Who'll Save Your Brand From Catastrophic Social Exposure?

We live in an age of empowered consumers and their buying journey starts online, not in a showroom; and it's informed by the opinions of others who have gone before them, not with marketing spin and the hyperbole of sales people. They listen to social channels and when they look online at your brand, what will they find?

There are thousands of examples out there of how consumers can create massivenegative impact on a brand without spending a cent. Just do a Google search on 'Uber' and you'll see the disruptive player in the the Taxi industry has some real issues. Here is a case study from personal experience... yes, I bought a Jeep.

I'm a wakeboarder and when I wanted to buy a new vehicle to tow our boat, there wasn't a lot to choose from that was rated to pull the weight of our rig. When I began my search online I quickly gravitated to the Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited but I had two concerns: product quality and handling in an emergency.

As I clicked, I quickly found an empowered Aussie consumer who created a way to get his money back on a lemon with 20 defects and 4 years of consumer hell. He created a Facebook page and got busy on Twitter raising money and awareness of big gaps in consumer rights under Australian legislation. He highlighted that consumers now have a powerful voice on social platforms. Mainstream media picked-up the story and the result was global coverage and worldwide brand damage that has cost Jeep millions of dollars in lost sales.

But all car makers produce lemons and this one consumer experience story was an exception, not the norm. Next I found the Jeep Moose Avoidance Test video on YouTube (main picture). American cars are typically made with softer suspension and the recommended tire pressures are designed for a comfortable 'floating' ride for a trip around the block at the dealership. I knew that running higher tire pressures would deal with the problem combined with my philosophy on never swerving to miss a kangaroo. There was lots of positivity about the vehicle and the Fiat diesel received brilliant reviews. I loved the look, features and compelling value for money. A friend already owned one which I borrowed for a test drive and I was sold. By the time I contacted a Jeep salesperson it was by phone to negotiate and I only walked into a dealership to sign the paperwork. Bought it, loved it.

But all this leads me to the real point of this story. Last year my son had his first car accident driving the Jeep when it was just 14 months old. No-one was hurt but he did $43k damage to our car and the insurance company did the normal things well in procesing the claim and taking the car away for assessment and then allocation to their chosen repairer. But the work was a disaster with the vehicle being handled by two different smash repairers. The communication and service was below standard but after more than 4 months we finally got the vehicle back but there were a number of things not working (I won't bore you with the list). I was frustrated and sent it back for rectification... more inconvenience. I then received a call from their loss assessor, Albert Wilson (pictured below) who shocked me by saying that he had identified more problems than I had listed, most importantly that the paint job was unacceptable... I had not complained about the paint.

Albert went on to say that he had organized for a free rental car this time around and that he didn't want our Jeep going back to us until it was right. I later discovered that Albert had once owned his own smash repair business, so he knew what 'acceptable' looked like. Wow, someone who cares and is thoroughly professional and capable, I thought. Albert works for AAMI (insurer) which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Suncorp (financial institution). These companies invest fortunes in brand building through television, radio, print and social advertising; yet without Albert and the people he trusted to do the job right (Ian MacKenzie the mechanic and Allan Alouf at ABS Smash Repairs), the insurance company was exposed to massive brand damage.

I've only gone negative in social once and it's was the results of decades of frustration... Microsoft hell contrasted by Apple heaven. It was nothing to do with technology and everything to do with poor customer service. Investing in legendary Customer eXperience (CX) is far more powerful than pouring money into a marketing facade. Imagine the brand damage to the insurance company if I'd gone negative in this instance with my Jeep (this post about Qantas has been read by 200,000 people) ... I was without the vehicle for 6 months but legendary CX was delivered by a grey haired artisan who truly cares about his employer and customers. Albert secured approval for a free loan vehicle and made sure the car was like new. This included working with Jeep dealers to get a number of things fixed under warranty which were not Albert's responsibility. When my Jeep was finally returned to me this week, it felt like I was again taking delivery of a new vehicle. Albert (below) turned a negative into a positive.

Think about that. I was without my Jeep for 6 months and couldn't tow my boat over summer on several planned vacations; two repairers, poor workmanship requiring   rectification, massive inconvenience and frustration. Yet I'm writing an unsolicited endorsement about wonderful service. I've also sent an e-mail of thanks to Albert's boss.

