Soft Skills. Hard Returns.

By Bob Musial

"Soft Skills. Hard Returns." is anything but soft. Here's why. A Harvard study indicates that 80% of your career success will be determined by soft skills. Whether you're a freshly minted graduate, a workforce newbie, or a seasoned pro, in some way, regardless of title or position you'll use soft skills. Communication. Collaboration. Innovation. Persuasion. Skills long considered exclusive to a sales position have been proven necessary for career advancement regardless of profession. The ability to effectively communicate and express ideas is vital and in "Soft Skills. Hard Returns." you'll learn that and more.      

 

Since the late 1950s, researchers have studied the importance of soft skills. It continues. A recent LinkedIn study reveals that 40% of employers struggle to match candidates with job openings where soft skills are requisite. Business development. Sales. Account management. Project management. Customer experience. These positions are becoming increasingly hard to fill. Employers face a widening skills gap. Because the majority of colleges and universities don't teach soft skills. So, they're usually acquired independently, on the job, or at the employer's expense.

 

Consider "Soft Skills. Hard Returns" your "go-to." It summarizes 40+ years of successful sales, business development, strategic marketing, advertising, and client-service experience in one eBook. With bite-sized, humor-laced stories you'll learn the skills necessary to protect and expand revenue. You'll gain the know-how to address everyday issues related to the right and the not-so-right ways of planning and delivering on objectives like strategic external and internal communications along with effective and memorable presentations. Client-needs-based proposals. SILO-busting. Productive-team collaboration. Improved-customer retention. Unconventional lead-generation approaches. And more, including how to handle the "bad" boss. With 570+ tips and supporting informational links shared over 5,800 times on social media platforms.  "Soft Skills. Hard Returns" addresses topics the majority of business and non-profit organizations face with real, common-sense solutions.  

 

Whether you call them soft skills, sales skills, or people skills, they're interrelated and pivotal to career success. Without them, you put your career in a stranglehold. 

 

With them ... you'll be in demand.

• Language: English
• Publisher: StreetSmart Business Development, LLC
• Release date: Dec 9, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386351054

Bob Musial

In interviews, I’ve been referred to as a "Biz-Dev Whisperer,” with a little humor thrown in. That sounds about right. 40+ years’ worth of hard and soft skills experience in business development, sales, advertising, strategic marketing, and customer service have enabled me to generate over $300 million in new and recurring revenue n today's market, spanning a wide spectrum of business categories. Everything from startups to Fortune 50 companies. Those skills have been tempered with a strategic, practical approach to helping clients solve problems by putting their needs first. And why the humor? Because when it’s relevant, topic-related levity helps to make the whole business development experience, communication process, takeaways, and outcomes more memorable. So far ... it seems to be working

Book preview

GENERATING AWARENESS.

And maintaining it.

THE FIRST STEP IN COMMUNICATING with prospects, as well as clients, begins with grabbing their attention and keeping it. Making them nod their head in appreciation, smile and be receptive to your message. That’s where things like advertising, public relations, social media, your website and regular outreach programs come into play.

What you say. How you say it. When you say it and how often you say it, will make a difference in how your target audiences perceive, relate and react to your ideas, products, services and the value your company can offer.

In order to do those things well, and do them consistently; it helps to familiarize yourself with the subtle aspects of persuasive selling techniques related to things like: different sales stages, buying personas, understanding your audiences’ hot buttons and more.

You’ll also need to know to speak the different languages common to various positions within a company. How to best answer questions when they’re asked. How to use intriguing tools to tell your company’s story so prospects and clients will want to listen to you and how to follow up.

You’ll find answers to those How Tos in this section.

21 StreetSmart Sales Reminders.

In one way or another, everyone is in sales. Here are 21 reminders that’ll help anyone in business, no matter what your position.

THEY’RE BOB-ISMS I’ve picked up from doing business development for ... well; suffice it to say I’ve been doing it for more than a week or two. Look, there are a ton of things of things that go into being a good salesperson. Things like: knowledge, preparation and research, motivation, empathy, integrity, storytelling ability, presentation skills, listening skills, creativity and more. A lot more.

But, I also believe there are other things equally, if not more important. Or said another way ... my lessons learned and words I try to live by.

I’m sure you have yours. Here are some of mine, in no particular order.

1. There’s no such thing as can’t. This one is personal. My father always repeated that phrase to me. And, naturally, when I was a teenager who knew everything, it annoyed me. After all, what did my father know about anything? Turned out, a lot. He quit school when he was 16 to support his family. Lived on his own and had to overcome more obstacles that I’ve ever encountered (including WW II) and managed to make something of himself. Was he educated? Not formally. Was he intelligent? Absolutely. As I got older, I came to better understand and respect what he meant by telling me there was no such thing as can’t.

In essence, he was conveying to me the power of negative and positive words. Here’s some pretty unusual research done on the subject, by Japanese scientist, Masaru Emoto. I was intrigued by his findings. Skip to the part about Words and Water. Read the article, you’ll see what I mean.

