312.863.8580 Samurai Business Group • 150 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 2800 • Chicago, IL info@samuraibizgrp.com

IntroductIon

“Within six months of [using The Samurai Sales Method™] our sales performance increased by 65%, the cost of sales was down 27%, the average sales cycle decreased by approximately 30 days, and our sales forecast accuracy improved to the point that we could confidently project quarterly cash flows.” - Anthony Rudolph, COO/General Manager, RMI International

Anthony Rudolph above, as well as each of the sales professionals quoted below, experienced a revolution. It was a revolution in sales performance that is not typical for today’s sales forces, nor for businesses as awhole, that are struggling to stay ahead of gradually declining performance numbers − worsening contact-to-close ratios, order values, etc. Yet those employing the method highlighted in this white paper have found their results to be not only typical but also extraordinary.

Their sales performances radically improved not due to working harder, but definitely due to working differently. They changed the way they viewed sales, and that changed their company’s numbers for the better, not to mention their personal paychecks. This came about by actually changing their habitual outlook toward the sales process.

“Even in this down economy … we got clients we never thought we’d have the opportunity to get. And the quality [is beyond our expectations]. I listened … and landed a client I had been grooming for 5 years! -- Rob Lange, VP

“My sales have more than doubled.” -- Phillip Stone, President

“This pr

CEO

“W

Sr. Vice President, Bank

e’ve more than doubled our size. We were a $230 million bank, now we are a $500 million bank, and Samurai has been a big part of that.” -- Chris Sweetland,

ogram really is for everyone … from the CEO down to the mailroom clerk. You must align your activities … [everyone’s activities]… so you appeal to your clients. I got my investment back in only 6 months! I was willing to let it take a year.” -- Mary Eggert. CEO Global Non Profit

“My sales increased almost 50% my first 6 months in the pr

Regional Director, Internet Co.

ogram. And this year, I have had over 60% year-over-year growth.” -- Patrick Moriarty,

“In just four months, my consulting income was over 6 times my previous volume!” -- Jon Paul, President, Financial Services

“[This method] ... changed my approach to [finally and properly] pursue the markets and customers that will give me the biggest return for my efforts.” -- John Marcquenski, President, Franchise

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How tHey dId It

“Adapt or die.” -- Darwin’s Rule

What could possibly get this many people to say this many outstanding things about one sales method?

The key is to stop selling, and instead help your prospects to buy. You do this because everyone loves to buy, but everyone hates to be sold. No, that IS NOT simple. Yes, it sounds simple, but it is terrifically difficult to do, given that no two prospects and no two buying opportunities are exactly alike. It requires continually thinking on your feet and having quick reactions. You will have to eliminate what we all yearn for − a daily system that we can learn and auto-apply case after case. Despite the fact that we all know that a method of this type yields cookie-cutter do-it-again-and-again sales techniques, we still unwittingly do it. It is human nature to slip into it if even for just some of our methods. It therefore becomes imperative that you set up the right method.

You are about to learn a different model. The only routine you will need to develop as a result of this method is the ability to constantly adapt to what your prospect is saying – often to your gradual and methodical series of guiding questions.

If you still think “stop selling, and help your prospect to buy” sounds too simple to be worth reading further, then you must feel it is a lot like simply teaching someone that in order to hit a baseball, all you have to do is 1) keep your eye on the ball, 2) swing straight, and 3) step out with your aiming foot micro-seconds ahead of the pitch’s arrival. If it were that easy, we’d all be making north of $800,000 annually in the Majors today! Instead, the devil is in the details, and it comes easily for only about one-half of one percent of us, and even they, like us, must practice, practice, practice. The technique in this paper can get you or your sales force into the top 5% of producers, who, with practice, can achieve a new routine of thinking.

The methodology to stop selling and to help your prospect buy is based on the Samurai Buying Decision Model™. The model incorporates leading academic research, proven principles of human behavior, and the best practices in sales and marketing. It is a natural approach that allows you to blend new knowledge and skills with your personality to form a personalized and seamless professional selling methodology that will greatly enhance your long-term performance.

The key is, it aligns your efforts with the prospect’s, resulting in a collaborative environment that leads to a mutually rewarding conclusion. Thanks to more than five years of development, implementation, numerous client testimonials, success stories, and validated results, we know this method works … especially in today’s rapidly changing marketplace.

If your current sales efforts no longer produce the results you want, and you find you’re working harder and harder for less and less, isn’t it about time to quit following the old ways that are no longer effective and try something new? So, finally, one last time, as Bob Lambert co-founder of Samurai Business Group says, “It’s time to quit selling and to start helping your prospects buy!”

“Quit selling, and start helping your prospects buy!”

312.863.8580 Samurai Business Group • 150 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 2800 • Chicago, IL info@samuraibizgrp.com

SolutIonS to ProblemS vS. FeatureS and beneFItS

“If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.” -- Will Rogers You should expect selling to have its confusions, frustrations, and upsets. But when you win, it feels great, and the financial rewards are usually even greater.

