enterprise SaaS technology executive. Previously, he was the former Chief Revenue Officer at Scout RFP, and has built high growth teams at Dropbox, SAP, Callidus, and Siebel Systems. Download the full episode to hear firsthand what Jerry believes is the winning formula to spur hypergrowth for any organization. Why is hyper growth enablement important? Enablement is a word that is often thrown around, especially in sales circles. I wanted to hear Jerry's take on what the real power in enablement is and why he sees it as the core of being able to create hyper growth. His insights are eye-opening, " I think enablement is very underutilized and often overlooked, especially at startups. Companies are spending tens of millions of dollars to recruit top talent, but once they're hired they get very little support to be successful. This model is flawed. Enablement is about getting your people excited about their work and equipped with the right tools, resources, and support to be successful on day one – if not before." And, it's this concept of what you do before a new hire starts that sheds new light on the onboarding process for me. Jerry follows a simple, yet highly effective onboarding process that goes as follows: Education – he provides his new hires with key information about the company, the industry, competitors – any and everything they may need to get up to speed on who they're working for and what they'll be doing. Expectations – even before someone starts, Jerry shares their 30 day calendar with them that outlines all trainings, meetings, and requirements. This is a great tool because it helps new hires coming in the door understand the expectations they will need to meet and enables them to align their personal life to meet their business goals as well. Empowerment – Every new hire has a "shadowing" plan that shows them upfront where and when their hands-on learning opportunities will be. This positions people from the beginning to get excited about learning and aware of where they can go for more support – without trying to figure it all out on their own. This is such an effective strategy – Education, Expectations, and Empowerment – because here at Vengreso we employ a similar model and find that it accelerates onboarding and our reps and SDRs that do this are much more successful – faster. How does diverse hiring drive enablement? We hear it all the time – increase diversity in hiring to produce a more innovative organization. I was curious to get Jerry's perspective on the role that diverse hiring has for enablement and establishing a hyper growth company. He shares, "Diversity in hiring is super important. But, the key is not just racial, ethnic, or gender diversity. You want to also have diversity in where and what industries you hire from. We recruit people from a much wider industry background than most companies do – by design. For example, if we know we're going after a lot of manufacturing customers, we'll go out and hire people who have worked in manufacturing because they understand the industry." This is such a novel approach to diverse hiring. Jerry makes a powerful point! If you want to better serve or prospect a particular customer or industry, it would make total sense to recruit sales people who may have worked in those industries because they will know that industry, inside and out. Listen into the full conversation to hear what other unique ways Jerry recommends hiring so that your team will be primed for hyper growth. What key metrics and KPIs should you track for hyper growth? In sales, metrics are everything. My motto is: If you're not tracking it, then you can't improve it. Jerry agrees and outlines some key metrics he monitors within his organization to ensure that they're exponentially growing. "The most important part about metrics is that they need to apply to everyone in the organization. Your KPIs need to also make sense for each position or role within your company – all the way up to the VP level as well. Because the power of metrics is it helps you to keep the pulse on what's working, what's not and where exactly you need to focus your attention to see improvements." One thing that Jerry highlighted that I found to be profound was the lack of VP or Director level interactions with customers. He finds (and my experience also validates this) that when more levels of your sales team get involved with a prospect, you're more likely to close the deal. I mean imagine what it would mean to a prospect to have the company CEO personally reach out to answer their questions. It seems like a simple task – but so many companies don't do it. In our conversation, Jerry also goes through the six high value activities he focuses on to spark rapid growth. Be sure to listen to the full episode to hear these gems and hear why Jerry says it takes 98 of these high value activities to close a single deal. This episode of the Modern Selling Podcast is brought to you by Korn Ferry. Korn Ferry transforms sales teams using their world-class Miller Heiman, methodology, employee assessments, benchmarking and talent advisor capabilities to increase win rates and quota attainment. Korn Ferry offers Korn Ferry Sell, a sales effectiveness app available in App Exchange and app source that helps your sales team develop and replicate powerful sales strategies that help sellers win more deals and crush their quotas. Learn more at kornferry.com/saleseffectiveness.