Here is the big lesson for those entrusted with a precious corporate brand: Deliver exceptional customer experience through outstanding service with empowered staff who truly care.

Create a culture and systems in your business where you provide a platform for customers, and rewards for staff, where people can become honest brand advocates. You don't need to provide perfect service, but you do need to show that you truly care when things go wrong and that you're committed to constant improvement.

Here's my recommended strategy for protecting and managing you brand with customer who are unhappy:

1. Intercept issues before they turn caustic
2. Listen via ALL [social] channels (Hootsuite and other tools are very useful in this regard)
3. Make sure they know you really care. (70% of the time customer leave or go therm-nuclear negative, it's because they think you don't care rather than because there were problems
4. Demonstrate genuine empathy
5. Never argue with someone online or in the real world. If you argue with an an idiot it becomes difficult for observers to distinguish who is who. It doesn’t matter who’s right; what matters is that you have a happy customer
6. Communicate, communicate, communicate
7. Deliver on every small commitment

Jeep listened to their market and they fixed the roll-over weaknesses and the short video below shows the results. Kudos to the producers for their balance and objectivity throughout the Jeep Moose Avoidance Test journey!  They provided a valuable community service and although Jeep did not like it, they responded and now have an even better product.

If you ever go negative in social, make sure you never cross the line to become a troll. Here is a post I wrote about social media negativity and dealing with personal attacks. If Microsoft had bothered to contact me to improve my experience or their service, then I would have written positively about it.

Suncorp and AAMI: Thanks for standing by your insurance product and for employing great employees such as Albert Wilson! Now it's over to you... who are the heroes you've seen save a brand from social media damage?

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website:

Main image photo by Flickr: Jeep Moose Avoidance Test by Teknikens Värld

Social Research: Pillar Three of Strategic B2B Social Selling

Intelligent social research allows you to effectively target the right organizations and engage people at the right time with insight and context.

Social research enables you to create a hypothesis of value and an engagement strategy to overcome the competition (including 'do nothing' / status quo competition). Research and planning is how you build the foundation of efficient and effective engagement.

Research has always been important for strategic sellers and the internet, especially LinkedIn, has transformed the way it's done. Anyone who fails to prepare for a meeting deserves a bad outcome. These are the research areas to focus on for B2B sellers:

• Research the organization you are targeting.
• Research your buyer's industry trends, threats and opportunities.
• Research the buyer roles who will need to be engaged and influenced.
• Research individuals and their connections.

When it comes to researching individual people and their relevance to a sales campaign, we can almost make the argument that the internet itself, Google searching and email are all secondary and tertiary channels to LinkedIn. The fact that we can transparently see an individual's social proximity is massively powerful. Success leaves clues and here are common practices and techniques used by the best sellers today:

• They are masterful in the use of search engine tools for refining and creating 'saved searches.'
• They read daily about their customer's industry in newspapers and online forums.
• They actively seek conversations with those who understand the trends, challenges and opportunities within the industries they serve.
• They embrace the concepts of Challenger Selling to earn high value conversations with the most senior people.
• The majority of their searches in a given business day are performed within LinkedIn to map the political power base and understand connections.
• They study the interrelationships of their own company via TeamLink to understand how their internal networks overlay with that of prospects.
• They create mash-up organizational charts for account planning and mapping the power base, buying center and competitor threats.
• They contribute to and leverage internal CRM systems as a single source of the truth about a current customer's status. This is critical to understanding who are the best references for supporting selling efforts to new named accounts.

Research can easily become overwhelming or paralyzing. It is therefore essential to have purpose and pragmatism in our research efforts. Here is what I recommend concerning your focus and priority in research.

1. Create your value conversation with the potential customer. Read The Challenger Sale and obsess about how you can create game changing value for the customer. Value as they define it, not a value proposition from your marketing department
2. Understand the political power base and create a winning relationship strategy to both 'sell to power' and help them gain consensus within their teams.
3. Decide which competitive engagement strategy is best for defeating the competition and also ensuring that they actually go ahead with purchase and implementation

Jamie Shanks has provided this list of social research tools that can make you hyper-efficient. Glassdoor is especially powerful for understanding the real culture of an organization.

