If you’ve seen our messages before, you might know that Boardroom Insiders delivers the most complete profiles of C-level executives on the market today.
One of the most common questions we are often asked is, “Who uses your service–and why?”
For a quick overview of our value proposition, check out this short video from Principal Lee Demby:
If in-depth information on executive decision makers could help you win more business in 2012, we would love to talk with you. Contact Lee today at Lee@boardroominsiders.com.
Having worked on CXO-facing programs for more than a decade, I think I have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn’t when it comes to getting attention and establishing credibility. But whenever I get a chance to chat face-to-face with someone in a C-level position, I like to validate my theories.
Recently I was presented with such an opportunity when I found myself sitting next to a CIO at Oracle OpenWorld. He showed an interest in what Boardroom Insiders does, so I took the liberty of picking his brain. “What makes the difference,” I asked, “in someone earning your attention…or not?”
First off, he admitted that he never answers his phone. With no assistant, he would be fielding calls all day if he did. He also told me that he only returns voice mails that show that the caller knows something very specific about him or his business–and has a value proposition that is relevant. “If I can see someone has really done their homework,” he said, “I think they deserve a call back. Otherwise I just don’t have the time.”
Only those who demonstrate that they understand his business and have the potential to add value–either by solving a problem or sharing some new information–get an in-person meeting. At that point, he said, he is appreciative when someone has taken the time to learn something about him personally. A Cuban who immigrated to the US as a child, he recalls being impressed when a new contact referenced another prominent member of the Miami Cuban community who was also in technology and was a reference customer. “It shows they care about taking the extra time to learn about me–that they are interested in building a relationship, not just making a quick sale,” he said. “Those are the type of vendors and account reps I am looking for –the ones who have invested for the long haul.”
All of this sounds pretty old school, doesn’t it? Sales has always been built on relationships, trust and “who you know.” And despite all the new ways of finding and reaching people, nothing has really changed. In fact, I would argue that the personal touch is more important than ever, because it helps you cut through the noise of unsolicited LinkedIn requests, mass emails and script-driven telemarketing. Smiling and dialing just doesn’t work anymore–better off spending some of that time researching your top prospects, or letting us do it for you.
Might seem like common sense, but it is so seldom done. Are you ready to hit the ground running in 2012? Stay tuned to this blog for more tips on how to be relevant to your CXO customers and prospects.
Over the years our executive profiles have supported many account based marketing programs (ABM). If you are not familiar with ABM, it is basically this: creating a strategy, communications and touchpoints tailored to the needs and careabouts of a single mega-account. Think Nike, Bank of America, UnitedHealth. ABM has been proven to accelerate the sales cycle as well as uncover net new sales opportunities.
We are often asked to consult on ABM programs and our advice is always the same: keep it simple.
Simplicity is key because ABM can get overwhelming very quickly. First, you have to acquire deep knowledge on each account and its decision makers–this is where we come in, providing you with in-depth insight into companies and executives. Secondly, you have to secure buy-in to such a program from internal stakeholders–someone needs to commit to doing the work. And finally there is scale to consider. You can spend many hours mapping out an ABM strategy for one account–how do you scale this across dozens of customers?
We offer three ABM tips for minimizing risk and maximizing success. They are as follows:
1. START SMALL: Begin by creating an ABM pilot for a handful of accounts.
2. KEEP IT SIMPLE: Focus on your customer’s basic careabouts. These might include business topics that are top of mind, personal interests and hobbies (golf anyone?) and how/where they like to engage with other business leaders, such as an industry conference or charity event.
3. CHOOSE THE RIGHT PARTNER(S): Engage with account teams who want ABM and are willing to collaborate with you. Ideally, you also want to choose accounts where you can add the most value (e.g., it has been challenging to “move the needle”)
At Boardroom Insiders we are passionate believers in ABM–it’s why we do what we do. We have a best practices presentation on ABM that we are eager to share with those of you who are embarking your own ABM journey. Interested? Contact us at lee@boardroominsiders.com.
Many successful businesses were started by people who developed a simpler way to perform their job. There was a fundamental need, a “must do” part of their success formula that took too long, involved too many people, or was costly to perform. So, they “scratched their own itch” and started a niche business completely focused on making life easier for the millions of people who share the same “must do’s”.
For over a decade I’ve been selling enterprise solutions to Fortune 500 companies. Anyone familiar with developing business in this space knows the importance of sales call preparation, and the in-depth research required. They also know the process can be a real slog, a true time vacuum. I knew 80% of my competitors wouldn’t do it, or would do it very poorly.
To get in and stay in the door with key decision makers, I would go well beyond researching industry dynamics and quarterly reports. I would spend the extra time to seek out the role-specific pain points, the personal focus issues, and timely quotes that helped me speak directly to what the executive cared the most about. Personal interests that I could build my solutions around.
Finding this kind of insight was my “itch”. Boardroom Insiders executive profiles was my “back scratcher”. I joined this early stage company about a year ago as I believe there are tens of thousands of strategic-minded sales pros out there who are searching for the same back scratcher every day.