2. Every meeting is a new business meeting. I’m never complacent about any meeting. I think you need to be prepared. To me, it doesn’t matter if I’ve known a client for a few minutes or a few years. I always view any meeting as an opportunity to strengthen an existing connection or make a new one. To learn and share something of value. To reinforce a relationship with credibility and trust.

3. Don’t sell anyone anything. Convince them to buy based on their need. Not yours. If it’s done right, the close will happen naturally. And you’ll get something out of it. New business. Repeat business. Oh yeah, Referrals too. It’s called value-based selling and Bob Apollo wrote a good article about it.

4. You need to speak and understand several languages. This ties into #5 below. By that I mean business languages as it relates to your products and services like: marketing, finance, project management, purchasing, and manufacturing. You need to be knowledgeable about all parts of the processes related to your business.

You can only get away with the, I don’t know, but I’ll find out response so many times before your credibility is compromised.

5. Understand the true meaning of value.  It’s about value not to you. But, to your client. Your prospect. Your employees and colleagues too. Value is a word that’s overused (to which I plead guilty). And it means different things to different people. If it’s a procurement manager, it’ll have one meaning. If it’s a CEO or a sales supervisor, it’ll mean something else. The challenge becomes understanding their definition in order to determine how you can best help them. "In our 2015 MHI Sales Best Practices Study, stated Tamara Schenk of the MHI Research Institute, we identified critical customer behaviors. One of these behaviors is that customers decide how they calculate value."

The study stated that 61% of the world-class sales performers indicated their customers required formal calculations on business value (things like ROI, TCO/Total Cost of Ownership, and specific business cases, etc.) before making a buying decision, compared to 39% the year before. You can learn more about the results by clicking here.

6. It ain’t one and done. To build on the previous point, according to research conducted at the University of California, Santa Barbara, repetition increases our mental validation of anything we’re exposed to. To that point, I always think it’s a good idea to reiterate and reinforce what the client perceives as value (there’s that word again). Whether it’s saving money, improving productivity, new technology, or competitive intelligence. You can do it with update reports, case studies or white papers. I frequently use custom cartoons that depict a problem scenario to which a client (or prospect) can relate, which also provides a solution. Whatever it is, you need to continually communicate the benefits of your product or service and do it over time. Or, said another way.

No value = No reason to buy. No reason to buy = No customers.

7. Walk the line. While reinforcing benefits and value is a positive thing, you need to be careful not to overdo it. So, I try to walk that fine line between being persistent and obnoxious with my follow-up efforts and allow for an appropriate amount of time between follow-ups. So, what’s an appropriate amount of time? It depends. Could be every other week, could be every two months. For me, it’s about every five to seven weeks. Just enough time to maintain a top-of-mind awareness without being annoying.

8. Speaking of follow-up. Whenever I send an email, I’ll always end it with, I’ll follow-up with you. I will never ask the client or prospect to call me if you have any questions. I figure, I’m the one who’s trying to gain agreement on something, so the onus is on me ... not them. Ian Brodie provides some good insights into follow-up in this article.

9. You have the right to remain silent. Besides applying in embarrassing legal situations, that statement applies in sales as well. Especially sales. Or, said another, more familiar way, He who talks first loses. Whenever there is a long pause during a meeting or presentation, particularly one which revolves around pricing negotiations, there is a natural nervous tendency by a salesperson to blurt out some type of justification. To fill the void with concessions of some type. Well, that works both ways. I learned a long time ago, the power of silence in those and other situations. Force yourself to say nothing and let the other person speak first. When they do, you’ll benefit. You will also not be negotiating against yourself. Kelley Robertson has a good example. Here it is.

10. Admit mistakes. Own it. You don’t have to grovel. Just express whatever needs to be addressed and move on. And by move on, I mean provide action items regarding how the mistake will be corrected. Then do it. And follow-up.  Here’s how Michael Houlihan, Barefoot Wine Founder, went about it.  

11. Convert critics to advocates. It’s easier said than done sometimes. I remember a time when the president of a healthcare company was required to use the ad agency where I worked, due to an acquisition and the relationship between my boss and the acquiring company’s CEO. Naturally, he wasn’t happy about it. Matter-of-fact, he told my boss and me that to our faces at our introductory meeting. Said he didn’t think we could do everything we said we could do to help him. Boy, talk about getting off on the wrong foot. But eventually, he came to realize we could, and did deliver on our promises and gradually, he became a believer. But, even better than that, he became an advocate. Was it an awkward and painful process? Sure. Did patience, persistence and performance payoff? You bet.

The key is to keep a positive attitude when faced with diversity. Accept the challenge. Then deliver. Oh yeah, make sure to follow-up.

12. Treat people like you’d like to be treated. No big revelation in this one. It’s been around a while. Guess there’s a reason why, eh?

13. Going to a meeting? Be on time. And conduct your meetings on time. Besides, unproductive meetings cost a lot of money. How much? Drake Baer from Business Insider wrote about it.  Click here to find out. It’s a staggering amount annually, as in billions staggering.

14. The most important currency you have is your word. Invest and spend it wisely. And if you give it. Keep it.

15. If your competitor has a product or service that can potentially better meet a client’s need. Don’t badmouth your competitor. That’s a display of weakness and lack of confidence. Instead, walk your client/prospect through a side-by-side benefits comparison and help them to make an informed decision. You’ll be viewed as having their best interest in mind. Which, after all, is the goal isn’t it?

