Each White Paper here is adapted from John's e-Handbook which is based on his 30+ years of High Tech (and low tech) research and hands-on experience in the USA and Europe. Each paper just a few pages and is written in conversational style for quick and pleasant comprehension. You will benefit by having your staff, your venors and your associates engage in open discussion and profitable implementation. ALL OF YOUR PEOPLE and everyone across your entire sphere of influence will be working harder and smarter to implement YOUR plans and ACHIEVE YOUR GOALS.

PROFITABLE GROWTH: Is The Goal of this page, this web site and our company:To Lift Your Margins and Your Bottom Line.

When you scroll down, you can read excerpts, plus the full paper: "Sales Overview for Non-Sales People" - at the bottom of this page.

To request any paper listed, just send an email to: mail@johncschuler.com It will be sent as a FREE, searchable, no-charge Word.doc email attachment. If you have a question or would like to see a specific subject covered, just mention it in your email.

Note: If you have a specific question to help YOUR business, right now, just send an email; a brief email or phone CONSULTATION is FREE.

John's engineering and business-operations experience is in-depth and hands-on. It covers Field Engineering and Customer Liaison, Marketing, Sales and Service. Drawing on his roles in Aerospace and Manufacturing in the US and Europe, John shares effective field-based and C-Level knowledge from his own experience, consultations, writings and seminars.

Intro: 80% of all travel is less than productive - to put it kindly. Since Pareto presented his 80/20 Rule in 1906, most of us have seen it bear out and used it in our business and daily lives.  It also applies to "Sales" Travel.

Premise: When travel is cut back, the weaker people are forced to be prepare more carefully to improve communications. Your better people get a lot more done in the time saved by not travelling. In both cases everyone wins. Your people become more effective communicators. Your customers actually get better support. And YOU gain more revenue and higher margins while spending less of your hard-earned bottom line.

Note: To request this paper, or any of the Free papers noted below, send an email to: mail@johncschuler.com

Intro: Been to a Home Depot lately? Had trouble finding something? And more trouble finding someone who actually knew something? Or worse, ever had someone tell you it is not in stock or does not even exist - only to find it 20 minutes later six aisles over? That's because the information is in a form you can NOT readily access. But the solution is at hand and it does not even require a computer.

To read more, you can request this or any of the other Free papers below by sending an email to: mail@johncschuler.com with Applying LEAN to the Retail Environment  - or any other title -in your subject line.

Intro: Most selling begins after a "Slent No" is detected from the customer. And this "selling" is improved when done empathically by "Non-Sales" people taught to listen carefully to prospects and customers. Your entire work force can quckly and easily learn to do it.

Experience has shown that you can freeze the size of YOUR SALES FORCE, yet DOUBLE YOUR PROFITS - because 95% OF CUSTOMER CONTACT WORK (aka "Sales") CAN BE shared BY EVERYONE IN THE COMPANY. The two-dozen or so topics below cover some of the key points.

Only 5% of "Sales & Marketing" Activity is "Pure Sales"; selling only starts AFTER a prospect or customer says: "No !". See paper # 5 below: "The Silent No".

That 5% - Pure Sales - Is The Handling of Customer Objections. e.g. See: "Cars Are Never Sold. Everyone in the company can help with the other 95%.

Reminder: For more information or a copy of any of John's Free White Papers, send a request to: mail@johncschuler.com

Note: If you have a specific question to help YOUR business, now, just send an email and a brief email CONSULTATION is FREE.

Intro: LEAN Manufacturing or The Toyota Way is not limited to just making cars or manufacturing goods. The concept of replacing a “standard” process-oriented system with one based on individual education and group knowledge is applicable to many other areas, including the arena of Customer Acquisition and Retention.

Intro: When good companies are in start-up mode, everyone is in "Sales". As the company grows, customer demands and unrelenting Day-To-Day & Quarter-To-Quarter pressures, steal our objectivity. A CEO needs to generate a "reset pulse" to get things back on track. Sometimes, it needs to come from an objective outsider.

Intro: To paraphrase a founder of Hewlett Packard, The Customer Acquisition and Retention Process is too important to have only your sales force doing it.

You can optimize your Customr Acquisition and Retention operation by getting ALL your people to do a better job of interfacing willingly, ably and successfully with customers.

Intro: This paper describes how CEOs and Owners can quickly and inexpensively get everyone in the company to understand the highly profitable and fun process of: Turning Prospects & Customers Into Profit Centers … And Keeping Them For A Long Time

Intro: Cars are "Marketed" by Manufacturers. People buy them - or not - in spite of the "Peddler" or "Con Artist" masquerading as a "Salesperson" at a typical dealership.