Nearly all companies empower their sales forces with an understanding of their products and services. Salespeople can probably recite the features and benefits, as well as the unique selling propositions, of their products/services while in their sleep. Prospects, however, once pitched, usually can as well – and also for each of your competitors. That simply puts you on an equal footing, and merely allows you to be a then-also-ran suitor.

The next level of selling involves knowing the prospect’s needs − and hopefully they are complex needs. If you have a prospect with simple needs, then we do not need to tell you, you are in a commodity business. Good luck, we wish you the best, but you are largely condemned to sell off of price, maybe with a few “value-addeds” thrown in. Even if you are in a commodity business, the goal, of course, is to get to as complex of variables as the prospect can support. You can offer to do other things for them for a fee that takes burdens off them, for example. But it goes without saying, being in a more complex selling environment − where the terms and moving pieces can be varied, although sometimes frustrating − is still the best place to be. There and only there will you find a customer who needs your guidance and insight and will listen to a trusted adviser but not a pitchman.

The features and benefits of your product or service are merely the starting point and are to be given no more importance than would, say, the fact you showed up on time and you spoke with clear English. Finding out your clients’ unique needs and complexity of their problems is where they open up and begin to say to themselves, “They get it; this is about me, not about them.” You must make it about them, and only by they revealing their complexity to you do they get emotionally engaged and come to accept you as a consultant.

Customers expect salespeople to focus on solutions to problems and not only on features and benefits of products. Have you ever left a

presentation feeling that you “nailed it”− that you were really “on” and that you had just given one of the best presentations of your life − only to have the prospect award the business to someone else? Well, chances are it is exactly because someone else went way beyond showing how their glove fits the prospect’s hand, to understanding the complexities of their hand, or hands. Someone else probably helped the buyer premeditate their unforeseen needs and offered solutions to meet adaptability.

As a result, people will ONLY make buying decisions with the people they trust or believe will get the job done. Building trust with the buyer is easier when the salesperson helps the buyer reach the right decision.

GaInInG truSt

“Confidence is the feeling one has before they understand the situation.” -- Anonymous

The most successful salespeople shift their orientation from selling products to helping buyers buy. But this comes from gaining the prospect’s trust. Gaining trust is infinitely more difficult than simply saying, “You can trust me.” As you know, trust has to be earned, and no one will ever trust you based on what you say, only on what you do. Let’s begin understanding trust then by first discovering why a buyer buys.

“Developing the ability to ask questions that are germaine, cogent and that help advance the decision… is the result of a change in behavior. It is not a mere change in tactics. It comes only with practice.”

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Step 1. Discover. Begin to develop the habit of discovering why the buyer needs your trust. There are always TWO reasons a prospect is buying – an apparent or published reason and a compelling or personal, unspoken reason. The apparent reason is why a business manager should buy, while a compelling reason is why he or she does buy. It is also important to note there is a one-to-one correlation between the type of apparent reason and the compelling reason driver. This correlation is shown in the table below.

Now an opportunity may be either the one a client already has, or the one they are unaware of that you feel you want to convince them is waiting for them, and you need simply illuminate it for them. Both fit into the Opportunity reason at left.

Step 2. Establish Trust During the Buyer’s Decision-Making Process. People do not trust organizations, but people do trust people. That is why most people object to

how Congress is performing, but re-elect their specific representative 90% of the time.

It is no secret the more a person is engaged with another, the more that person has the opportunity to gain trust. Although finding out how many kids a prospect has, or sharing a laugh may gain some rapport, it is not sufficient to establish trust. Trust comes only when the prospect feels you care more about their well-being than your own, and that can come only from actions, not words. During the cognitive buying process, prospects reveal how they are thinking, e.g., how many downsides their choices could incur, the costs and various upsides of their choices, etc. This is when they will be consciously looking for (or more aptly, listening for) the salesperson to reveal their loyalties. This is when you are to illuminate their choices, not through a knowing tone, but through a Socratic or questioning manner − leaving the judgment of the choices to their own future thoughts.

All buyers go through this same decision process: They…

1. discover their options, 2. uncover more opportunities/complexities than originally thought, 3. diverge out into the many optional paths, then… 4. try to converge the thoughts toward a best-case option.

Your opportunity to gain trust occurs certainly during steps 2 and 3 in the decision process just above, but also during step 4 as well. We all know people who mistakenly feel their opportunity exists in step 1 of this process. They say, “Here is what I have, and what I can do for you.” That is step-1 selling. In steps 2 through 4 above, rather, is when you do not “say,” but rather “ask,” “Have you thought about this option? Will it matter to other stakeholders if you did not do such and such?” And so on.

Step 3. Questioning with their interests at heart. Developing the ability to ask questions that are germaine and cogent and that help advance the conversation/decision and do not appear contrived, sophomoric, or glib is the result of a change in behavior for most of us. It is not a mere change in tactics. It comes only with practice. Everyone can get good at it. You no doubt already know someone who is a “natural” at it. But there are many who are not naturals and do just as well as the naturals. Through a combination of training, work, and good old-fashioned practice, they get just as good at it as the genetically prewired ones. There is only one way to get good at anything, and that is practice, make mistakes, improve, practice again, improve, and practice again.