What do you do when faced with change? How do you handle conflict? What ways do you nurture the different personalities on your team? All of these are questions that sales leaders must navigate on their journey to inspire and motivate their teams. But, all too often, the focus for sales is on meeting quotas or constantly outperforming the competition, that the "softer" skills of leadership get left by the wayside. And, with trends like Quiet Quitting becoming the norm, how sales leaders manage and lead are quickly becoming a hot topic of conversation to curb employee turnover. In this episode of the Modern Selling Podcast we dive into the importance that sales leadership plays and what sales leaders should be doing to build up their teams for success. Our guest, Sebastian Schieke, is one of the leading experts in understanding the new era of leadership and the best way to engage, motivate, and train teams to not just hit quotas but to excel as sales professionals. Sebastian Schieke is a leadership mentor, entrepreneur, speaker, author, and angel investor. As a digital enthusiast, he has witnessed disruption in businesses in the past twenty-five years, and seen the need for more great leaders in the ever-changing world. Sebastian is dedicated to making a positive impact by empowering motivated individuals and organizations to become exceptional entrepreneurs. Tune into this episode to hear firsthand what Sebastian recommends leaders do today to step up to the new leadership challenge and position their sales teams to thrive. What Is Resilient Leadership? Sebastian is most known for the concept of "Resilient Leadership". So, I wanted to better understand what it is and how it can be applied to B2B and B2C organizations. According to Sebastian, resilient leadership involves responding to what he refers to as VUCA: Volatility – we live in a world of constant changes that require us to adapt in new ways. Uncertainty – we have to learn how to expect and accept uncertainty as a permanent way of life. Complexity – we operate in environments that are integrated, interconnected, and highly complex networks of connections and relationships. Ambiguity – we must learn how to get things done when we don't always have the best data, the right answers, or the needed resources. Bottom line… As leaders, it is our responsibility to remain agile and flexible to adapt to what changes come our way, not only in the world, but also within our businesses and teams. And, it is within this space of needing to accept and be comfortable with change that leaders must develop a strong sense of resilience, so they can adapt while also reaching their goals. Download the full episode to hear how you can elevate your leadership style to be more resilient and aligned to excel even in the face of change. Why Is Resilient Leadership Needed? A recent McKinsey survey found that 86% of employees turn to their leaders more than public officials for guidance on how to navigate times of uncertainty. That means that as a leader, you truly do set the tone for the type of culture you have within your team and larger organization. And, since your teams are looking to you for continual guidance, support, and direction, how you respond is super critical. Sebastian shares his thoughts, "A resilient leader shows that even despite uncertainty, they always know how to find a way to get access to the resources they need. When you set this as the standard or example, it trickles down throughout all the levels within your company – from your executive teams, to your team leads, down to your individual employees." Another way of looking at this is that resilient leaders are not afraid of change because they recognize that it is change that creates productivity, growth, and innovation. And, it is through this understanding of knowing why uncertainty and change is such a blessing that sets resilient leaders apart. As Sebastian adds, "It's so important to make sure to do things wrong because only through failure can we learn and can we build our muscle of resilience and persistence. Knowing the power of failure and giving your teams the space to make mistakes is how you build high-performing teams." Listen into the full episode to dive deeper into the key benefits that resilient leaders bring to their teams and the role all of this plays in enhancing your team's performance. How do you build high performance teams? In my 20+ years as a sales leader, knowing how to lead teams effectively has been one of my strongest assets and skill sets. Sebastian has a unique perspective on high performance teams and what it takes in this resilient leadership model to build teams that are positioned for success. He shares his insight, "As a resilient leader who wants to create high performance as a standard, you must be a great communicator so you can generate buy-in. Buy-in is critical to all you do as a leader." In addition, Sebastian outlines three (3) key components to nurture, as a leader, in order to create high performing teams. They are: Behaviors – Identifying the behaviors and personalities in your team makes it easier for you to know how to navigate team dynamics to meet each person where they are. This is essential so that as the leader, you're able to bring people together in a synergistic way to reach your goals. Motivators – Understanding what motivates the people within your team is how and why high performing teams are so successful. Motivators can be money, prestige, recognition, community service, etc. The important thing is to get clear on what motivates people within your team to take action and build this into your overall team structure. Critical Thinking – Giving your team members (individually and collectively) the ability to make mistakes and reason through decisions is such a much-needed skill that so many leaders don't allow their teams to acquire. It is through this that you're able to build a sense of independence so that your team won't only be high performing, but also self-governing. Download the full conversation to learn more about resilient leadership and hear the 3-step system Sebastian recommends using to increase your team's performance.

With research showing that it can cost 5x more to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing one, learning the art of customer retention should be the top priority of every business. Add that to the statistic that even a 5% increase in customer retention can yield a 75% increase in profitability – there's no wonder the power that creating superfans can have on B2B and B2C companies. But, the key is to understand how exactly to transform a hesitant prospect, into a confident buyer, and ultimately into a lifelong customer. No one understands this process better than our guest, Brittan Hodak – the mastermind behind the best-selling book, Creating Superfans: How to Turn Your Customers into Lifelong Advocates. If you've been struggling with keeping your customers engaged, perfecting your referral strategy, or increasing your customer lifetime value, then this is the episode of the Modern Selling Podcast to download! Brittany Hodak is an award-winning entrepreneur, author, and customer experience speaker who has delivered keynotes across the globe to organizations including American Express and the United Nations. She has worked with some of the world's biggest brands and entertainers, including Walmart, Disney, Katy Perry, and Dolly Parton. She founded and scaled an entertainment startup to eight figures before exiting and is the former Chief Experience Officer of Experience.com. In this episode, we dive into all things customer engagement and retention to give you a true competitive advantage on how to give your customers such an incredible experience that they become superfans – for life! How should B2B and B2C companies engage with their customers? I wanted to jump right into the meat of Brittany's book and understand, from her perspective, what she believes is the "secret sauce" to creating superfans. She shares, "I think