Be sure to catch the bi-monthly Kansas City
Business
Journal column "On Competitive Advantage"
by
Speed
To Revenue's Sean Stormes
Dear Business Owner or Top Executive,
How is your strategic selling plan performing this year? Are you growing? If not, why? (the economy is not a good answer)
A better question: How much space exists between you and your competition? The size of that space creates the kind of marketplace distinction that inspires the passion that results in extreme customer loyalty.
Fact: Buyers will always find a point of distinction … even if it’s only price. And price knows no brand. That critical, differentiated space shrinks as you emulate the competition.
There’s a compelling reason why billionaire investor Warren Buffet analyzes and gauges a company’s Competitive Advantage as the primary factor when determining whether or not he will invest in them.
The matter of achieving true Competitive Advantage, as the company’s core revenue growth strategy, should dominate top management’s calendar. Working on the business delivers greater ROI than working in the business.
Rather than engage with prospects and customers to bring their voice into your strategic processes, we often find ourselves competing with our competitors. That brings evolution – small incremental advancements that will do very little to set you apart.
Peter Drucker said it best: while customer research was far more difficult to perform than market research, it was much more important.
Dynamic change is delivering new types of competition. If your customers have become bored with you, then the end is nearer than one might think. Familiarity breeds complacency. There are dangers with doing "business as usual."
Innovation and reinvention rules the day (and correlates directly to meaningful revenue growth).
Revenue growth cannot be silo’d or its responsibility delegated to the Sales organization. That’s an old paradigm, and it doesn’t work. Growing the business demands daily C-level attention, involvement, and sincere support since it is profitable, top line revenue that drives the enterprise.
To be clear, Competitive Advantage is not tired cliches about your business, is not determined by you (it's determined by your customers), and is the primary reason why someone decides to buy from you.
Only one strategy achieves all of the following:
- Can result in double-digit top line revenue increases within six months
- Being free of Price-based competition
- Delivers more of the market to you (vs. cold calling)
- Closes deals, resulting in higher Opportunity to Sales conversion ratios
- Protects margins, and in many cases, allows you to increase them
- Compensates for an average sales force
- Ensures the long-term viability of the enterprise
- Creates catnip for investors
Which growth strategy will you stake your reputation and company’s survival? Sales Training? There's definitely a time and place for it, but it's not at the top of the Strategic Planning list.
You need need create a connection with your prospects and customers, an emotional attachment that will compel them to spend money with you vs. someone else. How will you do that?
Please review our unique Revenue Growth System below, and call us when you're ready to have a discussion - free of charge, or course.
Best Regards,
Sean A. Stormes
Founder & Chief Growth Strategist
Growing Your Company's
Business in 2009-2010
At Speed To Revenue, our goal is take you from “Intuitive to Intentional” with 100% confidence. If you’re enthusiastic about enjoying the benefits of real Competitive Advantage and Optimizing Your Sales Effort, then you've come to the right place.
Additionally, if you’re in a position to allocate resources to a Strategic Growth initiative, then please explore our free assessment, proven methods, testimonials, insightful blog, and learn how we can help you.
Why not call us today about a free
consultation?
913.486.0762
The Speed To Revenue Growth System
Program
Strategy
Business Phase
Boost! ™
Creating Competitive Advantage
Planning
S-Harmony ™
Sales Force Optimization
Process
Winning in the First Third ™
Selling SkillsTraining
& Sales Performance
Management
People
Boost! ™
Description:
The genesis and absolute core of any winning revenue growth
strategy begins with the creation of real Competitive Advantage.
Without it, Price becomes the principle differentiator, reducing your
product or service to a mere commodity, eroding margins and
profitability. Your company becomes vulnerable, and survival an
undeniable concern.
Our comprehensive nine-step model (see below) and proprietary
architecture is designed to unearth fully customized “Profound
Declarations.” These claims are then merged with your company’s
unique story, creating a devastating one-two messaging punch that
resonates with your target customer audience. You will
also determine which customer and product segments can benefit the
most from your Competitive Advantages. The final pieces of the
puzzle are validating and then exploiting your new Competitive
Advantage with effective marketing.
The workshop consists of these nine units:
- Why creating a Competitive Advantage strategy should be your company’s #1 objective: The Eight Compelling Reasons
- The Seven Benefits: What a Competitive Advantage strategy delivers that no other strategy can
- What Competitive Advantage is, and what it is not
- What NOT to do: Common mistakes and misperceptions
- The Competitive Matrix: Its value, its purpose
- Creating your Competitive Advantage
- Ensuring success: Guaranteeing the effectiveness and ROI of your Competitive Advantage
- Effectively communicating your Competitive Advantage
- Achieving durability: Sustaining your Competitive Advantage
Marketplace distinction is achieved, creating an impenetrable, competitive moat around your
business. With your company now in a strong competitive position, growing market share
profitably becomes a reality.
