Episode 73

Why You Need Data-Driven Sales Strategies with Liz Heiman

Published on: 6th July, 2022

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Highlights

  • Growing up in a sales environment and going from international political economist to sales professional to business owner (01:09)
  • Learning to lead teams and build a business from living and learning in Japan (04:09)
  • How to turn a business around from loss-making to consistent and long-term profit-making (07:25)
  • The importance of building your sales strategy around data (11:19)
  • Knowing your worth and when it’s time to leave a job that doesn’t align with your worth (14:22)
  • Major differences between sales and marketing (17:58)
  • Getting a direct ROI on your marketing efforts and how it affects your sales (21:09)
  • Why you cannot grow your sales without a strategy and the necessary processes to support it (25:15)
  • Getting recognition for her unique way of approaching sales (30:47)

In this episode of the Transformed Sales Podcast, I had a chat with Liz Heiman, a national sales expert and the Founder and CEO of Regarding Sales. Her firm focuses on building B2B operating systems that drive extraordinary growth. She uses strategy and process to create a roadmap for success that focuses clients on getting the results that they need. She is an experienced international political economist well-schooled in digging through data to interpret results. With her unique background, combined with her focus on strategy and process, Liz delivers clients concrete solutions for difficult sales problems.

Do you believe sales is predictable and manageable? Liz says it is. From a brief look across the sales landscape, it’s clear that the importance of a data-driven sales strategy is not understood. Liz believes that it’s a huge mistake for anyone to think that their sales team can just start calling leads and make sales. A plan is needed to be most effective. And she will lend her expertise in this eye-opening episode so you can learn how to go about that and so much more. Don’t miss out! 

Quotes

“Activity without strategy and process is chaos” - Liz Heiman

“If you don't want chaos, then you have to have a strategy and processes to support it. And many sales organizations do not have that” - Liz Heiman

“Sales is about individual engagement with people and helping them solve their individual problems. Marketing is about helping people identify me as a potential solution to their problem” - Liz Heiman

Learn More About Liz in the Links Below:

Connect with Wesleyne Greer:

  • Wesleyne’s Website - https://transformedsales.com/
  • Wesleyne on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/wesleynegreer/
  • Wesleyne on Facebook - https://web.facebook.com/wesleynegreer
  • Wesleyne on Twitter - https://twitter.com/wesleynegreer
  • Email Her at wesleyne@transformedsales.com
Transcript
Wesleyne Greer:

Welcome to another episode of the transform

Wesleyne Greer:

sales podcast where we talk all about the science of selling

Wesleyne Greer:

stamp today. I am so excited to have Liz Hyman with me. How are

Wesleyne Greer:

you, Liz?

Liz Heiman:

I'm great. How are you?

Wesleyne Greer:

I am doing amazing. Let me tell you guys a

Wesleyne Greer:

little bit about Liz. She's the National Sales expert and the

Wesleyne Greer:

founder and CEO of regarding sales. Her firm focuses on

Wesleyne Greer:

building b2b operating systems that drive extraordinary growth.

Wesleyne Greer:

She uses strategy and process to create a roadmap for success

Wesleyne Greer:

that focuses clients on getting the results that they need. Liz

Wesleyne Greer:

is an experienced international political economist well

Wesleyne Greer:

schooled in digging through data to interpret results. With her

Wesleyne Greer:

unique background combined with her focus on strategy and

Wesleyne Greer:

process. Liz delivers clients concrete solutions for difficult

Wesleyne Greer:

sales problems. She is the youngest of five siblings and

Wesleyne Greer:

lived in California as well as Japan until finally settling on

Wesleyne Greer:

the Big Island with her daughter Solis. How does a political

Wesleyne Greer:

economist turn into sales and then start their own business?

Wesleyne Greer:

Tell us about your journey?

Liz Heiman:

Wow. It's been an interesting journey. Yeah. So I

Liz Heiman:

grew up in the world of sales, as you know, as lean my dad is

Liz Heiman:

Steve Hyman of Miller Heiman, fame, he started the company,

Liz Heiman:

Miller Heiman, some of you may recognize the book strategic

Liz Heiman:

selling or conceptual selling. And so I kind of got into sales.

Liz Heiman:

Naturally, it wasn't my choice. So I went to school, my I was

Liz Heiman:

going to study Peace Studies. And I did I said if he studies

Liz Heiman:

and then I decided, well, you know what most complex are about

Liz Heiman:

economics in the long run. So let's study economics. And so I

Liz Heiman:

studied international political economy. And my dissertation

Liz Heiman:

research was on the role of public opinion in US Japanese

Liz Heiman:

trade negotiations. So you know, you would think it would be

Liz Heiman:

related. But actually, I learned a lot about public opinion and

Liz Heiman:

about how words change belief systems. And you know, like, one

Liz Heiman:

of my favorite stories Sorry, I'm gonna just do this really

Liz Heiman:

quickly is, while I was working on my dissertation, and I was

Liz Heiman:

living in Japan, they had a drought and the Japanese believe

Liz Heiman:

with all their hearts and souls and minds that that Japanese

Liz Heiman:

rice is the best rice in the world. And with that belief, if

Liz Heiman:

you have to import rice, what do you do? Well, the ministers of

Liz Heiman:

trade decided to do was create mixed rice. So they brought in

Liz Heiman:

rice and they mixed it all together. It was long grain

Liz Heiman:

rice, short grain rice, brown rice, basmati rice, and then try

Liz Heiman:

cook that mess up is terrible. So confirming the belief that

Liz Heiman:

the Japanese rice is the best rice in the world. And when I

Liz Heiman:

brought my friends in Japan, Calrose rice, which is what I

Liz Heiman:

eat here, and what we grow in California, they were like this

Liz Heiman:

is really good. Like they're kidding. Actually action of what

Liz Heiman:

you pay for rice. So I learned a lot about how words framed the

Liz Heiman:

way people think. And because I was looking at public opinion,

Liz Heiman:

and watching how the information was coming out to them, and then

Liz Heiman:

how they were interpreting it and how public opinion changed.

