PPB March 2017

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June 12-14, 2017
| MARCH 2017 | 59
GROW
expectations. Maybe it’s time
for you and your salespeople
to raise your game.
Only after examining the
answers to the previous
questions are you ready to move
forward with some potential
solutions.
• Take on a new product or
a new market. This applies
mainly if the answer to No. 1
is that your market share is
so high that it’s unreasonable
to expect your salespeople to
continue to drive double-digit
growth. There’s obviously
danger in this approach,
particularly if you have a
great market position, but
the health of your company
demands it. High market
shares that lead to plateaus
also lead to complacency.
When you’re complacent, the
quality of everything you do
begins to decline, just a little,
until everyone is operating
at half speed and you don’t
know what to do about it.
New products or new markets
keep everyone challenged.
Yes, everyone will squeal—
particularly the salespeople—
but it’s for their own good, and
yours as well.
• Refocus your sales force.
Maybe the answer to No. 2
is that your salespeople are
not doing the things that
got them to the level they
are now. It can happen.
People can slack off in their
prospecting, the quality of
their customers or the quality
of their sales interactions. At
this point, it’s time to refocus
the salespeople, using good
management techniques, to
get them back on track and get
your company growing again.
You may also need to rework
goals, activity metrics and
other key measurements in
doing so.
• Retrain. This affects the
answers to No. 2 and No. 3. The
hardest thing for salespeople,
and sales managers, to wrap
their heads around is this:
Even if your salespeople are
having the same quality of
conversation they were 10
years ago, it probably isn’t
enough now. Your customers
expect more. The key here is to
retrain with a sales training pro
who has kept up with current
trends and with the internet’s
influence on sales dialogue,
and knows how to have the
kind of conversation that
customers demand now.
• Talk to your customers.
Sometimes it’s hard to see
the forest for the trees, and
sometimes it’s hard to see
the real reasons why your
customers buy and keep
buying. Let me be blunt
here. The best source of
information about why new
customers should buy from
you is your current customer
base. I’m always amazed at
companies that will throw
huge dollars at ad campaigns
and marketing programs
designed to “reposition” them
without taking a minute to ask
their happiest customers why
they buy and keep buying.
The answers your customers
give you will help you freshen
up your marketing approach
without getting rid of the
reasons why your current
customers love you.
• Make staffing changes. Yep,
this is the last resort but
sometimes it has to happen. A
couple of years ago, I helped
a client get off a four-year
plateau and grow 60 percent in
one year. The biggest change
made was that we released
a sales manager who was in
“coast and collect” mode and
replaced him with someone
who is a driver and strategic
thinker. Along with that, we
changed sales processes and
activity metrics, retrained the
salespeople and hired some
new employees. In fact, we did
everything above except find
new markets, because that
wasn’t their problem. But what
we did worked, and it can work
for you too.
You may be thinking, “But,
Troy, what’s so bad about a
plateau? My company is making
me good money, we’re not
working that hard and my risk
is low. I like my plateau!” I can
answer that this way: If you’re
not growing, you’re shrinking.
All it takes, in a plateaued
company, is one or two major
customer losses and not only
are you trying to work back up,
but your company has lost the
habits that made it grow in the
first place. Keep working and
you’ll keep growing.
Troy Harrison is author of Sell
Like You Mean It! and The
Pocket Sales Manager; he’s also
a speaker, consultant and sales
navigator. He helps companies
build more profitable and
productive sales forces with his
cutting-edge sales training and
methodologies and is a frequent
speaker at The PPAI Expo and
Expo East. Sign up for his weekly
e-zine at
or contact him: 913-645-3603,
.
Hear Troy
Harrison At
Expo East
Troy Harrison will be
presenting two education
sessions at Expo East,
June 12-14 at the
Atlantic City Convention
Center in Atlantic City,
New Jersey. Both are
free to PPAI members,
and to nonmembers with
a ticket, and earn one
CAS point. Register for
the sessions when you
register for the show at
Making Your Net Work
Monday, June 12
10:30-11:30 am
This session will help
you stop socializing and
move toward real referral
generation techniques
that work.
Naming Your Price—
And Getting It
Monday, June 12
1:30-2:30 pm
Harrison says
salespeople are their
own worst enemies when
it comes to giving up on
price. This session will
teach how to hold your
price—and make money.