Hear the Secrets of World Class Sales Professionals
Christina Izokovic — Be Better Than Yourself
When you’re #1, push to be better than yourself.
Christina Izokovic is the Number 1 Pharmaceutical Sales Rep, and Rep of the Year, for Avion Pharmaceuticals. She works in one of the toughest territories, that has a reputation for being a closed territory. By really diving deep and making a big impact, Christina has grown herContinue Reading …
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
I think women are raised to be aware of their surroundings and I think women are picking up the social cues and they’re watching all around them as they grow up, you know, they’re watching their moms you know, when they’re getting dragged to the store with their moms and you know, they’re watching and observing how people communicate and how they interact in the world and I think naturally, that’s what we do. And I think guys lead a little bit differently. I think they’re a little bit more in their own body if you wanna call it and kinda charging forward and sometimes don’t pay as much attention to kind of what’s going on around them, their surroundings. I’m being really general obviously so you’ll have to forgive me for that.Oh Kona’s gonna start barking here.Sorry, my cute little 15 pound dog is acting like an alpha chick here.So, what I would say is that, those kind of skills, watching and listening really help make a strong sales rep because you’re aware of what’s going on around you. You are listening to people and engaging in kind of that curious way, asking questions and I think that really helps and I think it really helps with dealing with people, those interpersonal skills areas.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
I spend a lot of time working with the SDR’s and mentoring the SDR’s so that we can sell business together and they make money and I make money.It’s a lot of time, you got to invest, right, you’ve gotta invest in your team and invest in your clients to be successful.I really sit down and walk through my territory with them. I spend typically the first month with them when they’re kinda brand new when they’re working with me, I spend the first month or so meeting with them twice a week and walking through kinda the different things that I know are proven, you know, that will make them successful so, I look at things like how are they prospecting, I wanna understand how they write because most sales reps don’t right well, don’t write emails well. So I really spend some time up front on that and pass some templates and help them to understand how to send out emails to prospects that are relevant and interesting to prospects versus you know, ‘canned kind of’ emails trying to get an appointment. I really focus on that relevancy so spending time with the emails, walking through my target account list and guiding them to either specific stakeholders, specific roles that I call on where I know I can get good success and the of course, you know, how I would like them to communicate with that person and part of that communication is how are they gonna ask for the meeting and you know, setting the expectation around that hour of discovery so that’s definitely part of that process.And then I meet with them on a regular basis after that initial 30 days is, we’re along the journey together, I meet with them typically where, you know, where I am 2 or 3 times, 4 times a week and typically, I’m you know, meeting them once or twice a week, “Hey let’s set our goals for the week.” “Who are you gonna call on?” “What folks are you going to get into?” You know this organization over here; we need to understand who’s who in the zoo. We need some ordered structured information etc, so, you have different stages of sales cycles that you’re in with a company, if you’re in the beginning stage, I help them to understand how to do the research and demandbase like I said has a great tool spider book so it’s nice that we have that and we definitely drink our own champagne so we use that tool as well as a plethora of other tools, like Rain King etc. And we’re really working together, I’m not just letting them kinda ‘go fish’ and hopefully have good luck. I wanna maximize their opportunity and help them to optimize the time that they’re prospecting for me. I really wanna help them optimize it so that we get good results so I move fast for sure, heavily.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
Folks don’t take enough time to really, properly do discovery. And people who know me, know that I talk about discovery a lot because it is the thing that I believe sets me apart and all the top players apart from the B-players and the C-players; is taking the time to really understand what this client is trying to achieve and what are those clients’ roadblocks and the company culture that is, you know, helping them, you know to excel to success or holding them back. You know, are they evangelists, people who are on the cutting edge or not so much?So, you know, really taking the time to fully do discovery and listen and not pitch during discovery is probably, you know, the number one thing that jumps out at me and I do think it’s crazy to pitch during discovery and I haven’t done it for probably 25 years. I mean it is a solid process that I’m loyal to because it’s really moved me forward and I see it as something that really sets the stage for everything else that happens in the sales cycle.Once you understand what’s going on in that company and you understand what their motivations are and you understand how they make their decisions and what’s gonna make this person look good or bad and how they measure success and what their real pain points are, not just ‘hey I’ve got this challenge or that’, but where does it really hurt? Where’s the friction behind that’s really standing in the way of them getting success? Once you understand those things, it sets the table for really being prescriptive in each solution and really being relevant to that prospect and that’s how you get deals done. So, listening and not pitching during discovery is I think, very important and I can’t understand why people pitch during discovery. I just don’t get it because it shuts out all their opportunity to really learn about their prospect.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