16. Do what you said you were going to do. Then surprise them ... do just a little more than what your client or prospect was expecting.  Ted Rubin has a good story about the value of surprises in this article. 

17. Think inside the box. When you are forced to come up with solutions to problems with limited resources, the outcome can be truly innovative. Like when the astronauts on the ill-fated Apollo 13 moon mission had to come up with a way to scrub the air they were breathing without access to tools and materials to make it happen. They were forced to come up with a solution...or perish. In a Wall Street Journal article, Drew Boyd and Jacob Goldenberg provided some other good examples of innovations which resulted from inside-the-box thinking.

18. Don’t use clichés. Or you’ll become one. Here’s a good list of a handful or two from Jeff Haden. But, there are bunches of them. Want to see how clichés can make you useless? Check out this post by Eric Jackson.

19. Get your S _ _ _ together. And by that I mean Silo or Silos. Yeah sure, every department has a budget and their own goals. But, what good does it do if everyone is headed off in different directions because information hasn’t been shared? Or, if meaningful, really meaningful feedback isn’t being provided? Everyone and every department in an organization should have a common goal. Ed Catmull, president of Pixar Animation and Disney Animation provides some great insights in his book, Creativity, Inc. which apply to any company. It’s definitely worth reading. 

20. Do something no one else wants to do. Volunteer for the projects everyone backs away from. You’ll learn a lot about yourself. And when you succeed, practice humility and share the credit. In doing so, you’ll learn how to be a good leader.

21. Always be learning. It’s becoming even more crucial in a business development and sales environment. But don’t take my word for it, Brian Signorelli wrote about it in his HubSpot article.

IN TIMES OF CHANGE, the learners will inherit the Earth while those attached to their old certainties will find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists Eric Hoffer

Last Point.

While we may not all be Influencers, we all have had business successes (and failures) in life to some extent and as a result, have our own words and street smart reminders to live by and learn from. It can be a positive thing to share yours with others. You’ll both benefit.

It will help in creating and reinforcing three strong communication basics:

● Establishing Credibility ● Building Trust ● Providing Value

Sales is a process ... and more.

The stages may vary slightly, but the end objective is the same.

I SAT STARING AT THE Dun & Bradstreet printout. It listed information for all the prospects in my California territory including the company name, revenue figures, address, telephone number and, of course, the decision maker’s name and title. After all, that’s what they beat into our heads during the intensive five-week training program I’d just completed:

Go for the decision maker.

The training program, called Professional Selling Skills, took a then-new consultative approach to sales. The seminar instructed us on all things related to the sales process and its associated stages—such as qualifying prospects, defining needs, understanding buying patterns, overcoming objectives, presentations, developing listening skills (which my wife will say I’ve never really mastered), establishing value-added quantification in relationship to ROI, effective follow up ... the list goes on.

A lot has changed since then—or has it? It’s much easier now to find out what you need to know about a prospect or a client. But although sales terminology might have changed, the basic principles of the selling process haven’t changed that much.

While every business is different, most follow a progression with comparable sales stages. I think of it as a continuum that starts with a sales development process and ends with revenue generation. And it’s true for new business acquisition as well as expansion of existing business.

The typical sales process in the simplest terms goes something like this:

1. Do target audience research

2. Create awareness and generate leads

3. Make contact, arrange a meeting, and/or conduct a presentation

4. Submit a proposal and win the business

5. Repeat

A successful consultative sales process hinges on two things: establishing credibility and building trust. Once those two things are running smoothly, revenue gets generated. Keep one important thing in mind. It’s all about the buyer—what they want and when they want it. The key is making sure your selling efforts are in sync with their buying signals and stages.

While there are only two fundamentals to this sales process, there are far more interrelated and supporting components that need to work in order for a successful end result to occur.

Here they are.

The 7 Stages of a Successful Sales Process 

1. QUALIFICATION

This is the stage where qualitative, quantitative, demographic, and psychographic research is analyzed to gain insight into prospect behavior and buying patterns. It’s where prospect identification, confirmation, and lead generation come in. Inbound marketing, social media, and content marketing efforts help generate qualified leads, greatly reduce cold calling, and shorten the sales cycle considerably.

2. Preparation

This sales process stage encompasses a variety of diverse sales skills, such as meeting preparation, creating interest, anticipating and overcoming objections, presenting, consulting, audience-engagement techniques, closing gestures, follow-up ... and more. A lot more.

And preparation isn't just a one-time thing—it’s ongoing. Some of the other preparation components encompass understanding the competitive landscape and challenges faced by your prospects, confirming that your products and services will address those challenges and do it in a cost-effective, needs-based manner, with agreed-upon quantifiable value. If you can't do all of these things, you're not truly prepared.

3. Presentation

Assuming you’ve done all your homework in the first two stages of the process, you may be fortunate enough to book a meeting. The stage following the meeting and/or presentation will be determined by how well you have nailed down the prior two steps and how well you perform your demo