The Reality of Selling Today

(The Two Most Important People Every Salesperson Should Know)
By Steve W. Martin

Summary
Selling today is not only difficult, it’s downright scary! You must fight off your usual cast of competitors and still protect yourself against the dreaded “no decision.” Knowing how to appeal to the “Bully with the Juice” is a mandatory sales-skill in today’s post-bubble economy.

Introduction
The 90’s were a great time to sell. While the deals were always competitive, there was more business to go around so everyone got a piece of the action. Compared to those heady days, everyone agrees that selling today is not only more difficult, but also harder than in any other time in their sales careers.

Growing up, I never thought my career path would lead to sales. In fact, I started my career as a software programmer. As a software programmer, I became knowledgeable about the fundamentals of how computers work. I learned the importance of the structure of language and how to build a “model.” Models are the descriptions and representations of how a system works. Understand a model, and you can recreate a system. Models enable repeatable, predictable experiences. When I transitioned my career into sales, I quickly realized that I could build models to explain customer behavior in the sales process.

Since then, I have spent twenty years in sales. I have worked with hundreds of salespeople and participated in thousands of sales calls while serving in positions ranging from salesperson to vice president. Over the years, I continually refined these models and compiled them in my new book titled, “Heavy Hitter Selling-- How Successful Salespeople Use Language and Intuition to Persuade Customers to Buy.” In Heavy Hitter Selling, I characterize attributes of successful salespeople (known as Heavy Hitters) and customers involved in the decision-making process.

There are many different ways to classify people involved in the selection process during the sales cycle including title, personality, and orientation (technical, business or financial). Another interesting characterization is displayed in the following graph that represents four different characteristics that a person can be measured against.

Fig. 1 Characteristics of Evaluators


The left axis is a person’s insistence that things be done his way. This is called being a “bully.” A bully will get his way at any and all costs. Being a bully is not necessarily a negative term, nor does it mean that the person is physically intimidating. It is simply the description of people who will tenaciously fight for their cause. Also, people are more likely to be a bully when they have an elevated status within the evaluation team. The status could be the result of their domain expertise (technical or business knowledge) or their title and the authority it commands.

At the other end of the spectrum, are people who are accommodating. They are apathetic to whatever solution is purchased. The degree to which people are a bully or accommodating depends on the effect the purchase decision has on their span of control, position in the company, or ability to perform their job.

On the horizontal axis, is the concept of “juice” and the “dud.” Simply put, juice is charisma. But even this definition is too simple. Some people are natural-born leaders. They have an aura that can motivate and instill confidence. That’s juice. Juice is fairly hard to describe, but you know it when you see it.

Having juice does not mean that these people act like John Wayne, nor are they necessarily the highest-ranking people involved in an evaluation. Instead, they are the ones who always seem to be on the winning side. Only one member of the customer’s evaluation has the juice. Single-handedly, he or she imparts his or her own will on the selection process by single-handedly selecting the vendor, and pushing the purchase through the procurement process. He or she can either finalize the purchase terms or instructs the procurement team on the terms that are considered acceptable.

“While there may be several bullies there will only be one that has juice. It is the bully who occupies the highest position farthest to the right that is the ultimate decision-maker.”

“Duds” are named after the ineffective firework they represent. Sometimes the fuse of a firework will burn down, but nothing will happen. Some fireworks may be very big but produce disappointing results. Duds have a lot of big talk but little action. “Accommodating duds” are people who do not take an active role in the sales process. Even worse are “dud bullies” who try to pretend the have juice, but don’t. For the salesperson, the realization of this may not come until too late.

For all of the people involved in the sales selection process, Heavy Hitters calculate their amount of Juice and their propensity to be a Bully. In the following example, John, Jim, Karl, and Rich are plotted according to the Hitter’s assessment.

Fig. 2 Plotting Individual Assessments


In the chart above, John is a dud bully, Jim is an accommodating dud, and Rich has the juice. Heavy Hitters naturally gravitate to people with juice. However, a person with juice may be apathetic to the purchase of your product, such as Karl in the preceding diagram. For example, a Chief Information Officer who has juice probably doesn’t care what toner cartridges are purchased for the laser printers. He or she will be accommodating and support the decision of the people who make that decision. Someone else has the juice for the procurement of toner cartridges. Many people have juice (charisma and authority), but only one person has the “juice” to single-handedly select the vendor.

Let’s assume the same company was making a decision about an enterprise wide computer system. You can assume the evaluation team’s decision will match the Chief Information Officer’s preference. His or her will may have been imposed on the evaluation process through brute force or by finesse. Either way, his preference was “bullied” into the decision. The most powerful position in all of sales is when your coach (internal advocate within the customer’s company) has the “juice.” If your coach has the juice, you win! The next best scenario is when your coach can influence the person with Juice.

Some people believe that the economy has changed the way products are purchased. People will argue that some purchases are truly made by committee without a bully with the juice. While a committee does put more fingerprints of accountability on the product selection, behind every committee (and its creation) is a bully who has the juice.