Liz Heiman:

It really, it was really interesting. And so it impacts

Liz Heiman:

what I do now a lot. I went back to work for Miller Heiman. So I

Liz Heiman:

started working there very young, I went back to work for

Liz Heiman:

them in 1998, as the director of Asia Pacific, and I can tell you

Liz Heiman:

all about that if you want. And then when they sold the company,

Liz Heiman:

it became clear at some point that really probably wasn't

Liz Heiman:

great for me to still be hanging around is one of the original

Liz Heiman:

islands. And so I started my own business. And then I worked with

Liz Heiman:

my sister, who's also a sales consultant, Alice Hyman for a

Liz Heiman:

while, and then I restarted my own business. And so that's how

Liz Heiman:

I got where I am now.

Wesleyne Greer:

So you literally been all the way around the

Wesleyne Greer:

world and back. And I really liked the fact that a part of

Wesleyne Greer:

what you did when you were in school was to understand the

Wesleyne Greer:

Japanese culture living in Japan. And then when you stepped

Wesleyne Greer:

into the corporate realm, you became the director of the APAC

Wesleyne Greer:

region, Asia Pacific region. So how did that your time in Japan

Wesleyne Greer:

to help you lead teams and build a business in the Asia Pacific

Wesleyne Greer:

region?

Liz Heiman:

I think the most important thing I learned as an

Liz Heiman:

exchange student because I was an exchange student college and

Liz Heiman:

then I did my graduate work as a ministry of education. Japanese

Liz Heiman:

Ministry of Education researcher came to say, here's what I

Liz Heiman:

learned is that people approach the world differently, which

Liz Heiman:

means they approach problems differently. So one day, I

Liz Heiman:

needed business cards, and I went and I like my dad called

Liz Heiman:

for Miller, Heiman said, I'm going to teach a program and I

Liz Heiman:

need you to translate, go get some business cards, I'll be

Liz Heiman:

there in three days or a week or whatever it was, and I went to

Liz Heiman:

get business cards and they're like, Okay, well have them in

Liz Heiman:

two weeks. And I'm like, if I pay you more, can I have them

Liz Heiman:

sooner? And they're like, no or in their life and us you're

Liz Heiman:

like, yes. How much you willing to pay? I will tell you, right.

Liz Heiman:

And so I begin this process of learning about how people see

Liz Heiman:

problems differently. And one of the reasons I really believe in

Liz Heiman:

a diverse workforce is because the cultural box we grow up in,

Liz Heiman:

and I don't mean this in a negative way, when we talk about

Liz Heiman:

being outside the box, we're talking about being outside that

Liz Heiman:

cultural box, not just outside any box, right? So that means

Liz Heiman:

that the moment I put people of cultural diversity of any

Liz Heiman:

diversity into the room together, we're naturally when

Liz Heiman:

we say outside the box, we're talking about two different

Liz Heiman:

boxes. And so you have this amazing thing that happens when

Liz Heiman:

you start to put people together of diversity. And because they

Liz Heiman:

see the world differently, and I would not have known this, had I

Liz Heiman:

not lived in Japan. And I'd be like, Okay, this makes no sense

Liz Heiman:

to me, right? Whatever it was, you know, there were a million

Liz Heiman:

things, every one of this makes no sense to me, because I was

Liz Heiman:

looking at it from the perspective of an American on a

Liz Heiman:

Japanese culture. And sometimes I was amazed. And sometimes I

Liz Heiman:

was appalled. But so then when I became the director of Asia

Liz Heiman:

Pacific, I understood a couple of things. One is I understood

Liz Heiman:

how Japanese people buy things, because I bought things with

Liz Heiman:

them and spent time with them and learned with them. So I

Liz Heiman:

began to understand how Japanese culture works, how they buy, how

Liz Heiman:

they think, also, my research helped me understand that. So

Liz Heiman:

then you can make some assumptions about how is that

Liz Heiman:

going to be in the rest of Asia, and there are differences in

Liz Heiman:

their similarities. But so I use all of that knowledge to help me

Liz Heiman:

to grow the Asia Pacific region. And when I started at Miller,

Liz Heiman:

Heiman, they were losing $200,000 a year. And when I

Liz Heiman:

left, two years later, we just we hadn't quite hit a million,

Liz Heiman:

but we were about to hit a million so and on track for

Liz Heiman:

5,000,005 years. So it was just taking everything. And when you

Liz Heiman:

start with the place that there isn't just one way to do it,

Liz Heiman:

there isn't just one answer to the problem, that if I look at

Liz Heiman:

it from a different perspective, I might come up with a different

Liz Heiman:

answer really changes the way you problem solve.

Wesleyne Greer:

Hmm. So I'm curious, you know, in this world

Wesleyne Greer:

that we're living in these days, it's such a global place. And

Wesleyne Greer:

when we think about leaders taking over positions, a lot of

Wesleyne Greer:

times they're taking over failing territories, or regions,

Wesleyne Greer:

or you know, places like you mentioned, what are some of the

Wesleyne Greer:

tips that you can give them to really start writing the ship?

Wesleyne Greer:

Like, what are some of those things that you would tell them

Wesleyne Greer:

will help kind of get from a loss to really having a big

Wesleyne Greer:

game?