The “Rule of Thirds” is really quite simple, but we think a powerful lesson lies within. Follow me for a minute.
Group A – This is the top 1/3 of your sales pros that drive the lion share of revenue and profit. These are the perennial “President’s Club” winners. It doesn’t matter which troubled accounts they have, or which storm-prone industry they work in, they will not be denied. They have the ability to engage decision makers and consistently stay in front of them. Cold calling new business seems to come naturally for them. Always growing.
Group B – This is the middle 1/3 of your sales pros that are always bouncing around their goals. Sometimes hitting 100%, but often having to pull a rabbit out of a hat at the end of the year to do so. When talking to these sales pros in Group B, they look and sound just like the ones in Group A, but something is missing. These sales pros normally know who their account decision makers are, but rarely speak with them. No growth, but no losses.
Group C – Unfortunately, in every sales organization there is a Group C. Group C is the 1/3 of the sales pros that interviewed well, they looked good on paper, but for reasons that could take up the rest of this blog…they just don’t work out. Enough said.
All sounds pretty familiar, right?
Here’s the catch, and the real opportunity. There really isn’t that much difference between the sales pros in Group A and Group B. And getting Group B sales pros to perform more like those in Group A might be easier than you think.
The difference is that Group A’s top sales performers are resourceful. They will not wait for marketing or sales leadership to empower them. To get the competitive edge, they will spend the extra two or three hours digging through the internet looking for buying triggers, personal interests, and pain points critical to C-suite engagement…all well beyond the tools and resources you currently provide them. Providing this group with more “data” does little for them. Providing them with finger-tip strategic insight makes them instantly more efficient and you become the hero again. No coaching needed.
Your real opportunity to move the revenue needle lies within Group B. This group is not as resourceful. They may not prepare for sales calls adequately (or at all) because they “can’t” invest the research time needed to prepare adequately. They will wait for management to provide direction, for marketing to give them the business intelligence tools to elevate their game.
So give it to them. Take the “I don’t have time to research” excuse out of the equation. Give them a simple, but deeply researched resource that is easy to bake into their voicemails, emails, and in-person dialogue. It doesn’t matter how cleverly integrated they are, this group will waste tons of time with the “data-by-the-pound” information tools most enterprise marketers provide their teams. This group needs simple – easy – fast, not noisy and complicated information tools.
So I ask again, what would happen to your sales goals if you could get some of your second-tier sales pros to perform more like your top-tier performers?
We are big fans of Marc Benioff, the visionary behind Salesforce.com, the leader in the red-hot cloud computing space.
Benioff shares our opinion on how enterprise sales needs to be approached–by understanding the customer’s business and by uncovering points of connection and relevance with the CEO or other C-level executives.
Convincing a CEO of the value of your proposition, says Benioff, gives you instant credibility and access with his/her lieutenants–people it might otherwise take you months or years to engage. It can cut months or even years off the sales cycle.
We wrote in an earlier post about the importance of understanding your customer’s CXO agenda, whether you sell into the C-suite or not. It is something Benioff understands and has leveraged to his success. Here is an excerpt from his 2010 book, Behind the Cloud:
“Don’t dial for dollars…always call with a plan. Learn about the company and use your network to find the right individual(s) to approach…When we were trying to win lender CIT as a customer, we realized that Gary Butler, the CEO of ADP, a customer of ours, was on the board of CIT. I reached out to Gary, who recommended us to CIT. The first meeting we had at CIT was with its CEO and chairman, Jeffrey Peek. By connecting the dots, we won the unlikely opportunity to get to the “C” level on an initial sales call. This ultimately resulted in a multithousand-user deal and an extremely short sales cycle.”
This what Boardroom Insiders is all about–uncovering valuable points of connection and relevance that you can leverage to get a senior decision maker’s attention. Want to learn more? Contact us.
Successful account planning requires understanding a core group of decision makers — and where they are headed next. Your solution will be questioned, approved or denied based on the direction set by a team of CXOs. How well do you know them?
We save our customers time and money — and make them smarter —by telling them what’s top-of-mind with executive decision makers. It’s that simple.
Up until now, our in-depth, premium executive profiles have been mostly made-to-order…but we’ve been busy growing our database and are pleased to now be able to offer subscriptions and licenses to our new Fortune 500 executive profile database.
What’s in the database?
· All Fortune 500 companies
· CEO, CFO, COO, CMO, and CIO – and many more!
· Breaking news and executive change updates
How do we deliver it?
· Unlimited URL access and downloads
· Annual subscriptions and channel partners
Who uses Boardroom Insiders premium content?
· Enterprise, Strategic, and Global Account Managers
· Marketing pros building executive engagement and sponsorship
· Sales leaders who place a premium on sales readiness
Boardoom Insiders is looking for channel partners to license this premium content. Contact Lee Demby at Lee@BoardroomInsiders.com or call 704.756.0894.
When talking with customers about the value of Boardroom Insiders CXO profiles, we sometimes hear, “But we do not sell to the C-level.”