There are three important rules regarding the bully who has the juice. First, if you cannot accurately determine who the bully with juice is in your deal and none exists, be prepared for no decision to be made. It takes a bully with the juice to make every purchase happen. This is a reality in today’s economy. Second, when there is a bully with the juice in your deal and this person is not helping you, always assume they are helping someone else. Therefore, the deal is lost. Finally, if a Bully with the Juice does exists but you aren’t able to identify the person, be prepared to lose as you are in a position of extreme risk.

“If you cannot accurately determine who the bully with juice is in your deal and none exists, be prepared for no decision to be made.”

I want to share with you a memorable, personal story about a bully who definitely had the juice.

The local account team had been working with a prestigious financial brokerage firm in New York for five months. During that time, the potential customer had completed a thorough technical product evaluation in its information technology lab. The sales team had invested a lot of presales engineering resources in this account. By doing so, engineer in charge of the technical evaluation had developed into a strong coach. He even approached the sales team to discuss the possibility of joining our company.

Our coach had warned us that the vice president of information services was a micromanager. He personally had to approve all new technology that was brought into “his” organization. Therefore, in order to receive his blessing, a company presentation was scheduled. The sales team can laugh about it now, but the presentation was much more of an interrogation than a business meeting.

From a personal standpoint, the vice president was combative and condescending. For example, as part of the presentation about the company, the sales team explained the patents that we have applied for and been awarded. To this point, he replied, “How do I know that these patents aren’t just red herrings [false or nonexistent] to throw off your competition!” The entire meeting felt like we were appearing on 60 Minutes, being asked by Mike Wallace, “Is it true you beat your wife?” Even though you answer “No” to the question, you are assumed to be guilty.

Given this set of circumstances, we had a limited options to build rapport. First, we maintained our composure and did our best not to take the attack personally. Second, we agreed (profusely at times) with the vp’s point of view when it was applicable. And finally, in the most professional, nonpersonal way we could muster, we countered on certain issues by offering other potential solutions. You do not want to directly contradict a bully who has juice.

As we left the meeting, I told the local salesperson that based on the beating we received, I thought it was a long shot the company would move forward with us. However, we had a secret weapon. Our coach would later tell us that our performance was deemed “acceptable” by the vice president. More importantly, our coach continued to lobby on our behalf. Several weeks later, we received our first purchase order from our new customer. It was through the coach’s persistent promotion of our solution that the Bully with the juice approved our deal.


Heavy Hitters understand that they must deal with duds and bullies while they are in hot pursuit of the person who has the juice. This story illustrates another important truism about enterprise sales-- Heavy Hitters know they need a constant, accurate source of information revealing the internal machinations of the customer’s selection process. The term “coach” is the popular name of a person who is the source of this inside information. Without a coach firmly entrenched on your side, you have no hope of winning the deal.

There’s an interesting way to determine who the bully with the juice is. Group dynamics are very complex and often revealing. A group’s behavioral pecking order is communicated by where people sit during meetings. Whether at a round table or in a classroom setting, the person with the most juice and greatest ability to bully will usually take the dominant seating position. This dominating behavior is also evidenced in meeting interactions. To explain this, we need to introduce the concept of the “participation pie.” The participation pie illustrates the amount of time each person interacts in a meeting or presentation.

Fig. 3 Participation Pie Charts


Usually, the person who interacts the most will be the bully who has the most juice. Bullies with juice are in charge and they want everyone to know it. And although dud bullies will be very active participants, the more they participate, the more it becomes obvious that they do not have the stature or expertise they think they do. We have all been in meetings where people like this are contradicted or even publicly chastised by members of their own team. Dud bullies don’t adhere to Mark Twain’s advice when he said, “It is better to keep your mouth shut and be suspected of being a fool rather than open it and confirm suspicions.”

Another key aspect of the participation pie is how the number of attendees affects the level of participation. In meetings with up to four members, the amount of time each person spends interacting and asking questions is relatively equal. As the group grows to eight people, the interactions become clustered around several people. In larger groups, up to twelve people, the majority of interactions are usually among a few individuals. These people are most likely to be bullies.

CONCLUSION
The model of the bully, dud, and juice help explain that members of the customer’s evaluation team do not share an equal vote or the same level of interest in the decision being made. Some members are apathetic while others are more insistent they get their way. However, one individual has the juice to single-handedly make the decision, and it is this individual that we strive to build rapport with.

In sales, we are frequently placed in uncomfortable situations where rapport is nonexistent. Unfortunately, salespeople will naturally gravitate to members of the evaluation team that like them. It’s human nature to want to avoid rejection and stay in your comfort zone.

Finally, salespeople are constantly placed in an environment where they must differentiate themselves and their product from other attention-getting solutions. Under these circumstances, the salesperson’s job is to create a receptive environment and create a relationship with detractors as well as supporters. Ultimately, there is one person who makes the final decision and truly matters. In today’s economic malaise, it is the bully with the juice who reigns supreme.

About the author:
Steve W. Martin is the author of the critically acclaimed new book Heavy Hitter Selling: How Successful High Technology Salespeople Use Language and Intuition to Persuade Customers to Buy. Please visit www.heavyhitterselling.com for additional articles and information.