Liz Heiman:

I think the first thing is to understand your

Liz Heiman:

data. And I'm amazed how many times I go into a company. And

Liz Heiman:

I'll ask them for things. Okay, tell me, tell me who sold what

Liz Heiman:

to whom tell me how much of what widget, have you sold? Tell me,

Liz Heiman:

like, I'll just start asking questions. Let's look at all

Liz Heiman:

your clients, I want to do a whitespace mapping, let's pull

Liz Heiman:

out a list of all of your clients and figure out what they

Liz Heiman:

bought. And I start playing with the data. And I really do play

Liz Heiman:

with data differently than a lot of people do. Ask, just start

Liz Heiman:

playing with it and go Well, what if this? Well, what if

Liz Heiman:

this? Well, what's the difference between this and

Liz Heiman:

this? And I'll start creating? I think in spreadsheets? It's a

Liz Heiman:

really weird way to think but I do think in spreadsheets, I

Liz Heiman:

think it comes up from my training. So you go into the

Liz Heiman:

data, and you find out what's really going on? Which

Liz Heiman:

distributors are selling and which ones aren't? What are your

Liz Heiman:

distributor selling? Are the things that your distributor

Liz Heiman:

selling profitable? Who are your different salespeople? What do

Liz Heiman:

they sell? What did they focus on? Where are they successful?

Liz Heiman:

What kinds of companies are they successful? And what kinds of

Liz Heiman:

companies are buying from you? What kinds aren't buying, like,

Liz Heiman:

just start playing with the data, don't have any

Liz Heiman:

expectations, just start putting out tables and comparing things

Liz Heiman:

and looking for things? And you will find the answers that you

Liz Heiman:

need? Because you'll say okay, this is where we're selling the

Liz Heiman:

most, whatever that is, and then we have to stop and go, is that

Liz Heiman:

the most profitable place we could be selling? Is that what

Liz Heiman:

we should be selling? And if the answer is yes, then how do I

Liz Heiman:

increase that? Do I sell more of that to more different people?

Liz Heiman:

Do I sell more of that to my existing clients who one of the

Liz Heiman:

things that I learned the minute I get in is if you have existing

Liz Heiman:

clients, you're leaving millions and millions of dollars on the

Liz Heiman:

table every single day? So what's going on with my key

Liz Heiman:

accounts? What's going on with the accounts? That should be key

Liz Heiman:

accounts, but I haven't done anything to grow them? And then

Liz Heiman:

what other things can I be selling to my existing clients?

Liz Heiman:

Right? So I've got them in the door. So that's how you start,

Liz Heiman:

you just start playing with the data until you can figure out

Liz Heiman:

what's a logical path. And what we don't do is what most people

Liz Heiman:

do, which is they say, okay, corporate gave us a number $5

Liz Heiman:

million, you get 10 of it, you tenement you get 10 of it go,

Liz Heiman:

that is not strategic, and it's not helpful. So you have to

Liz Heiman:

really decide where do I want this business to grow? Which

Liz Heiman:

kinds of accounts do I want them to go after? Which kinds of

Liz Heiman:

accounts do I want them to grow? You have to really be thoughtful

Liz Heiman:

and strategic. And one of the reasons companies get in so much

Liz Heiman:

trouble is low hanging fruit, right? Oh, we'll just go for the

Liz Heiman:

low hanging fruit or the mentality, I can sell anything,

Liz Heiman:

you know, I can deliver anything. So you sell it, I'll

Liz Heiman:

deliver it. Well, none of that is the basis for making business

Liz Heiman:

decisions. That's a basis for figuring out how to get the

Liz Heiman:

highest Commission, which I value in my salespeople. But now

Liz Heiman:

I want to direct them in a way that helps the business grow,

Liz Heiman:

and therefore will help them have higher commissions in the

Liz Heiman:

future. So it's about looking at all of the pieces together. Does

Liz Heiman:

that make any sense at all?

Wesleyne Greer:

So it makes absolute sense. It's really you

Wesleyne Greer:

have to start at a granular level, right? So a lot of people

Wesleyne Greer:

don't like starting at that granular level, sometimes they

Wesleyne Greer:

started a 50 million foot view, but you start at the granular

Wesleyne Greer:

level, because you're right, data doesn't lie. Right. So

Wesleyne Greer:

where are we selling? What are we selling? Who is selling,

Wesleyne Greer:

right? Like, let's just start with some data. And then once we

Wesleyne Greer:

start with the data, we figure out, okay, we're doing really

Wesleyne Greer:

well here, why are we not replicating this success in this

Wesleyne Greer:

area? Or why are we like you said, we're leaving so much

Wesleyne Greer:

money on the table? Because all of our customers only have one

Wesleyne Greer:

of our products? Or one of our services? Why are we not doing

Wesleyne Greer:

upsells? Then you go into the strategy, and I think so many

Wesleyne Greer:

people like to do it backwards. They're like, Oh, this is what

Wesleyne Greer:

we need. Okay, we need to have 20% year over year growth. But

Wesleyne Greer:

Where's that coming from? And how are we gonna make it? Yeah,

Wesleyne Greer:

and so

Liz Heiman:

we'll just pop it down. Without any data. It's

Liz Heiman:

really interesting. One client I was working with many years ago,

Liz Heiman:

I was like, Okay, well, where do you want to grow? And they're

Liz Heiman:

like, automotive? You know, we do great in automotive. And I'm

Liz Heiman:

like, Okay, well, let's look at it. So I pull out my favorite

Liz Heiman:

spreadsheet, which is company sales, wrap products, how much

Liz Heiman:

they bought of each, you know, size of the company, number of

Liz Heiman:

employees, whatever it is that you need to figure out what your

Liz Heiman:

growth potential is. And I went, Okay, you have seven automotive

Liz Heiman:

company, they buy one product, will they buy the other

Liz Heiman:

products? Why don't you go figure out if they'll buy the

Liz Heiman:

other products before you decide if you're gonna focus on money,

Liz Heiman:

because if they're only gonna buy one product, your potential

Liz Heiman:

for growth is really small. They had no idea because they've

Liz Heiman:

never looked at the data that

Wesleyne Greer:

way. Yeah. And then it's like, okay, so we know

Wesleyne Greer:

our product works best in this vertical. Why? Just like, how do

Wesleyne Greer:

you know that? Because like I said, in automotive, yeah,

Wesleyne Greer:

there's a huge win. But the sales cycle is so long, like,

Wesleyne Greer:

and can the company afford to float this long sales cycle to

Wesleyne Greer:

only get one product sold? Or does it make sense for us to

Wesleyne Greer:

switch industries? So we can kind of say, okay, we can get

Wesleyne Greer:

faster wins, maybe it's a smaller ticket item, but it's

Wesleyne Greer:

faster and more widgets, right?