Reasons Prospects Are Buying

Visible, Apparent Corporate Reason

They have.....

Unspoken, CompellingPersonal Reason

They really have….

A ProblemAn Impending EventAn Opportunity

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PainFearGain

312.863.8580 Samurai Business Group • 150 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 2800 • Chicago, IL info@samuraibizgrp.com

PuttInG It Into actIon

“Judge a man not by his answers, but by the questions he asks.” -- Voltaire

Although your questioning will be as varied as there are permutations of clients, products, services, and personalities, here are just a few examples − both universal and specific. You will need to obviously adapt these to your industry and products and services.

You may get a push-back from prospects, sometimes very early on, depending on their lack of familiarity with you or your company. It may come as soon as you

ask the very first question that they feel starts to get even close to “insider information.” One gentle way of repelling that is to say…

“I am sorry. I can understand you may feel I am trying to pry. But rather, I am in the best position to advise which customer solution may be best if we have an open conversation. You know that your problem (or opportunity) is complex. I am still learning that. My solutions may be equally complex or varied, and I just want us to discern the best possible one that may even exceed your expectations.”

Then resume the questioning at an appropriate moment and after they’ve had the brief chance to absorb your thoughtful comment. And as the world-class business consultant W. Edwards Deming said, “If you do not know how to ask the right question, you discover nothing.”

Earlier we made the obvious statement that trust can only be gained by what you do, not by what you say. The

process, however, of asking questions and helping prospects sort through their divergent and then convergent thinking is actually an action on your part; it just happens to involve talking. It is the courtesy, the gift to the prospects of this process that evokes their trust.

Examples of Universal Generic Questions • How is business? • How is your short-term business comparing with your medium-term business? • How are your core clients doing? • What is working for you right now? • What have you tried that has not worked?

Examples of Industry - Specific Questions

• If you employ solution/option {A}, will you ultimately be constrained by {X}? • Given your currently configured needs, what might become additional demands, both foreseen and unforeseen? • What will a commitment to this solution do if our competition unveils/adapts/announces {Y}? • Can you live with this flexibility (or lack thereof)? • Where will your needs be in 6/12/24/36 months?

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concluSIon: a cHanGe In beHavIor not SImPly a cHanGe In tactIcS

“The second half of a man’s life is made up of nothing but the habits he has acquired during the first half.” -- Feodor Dostoevski

“When you are not practicing, remember, someone somewhere is practicing…and when you meet him, he will win.” -- Bill Bradley (US Senator, NBA All-Star)

Since the types of questioning that are genuine and intelligent and that gain one’s trust are as myriad as the permutations of clients, products, services, and personalities, the skills needed to engage in this method are a change in behavior and not simply a change in tactics.

It may be perceived as a mere change of tactics, but it requires a systematic change that comes only from practice and even training. The table at left shows the disappointing amount of training time the average sales professional goes through relative to the time he or she actually sells – or rather helps a client buy. Each group shown in the table are professionals (except perhaps luge runners, who, incidentally, win based on performance times of less than a minute!). Despite all being professionals, and most making their personal incomes from their performances, this shows how sales professionals spend far too little time practicing their craft.

There is no substitute for training or practice. Just as no coach would throw a player on the field who has had only minutes of practice time for each hour expected of performance time, nor should any sales manager throw a sales professional into their market with only minutes of training per week − especially training that is mere features- and benefits-oriented. One must train in this technique of selling.

The need for an ongoing regime of training cannot be emphasized enough. And, even if you feel you are trained – especially in this method of mentoring your prospect to buy − then you, more than anyone, know you need continuing refreshing and updating. Numerous associations and institutions, not to mention individual coaches, exist for this express purpose. Most are easily found on the Net. We encourage you to pursue them and commit to a program. Please shun all those who do not help perfect your ability to react to the myriad demands of the guiding, coaching, questioning, and consultative sales approach. We wish you the best of luck and indeed…. “Quit selling, and start helping your prospects buy!”

Typical Ratios of Training Time to Actual Performance Time

Hours spent training versus hours spent in live performance by professional groups.

Professional/Event

Training Time toLive Performance *

Winter Luge Competitor 174 to 1

Football Player (NCAA and NFL)** 15 to 1

Golfer (PGA Pro Circuit) 9.5 to 1

Baseball Player (NCAA and MLB) 6 to 1

Classical Voice or Instrument Performer 5.6 to 1

Average American Sales Professional 0.12 to 1

* Does not include off-season conditioning or time spent prior to be coming professional.** Assumes ‘one side of the ball’ playing time.

“It is the courtesy, the gift of this process to the prospect that evokes their trust.”

312.863.8580 Samurai Business Group • 150 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 2800 • Chicago, IL info@samuraibizgrp.com

The Samurai Business Group runs monthly workshops for both sales managers as well as individual sales professionals on this Socratic, consultative sales model. You can find more information here:

www.samuraibizgrp.com

Samurai Business Group150 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 2800Chicago, IL 60601

Phone: 312.863.8580Email: info@ samuraibizgrp.com

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