one of the biggest mistakes companies are making right now is that everyone is siloed. In other words, we have 'over-compartmentalized' employees away from customers. So much so that many times employees are losing track of how their work affects customer retention. I say that it does not matter what department you're in – everybody is in the customer experience department." Brittany also outlines a powerful "Supermodel Framework" that companies should be following to ensure that their customer experience is building superfans. The framework breaks down as follows: S – Story – It's important to make it clear to even prospects what your true superpower is and why they should be interested. U – Understand – Sales teams must fully understand their customers' stories and find that intersectionality between what their customers are looking for and what they can provide. P – Personalization – Prospects and customers alike now expect that all communications and interactions are personalized to their preferences and needs. E – Exceed Expectations – In a world where your customers could easily go to a competitor, you have to be in the business of meeting and exceeding their expectations every time. R – Repeat – Creating Superfans requires consistency in your customer experience. What leads them to stay is the experience and reputation you build. Listen into the full conversation to hear what Brittany says is the best way to nail the SUPER Framework and why she believes it will revolutionize how we approach our customers. How do you understand what your customers need? I was curious to know what Brittany recommends sales teams do to truly connect with prospects and customers in new ways by leveraging "stories." She walks through a powerful framework – in her famous acronym style – that sheds a lot of light on the right way to engage and resonate with your ideal audience(s) in new ways. S – Struggles – Know what pain points your potential customers have and how you can speak to them in your outreach. T – Transformation – Getting clear on the transformation that your product/service can provide makes it easier for the prospect to envision working with you. O – Options – Understanding that every prospect and customer has multiple options is key so that you can always lead with value and become a trusted source of information for them. R – Reservations – Customers (even when they buy from you) may have reservations about making a repeat purchase. Be sure to make every touch point memorable and address any objections or concerns they have upfront. Y – YOU – Think about if what you offer is the best solution for your customer. All too often salespeople focus on the sale with no regard to if their solution can actually solve their customer's problem. If you're not best suited to help your customer achieve the transformation they're seeking – then be okay with communicating that! Join the full conversation to hear Brittany's story gems and how sales leaders should be training their teams to tell the right stories at the right times to convert prospects into repeat customers. What's the best way to ask for referrals? Part of Brittany's book, Creating Superfans, dives deeply into referrals – when to ask, how to ask, and also how to reward your customers for sharing your business with their network. What she explains was spot on and similar to what we do, here at Vengreso, "People ask me all the time 'how can I get more referrals?' And, something that I've found to be true over the years is, if somebody has never worked in sales, referring business to you is not top of mind. So, many times, unless you ask, you won't get the referral." This can seem very simple to just ask for the referral, however, I've seen it throughout my sales career – so many companies never actually ask their customers for referrals. Brittany details a practical system to follow to not only get referrals but to acknowledge and thank your superfans for giving them. I find her work absolutely fascinating and her quick tips to thank customers is why the people she works with get such incredible results! Jump into this episode and pay particular attention at the 37-minute mark to get her gems on referrals. This episode of the Modern Selling Podcast is brought to you by Korn Ferry. Korn Ferry transforms sales teams using their world-class Miller Heiman, methodology, employee assessments, benchmarking and talent advisor capabilities to increase win rates and quota attainment. Korn Ferry offers Korn Ferry Sell, a sales effectiveness app available in App Exchange and app source that helps your sales team develop and replicate powerful sales strategies that help sellers win more deals and crush their quotas. Learn more at kornferry.com/saleseffectiveness.

Efficiency and productivity have become major buzzwords in the business world. From sales teams who are looking to increase the number of outreach messages they can send, to customer service departments seeking to streamline communications, to online pharmacies wanting to quickly address customer FAQs – every industry needs tools to be more productive. Coupled with over 52% of the standard workweek being spent doing repetitive tasks, that distract knowledge workers from strategic work – over $16 billion in productivity is lost every week. That's why our FlyMSG text expander is on pace to completely revolutionize how teams communicate, how customers are engaged, and how productivity is finally achieved in B2C and B2B businesses. In this episode of the Modern Selling Podcast, we dive into the problem that FlyMSG solves, what the market potential looks like, and how eager investors can get access to an incredible investment opportunity. Download the entire episode to hear the ins and outs of how FlyMSG works and what industries are already lining up to use this productivity tool to save time. What is FlyMSG? FlyMSG is a personal writing assistant and text expander platform that helps today's modern knowledge worker replace the copy and paste. When we started on this journey over two years ago, we had no idea that FlyMSG would evolve into the powerhouse tool that it is today. As you may know, Vengreso, was started as an online sales company, pro But, after working with thousands of sellers, we found that many sellers had sets of scripts that were stored all over the place. Some scripts might be in a Google document, others might be in Notepad, and others might even be stored in a draft email. With all of these different scripts in different places, we saw sellers sinking tons of time just trying to track things down. So we launched FlyMSG to take all those prospecting messages, customer engagement messages, LinkedIn messages – you name it and put them in one cloud-based solution that they could tap into in seconds. Fast forward to today, FlyMSG is far more than a sales productivity tool. It has evolved into a business productivity tool – across nearly every industry! Our now 2,000+ users span sales, customer service, marketing, human resources, education, pharmaceutical, real estate, and even the tech industry! We have Google developers who leverage FlyMSG to call up repetitive code, online customer service teams that use FlyMSG to quickly respond to customer questions, HR Managers who incorporate FlyMSG to send out onboarding emails to new staff members. The number of use cases for FlyMSG has expanded exponentially – and is showing no signs of slowing down. Tune into the full episode to hear why FlyMSG is positioned to take a large share of this $42 billion productivity management software market and how you can be a part of this exciting new venture. What is the growth trajectory of FlyMSG? FlyMSG is positioned to penetrate the Productivity Management Software market, which to date stands at $42 billion but is estimated to balloon to $122 billion in the next six years, at an impressive 14.5% compounded annual growth rate. Since the pandemic, the demand on productivity tools has exploded and has become a growing need for every knowledge worker