Liz Heiman:

Or maybe it's got a higher profit margin, or maybe I

Liz Heiman:

have to start with this product to get in the door. And then I

Liz Heiman:

saw my higher profit margin products, but not to this

Liz Heiman:

industry, or Yeah, you know, there's all kinds of things that

Liz Heiman:

could be true. So you have to start asking the question. And

Liz Heiman:

one of the things that I've learned over the years is

Liz Heiman:

sometimes those key accounts, the most important accounts are

Liz Heiman:

the least profitable. And the other thing I find is that

Liz Heiman:

there'll be if you take the clients, and you put them in

Liz Heiman:

order of highest sales to lowest sales, and you look at the

Liz Heiman:

bottom 20%, they're not worth your time, because all together,

Liz Heiman:

they make up a fraction of your highest account, and you're

Liz Heiman:

like, how much time does it take to service these 50 accounts?

Liz Heiman:

What if I turned those 50 into, I got rid of them and got three

Liz Heiman:

at a better size? Right? I could replace them with three

Liz Heiman:

companies that don't even buy a lot. So it's looking at all of

Liz Heiman:

the information to figure out where are we putting our effort?

Liz Heiman:

And how much sales time does it take to sell those 50 accounts

Liz Heiman:

that are spending? I mean, seriously $300 a year in some

Liz Heiman:

cases, and like and your top clients spends $300,000 a year?

Liz Heiman:

So how can you justify that? Well, I made a lot of them, do

Liz Heiman:

you really need a lot of if they're buying online, and you

Liz Heiman:

don't have to do anything, you get 1000s of them? And who

Liz Heiman:

cares? Hallelujah, that's great revenue. But if your salespeople

Liz Heiman:

have to work on it, how do you justify the salespersons time?

Liz Heiman:

Yeah, and he count people and onboarding in a $300 or

Liz Heiman:

$500 $1,000 sale. And this is the kind of stuff you really got

Liz Heiman:

to think about. The reason I'm about data is I spent three

Liz Heiman:

hours combing through a customer's data, a client's data

Liz Heiman:

yesterday, and I'm so totally in the data mindset, right?

Wesleyne Greer:

You're like, your mind is all about the data.

Wesleyne Greer:

So you went from your father's company, you said, Hey, I think

Wesleyne Greer:

it's probably time for me to leave when you have to make that

Wesleyne Greer:

decision, although the company had been sold, and it was

Wesleyne Greer:

acquired by another company. Talk to us about that transition

Wesleyne Greer:

that you went through, knowing that you'd worked in this

Wesleyne Greer:

company for like, literally grew up in the company, you had to

Wesleyne Greer:

leave. What did you go through? How did you know it was time?

Wesleyne Greer:

That's the first question. And the second question is what was

Wesleyne Greer:

the process you use to move forward?

Liz Heiman:

So there are a couple of things. Remember that

Liz Heiman:

my focus was on Japan. So that was part of one of the things

Liz Heiman:

that drove me but when I was at Nordheim, and there were a

Liz Heiman:

number of things that made me say This is probably time for me

Liz Heiman:

to leave. But the moment came when I said, okay, my contract

Liz Heiman:

was that when the company had a million dollars, I started get

Liz Heiman:

10% of revenue instead of the salary I was getting, which was

Liz Heiman:

relatively low comparatively. And he looked at me and said,

Liz Heiman:

We're not going to honor that contract. Oh, so if you want to

Liz Heiman:

stay in this day at the salary that you're getting with no

Liz Heiman:

commissions? And I said, No, thank you. I guess you don't

Liz Heiman:

want me to be here anymore. And he left. Wow. So that was, you

Liz Heiman:

know, it was really obvious. And I think we should all do that. I

Liz Heiman:

think that there comes a point where you said, this is what I'm

Liz Heiman:

worth. And if somebody doesn't see the value, then go figure

Liz Heiman:

out if somebody else sees the value. So the reason I went to

Liz Heiman:

work for myself was I really wanted to do stuff relating to

Liz Heiman:

Japan. And I don't know why I didn't try to go get an Asia

Liz Heiman:

Pacific job. It just seemed natural to me, that it was time

Liz Heiman:

to start thinking about, and I started a company at that time

Liz Heiman:

called regarding Japan. And my concept was, as an atlas company

Liz Heiman:

with two parts. And your laugh at this one part was going to be

Liz Heiman:

consulting because I knew tons of people who could do

Liz Heiman:

consulting on business between the US and Japan. And my idea

Liz Heiman:

was, okay, well, we'll grow it, you know, it'll be you, Japan,

Liz Heiman:

and then we'll add Korean scholars and experts, and then

Liz Heiman:

you know, whatever. The other part of it would be in this

Liz Heiman:

remember is in 2002. The other part is, and we were still

Liz Heiman:

using, I think, at that point, we were probably still using

Liz Heiman:

dogpile instead of Google and Google was, you know, not our

Liz Heiman:

number one choice of things to do. And I thought, Okay, here's

Liz Heiman:

what I'm going to do. The other part of the business is going to

Liz Heiman:

be like a directory. This is how I thought of it. So if you're in

Liz Heiman:

Chicago, and you're a sushi chef, you put your name on here

Liz Heiman:

for five or $10 a year. And then anybody who wants to know why

Liz Heiman:

anything about Japan, then they just go into their database,

Liz Heiman:

right? And I went to my dad, my brilliant dad, and I said, Dad,

Liz Heiman:

this is what I wanted to do. And he looked at me and said, That's

Liz Heiman:

not my business. And I look back now and go, Yeah, that was a

Liz Heiman:

business was actually a business. So but in any case, I

Liz Heiman:

started doing regarding sales. And then I still ended up doing

Liz Heiman:

coaching, teaching programs for Miller Heiman. And over time, I

Liz Heiman:

found that my clients were not in the regarding sales area,

Liz Heiman:

they were just business and sales. I mean, regarding Japan

Liz Heiman:

stuff, they were in just business and sales. And then

Liz Heiman:

when I moved to Hawaii, and I thought, Oh, this will be great.

Liz Heiman:

But I'm on the Big Island of Hawaii, and all of the business

Liz Heiman:

between Japan and Hawaii was happening in a wahoo. And so

Liz Heiman:

pretty soon, I just started doing sales and marketing

Liz Heiman:

consulting. And I was doing a lot of marketing consulting on a

Liz Heiman:

small islands. And then when I came back, after 14 years in

Liz Heiman:

Hawaii, I came back and just started getting back into the

Liz Heiman:

world of into the world really, and more into the world of

Liz Heiman:

sales. Hmm.

Wesleyne Greer:

So sales and marketing, let's do some

Wesleyne Greer:

Mythbusters. Here, a lot of people think oh, sales and

Wesleyne Greer:

marketing are the same thing. If you're a good salesperson, you

Wesleyne Greer:

can be a good marketing person, if you're a good marketing

Wesleyne Greer:

person, you can be a good salesperson. So tell us from

Wesleyne Greer:

your opinion, what's the biggest difference there.

Liz Heiman:

So first of all, the difference between sales and

Liz Heiman:

marketing is that as a salesperson, I'm about

Liz Heiman:

individual engagement with people and helping them solve

Liz Heiman:

their individual problems. My job in marketing is to help

Liz Heiman:

people identify me as a potential solution to a problem,

Liz Heiman:

even a problem they didn't know they had, maybe maybe I'd

Liz Heiman:

helping them identify that there's a problem or that

Liz Heiman:

there's a problem that can be solved, they may not know that

Liz Heiman:

they may know they have a problem, but they don't think it

Liz Heiman:

can be solved, they may not even know that that it's a problem or

Liz Heiman:

a possibility for the future. That's the primary difference.

Liz Heiman:

Now, some of that has come back together. Because in a world

Liz Heiman:

where people buy online marketing is moving the needle

Liz Heiman:

until they make the purchasing decision. But any decision that

Liz Heiman:

is made that requires an individual to engage with the

Liz Heiman:

customer in order for that decision to be made. That's

Liz Heiman:

really where sales steps in. So so if you are completely 100%,

Liz Heiman:

digitally driven business where all of the buying happens

Liz Heiman:

online, you don't have a sales department, your marketing

Liz Heiman:

department is your sales department in that case, because

Liz Heiman:

all sales happen that way. But the moment you start having and

Liz Heiman:

I really focus on business to business complex sales, so the

Liz Heiman:

moment you start having business to business engagements, you

Liz Heiman:

have a sales department. So as that engagement gets more

Liz Heiman:

complex, meaning you have multiple people involved in

Liz Heiman:

buying decision, it's a big dollar amount. It's going to

Liz Heiman:

impact multiple departments, it could take six to nine months,

Liz Heiman:

12 months I've a client that five years is their sales cycle

Liz Heiman:

because they sell to the Department of Transportation. So

Liz Heiman:

from the time that they decide to do a project could could be

Liz Heiman:

five years until it actually happens. So that's kind of the

Liz Heiman:

difference between sales and marketing. And I really moved

Liz Heiman:

when I was in Hawaii, it made sense on my little island in the

Liz Heiman:

middle of the Pacific to be focused more on marketing

Liz Heiman:

because most of it is business to consumer and In the stuff

Liz Heiman:

that's business to business is business to small business

Liz Heiman:

because there are no big businesses there. Except like

Liz Heiman:

selling coffee. Coffee is a huge industry in my little island

Liz Heiman:

bento. But that was business to business complex because they

Liz Heiman:

were selling to resellers or to restaurants or anyway. But when

Liz Heiman:

I came back to the bigger world where marketing has become so

Liz Heiman:

complex, there's not even such a thing, as somebody who's a

Liz Heiman:

marketing expert who can do the digital, the content,

Liz Heiman:

advertising, SEO, the web, like knowing all of those things has

Liz Heiman:

become so big, that if you are selling to enterprise, or you

Liz Heiman:

have a huge business to consumer company, one person can't know

Liz Heiman:

everything they need to know. So I started focusing on sales

Liz Heiman:

only, although I do a lot of messaging and positioning with

Liz Heiman:

my customers, with my clients. But the point is that in a

Liz Heiman:

business to business complex sale, the same kinds of things

Liz Heiman:

have to happen all the time. So we keep, I can help them build

Liz Heiman:

all of that. But when you get in the marketing side, you need

Liz Heiman:

multiple experts to make that happen.