In all of this, don't neglect your CRM. It's where you should be creating the single source of truth about your accounts and opportunities. It's where your strategy documents should live and be shared with your team. Having said that, the rocket fuel of B2B selling is LinkedIn Sales Navigator and here's why LinkedIn is the quintessential sales dashboard:

• There's a growing number of people that just connect LinkedIn to Twitter, Facebook & Google+ but only utilize LinkedIn as their core network. 
• LinkedIn has cracked the code on making a social network into a profitable business model with 2.21B in revenue in 2014. 
• They've essentially transcended the restrictions of "social networking" nomenclature / classification and become something entirely new: a human-centric virtual world mapping the economic graph.
• Who else is mapping the global economic graph? I'd be hard-pressed to answer that question which further highlights the level of blue ocean strategy and divergent, focused and memorable value curves they've effectively exploited.
• The majority of executive buyers are looking for sales people to teach them new insights. LinkedIn has become the global hub for subject matter expertise as it flexes into both Publishing 3.0 and Learning 3.0. 

CRM could literally melt away were Navigator to allow for just a few extra features like: Sorting of lead lists, designation of current contacts and opportunity management with minimal stage creation. Just a few basic classic CRM functions could help LinkedIn Sales Navigator be an end-to-end enterprise selling tool. Unlike CRM, LinkedIn has self-healing data.

Research and prepare before charging in. Now it's over to you; how do you leverage social to hit the sweet spot for effective research? How do you make your social research matter? 

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Marc Smith NodeXL Twitter Network Graphs: Social CRM

B2B Social Selling Demystified – Five Strategic Pillars

We live in the age of personal brands. This article will provide you with a framework for creating your own personal social strategy in the world of complex business-to-business (B2B) selling.

It’s important because the vast majority of buyers do research before a meeting. What will they see when they look at your LinkedIn profile or blog? We all need to show our value online before we’re invited to have a conversation.

This is the first of a series of posts where I define strategic social selling and the 5 pillars that enable the best results.

Before we begin, NEVER FORGET THAT A HUMAN CONVERSATION ON THE PHONE IS THE INITIAL GOAL WITH ALL SOCIAL SELLING INITIATIVES!

Understand that the term ‘Social Selling’ is a misnomer. Those who spam, push, annoy, narcissistically drone or aggressively sell are unfollowed and disconnected as quick as a click. Here’s my definition of ‘Social Selling’ for B2B:

The strategy and process of building quality networks online that accelerate the speed of business and efficiency of selling. It is achieved with human engagement through social listening, social publishing, social research, social engagement, and social collaboration.

In this definition, technology is merely an enabler but can be leveraged to create truly incredible results with the right strategy. As an example, here is my own case study with the results from just 90 days of intelligent effort. Obviously, social engagement is supported by technology and social platforms but it’s really all about human interaction and providing real value through insight or assistance with relevant content.

Social platforms, especially LinkedIn have driven the era of personal brands and the reality that we now sell naked. The days of being able to project a manufactured persona are gone… people can quickly uncover the reality of who you are, how you operate, how well you’re connected, and the value you offer… all before you ever get to say a single word on the phone or face-to-face. Social proximity is a real factor that enhances or undermines potential connection, often without the seller ever discovering how their network (or lack thereof) helped or hindered their efforts.

Your social strategy will depend on what you’re seeking to achieve and where your market is but don't fall into the trap of becoming busy in social without having a strategy for both connection and content. As an example, think about the reasons for posting in LinkedIn Publisher. Are you seeking to attract and build an audience platform? Are you wanting to provide insights and credibility to support your new business meeting requests? Are you wanting to proactively deal with potential objections you could encounter? Are you seeking to associate yourself with admired brands and thought leaders? Are you perhaps chipping away at commonly held myths about your disruptive solution set to cause a sea change? 

Social selling is a strategy, not a set of technologies. Once you know what you’re seeking to achieve and have defined goals and metrics, then you can design your strategy and action plan to cascade down to the five pillars. I will cover these in detail with subsequent posts but here’s an overview.