Cynical note: Most of the very few honest people who do try to make a living in automobile sales by actually helping customers are currently weeded out and fired for not going along with the Machiavellian status quo.

***

Intro: Shows the makeup, personalities, advantages and pitfalls of using various people and sales methods. From sleazy commission-only sociopathic peddlers to professional engineers helping prospects to implement million-dollar solutions. Sent as a 1-Page Microsoft Excel attachment. For your free copy, send request to: mail@johncschuler.com

Intro: Until then, you're "Marketing" - In a one-way communications channel.

Intro: Armies kill their Enemies, but Sales Forces should not kill their Customers.

Comment: Honest "Sales" is NOT a Zero-Sum game.

Intro: Calling or visiting prospective customers (Prospects) is OK.  But true "Cold Calling" to those who have NOT requested they be contacted (Suspects), is a demoralizing and wasteful use of time and money. Even worse, it antagonizes the true prospects who need your product or service. See also: Commissions Can be Dangerous

Intro: When a marketing offer fails, the prospect does not call to tell you, "No!".

Intro: If you use a commissions-only sales force, you risk alienating your prospective customers, and you put your entire company at risk.

Comment: Car Dealers are a perfect example of the pitfalls of using commissions exclusively. They churn through people at a prodigious rate. They often only survive because at the turn of the century dealers lobbied the States to block manufacturers from owning dealerships. For a discussion of why Car Dealers and many companies like "Commission-only" Sales Forces, See: Commissions vs. Leadership.

Intro: In most cases, commission-only sales forces are also poorly led. You can't develop healthy risk-taking and customer hand-holding by using fearful, insecure people. And you can't develop viable leaders when your employee base is transient and your only motivation is "Sell a Lot Or I'll Fire You!"

Intro: Most people do NOT understand the difference between "Sales and "Marketing". Sales ONLY begins AFTER the Suspect, Prospect or Customer says: "No"

Intro: If your "Sales" people are Cold Calling, it shows your marketing group has failed.

Intro: Lies - overt or covert - white, black or gray - lower one's own self image and are also a waste time and money. It is far, far better - and a lot more profitable - in an honest transaction - to state the drawbacks - and any hidden costs - right up front.

Intro: This is because we confuse Marketing with Selling, Selling with Peddling, and Salespeople with Con Artists. See also: "Free Chart" above.

Intro: John's Free Chart shows 7 different "Sales" Types, what motivates them - and how their actions - bad or good - impact your demise, survival or true success. This paper explains the background of the chart.

Intro: Most people, even "Sales and Marketing Professionals" confuse these three - or just ignore the differences.

Comment: We collectively waste hundreds of millions of dollars every year in thousands of companies, large and small - across the USA - because we don't target our audiences.

Intro: In reality, we all "Sell" all the time.  When we ask a Mentor to help us, we're selling ourselves to that Mentor or Teacher.  When we enter a restaurant, we "Sell" the host or hostess on the implied benefit (to him or her) of a finding a good table for US. 

Comment: The key is to understand WHAT we are selling - and WHY. And what we are offering the other person and why. Most people are familiar with WIIFM - What's In It For Me.  We need to also remember - WIIFOC? - What's In It For Our Customer - or Vendor or Provider or Mentor?

Intro: 95% of all sales are made - or killed - by "Non-Sales" people like you and me - and the shipping clerk, and the receptionist, and the telephone message system, and / or the human Operator.

Comment: Machines can Market (offer) things, but they can't address an objection (They Can't Sell).

Intro: You can cut your sales force in half and actually increase sales and profits - If you first train and motivate the other half - plus the "Non-Sales" people in your company to embrace Prospect and Customer Support.

Comment: To fund the change, you need to take the direct sales force money you save and use some of it for training and some of it for motivation. Your remaining people will love you for it and the extra money keeps the motivation rolling right along.  Happier people, happier customers and more money for all.

Intro: Customers don't care about our Internal Goals.  They only respond to THEIR goals.  So our External Goals must match their needs.

Intro: Imagine you are a large distributor and offer three different wines.  A 50-Point, a 75-Point and a 99-Point. Now imagine you routinely sell your 99-Point Wine at a deep discount to early arrivers, and then charge high premiums for the remaining Bottles? 

Comment: This would be an insane thing to do, right? But guess what? The Airlines do it every day! They let an early-booking $50 tourist pick out the best seat, then alienate their best business customers, by charging $150 for a middle seat in the back of the bus because that is all that is left. Then they wonder why they can't make a profit.

