“The chances of success are much better if you’re focused on the small things.” – Ivana Zivkovic Meesters in today’s Tip 592
How about you? What are you trying to achieve?
Join the conversation below and go check the full interview with Ivana!
Ivana Zivkovic Meesters on LinkedIn
Ivana Zivkovic Meesters on Sales Success Stories Interview
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Transcript
Scott Ingram: You’re listening to the Daily Sales Tips podcast and I’m your host, Scott Ingram. Today’s tip is actually an excerpt from my most recent interview on the Sales Success Stories podcast that we released yesterday featuring Ivana Zivkovic Meesters. Ivana is one of the top channel sales reps at Cisco and had some great wisdom to share. Here’s a taste:
Ivana Zivkovic Meesters: Through my career, I’ve covered over a hundred different partners. Right now I only have one, but really, if I look at, through my sales career, it’s those small victories, right? Those milestones that give you that bit of success that keeps you moving forward because it’s that little by little that gets you over the top. The big wins are fantastic and I’ll take them every day and twice on someday. But those are not as many as we would like, right? The chances of success are much better if you’re focused on the small things. And when you work in the channel it’s the long haul, right? We get to our numbers really by helping our partners be profitable, enabling them on driving results through their sales teams, making sure that they have the tools they need to be successful, right? And that means 365 days a year. You need to be working with them, supporting them, and really focused on those small successes. So maybe it’s that sales rep that maybe is struggling to get that first lead from Cisco that maybe they’ve just started, maybe it’s that seasoned sales professional that really wants to take the next step, but is finding it hard to get the partnership going, sitting down and coming up with a plan and working with them and with your internal account team and getting to that small bit of success where you can see the tide turning. There are all these little nuance things that happen in the channel that really make it interesting varied and give you so much, I guess, reward for the effort you put in, right? As long as you look at them as success or victories and you acknowledge them, right. If you’re just looking for the big numbers on your day to day, you’re going to have a tough slog. You have to be committed to putting in the time and feeling good about the work you’re doing through the small victories really.
Scott Ingram: Yeah. The thing that strikes me is how much emphasis you really putting on being that true partner. I mean, they get the things I’m hearing you talk about are just understanding their business and their profitability and what drives them. And then taking that a step deeper and understanding that really at the rep level for that individual. What are the things that are driving them? What are they trying to achieve?
Ivana Zivkovic Meesters: Exactly. Because when you look at partnership, it needs to be a partnership. It cannot be one way. So if imagine this, if we look at going into a partner and just demanding that they sell Cisco and just looking at that particular fact, it’s not going to get you very far. I mean, the reality is most partners have a myriad of vendors that they can sell. Right? And that’s why the relationship is so important. I care about them achieving their goals. I always say I have two year ends. I have the Cisco year-end and I have my partners year-end, right? I worked just as hard on their year end as I do on ours to make sure that they have what they need to get revered and get their compensation. Right? Because I know that at the end of the day, they will be there for me. I sell as much for them as I do for myself.
Scott Ingram: For the full episode just look for episode 101 on the Sales Success Stories podcast or top1.fm/101 will take you straight to the show notes.
Once you’ve got that queued up for your listening and learning pleasure. Be sure to come back tomorrow for another great sales tip. Thanks for listening!