Social Listening: The process of proactively searching and monitoring for trigger events that provide potential opportunities to improve your own customer service, intercept competitors' customers, or engage potential clients early in their own buying process. Hootsuite and TweetDeck are just two examples of tools that could be used. Salesforce Radian6 is an excellent tool for Analysis in enterprise environments. Oracle and others also have excellent tools.

Social Publishing: Publishing insights, opinions and valuable information to attract audience or evidence credibility and value. Here is a brutal truth for sellers today: If you can't write, then you can’t sell. You need to impress with both your business value (what you do for your clients) and the values by which you operate (your ethos and the way you engage and deliver). LinkedIn Publisher is the number one blogging platform on the planet based on mathematical network effects, propensity for virality and it integrates with your personal brand. Some pundits have named this "networked blogging." Twitter can be used to amplify your publishing efforts as the spokes to your LinkedIn economic graph hub. What are your potential customers looking for online before they look for you? You need to publish in a way that leverages search engines (SEO) so they find you as a source of insight and education early in their buying cycle. It's rare that a single meeting occurs in the software technology space, without a thorough scouting of LinkedIn profiles. Aren't you employing this type of research? 

Social Research: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe” – Abraham Lincoln. Anyone who initiates contact or arrives at a meeting having failed to do their homework is an amateur. Social research allows you to identify social proximity, background, financial performance, industry trends, competitor relationships, common interests and much more. The amount of information freely available online to research individuals, corporations and industries is staggering.

Social Engagement: By listening for relevance, attracting interest and establishing credibility through publishing, and by doing your research – you’re now ready to engage. Social enables you to be where your clients are in forums, blogs and special interest groups. The best social sellers engage with context and relevance and their success rate being above 90% for securing meetings. LinkedIn’s own research has found that those who use their platform extensively before initiating contact are 50% more likely to achieve their sales targets/quotas.

Social Collaboration: We live in a world of mash-ups for creating best of breed solutions for sales, marketing and project management. The best sales people execute flexibly and collaborate online using tools such as Skype, go-to-meeting, Drop Box, Google Docs and many others. They also utilize their own CRM software and other tools to rally internal resources and manage expectations. The very best sellers are engineers of outcomes rather than mere warriors of persuasion. Research from the Rain Group unearthed that "collaboration" is one of the rarest experiences for executive buyers. They crave this and social allows you to do it. Further, it transfers the psychology of ownership of the ideas to buy from seller to buyer. 

Have a strategy for engaging in a personal, human way before you jump into social media platforms and technologies. Where are your customers online and what are they looking for before they search for you? Forget push marketing and interrupt selling; instead engage buyers early in their online journey by attracting them to you with useful information, insights and value.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au

Main image photo by Flickr: Brian, Revelation in Blue

Social Listening: Pillar One of Strategic B2B Social Selling

Social Listening: The process of proactively searching for trigger events that provide potential opportunities to improve your own customer service, intercept competitors' customers, or engage a potential client early in their own buying process.

Selling has always been about being a great listener... social selling is no different. But in modern selling there are many tools that can be used to automate the listening process; Hootsuite and TweetDeck are two examples. But before you start configuring your listening tools you need to have a clear understanding of what you're listening for.

Have you segmented your markets and identified the various buyer roles that you can target effectively? Who are the competitors where you have a track record of switching their customers over to your solutions? What events create awareness of need or that amplify perceptions of pain?

What negative events motivate people to take action to change the status quo? Is it scandal, legislative changes, new compliance obligations, suppliers being acquired or dropping the ball, competitor reps moving on or retiring? The list is endless but the point here is that you need to know what you're listening for. I'm surprised at how few sellers are creating basic Google Alerts or Twitter lists to listen by segments.

Stephen Covey said, "seek first to understand than be understood." You must first open your ears, heart and mind.

