“And when you find those people who do execute and who do follow through and do bring those opportunities, they are gold” – Scott Ingram in today’s Tip 253
What can you do for them? How can you make sure that you are paying it forward and paying it back to them?
Join the conversation below and feel free to share your thoughts!
249. Partner with Purpose and Process – Jack Wilson
2019 Sales Success Summit
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Transcript
Scott Ingram: You’re listening to the daily sales tips podcast and I’m your host Scott Ingram, earlier this week and tip #249, Jack Wilson talked about partnering with purpose and process and while I love the contents of that tip, I think the topic is potentially even more important and it’s something that we haven’t really addressed here on the daily sales tip show really at all in until Jack brought this up and it’s this idea of developing business through relationships and more specifically through essentially channel type relationships. Right? A lot of times this is other companies or other sales professionals, a lot of the time that are selling in adjacent markets that are maybe complementary to or at least selling to the same types of individuals who become your buyers and really leveraging those relationships, creating those opportunities together and Jack talks about some really great positioning around that and some expectation setting. It’s something that I don’t do actually. It’s something I’m starting to do a lot more in the way that my current role is evolving and something I used to do a ton of early in my career, especially when I was working with ADP and companies like that. And one of the things that I found and that really was core to my success in a lot of those efforts is recognizing that not everybody is wired to deliver those types of opportunities. Some people are very generous and they get it, they’re willing to share, they’re willing to make those introductions and some people just aren’t, it’s literally just not in their DNA. And the most important thing for me was figuring out who are those right people. And you know I feel like it’s almost a filtering process, right? You spend a lot of time when you’re developing those kinds of networks and you’re developing, call it your own personal channel, just doing the filtering and figuring out who are the people that are going to be able to help me and who do I trust enough to refer to my clients, right? Because I’m certainly putting my reputation on the line anytime that I do that. And I worked with the CEO of a, of a very small company here in Austin years and years ago who had this great model that I’ve really adopted ever since when it came to these partnering types of conversations and as he was beginning that relationship and there tends to be it’s all big talk, right? Talk is totally cheapened in this place, right? There can be all of the promises in the world of all the business that we’re going to be able to do together, but none of that matters until those introductions start to get made and what he would always ask and I learned so much from him in his process here, he just say, show me one. And the idea was, look, this talk is great. We’re really excited about being able to do all of this work together, but let’s just do one deal together and see how that goes and make sure that we both benefit. You’ll get an opportunity to see how I work. I’ll get an opportunity to see how you work and we’ll get to know each other through this process, but let’s not boil the ocean, show me one. And so it makes it very tangible, very actionable. Ideally in that conversation, we can identify the one who’s it going to be, right? We just talked about how much opportunity is out there, what’s the one company or who is the one individual that we want to focus on right now? And maybe you can make an introduction right now. Maybe you want to pick up the phone. I had another friend just at an incredible kind of pillar of networking here in Austin. His name is Peter Strople. And Peter, he never wanted to have any follow-up items for himself, right? He knew, Hey, this, this probably isn’t gonna get done if I don’t do this right now. And he would literally, anytime he had one of those opportunities to make an introduction, he would just pull out his phone, call that person. He had enough relationship. They’d almost always pick up and he’d hand the phone to you. You know, he might give a really short introduction, but it was, you’re on this spot right here. Let’s do this right now. So you know, think about those types of opportunities, right? Rather than dragging out this process, thinking about can we make the introduction, can we affect this change? Can you show me one right now in this moment and begin going through that. And when you find those people who do execute and who do follow through and do bring those opportunities, they are gold, right? If you’ve got one individual that might bring you, let’s say they’re in a position that they can bring you to three, four, maybe five opportunities, even in a given year, they are hundreds of times more valuable than the person that talks a big game but is never going to make that introduction. And so the thing that I always focused on after somebody had shown me one right. After the fact that they’ve shown, Hey, they can deliver, those are the people that you want to take care of. Those are the people that are the heart and core of your network and your relationships. And that’s something that I continue to this day. You know, the people who have been the most involved, the most invested in the Sales Success community, and who, again, didn’t talk a big game but just continually delivered, right? The ones who brought people to the Sales Success Summit, the people who consistently on schedule without my having to harass them to death, deliver sales tips. And you know, I mean, you can find those people on the show. It’s really, really obvious. And in particular, Jeff Bajorek and Jason Bay. Every week they’re on the show and they’re the people that I have to worry about the least. So what I’m gonna encourage you to do this, I’ve gone a little bit long, as I got up on my soapbox today, but I want you to think about that idea of show me one, right? Then the next time you’re in that conversation finding that one opportunity to be able to execute and work on right now. And then think about who’s already in your network that’s already showed you one that showed you two or three, and they’re wired the way that you want. They already believe in you. They already trust you. You already have that Goodwill. What can you do for them? How can you make sure that you are paying it forward and paying it back to them and really investing in those relationships because over time they will absolutely be the most valuable. All right, thanks for listening to today’s tip. Make sure you’re subscribed to the podcast and come back tomorrow for another great sales tip.