It’s true that in your day-to-day role as a sales or marketing pro, you may never cross paths with an enterprise CXO customer. Most of us spend our time focused on their many lieutenants–the myriad executives and middle managers empowered to make decisions on the company’s behalf.
This is all well and good–but if you are like most salespeople and marketers, you want to accelerate the sales cycle, get ahead of RFPs (before they land in your competitors’ inboxes) and crack those hard-to-penetrate accounts. Success on these fronts requires proactivity and insight–and familiarity with what we call the CXO agenda.
Every year, CXOs issue a handful of business objectives or initiatives that guide all other activities inside their company or department. These can be found in CXO interviews, speeches, annual reports and SEC filings. Under the CXO’s direction, all activity and investment must support these initiatives.
This is a huge opportunity for a sales or marketing pro–if you can show a direct connection between your company’s offering and some part of the CXO agenda, there’s no way you can be ignored.
Those well versed in a customer’s CXO agenda can answer some of the following types of questions:
What are their business goals for the year?
What products/solutions are they most focused on?
Are they looking to expand internationally or grow domestically?
Grow organically or through acquisition?
Cut costs or ratchet up R&D/marketing spend/hiring?
Are they pro- or anti-cloud computing/bring-your-own-computing?
Sure, you can wait for the RFP to come out, which will outline what the company thinks it wants. But knowing beforehand what is going to be in that RFP–because you are already engaged with that customer–gives you a definite edge, and an opportunity to establish yourself as a trusted advisor.
Remember–many companies don’t know what they don’t know and are looking to their suppliers to understand their business and show them a better way. The vendors that are proactive about doing so come out on top.
Want to talk more about how Boardroom Insiders can help you understand the CXO agenda? Contact lee@boardroominsiders.com.
As purveyors of in-depth executive profiles, we hear on a daily basis from enterprise sales teams looking for more information on executive decision makers. While some of these are one-off orders from individual salespeople, the majority of requests have to do with company-wide initiatives designed to transform the sales culture. Technology companies looking to move along the continuum from product pusher to thought leader are retraining their salespeople to focus more on executive engagement and key accounts. Having had the privilege of working with some of the world’s top sales organizations, we have identified some critical success factors for sales transformation efforts. They include:
Speak the right language: Stop talking products and start talking the language of your customer. What business problems are your products going to solve? Showing you understand their business will win their confidence and give you an edge over the competition.
Understand the players: Any good salesperson knows who the decision makers are–but how much do you know about these decision makers? What are they saying in the marketplace about their current initiatives? What is their background? Who are their influencers? Doing your homework can help uncover nuggets of information that you can leverage to access and influence these key players.
Align with marketing: How much do you collaborate with marketing? Are there gaps between what they provide and what you need to succeed? If so, what are you doing about it? Marketing should be a key stakeholder and enabler of any sales transformation effort. Don’t dismiss them–empower them to help you.
Leverage face-to-face events: Most companies participate in hundreds–even thousands–of trade shows and events every year. Do you know which of your customers are also attending? A strong partnership with the event marketing team can be a powerful sales enabler as they can tell you which customers are showing up where–and they can also design some impressive on-site VIP programs for your key accounts.
Use your executive sponsors: Executive-to-executive engagement is a powerful way to move deals through the pipeline faster. Marketing programs or events that leverage executive sponsorship are ideal, because they allow executives to meet many customers in a short period of time. Even better, choose your executive sponsors to align with customers’ interests and backgrounds. For example, if you have a customer who spent two decades in the army, match them with an executive sponsor who also served in the military. Building meaningful relationships is easier when you start out with something in common.
Be smart enough to realize that “you don’t know what you don’t know:” Every sales person would like to think that he knows everything there is to know about his customers. But what you don’t know can add up to missed opportunities worth millions. The information in Boardroom Insiders profiles has repeatedly helped sales teams uncover new multi-million dollar opportunities with their own accounts that they did not even know about. Making sure you are in the running for these new opportunities is the real fruit of sales transformation.
Successful account planning requires understanding a core group of decision makers — and where they are headed next. Your solution will be questioned, approved or denied based on the direction set by a team of CXOs. How well do you know them?
Boardroom Insiders saves you time and money — and makes you smarter —by telling you what’s top-of-mind with executive decision makers. It’s that simple.
Up until now, our profiles have been mostly made-to-order…but we’ve been busy growing our database and are pleased to now be able to offer subscriptions to our new Fortune 500 executive profile database.
What’s in the database?
· Top 150 companies complete – full Fortune 500 by August 2011
· CEO, CFO, COO, CMO, and CIO – and many more!
· 90-day updates, with breaking news
How do we deliver it?
· Unlimited URL access and downloads.
· Annual subscriptions
· Plus, custom Executive Profiling.
Who needs Boardroom Insiders?
· Enterprise, Strategic, and Global Account Managers
· Marketing pros building executive engagement and sponsorship
· Sales leaders who place a premium on sales readiness
If you are selling into the enterprise, a subscription to our new Fortune 500 database is a no brainer! For more information, contact Lee Demby at Lee@BoardroomInsiders.com or call 704.756.0894.