Practice social listening with a trigger event oriented focal point. In the past, organizations have focused on the territory or target list without ranking the accounts by propensity to buy based on the most compelling triggers. In the old days of solution selling, questioning was leveraged to uncover the "compelling event." Now that's just table stakes. The compelling event should be self evident through effective listening. You should know that going in. Now it's up to you to meet that golden opportunity with disruptive insight to open this account and gain preferred status upstream educating and enabling your prospects along the buyer's journey collaborative. Develop trust and help them to realize that business transformation is possible by implementing your solution. They'll also get a flavor for what the working relationship will be like.  

Beyond the obvious Google Alerts, make sure that you have a dashboard set up to glean every aspect of what your dream prospects are putting out into the social ether: press releases, white papers, reflections on the annual report, balance sheet, interviews, YouTube videos (subscribe to their channel), Tweets, Facebook shares, Google+ updates, Pinterest boards, Instagram, SlideShare and even search the first 15 pages of search results of Google with a fine toothed comb. Successful strategic selling starts with a keen interest and insatiable curiosity. 

Create you own social listening headphones! Or even better, a social selling war room. The main picture in this post is of the Dell Social Listening and Social Media Command Center.

LinkedIn Sales Navigator now compiles all these updates in one place so you can track leads and accounts, the updates their sharing, news related to the companies, and it even suggests leads to you and how you're connected via your overlapping networks. Owler.com is a phenomenal free tool I'd recommend for competitive analysis and triggers invented by Jim Fowler, the founder of Jigsaw, that became Data.com. Also consider tools such as insideview and techwalkeralerts. All of these products below are excellent social listening and monitoring tools.

Also read the old world newspaper (an oldie buy a goodie) online. Subscribe to services such as Meltwater. Listen by tuning search engines, subscribing to RSS feeds or content aggregation services. Here are the big social platforms to monitor if you are committed to strategic social selling.

LinkedIn is ideal for monitoring buyer roles changing in target organizations or listening to issues, trends, hot topics, opinions and opportunities in special interest groups. Those who actively use LinkedIn are 50% more likely to achieve their sales targets! failure to use LinkedIn in B2B selling is negligence!

Facebook if you're in the world of B2C. Two-thirds of social happens in Facebook and there 1 billions searches every day! Facebook continues to be giant in social.

Twitter is the megaphone of social amplification and the most rapid notification system on the planet. Use tools such as TweetDeck to build you listening lists.

Here is a post on why listening is the timeless skill we all need to master.  Now it's over to you... Where do you get the best results in social listening? What are your tips for others?

Here's how to get back to my Social Selling overview.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Geoff Livingston; Dell's Social Media Command Center

Social Publishing: Pillar Two of Strategic B2B Social Selling

Social Publishing: Writing original content and publishing insights, opinions and valuable information to attract customers and evidence credibility and value.

Whether you’re looking for your next role or seeking an appointment with the CXO of a target prospect; you need to show your value online to earn a conversation. This is because the majority of buyers research before a meeting; so what will they see when they look at your LinkedIn profile or blog? You need to impress with both your business value (what you do for your clients) and the values by which you operate.

I recommend that you publish where your audience is and LinkedIn Publisher is therefore the ideal platform; not just because it's connected to your professional profile but because the reach is staggering:

• LinkedIn Publisher is the number one blogging platform on the planet
• LinkedIn has 350,000,000 members and 2 people join per second
• LinkedIn has 200,000,000 unique views of pages per day
• 40% of LinkedIn members use it daily
• 60% of B2B buyers research before engaging

Don't just blog - that's Web 2.0. Take the plunge on LinkedIn Publisher into Web 3.0 - the web of context and social proximity. Understand the inter-relationships of your networks and network's networks. Share your subject matter expertise and thought leadership on here daily. The network effects and engagement are without parallel. I controversially advocate moving your blog to LinkedIn where you'll get exponential views, reads, likes, shares and comments.

Here is real case study example. In December 2012 I wrote a paper and published it on my website... over nearly two years I had less than 100 downloads. During that time I also re-purposed it into a website blog and over 14 months I had less than 300 reads. Here is a screenshot of the white paper.

In November 2014 I re-purposed it into two blog posts in LinkedIn publisher (two bottom left posts in screenshot below) and the results have been staggering with well over 200,000 reads and incredible engagement. The screenshot below provides an example of the results I was achieving within 30 days of switching my content publishing to LinkedIn.