Wesleyne Greer:

I'm with you. I actually, when I started my

Wesleyne Greer:

business, I started it and I was an outsourced sales and

Wesleyne Greer:

marketing manager for small businesses. And I soon realized

Wesleyne Greer:

that, oh, I really don't like marketing. That for me, because

Wesleyne Greer:

as you said, sales is the one to one, it's the How can I convince

Wesleyne Greer:

this person to move from one step to the next step? Whereas

Wesleyne Greer:

marketing, it's like, Hey, I'm a person in this world, come

Wesleyne Greer:

identify me. And so like you I'm very metrics driven and the

Wesleyne Greer:

marketing metrics, I call them kind of warm and fuzzy, right?

Wesleyne Greer:

It's like you can't really get a direct ROI on exactly what

Wesleyne Greer:

you're doing and how that impacts the sales.

Liz Heiman:

Well, we can actually, okay, actually can if

Liz Heiman:

we do it, right. So this is one of the things that I do help

Liz Heiman:

companies do, what happens is that the ROI is not a short term

Liz Heiman:

ROI. So in marketing, we tend to focus on conversions, meaning

Liz Heiman:

somebody downloaded, somebody pressed a button, somebody

Liz Heiman:

agreed to a meeting, whatever it was that that's there's

Liz Heiman:

conversions, and that's fine. But there's a difference between

Liz Heiman:

conversions and a marketing qualified lead, and a sales

Liz Heiman:

qualified lead, right. So marketing, qualified lead meets

Liz Heiman:

certain set of criteria, sales, qualified lead has to be valid

Liz Heiman:

enough for a salesperson to say I have a super busy day with a

Liz Heiman:

whole bunch of clients who need my time and attention. And I'm

Liz Heiman:

actually this is worth me paying attention to right. And then

Liz Heiman:

then sales goes on to qualify further, right. So this is

Liz Heiman:

qualified to deliver to sales. Now sales qualifies out those

Liz Heiman:

that are not, it's not the right timeline, it's not whatever

Liz Heiman:

would it's not the right product fit, they don't have the budget,

Liz Heiman:

whatever. So there's a disqualifying process has to

Liz Heiman:

happen. So in the midst of all of that is the tracking. And

Liz Heiman:

what happens is our tracking is very poor. Yeah. So you have to

Liz Heiman:

set up your CRM such that I know the first touch happened here,

Liz Heiman:

you have to be able to have multiple tags associated with a

Liz Heiman:

customer under source. So maybe the first time we talked to them

Liz Heiman:

was at a at a trade show. And maybe they didn't talk to us for

Liz Heiman:

three years. And then we sent out something and now there's

Liz Heiman:

actually two, two lead sources, because we wouldn't have had the

Liz Heiman:

second conversation if we hadn't met them at the trade show. And

Liz Heiman:

so what we think is, oh, well, we didn't make enough money on

Liz Heiman:

that trade show. Well, maybe we did, it just took three years to

Liz Heiman:

do it. Hmm. So that's what we need to know. And we need to

Liz Heiman:

know the lifetime value of the client. So I'm that convert a

Liz Heiman:

lot more through other marketing methods that don't last as long

Liz Heiman:

that don't buy as much, but the ones that I needed to trade show

Liz Heiman:

that are really ideal customers, it may take longer for them to

Liz Heiman:

buy, but they may buy 1020 30 times as much and stay with us

Liz Heiman:

longer. So what we have to look at the short term, but we also

Liz Heiman:

have to look at the long term, the lifetime value of a customer

Liz Heiman:

to really know what works and what doesn't work. And it's very

Liz Heiman:

complicated. And

Wesleyne Greer:

so you are, I would say or what you do, or

Wesleyne Greer:

did, I would consider you a strategic marketing advisor,

Wesleyne Greer:

right? Because it's, you're giving people those metrics that

Wesleyne Greer:

matter. One of the things that I find with a lot of the marketing

Wesleyne Greer:

firms that are out there is they're just focused on pay per

Wesleyne Greer:

click, or they're just focused on LinkedIn. They're only

Wesleyne Greer:

focused in their little silo. And it's like, well, how does it

Wesleyne Greer:

play into the big picture of what we need? And like you said,

Wesleyne Greer:

understanding those conversion points. So okay, we went to a

Wesleyne Greer:

trade. So we got 100 leads, those leads are in the system,

Wesleyne Greer:

and you're like, Oh, we're not going back to that trade show

Wesleyne Greer:

next year, because nobody converted, right? But it's the

Wesleyne Greer:

continuous touch. They're opening our newsletters. They're

Wesleyne Greer:

doing something they're clicking on links. They're not raising

Wesleyne Greer:

their hand yet, but they're doing those passive things to

Wesleyne Greer:

let you know that I'm still here.

Liz Heiman:

Yeah. And when need to be really clear about this is

Liz Heiman:

the customer journey thing, right? What is our customer's

Liz Heiman:

journey? And who are the people that become part of the customer

Liz Heiman:

journey that actually have the ability to start the sales

Liz Heiman:

process?

Wesleyne Greer:

Hmm, yeah, that's good. So tell us about

Wesleyne Greer:

your current venture, because we're now we're back in the

Wesleyne Greer:

States. So we've gone around the world, and we're back in the

Wesleyne Greer:

States, tell us about your current company.

Liz Heiman:

So my company is called regarding sales. And I

Liz Heiman:

focus on strategy and process. So what I believe is that

Liz Heiman:

activity without strategy or process is chaos. So if you

Liz Heiman:

don't want chaos, then you have to have a strategy and processes

Liz Heiman:

to support it. And many sales organizations do not have that.