Yeah, I look at the things that I need to do to move the needle in my deals. Sometimes that’s following up on stuff that is in process, you know, follow up thank you notes after a meeting with a client or sending case studies or you know, research, white papers, etc.Sometimes it’s just making a list of folks that I need to follow up with, right, ‘hey tomorrow I’ve really got to check the box here with this 4 companies and make sure that I touch base and that we move the needle.’ Sometimes it’s preparing, I always take a look at my calendar, you know, a little, a day or 2 ahead. Then what do I really need to focus on for tomorrow? Do I have to prepare for a presentation? You know. Do I need to make a list of companies that I wanna attack? Right, that I wanna start going after and really working with and maybe I’ve got to do a little bit of research before Discovery calls the next day etc, so it’s kind of whatever’s on my plate. I’ll take a look at typically every Sunday night I do that for the week ahead and then I do that on a daily basis so, really just so I kinda stay on top of my game and I continue to move the needle forward so, I’m not a naturally organized person so I have to have a discipline around it otherwise I wouldn’t be organized at all.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debbie Rapson of Demandbase:
The key is you want to be in control of the decision; you don’t want, things to happen do you. You wanna drive your destiny and although sometimes if it feels like things are happening to us, I think it’s important to realize that, that we actually do get to drive our destiny and the more pro-active you are about it, the better life you’ll lead both professionally and personally.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
I think that what goes through my mind is a complete reassessment when those things happen, and they pretty much, territory doesn’t change every year although some segment of my territory definitely changes every year you know. Maybe its adding accounts or cutting accounts or focusing more on customers, versus prospect. So certainly there is an element of change every year. I really sit down and go right into research mode and put together you know, and evaluate what is my opportunity here. How can I, can I capitalize, can I make the numbers that I want to make, can I make the money that I want to make? Is my situation still ideal and I’ve got you know a list of things like, this is an example, for me working in the office is a non-starter. So if somebody said to me okay now next year we want you to you know come 100% into the office every day. That would a no go decision for me. Making a certain amount of money, you know if I can make over great, if it’s less it’s a no go decision for me. So I’m very clear about what that criteria is and I just go into evaluation mode. Can I do it with what I’m given here and I also don’t hesitate to negotiate whatever it is that’s changing.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
One of the things management did for me, it really helped me to become a better rep. I understood very quickly after that when I decided to go back into sales and carry a bag. I decided it really gave me some great insight really how to be a better rep. The things that managers think about, you know solving problems for myself and bringing solutions to management etc. So it was really neat. A neat experience.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
That is a great question. I now think it has played a huge role in my success but 20 years ago if you’d ask me that question, id probably would have said I don’t think it matters at all but through the experience that I’ve gotten, and the expertise that you get by staying in 1 industry I think it matters a lot. Not only for the experience that you get in the industry and it really helps you to become an expert, and provide credibility to your customers that you really know your stuff, but the networking factor is absolutely huge. I’ve had customers for the last 10 years that I have been in this industry buy from me 3 or 4 times, because you know they I’m not going to steer them on. I’m always going to be straight up with them and I’m going to make sure that they are well taken care of, and that huge in just getting that repeat in business because our clients move around to other companies, and we move around to other companies but staying in that same industry I think has really benefited me.
Clip from Episode 11 featuring: Debe Rapson of Demandbase:
Not long ago I was in a deal with a company that will remain nameless, but they’re a large telecom manufacturing equipment company and we were in a sales cycle, and it was getting very competitive and because I had done so much discovery upfront, I really understood what the client was trying to achieve but my competitor was kind of wooing the client with gifts, and tickets to places and unfortunately the solution that the competitor was offering really and truly didn’t make sense for the client. It wasn’t going to help that person achieve their, you know their goals and it was actually you know probably going to be one of the sticky decisions that sometimes clients make that make them look bad, and we have seen folks get fired over sometimes over those kinds of decisions. So instead of letting it go I decided to just have a heart to heart with the client, and say look whether you decide to move forward with me now, or whether you decide to move forward with demand base later, you know here is what I know and I kind of took it back to what I had learned in the discovery and provided documentation, on why that competitors solution wasn’t going to meet their needs, and it was a risk right because this person was being wooed and, and I could tell that this person was kind of moving in that direction to go with the decision that wasn’t really going to be good for her or her business. So I kind of stood up and said look, whether you decide now or later you need to know this because at the end of the day we are going to do business at some point in my career, and yours and I want to make sure that I have done all that I can do to steer you in the right direction and to be transparent with you, and the client did a 180 turnaround and thanked me and this person had a pretty big ego. So that was part of the risky stuff of telling this person, hey you are going down the wrong path here right, and did a 180 turnaround and we ended up getting the business, and she told me she really valued me doing that and you know providing the evidence that she needed to really understand why.