I've adopted a strategy of quality content publishing to show both my value and my values... and I've been astounded by the results after just 90 days. Since adopting a content publishing strategy, business is coming to me and the conversations are completely different. Instead of me being asked to justify why I am the best person to deliver keynotes, consulting and training workshops; I'm instead being asked if I'm available and what I charge. Don't let anyone tell you that social selling does not monetize!

If you're a sales person, I recommend that you write your own original content as it adds credibility to your LinkedIn profile and it's the best way to learn about what you want to talk about with customers. At the very least, use LinkedIn Updates and Twitter to be a content aggregator and curator, making yourself a valued hub of other people's relevant content enhanced with your insights. Importantly, never plagiarize other people's content and always attribute source where ever possible. If you're the leader within a business, be intentional about your writing strategy to build following around a personal employee brand you trust.

The fastest way to build compelling topical posts is to newsjack current events(President Obama) and here is an example from when Harrison Ford crashed is WWII aircraft on a golf course. I've written other detailed posts that provide many tips and advice for social publishing and all of these are essential reading:

• How to create viral content
• How to crack the LinkedIn Publisher Code
• The daily habit of creating content and being active in social
• Top 10 Reasons Why Your Sales Reps SHOULD Be Creating Content
• 10 Steps To Build Wildly Remarkable LinkedIn Publisher Content Daily
• Frequency – What Sex And LinkedIn Have In Common

Now it's over to you... I believe that in today's world, if you can't write, you can't sell and that sales people should be content creators and content curators. Feel free to weigh-in. How do you achieve the best results with publishing to attract clients? What are your tips for others?

Here is how to go back to my Social Selling overview.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: redspotte

Social Engagement: Pillar Four of Strategic B2B Social Selling

Social engagement is simply how we establish connection and build relationships with people in social media. All the rules of the physical world apply including professionalism, good manners, respect and integrity.

Blasting someone with your uber-messaging Gatling gun projection machine causes people to recoil. Baiting people with content to capture their details and then launching a ‘shock and awe’ bombardment campaign damages your brand. Too much ‘noise’ creates selective deafness in your audience.

We’ve all been on the receiving end… instead use social listening and social research to be targeted and relevant for those with whom you pursue a relationship. Be a Hawkeye cupid sniper rather than a worrier with an arsenal.

The way we sell is more important than what we sell. How we open the conversation is far more important than how we close the sale. Masterful openers set the agenda and establish value. When we engage anyone in business we need to:

• Introduce ourselves within a trusted network

• With relevant context that creates value in a conversation

• Leading with insight and respecting their time

• Without pressure or manipulation

All of this can be done in social with LinkedIn being the critical platform for B2B sellers. Be where your customers are... where do they go online to research and gain insight? What online communities are they part of? What do they look for before they look for you? Here are the things to focus on:

• Use Sales Navigator to determine social proximity for good old networking to secure an introduction. Warm introductions trump cold calls every time.

• Pick up the phone and call them... it still works a treat!

• Lead with why, rather than with what you do and how you do it. Be clear about the business value you offer in terms of delivering outcomes and managing risk.

• Be a giver not a taker. Ensure that they take more from the meeting than you.

• Create well conceived templates that you tailor for InMails and emails to anchor meeting and conversations. Convey that you've authentically researched them and their company thoroughly to glean actionable insight. 

• Become a valued member of the online communities in which your targets participate. No creepy stalking or cheap self promotion... just weigh-in with insight and become known to the group as a valued member.

• Be clear about what the next steps should be.

• Always follow-up in a timely manner on every small commitment.

Connect in context, engage with relevance, focus on business value (delivering their outcomes and managing their risks) and endeavor to build a relationship of trust.

Feel free to weigh-in. How do you engage using social and what are your tips for others? Here is how to go back to my Social Selling overview.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Spreng Ben

 

Social Collaboration: Pillar Five of B2B Social Selling

Social Collaboration is the process of leveraging technology to work efficiently with customers, partners and your extended team to strengthen relationships and achieve rapid results.