Liz Heiman:

And so when you talk to the CEO, or the founder about sales, they

Liz Heiman:

will say things like, my Sales Team Drives me crazy. Sometimes

Liz Heiman:

they'll say things like, they all need to be fired, and we

Liz Heiman:

need to hire all new ones. Or they'll say things like, it's

Liz Heiman:

totally unpredictable. I cannot run my business based upon the

Liz Heiman:

information that I get. It's unpredictable, they're

Liz Heiman:

unmanageable, it's chaos. And I hear this over and over and over

Liz Heiman:

again. And even if you don't say the words out loud, if you're a

Liz Heiman:

CEO, or founder, chances are you're feeling some of it. And I

Liz Heiman:

know that because when I'll say it, people will go. Yes. Totally

Liz Heiman:

chaotic. So how do we fix that? Well, one is we need to have

Liz Heiman:

processes. One, we need a strategy. If salespeople are

Liz Heiman:

just arbitrarily selling, so what so you're selling, but you

Liz Heiman:

have a vision and values and a mission, your vision for where

Liz Heiman:

you want to be in the future? Are the things that you're

Liz Heiman:

selling. Now taking you where you want to go, where you

Liz Heiman:

believe your growth path is? Are these the clients that will grow

Liz Heiman:

with you and stay with you? Are these the clients that as you

Liz Heiman:

develop your product, it's going to fit them? Or are you trying

Liz Heiman:

to develop a product to fit everybody, because your

Liz Heiman:

salespeople are selling to everybody, and everybody has

Liz Heiman:

different needs? So is your sales organization directed in

Liz Heiman:

such a way that they can be successful, and you can be

Liz Heiman:

successful? So you've got to start with strategy, you got to

Liz Heiman:

start with things like your value, vision and mission,

Liz Heiman:

vision, values and mission. Thank you. I always do that

Liz Heiman:

backwards. In case you didn't notice that, from what everybody

Liz Heiman:

else says. And then you need to know who your ideal customer is,

Liz Heiman:

or who your ideal customers are, who am I selling to what

Liz Heiman:

industries, but what about the people in those industries or

Liz Heiman:

companies in those industries? Make them really ideal? And then

Liz Heiman:

you need to how am I positioned in the marketplace? Right? visa

Liz Heiman:

vie my customers problem visa vie the competition? How am I

Liz Heiman:

positioned? How do I talk about me as a company, and what I

Liz Heiman:

deliver and who I deliver it to? And then like, if you think

Liz Heiman:

about tennis shoes, how is Nike position versus Adidas? Versus

Liz Heiman:

ASICs? Right? They all have totally different positioning in

Liz Heiman:

the marketplace, they spend billions of dollars trying to

Liz Heiman:

make sure everybody knows how they're positioned in the

Liz Heiman:

marketplace. Just do it right. And then we have to understand

Liz Heiman:

value proposition. If it's a business to business complex

Liz Heiman:

sale, we have multiple buyers, that we need a different value

Liz Heiman:

proposition, we need to understand what is their

Liz Heiman:

relationship to the problem? And how do I talk to them about it?

Liz Heiman:

So that's the beginning of building strategy and messaging.

Liz Heiman:

And then we have to think about process. What is my sales

Liz Heiman:

process? How does it fit into my CRM? How do I manage it? Was my

Liz Heiman:

sales strategy? What are those numbers that we came up with?

Liz Heiman:

And how am I really going to hit them? What industries makes

Liz Heiman:

sense? Which people make sense, which products makes sense, all

Liz Heiman:

of that stuff? Those are the kinds of things if I have key

Liz Heiman:

accounts, what is my process for developing strategy for each of

Liz Heiman:

those key accounts. So all of those kinds of things that are

Liz Heiman:

repeatable and predictable, and enable a company to have some

Liz Heiman:

idea of what's going to actually happen in sales. Instead of just

Liz Heiman:

drop you know, I was a pictures, you drop the the opportunities

Liz Heiman:

in the top, it says black box and you pray stuff comes out the

Liz Heiman:

bottom says a prayer is not a strategy, it's a good start. But

Liz Heiman:

it's not going to get you where you need to go, all the positive

Liz Heiman:

energy in the world isn't going to turn those into close deals

Liz Heiman:

if you don't have a good process for doing it. So that's what I

Liz Heiman:

do.

Wesleyne Greer:

I love it. Because you know, we started and

Wesleyne Greer:

you were talking about the data, the tactical bits, and then now

Wesleyne Greer:

you're talking about the strategy. And so really, what

Wesleyne Greer:

you do and you help your customers do is you're like

Wesleyne Greer:

bridging this whole black box, because you got to have the

Wesleyne Greer:

strategy, you got to have the tactical because that's how we

Wesleyne Greer:

ensure we build a thriving sales organization. So just having

Wesleyne Greer:

those tactical bits of the bits and pieces doesn't help if we

Wesleyne Greer:

don't understand who the individual buyers within our

Wesleyne Greer:

selling situation are what value propositions we need to give

Wesleyne Greer:

them how we speak to them what the messaging I mean, like all

Wesleyne Greer:

of these things, and so like when a CEO or sales leaders like

Wesleyne Greer:

oh, these salespeople said, my question is always like, Oh,

Wesleyne Greer:

really? So tell me what have you done? Like, what's your

Wesleyne Greer:

contribution to this? Right, like, what What have you done?

Wesleyne Greer:

And they're like, Well, I'm the visionary, I created the company

Wesleyne Greer:

or I sold for 20 years. And I'm like, Yeah, but we have to

Wesleyne Greer:

change. It's not the same as it was 20 years ago.

Liz Heiman:

Right. And I see that a lot. So I have two

Liz Heiman:

distinctly different customers I focus on one is startups with

Liz Heiman:

investors who are demanding results, and starves don't have

Liz Heiman:

deliver it. But the others companies have been around 20 or

Liz Heiman:

30 years, and they're going on. Yeah, this isn't working

Liz Heiman:

anymore. But they're like, Well, okay, it's been 20 years, let's

Liz Heiman:

rethink it. And so, you know, and it's hard because you really

Liz Heiman:

have to start over and reposition yourself and rethink,

Liz Heiman:

does my process make sense? And all those things, you really

Liz Heiman:

have to start from the beginning and rethink it. And it's hard?

