Managing a Sales Organizationaka

“Nothing happens til somebody sells something”Rich Rifkin

SalesThomson Reuters

October 2014

BACKGROUND

• Twenty plus years in Technology Sales

• Mostly to law firms

• Fifteen years managing Sales team– Field Sales

– Inside Sales

– Sales Engineers

– Sales Support

– Marketing

FirmExperience

LeverageableRelationships

Client Need

LEVERAGING YOUR VALUABLE ASSETS – THE THREE LEGS OF THE BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT STOOL

Opportunity

AGENDA

• Selling

• Compensation

• Strategy & Tactics

• Presenting

• Culture

• Tools/Technology

SELLING

• Sales job – as good as three things– Product

– Territory

– Comp Plan

• Managing– Support your “A” players in every way you can

– Turn your “B’s” into “A’s”

– Weed out your “C’s” or find other roles

CORCORAN BUSINESS OF LAW BLOG

• Linking Business Development to Partner Compensation – Sept 15, 2014

• “It’s time to touch the third rail of law firm management: Partner Compensation”

• “Many compensation plans overemphasize origination and in so doing fail to recognize the critical contribution of many partners. Furthermore, the plans often fail spectacularly in addressing and rewarding origination”.

• Importance of a team to close and maintain clients

• Hunters vs. Farmers

• Retention as part of comp plan

CORCORAN BUSINESS OF LAW BLOG

• Successful comp plan - rarity– Furthers the firm’s strategic objectives

– Easy to understand and therefore “spit-ball”, i.e. how much will I make if we close this?

– Easy to administer

• “Grow the business” is not a strategy

• Challenges with Change Management– Make incremental, wise changes, which move the comp plan

in the right direction

STRATEGY – BE AN EXPERT

• Know your product

• Know your prospect

• Know their issues as a company

• Know their industry issues

• Leveraging resources

• Know your unique competitive advantages

• Know how your firm creatively “manages” legal projects

• Be cost competitive

PRESENTING - HOW DO YOU PREPARE?

• Role play

• Assess/Grade

• Improve

• Lather, rinse, repeat

• NEVER say words out loud in front of a client that you haven’t “practiced”

CULTURE

• Everyone is in “Sales”

• Nothing happens til somebody sells something

• Every client should be a reference, whether you’re there or not

CULTURE – HOW TO BE AN EXPERT

• Sales training

• Creating a Sales Culture

• Read Selling books– Ask questions, listen to the answers, take NOTES

• Confident, not cocky

• Stay up on industry publications

• Listen to industry/appropriate podcasts

• Recommend them to clients

• Reading industry pubs

EXTERNAL CONSULTANTS/PARTNERS

• Get to know the key influencers in their market

• Why would they recommend you?

• Networking

• Becoming “known” in the community

• Social Media

• Blogging

CONFERENCES/EVENTS

• Pass around attendee list and see who can help tee up meetings

• Mandatory 3 meetings per day tee’d up in order to attend conf

• Must send call notes about meetings

INCENTIVES

• Reward Sales Notes

• Acknowledge and broadcast success’s

• Contests

• Gamification

SALES IS TELLING A STORY

PRESENTATIONS

• Talking about capabilities vs telling a story

• Make the story YOURS

• Avoiding “the hammock”– Number play

– Big picture

– Props

DIRECT VALUE OF CONTACT NET

• Client C• Rumor’s of Heller Ehrman’s

demise were running rampant

• We were having lunch w/ CMO, Lilli Smith

• Recommended to Lilli that she should run a Monitor search showing who Heller’s biggest clients were

• Then run a search showing who at Client C knew those firms

• Result: Easy pickin’s for orphaned clients and potential lateral candidates

• Lilli sent MP an email from her Bberry telling her what she was going to do

• MP thinks she walks on water

• Client B• Municipal Practice Group – one

of largest in firm

• Has list of 3,000 contacts

• Take hours to update every year

• Were missing email address’s for 1,000 contacts

• Problem: Couldn’t send e-card holiday cards ($500 in postage + time) and those 1,000 people were not getting e-alerts

• Solution: Use CN to match contacts to email address without bothering the lawyers! “Can’t see living without it”

• Client A

• MP called CMO complaining that a recruiter was targetting firm partners

• CMO ran CN search to see who was had good relationships with that recruiter

• Nipped potential defections in the bud

MEETING NOTES

• A few quick comments after EVERY meaningful meeting– Date

– Attendees

– Main discussion topics

– Agreed upon next steps

– Attach them to CRM!

BULL SESSIONS/COMMISERATING

• How was your week?

• What worked great?

• What didn’t?

• How can we do better next time?

MANAGEMENT TOOLS

• CRM type Reports – Forecasts

– Activities

– Experience

– Accurate mailing lists

THE REAL SECRET TO SALES SUCCESS

• Do consistently great work so that your clients can talk to prospects without you even knowing about it.

• The golden rule

• Thank you!