In the context of B2B social selling, collaboration creates conversations in communities and builds teams across physical boundaries. Go beyond mere publishing to engage and then collaborate using social media platforms. Make yourself a hub of networking and invite experts in where they can contribute. Value diversity, encourage opinions but gently discourage overtly selling or pushing personal agendas.

Social drives efficiency if you operate with purpose and finesse.

Birds of a feather flock together but they don't need to fly in and physically be in the same space to see a demonstration, collaborate, share ideas, work on documents or manage opportunities and projects. Social collaboration tools are everywhere and many are free... LinkedIn, Google Docs, Facebook, your iPhone to do conference calls and much more is available to transform the way you work with others. Tools that were very expensive not that long a go are now free... video conferencing is an example. Social is a great example of disruptive technology operating in the cloud. We really can beam in virtually and engage meaningfully.

According to research published in 2014 by London investment management firm, Nutmeg, commuters spend an average 10,634 hours traveling to and from work over their lifetime. Traveling wastes time and is a productivity killer. Working from home and teleporting into your meetings using the interweb can be done to great effect.

Tools such as Google Hang-outs, Skype, WebEx, and Go-to-meeting provide the opportunity to collaborate virtually but how do you ensure best possible engagement from every person? We've all experienced physical and virtual meetings where people are there but not really present; working on emails or digitally distracted.

You can tell when people are not there so get them engaged by asking them questions. Let people know you can hear them tapping away on their keyboard. Set the ground-rules for every meeting... "If you're going to be in the meeting, then be fully here." Let people know that it's important to respect everyone's time. Make sure you understand the technology your using and this video is a funny example of the worst of virtual meetings.

Collaboration means working effectively together so share information openly and make sure that it's timely and accurate. Use your content management and internal Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system well so that your internal team has an accurate view of the opportunity and knows the current status. Use the update/feeds capabilities (if your CRM offers the feature) to keep people informed. Ensure actions are being captured and tracked, also that contact details are up-to-date for all the players within the account. Earn the support of others by using your systems and tools well to earn their support and allocation of resources.

Social media platforms and modern communication tools make the process of connecting and collaborating amazingly affordable. I'm old enough to remember messaging technologies being introduced back in 1980s when email replaced memos... it's amazing how the world has changed in one lifetime! Now instant messaging, live chat, uploading photos and videos, scanning documents, virtual deal rooms, mobile applications, and myriad other examples have transformed the speed of commerce.

But amidst the frenetic pace of business and the overwhelming number of meetings demanding your time; set yourself apart by:

• Using technology well (logged-in and set-up before the meeting is due to start).
• Respecting everyone's time by circulating an agenda in advance.
• Setting expectations for participants and their contributions.
• Starting on time and keeping the meeting on track.
• Politely calling people out for bad behavior (there but not there).
• Capturing and circulating actions.

Here is a list of cloud/social presentation and collaboration platforms from Jamie Shanks that enable you to present and do demonstrations incredibly well.

No-one I know fosters collaboration and engagement in social better than John Smibert who leads the LinkedIn Strategic Selling group. He's masterful at starting conversations and encouraging individuals to contribute by reaching out personally to those he respects asking them to contribute. How do you achieve the best results with social collaboration tools and platforms? What are your tips for others? Here is how to go back to my Social Selling overview.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Picture by Harry Harms. Every year Christian Moullec trains a number of geese to follow his ultralight plane. He uses this group and his plane to guide migrating geese from Lapland to France, avoiding areas where the geese might be hunted. In the spring the geese migrate back on their own. In this shot he is accompanied by cranes.

Do We Ever Really Learn From Sales Failure?

I've recently had the privilege of getting to know Cian Mcloughlin as part of a Sales Masterminds group that's been formed in Australasia and led by John Smibert (Strategic Selling Group in LinkedIn). Cian has real insights into how to drive massive success in complex selling and I asked him about the role of win and loss reviews, why they're important and what mistakes companies make. Here is his wisdom... the rest of this post is from him (with pics from me).

“You don’t learn from successes; you don’t learn from awards; you don’t learn from celebrity; you only learn from wounds and scars and mistakes and failures. And that’s the truth.”  Jane Fonda.