on the planet. According to our research, the average knowledge worker is spending at least 25 hours a week doing manual repetitive tasks between email and data entry. This topic of how to increase productivity has become a hot topic across all business verticals and industries. Which is why FlyMSG has the potential to attract millions of users, very quickly. Plus, unlike other productivity tools, FlyMSG has 200+ built-in templates that users can immediately use when they download the plugin. From 60 different HR scripts to 40 different sales scripts – you name it, we're building it out in FlyMSG to make the need for copy and paste to become nonexistent. Join the conversation and hear the exciting stats of the industry and FlyMSG's growth plan for early stage investors. What is FlyMSG's competitive advantage? We've studied what our initial FlyMSG users are looking for and how they're using it to build in a host of unique features including the ability to: Categorize content – you can seamlessly sort, label, and categorize your stored FlyMSG Fly Plates, making it easier for you to recall and share key messages and information. Use FlyMSG everywhere online – FlyMSG is not limited to one platform or one website. Instead, you can use FlyMSG – no matter what online platform you use and can easily pull in messages in email, social media, websites, etc. Educational support – unlike other tools, FlyMSG also comes with a robust library of sales and prospecting training that teaches users how to make their messages more effective for their various audiences. Plus, from the investor's perspective, FlyMSG is the only productivity tool that offers $10+ monthly plans, which puts our Average Revenue Per Unit (ARPU) 3-5x higher than our competitors. By leveraging Vengreso's previous success as a Sales Training company, we have a solid marketing and influencer foundation to get traction quickly and to tap into a prospective customer audience of more than 5,000,000 that we already have access to. Because of our existing thought leadership position in the market, we can get more traffic to our website just through social posts than other businesses can using Pay Per Click ads. Listen in to the full episode to hear the impressive bios of our leadership team and get an inside scoop into who is on our Board of Advisors. What's the investment opportunity with FlyMSG? We forecast FlyMSG will have 2 million active users in the next five years and will be valued at $65 million. We're confident we can hit these user numbers because we have a global team of developers who are actively working to scale FlyMSG and bring in highly unique integrations with AI copywriting, Behavior Analysis, CRM integrations, and much more! For this round, early stage investors can get in with an investment as low as $100. However, if you invest $5,000 or more you'll receive lifetime access to FlyMSG as well as a host of other benefits. This is an amazing opportunity – and I don't just say this as the Co-Founder. We have been contacted by several large tech giants who are closely watching the growth of FlyMSG and would be interested in an acquisition in the near future. And, for all angel investors – regardless of the investment, we're offering a 20% discount on all future rounds and a $7 million cap – whichever is greater. If you're an interested investor, you can learn more about this FlyMSG investment round on our WeFunder page or feel free to email me directly at mario@vengreso.com!

There's a seismic, yet quiet, shift that's taking place within the sales industry. Not only are modern buyers becoming more sophisticated and harder to sell to, but the modern seller is also evolving. The demographics of who is entering the sales industry is quickly changing, which is making it clear that a one-size-fits all approach to sales training won't work. That's why those B2B organizations that have been able to enhance how their sales leaders show up in the workplace and how they keep their sales teams continually motivated are silently carving out an impressive competitive advantage. Because when you have a highly motivated (and effective) sales team, then the customer experience is often better streamlined and supportive – helping to turn first-time customers into lifetime customers. And, what sales leaders must do to keep their sales teams motivated and improve their customer service experience are exactly what we dive into in this episode of The Modern Selling Podcast. Our guest is not only an expert in this field, but her insightful new book is poised to give sales leaders a much-needed new perspective and tangible strategies to use to elevate how they lead and inspire their teams. Dionne Mejer is the Founder & CEO of Inside Sales by Design and author of the highly anticipated book, The Stepped Approach: Onboard Better, Systemize Smarter, and Bring Out the Best in Your Sales Team. Her innovative inside sales training tactics and proven approach gets her clients results every time. As a 20+-year Inside Sales veteran and executive, Dionne specializes in establishing and growing inside sales teams at mid-sized companies. Her intimate work with sales teams of all sizes and experience levels allows each of her clients to thrive as they discover their own voice in leading their Inside Sales team or rep in shepherding clients to a positive outcome. Her global client Rolodex is equally long as it is impressive, with her clients consistently enjoying a 25% uptick in their funnel activities and a 30% increase in deal closings, as a result of working with her. Listen to the full conversation to hear what Dionne recommends sales leaders do today to revamp how they're onboarding, training and motivating their staff. What should sales leaders be doing today? The pandemic has, in many ways, fundamentally shifted how modern buyers buy. The modern buyer is more informed, harder to reach, and is not easily sold on just features alone. All of these buying complexities make the job of a salesperson even harder. I wanted to hear Dionne's perspective on what sales leaders can and should be doing right now to combat the high sales rep attrition that's taking place. She shares, "The challenge is that we have multiple generations of sales people within our organizations. So, the question must become: How do we take this diverse group of folks with different experiences, different perspectives, different mindsets, and different experience levels, and bring everybody together to have a really, really good customer experience?" But, the key here is that to have a great customer experience, requires that every customer touchpoint (even with sales) is strategic, aligned, and productive. I've had my fair share of "sales fumbles", where as a potential customer, my needs were never asked or even remotely acknowledged. So, in many ways, if B2B organizations aren't careful how their prospecting and sales processes are set up, they could easily (and accidentally) be working against both their sellers and their potential buyers. I asked Dionne to dive deeper into what challenges she's seeing right now in this space. Her insights were so good, "A lot of what needs to happen now is around how do we, as sales leaders, manage in a remote environment? How do we have a good customer experience? How do we have conversations? How do we set the stage and have expectations for our teams in this new world order, where we have four generations in the workplace and everyone may be working remotely?" Tune into this episode to hear what Dionne says sales leaders can do to answer all of those questions and craft a seamless sales training experience that empowers sales teams to improve how they handle prospects and customers. How should sales leaders train to improve the customer experience? This is a hot topic in many of the sales leadership circles that I'm in, which is why I had to ask Dionne her perspective. In many cases, B2B organizations are leaning in on following sales processes and protocols which often leaves little to no