The Sales Prevention Team

I was talking with a colleague regarding past experiences with clients and he came up with a beautiful explanation for sales with some companies he had worked with in the past.  The “sales prevention” team was the label given.  Both a humorous and sad label.

Organizations are desperate for revenue in these economic times and push methods reign to “get the revenue.”  Some times organizations use manipulative methods to up-sell or convince the customer of an “unrealized” need.  Most of this stuff is BS and actually can work against you in raising costs.  Returns are a good way to identify some of these costs to hit revenue numbers.  When customers buy things that don’t fit their needs they return it and there is cost associated with returns including distrust from the customer that can’t be measured.

Sales departments that can’t help customers solve problems can actually prevent sales.  When non-sales calls are taken in a sales area they often get passed to customer service.  Most service organizations see this as a good design as they have sales “specialists.”  The customer, however, sees it as another barrier to overcome.  not helping a customer at point of contact creates great dissatisfaction . . . it prevents sales.

Some sales folks are more interested telling you about their knowledge than helping you solve the service problem they have whether it relates to purpose (value demand) or a problem the service organization created (failure demand).  I roll my eyes when I great detail about the features and benefits that don’t matter to me from a sales person that is working hard to convince me.  Most customers want to call to buy, but the failure demand and the salesperson get in the way . . .  more sales prevention.

Making sales is a process of discovery.  How do I enable the customer to get what they need and not more than that?  Or helping them discover new ways to get jobs they need done more effectively and efficiently.  This is sales enabling.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the The 95 Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbittor LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

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The Road from Unconscious Incompetence to Unconscious Competence

On occasion I go back and read some old favorite books that helped shape my thinking.  Peter Scholte’s book, The Leader’s Handbook, was one such book that gave a me pause.  The history of what became known as the Quality Movement is well-described.

One such concept from the book is for whole management to move from a state of unconscious incompetence to a conscious competence.  Too many executives do not understand how poor their systems are performing.  One of the great breakthroughs in service industry (my perspective) is the idea of failure demand – a failure to do something or do something right for a customer (95)  – this measure alone begins the process of unwinding myths and legends that exist in organizations and opens a new way of thinking.  A move from unconscious incompetence to conscious INcompetence.  More ways are need for management to understand the damaging effects of poor thinking.

Once management understands they have a problem that is steeped in their thinking, with the right guidance and being empirical an organization can begin to achieve conscious competence.  It still requires work to be competent and reinforcement of new thinking to make improvement.  Unpacking old and damaging thinking takes time.  Management must learn that it takes patience, persistence, humility and a period of ineptness – something most managers are uncomfortable in doing as confidence (even wrongly achieved) is a trait embraced.

But managers are incompetent and part of competence is learning an organization as a system . . . outside-in from a customers point of view.  This requires knowledge of the work and competence in doing the work and/or the ability to defer to those that do have competence in the work.  And in service, the work is the interaction of customer and front-line employee to satisfy customer demands.

Why is being in the work so important for management?

Because this is the place the business fortunes are won and loss.  This is where you can see the effects of the unintended consequences of policies, rules, mandates, standadrdization and other management driven measures and programs.  This is the best way to move from unconscious incompetence to conscious INcompetence.  Otherwise, management tends to rationalize the situation without seeing and hearing for themselves.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the The 95 Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbittor LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

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Increasing Sales is About Changing Thinking

Whether you live in the US or not, the thinking about how to increase sales seems universal.  Hiring sales type personalities that can overcome objections and hit targets.  This thinking has been repeated so often that organizations have come to believe it . . . if it were only true.

The service that most organizations achieve for their customers is horrendous and poor service leads organizations filled with revenue targets to “hit the number.”  Incentives and training to overcome objections is the recourse.  No one addresses the main thing that prevents sales, namely, bad service.

This bad service can be measured in organizations by understanding what percentage of customer demands are in the form of failure demand (the failure to do something or do something right for a customer).  The percentage in most organizations is between 25 and 75% of all customer demands.  It is difficult to sell to someone with this much failure.

High failure demand means we have to compensate for our bad service by selling.  After all, it takes a lot of extra sugar coating to sell to someone that gets horrible service.

Service can only be improved by changing the system and the system requires new thinking about the design and management of work.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the The 95 Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbittor LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

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