Wesleyne Greer:

Yeah. So when you think of as your diverse

Wesleyne Greer:

career and all of the things that you've accomplished, what

Wesleyne Greer:

is one thing that you are most excited about having

Wesleyne Greer:

accomplished within your career professionally, or personally?

Liz Heiman:

Well, of course, the thing I'm always most excited

Liz Heiman:

about is my beautiful daughter. But I think what's exciting to

Liz Heiman:

me is putting together these programs that are very

Liz Heiman:

systematic, very structured, very organized, and deliver very

Liz Heiman:

clear results. And being able to say to other people in the sales

Liz Heiman:

arena, this is what I do. And having my friends like you who

Liz Heiman:

are consultants who do similar stuff, go I get that and then

Liz Heiman:

say, oh, process call is strategy call this, like, that's

Liz Heiman:

what I'm really proud of is that people now recognize that, that

Liz Heiman:

I do this really unique thing that most other people just

Liz Heiman:

don't do. And they just they can't think about it the way I

Liz Heiman:

think about it, because they don't have my diverse

Liz Heiman:

experience, right? They didn't get a graduate degree and

Liz Heiman:

economic and international political economy, right.

Liz Heiman:

They're not methodologist by training, so part of my graduate

Liz Heiman:

degrees methodology. So I'm a methodologist. By training, I

Liz Heiman:

learned all of these things from a different perspective than

Liz Heiman:

most people who do the work that I do. So inevitably, I approach

Liz Heiman:

it differently. And this is that thing about diversity, right? So

Liz Heiman:

it's my diversity of background rather than coming, I do come

Liz Heiman:

out of a sales world couldn't help it. But I also come out of

Liz Heiman:

this educational background that most people who are sales

Liz Heiman:

experts, or senior sales leaders don't have, that just don't have

Liz Heiman:

that piece of the puzzle that I

Wesleyne Greer:

got. That's awesome. It just goes to show

Wesleyne Greer:

you I love telling brand new people that are getting into

Wesleyne Greer:

sales that college teaches you how to think, right? And you use

Wesleyne Greer:

those tools in various different ways. When you were in college,

Wesleyne Greer:

did you ever think that you would be doing sales strategy?

Wesleyne Greer:

When I was in college, I definitely didn't think that I

Wesleyne Greer:

was going to be teaching people how to sell, you know, as a

Wesleyne Greer:

chemist. So really taking what we've learned and how we do it,

Wesleyne Greer:

and we put the pieces of the puzzle together,

Liz Heiman:

right? And you approach it as a chemist and I

Liz Heiman:

approach it as an economist, right? So do we bring different

Liz Heiman:

things to the table when we're doing it? And I will tell you,

Liz Heiman:

when I was in school, the last thing in the world I was ever

Liz Heiman:

going to be was a salesperson because like that's what I grew

Liz Heiman:

up in. And I was going to do international trade relations,

Liz Heiman:

right. I never dreamed I'd be here even though it was right in

Liz Heiman:

front of me as possibility. It wasn't what I was thinking. Hmm,

Wesleyne Greer:

I love it. I have enjoyed our time together

Wesleyne Greer:

live. This has been an amazing, amazing conversation. Thank you

Wesleyne Greer:

so so much, what is the one best way people can get in contact

Wesleyne Greer:

with you? LinkedIn? Liz

Liz Heiman:

Hyman. Okay, that's the easiest way. And if you I

Liz Heiman:

have all kinds of content, if you want it to just go to

Liz Heiman:

LinkedIn and ask me how to find it, ask me questions, happy to

Liz Heiman:

do it. But tell me, they need to tell me where you met me because

Liz Heiman:

I get all kinds of crazy connection requests. And

Liz Heiman:

sometimes I ignore them. Because they're crazy. So say I saw you,

Liz Heiman:

you know, when are you talking to Wesleyne? And I'm like, Okay,

Wesleyne Greer:

I'm with Yes. In your connection requests. Always

Wesleyne Greer:

remember we talked about having a nice personalized connection

Wesleyne Greer:

request and make sure you say hey, I listened to your

Wesleyne Greer:

conversation with Wesleyne. And I really want to connect with

Wesleyne Greer:

you because she'll be like, of course, a friend of Wesleyne is

Wesleyne Greer:

a friend of mine, of course. Happy to connect. Thank you so

Wesleyne Greer:

so much for your time, your talent, your expertise today.

Wesleyne Greer:

You have given us more than enough today. Thank you. Glad to

Wesleyne Greer:

be here. And that was another episode of the transform sales

Wesleyne Greer:

podcast, remember and all that you do in every way that you can

Wesleyne Greer:

be sure to transform your sales each and every day. Until next

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About the Podcast

Transformed Sales
Transforming Sales Managers to Lead Using Behavior-Based Skills Development
As a sales manager, you are judged by the performance of your team. And you're praised when they do well. But one thing that you've not been able to figure out is how to get everyone on your team consistently hitting quota every single month. Sales leadership is difficult.

The Transformed Sales podcast equips sales leaders with the skills to develop high-performance teams. We provide coaching strategies for improving sales team performance, mentoring developing sellers, and providing ongoing support for best practices. As a result sales leaders can guide, create, and nurture long-term relationships with their teams.

You will learn how to enhance your ability to engage in productive conversations with internal team members, resulting in a collaborative, dynamic environment where sellers feel supported.

Transformed Sales assists businesses in developing and building the culture necessary to build high-performing sales teams. In this leadership coaching program, coaching strategies are offered that can be used to improve the performance of sales teams. These strategies provide ongoing support and reinforcement of best practices