room for actual, valuable conversations that nurture the prospect. Instead, the focus is solely formulaic and too rigidly linear that it leaves many buyers turned off from the sale, with even the first email outreach. I know this space is Dionne's zone of genius, so I ask her to share what she's seeing right now: "In order to give a good customer experience, you have to review and often change your internal processes and/or your external ones. Too often sales teams are told to follow a specific sales cadence – without fail. The problem with that is if you start to systematize too much, then you make it harder for your sales teams to have the value-driven conversations they need to provide an exceptional customer experience." Download this episode and listen in for the powerful example of what not to do during a demo call and why how you handle a sales rep switch is so important for building trust. What can companies do to create a motivating sales environment that benefits customers? It's one thing to "talk" about what a good customer experience is, but it's an entirely different story to define what that looks like for your sales leaders and reps. Here at Vengreso, our employees are spread out across the globe, so keeping those authentic touchpoints can be hard. We're very initial with building a rock solid team atmosphere – even virtually – where everyone feels supported and personally developed toward their individual career goals. But, I know this is not the case with many other B2B and B2C companies. I ask Dionne to walk us through what companies can do to build truly engaging, inspiring, and motivating environments so that their sales teams want to sell and enhance the customer experience. She explains, "This doesn't have to be complex. Building the right environment to promote positive customer experiences, starts with being clear with expectations. Sales leaders need to have that conversation with their team: What does a good customer experience look like and how do we consistently achieve it?" Dionne teaches sales organizations and leaders to take these three steps: Create a purpose statement – this is your guiding North so that everyone understands why you do what you do and what you are trying to collectively achieve. Put the right tools and systems into place – by having systems, you can automate steps that would free up your sales team's time to focus on building relationships with your customers. Give your team responsibility in the process – when you disconnect the team from having a say in the purpose of the team or action, then you open up the opportunity for them to disengage from their work. Listen into the full conversation to hear what other key steps and actions sales leaders need to take to uplevel their team interactions to skyrocket their customer service experience. This episode of the Modern Selling Podcast is brought to you by Korn Ferry. Korn Ferry transforms sales teams using their world-class Miller Heiman, methodology, employee assessments, benchmarking and talent advisor capabilities to increase win rates and quota attainment. Korn Ferry offers Korn Ferry Sell, a sales effectiveness app available in App Exchange and app source that helps your sales team develop and replicate powerful sales strategies that help sellers win more deals and crush their quotas. Learn more at kornferry.com/saleseffectiveness.

With the oversaturation of cold calling, messaging, sales emails – the modern buyer is savvy to all the ways that sellers reach out. That's why, according to our poll of sales professionals, prospecting is THE most time consuming step of the sales cycle. But, there's a loophole that sales leaders and their teams can use to not only find the ideal prospect, but to make it even easier to engage them in conversations that actually build relationships and lead to sales. It's Content Based Marketing and when done right it can turn online content into a consistent pipeline of prospects. In this episode of the Modern Selling Podcast, we dive into the ins and outs of how this stealth prospecting strategy works, how to get started, and the best way to position your online content to sell. Our guest, Logan Lyles is a pioneer in this field and comes with a wealth of knowledge to share to help sales teams, sales leaders, and sales organizations scale their visibility through Content Based Marketing. Logan Lyles is the Head of Partnerships at Teamwork, a project management platform built for scaling client work. Logan previously served in several leadership roles at Sweet Fish, a B2B podcast agency serving mid-market SaaS companies. Taking over sales from the agency founder in 2018, Logan helped triple the business in his first 6 months. He also played a key role in landing the agency on the Inc 5,000 List (twice), while helping the company both 10x headcount & increase ARR by 1,283%. Logan works from his home office (that's slowly becoming a mini video studio) alongside his labradoodle, Mack, in Castle Rock, CO. If you've been looking for a way to enhance your prospecting effectiveness, this episode is the one to listen to. Download the full conversation now and see how easily you can start posting online to attract your ideal prospects. Does Content Based Marketing Work? The short answer is: absolutely! This podcast is a prime example of that. When you reach out to a cold buyer and ask for a sales meeting, you're often met with objections – that's if you can even get through to them. However, if you take a Content Based Marketing approach, you can showcase your expertise through posts, establish yourself as a thought leader in the industry, and have prospects come to you to learn more. I've used this strategy for almost seven years now to land some of our biggest accounts, here at Vengreso. I'm going into the fifth season of the Modern Selling Podcast and this strategy has enabled me to connect with hundreds of CEOs and key decision makers from startups through Fortune 500 companies. And, in my case, you could start your Content Based Marketing strategy with podcasting. Logan agrees, "Content Based Marketing or Networking is like a Trojan Horse. If you take the podcast route, it is actually a gift if you do the work to promote the person you've interviewed to create the content. Then if they share it on their social media platforms, it helps you, as the interviewer, get more visibility." Join the conversation now and hear why Content Based Marketing is so effective in lowering the objection barrier and helping you establish key relationships with stakeholders. How do you start with content based marketing? The beauty of Content Based Marketing is, you don't need expensive equipment or a marketing team to get started. Whether it's short social media posts, blogs, or videos – the lift and the skills needed to create content is minimal. I was curious to hear Logan's take on the best way to get started and what he shares is spot on, "After every sales call, there is at least one content creation opportunity. Write down the questions you answered and after the call take a few minutes to either write your response or hit record and make a quick video answering the question." The way I see it, every sales call should create at least three pieces of content, a written post, a short video, and a possible blog article. Whether you're in sales or partnerships, or running a business, there is a strategy that can be leveraged in Content Based Networking or Account Based Podcasting by creating content with the people you want to know. You get to highlight their work and they get the recognition – and either way, you're creating a relationship that could lead to a sale. To make it even easier to capture this content, Logan suggests recording your sales call, getting it transcribed and using the transcription to create the content so you don't have to spend much time producing content. What equipment should I use for Content Based Marketing? Getting started with Content Based Marketing doesn't require a lot. The goal is to produce