Benefits/ROI:
- Potential double-digit revenue increases within six months
- Being free of Price-based competition
- Competitive Advantage closes deals, resulting in higher Opportunity to Sales conversion ratios
- Protects margins, and in many cases allows for margin increases, thereby improving profitability
- Compensates for an average sales force
- Ensures the survival of the enterprise
- Attracts investors like cheese attracts mice
S-Harmony ™
Description:
Sales Force Optimization, the science of aligning critical Sales support
systems and processes to create an environment capable of producing
a symphony ripe for revenue growth – designed with a common goal
in mind – prevents disjointed chaos that creates obstacles to
succeeding.
These support systems and processes include, but are not limited to:
- CRM
- Company policies and procedures
- Compensation Systems
- Job model and descriptions
- Performance Reviews
- Hiring Criteria & Process
- Expectations
- Goal Development
- Vendor programs
- Forecasting
- Pipeline
- Training
- Recognition & Reward
- Senior executives’ decisions
Additionally, the absence of these systems is the equivalent of driving
a car without an instrument panel. If you don’t know how fast
you’re going, or where you’re going, or whether or not the car needs
gas or oil, you will fail.
Many salespeople are hired without the DNA to be successful in Sales,
inadequately on-boarded and trained, and then told to “go get em’!”
Frustration occurs once they don’t experience success—usually early
on—and again, later, once they realize the systemic deck is stacked
against them. The old adage applies: put good people into a bad
system and most days the system will prevail. It is management’s
responsibility to “Put People into a Position To Win.”
This workshop consists of these five units:
- Review and group discussion of the Speed To Revenue whitepaper, “The Eight Reasons Why Sales Organizations Fail”
- Identification and analysis of all company Sales support systems and processes
- Calibration: using our Alignment Matrix, and your revenue growth strategy and goals as the success gauge, compare how each support system helps achieve overall Sales success while measuring strength of congruency that helps you achieve the overall strategy
- Simplification: Deciding what stays and what goes
- Validation: Customer, Salesperson, and Sales Manager Approved
Benefits/ROI:
By reducing the opposing forces – the “friction” – between Sales
support systems and processes, sales cycle speed improves and
measurable synergy occurs, enabling the new, more integrated and
congruent Sales machine to be more productive and effective.
Winning in the First Third ™
Description:
A 2008 Sales & Marketing magazine study found that only 16% of
salespeople achieve 90% or more of their annual sales goal, even though the
American Society for Training and Development estimates that U.S.
companies spend over $15 billion per year for sales training.
The cause of this incongruity? The old paradigm of selling techniques as the
primary method of growing profitable market share is obsolete, yet is
perpetuated by the plethora of traditional “Selling Systems” on the open
market. Proof: ask anyone who has been sold to in the past 10 years, and
ask them if it was a pleasant experience. Better yet, ask them if it is the reason
they bought (or not).
Winning in the First Third™ is the only selling skills training that’s rooted in
the Continuous Improvement Process concepts of Dr. W. Ewards Deming, the
American who taught the Japanese how to build quality products and
services. By analyzing the causes of why people don’t buy, a more effective,
conceptual selling model is created.
Additionally, this model is “Salesperson Certified,” meaning it was created
over a 20-year period with assistance from some of the most successful
salespeople on the planet. This model also allows for full customization to
any company, anysalesperson, or any selling situation.
This workshop consists of the following five units:
- Creating your company’s Sales success model: Designing the Sales management support machinery, including all Sales Performance Management processes
- Dr. Deming and the Continuous Improvement Process Diagram
- Foundation: Review of the “13 Sales Warrior Principles”
- Formal Sales Process: The condensed, proven steps to Sales success
- Question Design: What nobody ever showed you about creating world-class questions that cause people to purchase
- Winning: Tying it all together
Benefits/ROI:
Note: To receive the full benefit of this conceptual selling skills model, the
first two programs (Boost and S-Harmony) should first be executed.
While benefits vary widely dependent on the Sales DNA level of the
salesperson and the commitment and support of the management team,
hundreds of new and long-tenured salespeople have written glowing reviews
of Winning in the First Third. Some have seen their sales increase by 70%
within two months after taking the course.