In our continuing Sauga 960 radio interview series, we tackle sales strategy and tactics as life gets back to (somewhat) normal!

Your Business, presented by David Wojcik, understands business. As the CEO/President of the Mississauga Board of Trade, he focuses on current commercial issues and how they affect entrepreneurs and key executives. 

Listen here:

David Wojcik: Not having a sales plan is like trying to cook a meal with no recipe, you make decisions that seem best in the moment, jeopardizing the end result. What key elements should a sales plan entail? To help us with the conversation is sales guru, Linda Kern. Linda is the President of The Kern Group, providing a sales growth process and unique tools for driving sales results. Welcome Linda.

Linda Kern: Thank you, David.

David Wojcik, Sauga 360

David Wojcik: Well, I think that, that said it all right there with the intro, and it sets us up nicely for what we’re about to talk about. The sales plan, where does it start Linda? Pretend we’re neophytes to this and we don’t know anything about sales. Where do we start?

Linda Kern: I always like to start with the really big issues within the company, or at least the strategic bigger picture stuff. So vision, mission values, and thanks to our friend, Simon Sinek, the WHY of the company. I think it’s important to go back to some of the fundamentals of, what is this business really all about? Why are we here? What are we doing? Who are we serving? And how are we serving them? So that’s where I would start followed very quickly with an analysis of the past 12 months, some industries that might be a little more than 12 months, but for the most part, you want to take a look at the business of the last 12 months. Where did it come from? What industries? What kind of business? You’re looking for things in that analysis that are jumping off the page to you.

Another aspect might be, if you sell certain products or services to those companies, are there other products and services you can sell? So people tend to see trends like the source of business, as well as the industry, and then, looking at gee, I could sell also other things in those accounts, those would be two startup points.

David Wojcik: How often do you see it? And you and I have been in the sales game, you’ve been in much longer than I have only because I keep jumping in and out, but how often do you see where a salesperson has been in the game for a while, and they start to flounder and it’s because they are not paying attention to the basics?

Linda Kern: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah, a lot really. I see it a lot because you can get comfortable in the way, I did this 10 years ago, I did this five years ago, you can get pretty comfortable in the way you’ve been doing things, and that’s why I think it’s even, almost more important for a seasoned salesperson to sit back and take a look at what’s been happening and what they want to happen in the coming year, because there are other things you want to think about as well, not just the sales goal and quota, but maybe you need to also look at who have I been targeting? Am I targeting the right companies? Am I targeting the right companies for the environment we’re in today? Am I taking advantage of referral sources, referral partners? I mean, are there other people, companies, businesses that I could be tapping into to introduce me to potential customers? So yeah, definitely the more senior people can get a little stale.

David Wojcik: Stale. One of my favorite sayings is I say, this worked for me so well, I stopped doing it years ago, and then we have to pull ourselves back. Why does it happen? I mean, we start off with basics, we start off with great sales training, and then we get away from that, and I wonder, why do you believe that salespeople tend to go down this wrong path?

Linda Kern: Yeah. The first word that jumped into my mind when you asked the question is complacency, but I really think it’s deeper than that, I really think it’s a lack of proper systems and processes and procedures in place to hold the salesperson accountable to what makes them successful. And so accountability in the sales world and maybe other worlds as well, but accountability can be seen as micromanaging. And so I’m always saying to sales leaders, “It’s not micromanaging, you’re actually holding your team accountable to what success looks like.” And if they’re seasoned and if they’re experienced, they need help too, because sometimes you can get complacent, sometimes you can get into a routine, sometimes you can get comfortable, and sometimes in this environment of COVID, you can get… You can start to use that as an excuse, and you really want to leverage a peer or your manager to help you have ongoing conversations about what are the right activity… It all comes down to how you spend your time, what are the right activities to take place every day and every week that will lead to my success?

Linda Kern, The Kern Group Inc

David Wojcik: So let’s talk about that because when I was in the sales game, I always started my day with a plan, but the plan was something that I set up the week before. So how important is that daily plan of towards success?

Linda Kern: Love the question, because it’s been something I’ve been fine tuning myself for, for a number of years to figure out what the right cadence is. So for me, it is different for everybody, for me, the right cadence is doing a plan on the weekend, I know that’s not required, it’s just what I like, because I always think of the Monday to Friday clock ticking, I should be engaging with prospects while they’re at their desks, and so I do it sort of an hour to 90 minutes on a Sunday usually. I don’t do it every Sunday, but on a good Sunday, I am doing it. And then I’ve built in this new thing this year, where I’m trying to sit down with a cup of coffee before my actual day begins of engaging in email, and thinking for 20 to 30 minutes, what do I want to do that day?

Some days it’s five or 10 minutes because there’s so carry over from the day before, but the idea is, I always say when it comes to the daily plan, that I want to be accountable to what I did that and feel good at the end of the day that I did what I wanted to do. Now in sales, and I think you were alluding to this, in sales, we could have the perfect plan set up for the day and by 9:00, 9:30, 8:00 even, the phone rings, we get an email and the whole plan just goes out the window. So I do warn salespeople that they have to be flexible and master the skill of prioritizing. What’s the most important thing for me to do, even though my number one was barely completed on my list of 10 things? And now I’ve got to go do something that’s not even on the list. So you do have to be flexible.

David Wojcik: There were two passages that I remember about sales. One is, one of the authors said, “The only time you’re really selling is when you’re in front of a customer, or in front of a prospect.” And the other one said that sales is 95% perspiration and 5%… sorry, 95% inspiration and 5% perspiration. So that planning for the meeting is all important, it’s like a football game, the athletes they practice and practice all week for one hour of play. How important is it for a sales manager to be on top of their team with respect to planning?

Linda Kern: So, so important. I mean, when I see problems on a sales team and a new client wouldn’t know I’m doing this, but when I see problems on a sales team, I look to the sales manager because it’s really the sales manager who gets in their way, makes them feel uncomfortable or enables their success, partners with them. And so I’m a big proponent of one-to-one. So you sit down with your sales rep now, new salespeople, you might want to sit down with them one-to-one every week, a more seasoned salespeople, I wouldn’t go any less than every other week, even with a sales senior salesperson.

David Wojcik: Right.

Linda Kern: And so it’s about talking it through, it’s about making sure that the right things are being done, and that the salesperson kind of get the opportunity to think it through and talk it through. And I sometimes, I have a business development role with one of my clients right now, and sometimes I will ask, we speak every week, I’ll ask what’s the priority right now? What’s the vision for this quarter? Because sometimes there are things that are taking place in the organization that I’m unaware of. And it’s really helpful, even though I’m a very seasoned salesperson, I still ask that question that, sometimes I think I should know the answer. So salespeople, I give you permission to ask all kinds of questions just to keep you focused.

David Wojcik: So we never assumed that just because someone is a seasoned sales professional, that they have all the tools in their bag. We’ve been in conversation with Linda Kern, she’s our sales guru from The Kern Group. Thanks for being with us.

Linda Kern: You’re welcome. My pleasure.