content that your prospect wants to read. Whether it's common questions, addressing problems, sharing new perspectives, or even highlighting new solutions – you get to decide the type and frequency of content you post. If it's video content, we walk through the best pieces of equipment to start with like: Logitech C 920 – this inexpensive HD webcam can record high quality content without much editing needed. Ring Light – make sure you have stellar lighting and this setup will help you create content in minutes. Audio Technica 2100 – get crystal clear audio with this affordable mic and have instant radio booth quality. Listen to the conversation and get the inside scoop of the must-have equipment to get to start producing content that will get your prospects to lean in. This episode of the Modern Selling Podcast is brought to you by Korn Ferry. Korn Ferry transforms sales teams using their world-class Miller Heiman, methodology, employee assessments, benchmarking and talent advisor capabilities to increase win rates and quota attainment. Korn Ferry offers Korn Ferry Sell, a sales effectiveness app available in App Exchange and app source that helps your sales team develop and replicate powerful sales strategies that help sellers win more deals and crush their quotas. Learn more at kornferry.com/saleseffectiveness.

When it comes to hitting sales quotas, scaling companies, and retaining top sales talent – all of these areas often fall back on one thing: leadership. Without effective leadership, companies don't grow. But the question often becomes, what makes an 'good' leader? In the midst of the Great Resignation and, more recently, the Quiet Quitting trend, the role of leadership cannot be ignored. In this episode of the Modern Selling Podcast we explore the ins and outs of post-pandemic leadership, what it means for sales organizations, and what strategies leaders should be using to expand their circle. This episode's guest, Matt Poepsel is one of the leading experts in the field and brings a highly unique perspective that makes this one of my absolute favorite episodes. Matt Poepsel, PhD is a tireless champion of human potential. A shameless self-improvement fanatic, he enjoys sharing his observations, advice, and humor through his writing and workshops. His professional life has been shaped by his business, military, and academic experiences. Dr. Poepsel currently serves as the Vice President of Professional Serves for The Predictive Index where he serves 1,000+ Talent Optimization Consultants around the world, develops highly scalable programs and tools that produce business results, and designs strategic talent optimization solutions for clients. Prior to The Predictive Index, Matt founded Covocative – a next-generation sales development platform and served as the Vice President of Professional Services at Gomez, Inc. – a Boston-based software startup that was later acquired by Compuware Corporation. If you're a sales leader or leader of any kind, this is the episode to listen to so you can walk away with the right strategies that work now to inspire, ignite, and explode your team's performance. What role does leadership play in sales? With any organization, the leader is at the helm of how things operate and the leader is responsible for setting the tone of the workplace culture. I wanted to get Matt's perspective on what he sees is the role that leaders play in business. Matt shares, "Leaders have the opportunity and I would say a responsibility to make sure that the individuals on their team can see themselves in the company's mission. It's up to the leader to connect the dots for them and to create alignment between the needles they're moving so that as a sales person they know what their contributions mean to the team and the overall mission." But, what are the things that leaders "should" be doing to help not just retain their top talent, but to keep everyone inspired and motivated to take action. Matt outlines three key things sales leaders can focus on: Being – sales reps want to feel that they're treated like a human being. That's why leaders taking time out to connect with their individual sales people is so important. Because if you don't know about their life and interests outside of work, it will be easy for them to feel disconnected from the team and just like "another worker". Belonging – If the Great Resignation taught us one thing, it's that people no longer want to just be a number. They want to feel like they belong and their work matters to their leaders, to their team, and to the larger organization. As a leader, you can sow into this sense of belonging by recognizing your sales people, working with them to outline their goals, and by acknowledging their efforts when they go above and beyond. Bigger – Even in sales, understanding the "mission" is an important part of helping people connect to their work. What is it that your company represents? What are the problems your company is helping other businesses or people solve? According to Matt, if you're not showing your teams how they're contributing to a larger mission (than just hitting quota), you could be missing out on an opportunity to inspire your teams to reach higher levels of performance. Download the full episode to learn what sales leaders can do to start infusing the 3 "B's" of leadership into how they lead their teams. What leadership traits are missing in the workplace? We often hear about trends like "Quiet Quitting" and other things that are redefining how people are showing up in their roles. I was curious to hear what Matt's view of this was and what fundamental leadership traits we need to close the growing gap. Matt explains, "The biggest missing pieces are trust and psychological safety. These things are not just nice to have, they're a requirement to build work environments where people want to perform at their best. The reality is trust and psychological safety are what drive real business results. When these are present we see higher levels of innovation, higher levels of profitability, higher levels of creativity, and problem solving." I think this points to a large and very important point – when we build environments on trust and psychological safety, we, as leaders, give our teams the permission to take risks, make mistakes, and try new things. Listen into the full conversation to hear what Matt believes sales leaders should be doing to consistently create highly innovative sales environments. What is Enlightened Leadership? There are dozens of different leadership styles and doctrines – all with their own unique perspective of what they believe makes a "good leader". This leadership space is Matt's area of expertise, so I wanted to hear how he differentiates the various leadership styles. Matt outlines, "We've seen leadership in different theories progress over time, which is great. We've gone from the authoritarian type, with the 'do what I say' style to now what I call the 'enlightened leader' who is able to uniquely meet the needs of today's modern worker. Enlightened leaders take a human centric and more business performance approach to leadership. " According to Matt, an Enlightened Leader knows and communicates their vision and is not only open to giving feedback but requires it for their own leadership development. If you've been challenged with keeping your team motivated, then be sure to listen to this episode to hear the exact steps Matt says to become an Enlightened Leader. This episode of the Modern Selling Podcast is brought to you by Korn Ferry. Korn Ferry transforms sales teams using their world-class Miller Heiman, methodology, employee assessments, benchmarking and talent advisor capabilities to increase win rates and quota attainment. Korn Ferry offers Korn Ferry Sell, a sales effectiveness app available in App Exchange and app source that helps your sales team develop and replicate powerful sales strategies that help sellers win more deals and crush their quotas. Learn more at kornferry.com/saleseffectiveness.