Intro: Being able to leave a voice mail can be a great advantage. Call at night when you really need to explain or "Set The Stage" for a future approach.

* This paper can be copied and disseminated freely with the proviso that the copyright line below is maintained.

© 2007-2008 John C. Schuler, OEM Solutions Group http://www.johncschuler.com

The Situation:

In many companies, even in technical companies, the "Sales Process" is poor to terrible - because it does NOT utilize the very strengths and capabilities taught to its own engineers – the basics of Observation, Measurement, Planning and Intervention

The Trap:

Even companies with bright and capable CEOs with a solid engineering education, once they grow beyond the start-up phase, soon fall into the day-to-day "Sales" trap of "Tactical Concentration".  They focus on a few "sales employees" and key customers - instead of developing a viable Upstream Marketing Plan and implementing a longer-term Marketing and Sales Plan using ALL their people.

Why the System Stays Broken:

Most people HATE "Sales" because they equate it to "Peddling".  And most people, especially engineers, want NOTHING to do with it. So even CEOs who have technical educations and who should know better, devolve into the quagmire of using just a few sales and marketing people.

Definitions:

Marketing:  Offering a product or service. Usually a one-way communication via many means.

Sales: What we do AFTER the Prospect or Customer says: “No!” Using empathy and intelligence to help people make good decisions that are in their best interest: Only about 5% of all activity, even in a dedicated sales force is actually “Sales”.

Pedding: Trying to get money from another person by any means – harmful or not.

Prospect: A person who has shown interest in your product or service – and can afford it, too.

Suspect: A warm body; interest and financial status unknown.

Working In A Vacuum:
Even worse, these two groups usually work in isolation from their own expensive and often-capable talent pools - to "manage" the prospect and customer base. To quote Jeffrey Pfeffer of Stanford Business School: [*] " In almost every field there are accepted truths, or conventional wisdom, that guide decisions and actions.  And in almost every field, including medicine, many practitioners and their advisors are unwilling or unable to observe the world systematically because they are trapped by their beliefs and ideologies.

"[*] Jeffrey Pfeffer & Robert I. Sutton: Hard Facts Dangerous Half-Truths & Total Nonsense; profiting from evidence-based management. Harvard Business School Press Edition (c) 2006p14

By educating the employees and associates of today - who will become the Directors, VPs and CEOs of tomorrow, about the real experience-driven value of properly implementing and managing the Customer Acquisition and Retention aspects (Sales) of their future companies, we will all have done a significant service for our Students, their future Customers - and for our Society at large.

And since our Customers are the ones with the money, and they will get better solutions because we educated their "Support Engineers", they also will fare better and have even more money.  

Giving Back:

Now if we can just build into every person and graduate who goes through the "Customer Relations" course the desire to tithe to their Alma Mater ! (;-)

With some 30 years in training and leading technical people in the sales and applications-support of complex equipments sold to C-Level Executives and Factory Managers, I’ve seen much wrong, and some right, in literally 1,000s of companies in the US and Europe. Over the years I found that the method that is most helpful - for the companies who have the courage to adopt it - is the concept of doing "Applications" 95% of the time – and "Sales" for the other 5%.

Personality:
The three key ingredients for anyone to better interface with customers and help their companies succeed - all other things being equal – are intelligence, empathy and personality. 

In the Capital Equipment world where Million-Dollar-Plus Systems are the norm, the pre-sales engineer is the one with the personality and ability to intuit the prospect’s needs. The post-sales engineer is the one who is more-typically introverted, but has enough personality bandwidth to go into the field to help an existing customer – without causing harm.

Education:
The truly introverted engineers who have no desire to even attend a "Customer-Relations" educational class or seminar are often the truly brilliant ones who are point-focused.  They too are much needed in the overall scheme of things, but perhaps only in the background where they are more comfortable.  The key - as in all education - is to fit the teaching to the student. 

Fortunately, it is often possible to improve the Customer Relations aspect of the "Engineering Personality". For those Engineers and other Non-Sales people with the desire and ability, and who can understand and internalize the differences between "Sales" and "Peddling",  we can expand their horizons while still permitting them to maintain their self-respect and prowess. 

The Bottom Line:
In many cases, the engineers and other workers who later find they don't really like being chained to a design desk or manufacturing area are the very ones who are good candidates to become "Sales Engineers" or Field Applications Engineers or Customer Support Technicians. They can contribute greatly to Customer Satisfaction, Company Growth and Improved Margins and Profits.

For more information, send email to: johnschuler@comcast.net

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