When prospects stop responding, what do sales reps do? Send even more sales messages. It's this 'spray and pray' approach that is sabotaging the sales success across almost every industry. But, how can you effectively reach your potential customers in a way that's scalable without becoming part of the growing "sales noise"? That's the question that agile selling tackles and the hot topic of this episode of the Modern Selling Podcast. We welcome one of the biggest champions of agile selling to learn from him what it is, how it works, and why it is the future of how modern sellers should be selling. Stephen Messer is a serial entrepreneur, inventor, investor, and the co-founder of Collective[i]. Prior to Collective[i], he served as LinkShare's CEO and chairman of the board, helping to create the sector of online marketing commonly referred to as affiliate marketing. Under his leadership, LinkShare expanded its network of websites to become one of the largest of its kind with its global reach extending from the United States to Japan, Canada and Europe. Now, with Collective[i], Stephen has helped to create one of the world's largest networks capturing data around B2B sales activities. Using artificial intelligence and predictive analytics, Collective[i] merges client CRM and other relevant sources of data into our network to generate intelligence used by the world's leading sales organization to generate revenue, streamline/automate non-revenue producing activities, and enable enterprises to be customer centric and data driven. Their patent-pending technology and applications designed for sales managers, operators and professionals are essential to the modern sales force. That's why this is one episode of the Modern Selling Podcast you do not want to miss. Download the full conversation and hear firsthand how agile selling can transform your sales process and win rates. How has the modern buyer changed? Before we jump into our discussion of agile selling and the power behind this method, I wanted to get clear from Stephen on how he's seen buyer behavior change through the years. From his perspective, there are three core shifts that have taken place: More buyers are involved now in the process. With so many companies shifting to a virtual, work from home model – this inevitably introduced more stakeholders into the buying decision. It's not as easy to get up and walk to your supervisor's office to get approval. Now, emails, Zoom meetings, and a litany of other communication channels have to be involved in a remote environment before a decision is made. Buyers are doing more research. Before buyers would reach out to sellers to gain more information. Now, buyers are doing their own research and being more and more selective with who they reach out to. Buyers are skeptical of working with sellers. How buyers engage with sellers has dramatically changed. Fewer and fewer buyers are giving their real information, for fear of being spammed with endless sales messages. This makes it even harder for sales reps to reach buyers. As so many sales leaders have seen, our modern buyers are going into "hiding" so to speak to get away from the somewhat intrusive sales cadences. But, if sales cadences are largely being ignored and buyers are going underground – what can sales reps do to truly get buyers to be open for a sales call? That's the very question that agile selling is able to answer. Listen to the full conversation to get access to these sales gems from, Stephen Messer, one of the top data-driven sales gurus in the world. What's the importance of personalization? Personalization in modern selling is everything! I have a folder in my email that I titled, "Emails that suck" and I can't tell you how many I get on a daily basis. And, they all have one glaring thing in common – they're never personalized. In essence, I and so many other prospects have just become a "Dear First Name". These emails aren't written to speak to my exact pain points, they're not conveying value that's relevant to me, and they're clearly written in a way that makes me feel just like any other buyer I was curious to hear Stephen's take on personalization and its impact on engagement rates based on the sales data he sees everyday. Stephen shares, "The question with personalization really is: can we improve productivity in how we reach buyers while at the same time giving them higher value interactions? This is where analyzing the data is so important. Personalization doesn't have to just be in the messaging. It can be in knowing the best time to send the email, or the right platform to reach out to, or knowing who to send the email to in the organization. Personalization comes back to one thing: research. We have to take the time to research who we're trying to sell to, if we're ever going to be effective." Jump into this episode, and listen to the end, to hear what Stephen says is the best way to personalize your sales messages to stand out. What is agile sales? Agile sales is being offered as an alternative to the traditional approach of people, process, and technology. According to Stephen, agile sales is all about moving away from making sales decisions based on opinions and "intuition" and, instead, using data to drive substantive changes to the sales process. It's through agile selling that the modern seller will be better positioned to know how, what, and when to reach out to modern buyers and actually get a response. Stephen shares a powerful point in this episode that reminds us all that we can't look at our prospects in a vacuum. We must consider the entire landscape of the world around them to understand their buying behavior and it is agile selling that makes this possible. If you've been looking for a new approach to sales to help increase your win rates and better engage with your prospects, then this is THE episode to listen to. This episode of the Modern Selling Podcast is brought to you by Korn Ferry. Korn Ferry transforms sales teams using their world-class Miller Heiman, methodology, employee assessments, benchmarking and talent advisor capabilities to increase win rates and quota attainment. Korn Ferry offers Korn Ferry Sell, a sales effectiveness app available in App Exchange and app source that helps your sales team develop and replicate powerful sales strategies that help sellers win more deals and crush their quotas. Learn more at kornferry.com.

With the sales enablement industry exploding, why is it that B2B and B2C companies still struggle to hit quota? The answer isn't at all what we would expect. Because despite all of the sales technologies, improved sales methodologies, advanced sales training – there still seems to be a disconnect between how modern sellers sell and how modern buyers buy. But, how do sales leaders effectively close this gap is quickly becoming a hot button topic in the sales community. And, addressing what this all means, why there is a widening gap, and how to efficiently turn the sales tide are exactly the areas of expertise of this episode's guest, Dr. Howard Dover. Dr. Howard Dover is the Founder and Director of the Center for Professional Sales at the University of Texas at Dallas, renowned speaker, and the Amazon best-selling author of The Sales Innovation Paradox: Harnessing Modern Methods for Optimal Sales Performance. Over the past decade, he has trained some of the top entry-level sales producers and regularly shares his findings and modern methods via various conferences and publications. Before working in academia, Dr. Dover founded several companies, including a sales contracting company that he operated for a decade. During his start-up years and government work, he developed the ability to harness technology to increase both the efficiency of business processes and the effectiveness of sales efforts. Download this episode of the Modern Selling Podcast to hear Dr. Dover's impactful insights and recommendations to sales leaders to close the gap. What is the sales innovation paradox? I wanted to kick off our discussion with a term that many aren't familiar with. Over the past three years, no one will argue that we have seen a radical shift in how selling is done. With the pandemic, pushing modern sellers to embrace more virtual selling options, the number of tools at sales professional's disposal has dramatically increased. Yet, sales haven't followed the same trend. Which is why I always say, "a fool with a tool is still a fool." I wanted to get Dr. Dover's take and better understand what this sales paradox is, how it started, and the implications it could have on the buying/selling process. His unique perspective is quite telling, "How is it possible that we live in a day where we have technology that was designed to make us better at sales, and yet somehow we find ourselves in a place where we are decidedly worse at selling. That is the Sales Paradox. When we look at the research, buyers overwhelmingly are saying they want a sales rep free experience. But, we keep pushing for more and more sales reps to sell." I've seen the same trend in the industry over the past few years. Like The Sales Paradox asserts, the number of SDRs has increased by 1,300%, but their productivity and success rates are dismal at best. In other words, customers have gotten smarter about buying faster than sellers have gotten smarter at selling. And, this isn't unique for a particular industry. This is a growing trend that is on pace to continue to worsen, if left unaddressed. Listen to the full conversation to hear what sales leaders could be doing to make matters worse and what they should be doing instead to drive more sales conversations. How can sales reps book more sales calls? If there is a sales paradox at play that isn't leading to more sales, then how can sales reps truly book more calls with prospects? Here at Vengreso, we have a very specific method that we follow to personalize all of our outreach messages to increase the chances of building an authentic relationship with potential customers. Many sales reps take the 'spray and pray' approach and bombard prospects with lots of generic messages that don't speak to their direct pain points or needs. I wanted to hear Dr. Dover's insights as they relate to what he believes is the "secret sauce" to move the sales needle. What he shares was very interesting, "We're giving the customer a phenomenal opportunity to go find defensive mechanisms to run and hide because the sales messaging they're receiving is extremely irrelevant to what they need. What sales reps need to be doing is building relevance into their messages. That's why doing your research before you reach out is so key. Then you'll know more about your prospect and can add that into your outreach to increase your chances to get a response back." Relevance, like Dr. Dover mentions, is a key part that seems to be missing from the sales motion. With prospects receiving thousands of sales and marketing messages, mastering how to stand out is science. And, building in relevance and personalization is critical to landing a sales meeting. What is a sales disrupter? When it comes to excelling in sales, it often takes unconventional ways. Dr. Dover coined the term "sales disrupter" and I was curious to know what traits embody that title. "A sales disrupter is somebody that doesn't follow the classic Sales Machine. They're willing to break the mold and try new things to personalize and customize the sales experience for potential customers." This innovative thinking is so important, especially in today's day and age when prospects are leery of getting put into a sales funnel and being aggressively sold to. Dr. Dover finds that sales disrupters do two things extremely well: They look for new ways to authentically connect with and engage prospects and customers to build lasting relationships. They leverage sales technology to enhance their relationships, after they've personally nurtured it. Be sure to download and listen to the full conversation to learn how you can cultivate sales disrupters in your organization to improve sales. This episode of the Modern Selling Podcast is brought to you by Korn Ferry. Korn Ferry transforms sales teams using their world-class Miller Heiman, methodology, employee assessments, benchmarking and talent advisor capabilities to increase win rates and quota attainment. Korn Ferry offers Korn Ferry Sell, a sales effectiveness app available in App Exchange and app source that helps your sales team develop and replicate powerful sales strategies that help sellers win more deals and crush their quotas. Learn more at kornferry.com/saleseffectiveness