Not all scars, in life or in business, should be seen as badges of honor. Most of my business battle-scars (with the possible exception of my grey hair) I wear on the inside. Earned in hard fought deals lost at the 11th hour or sales skirmishes over before a single power-point had been fired in anger.

The thing about scars, be they from life or business, is we should always learn from them. It’s one thing to lose a deal or miss out on a promotion at work, but before the scar has even begun to form, you need to be asking yourself “what can I take away from this experience, how do I learn from it and ensure I’m better, smarter and more prepared next time around?”

Unfortunately the vast majority of professional sales organisations, I’m talking big companies spending inordinate amounts of time and money prospecting for new business, actually spend very little time or money trying to understand why they won or lost a deal in the first place. We all know line attributed to but almost certainly never uttered by Einstein “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome”. You can guarantee whoever did say it, didn’t work in the b2b sales world!

The amount of wastage, duplication and chasing of lost causes which occurs across the business world is borderline criminal. I wouldn’t even hazard a guess at the real and opportunity costs associated with sales organisations (be they technology, professional services, engineering & construction, utilities, oil & gas companies) responding to numerous tenders, conducting lengthy cycles with would-be customers or undertaking hugely expensive proof of concepts, only to lose the deal and walk away with nothing.

My personal opinion (and I’ll be the first to admit I’m biased) is that win, lose or draw if you’ve conducted a professional sales process, you’ve earned the right to extract some value from the experience and the vast majority of b2b customers out there agree with me. So, the next time you’re conducting a major deal, whether you’re in the box seat or staring down the barrel of defeat, pause for a moment and ask yourself the following questions. Win, lose or draw…

• What insights could this client give me to improve or refine my sales skills and do an even better job next time?
• Could their feedback help me to distance myself from my competition in some small but important way?
• Am I winning this deal on product, price or my ability to present a compelling, credible and believable story?
• Am I losing on product, price or my inability to engage, inspire or educate my prospective client?

I suppose the real question you should be asking is what lesson could this new new scar teach me?

Follow Cian in LinkedIn and read his posts. He has held senior sales and channel management roles in a number of the world’s largest IT software companies, including Cognos and SAP, in 2011 Cian became the founder and CEO of Trinity Perspectives, a boutique sales consultancy firm based in Sydney. He also co-authored an Amazon #1 bestseller ‘Secrets of Business Success”, and is a regular sales and marketing commentator in the mainstream media including Sky News Business, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age newspapers.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Erik Charlton Fire Eater

5 Ways To Overcome Adversity – And Rise Like A Phoenix

Bernadette McClelland is part of Sales Masterminds Australasia and it's been my privilege to get to know her. She's overcome setbacks with health, sexism and in business, both personal and professional. I asked her for some advice on how to overcome adversity and here is her wisdom.

Bernadette responded instantly with: "There are a couple of things I learned along the way: A problem shared is a problem halved, and there really is light at the end of the tunnel. I said , "I thought that was usually a train coming the other way." She just smiled.

I now this is an important topic because sales and leadership is filled with difficulties and life always throws us a curve-ball. I asked her why she feels passionate about being resilient. Here is her response.

• Three people I know in senior roles both on a local scale and a global scale were made redundant last week alone and they're hurting.

• Forty-four small businesses per week close their doors every day in the state of Victoria, Australia and I understand that pain.

• The role of a salesperson is one of the top 10 jobs that show an increase in depression caused by stress for failing to meet budget and uncertainty about commissions. For men, this is impacting their identity and their ability to be the responsible provider and protector of families and I actually see it in my clients.

So what do you do to bridge that chasm when the gap becomes too wide? How do you overcome real adversity and how do you reinvent yourself when what you know and are comfortable with is no longer in your control?

A back-story here to provide context. I was a successful saleswoman in corporate Australia and decided to take a break and 'do my own thing' based on passion and a desire to help salespeople become more successful. I was still stuck in a corporate way of thinking and it didn't work as well as I had wanted. No biggie. It allowed me to purchase a retail shop in country Victoria instead which was super successful and we ended up buying out one of our national wholesalers and began to import our own designer products which also was a great business. Six years of success.

Then, left of field, an accident, a life defining illness, twelve months bedridden, liquidation, bankruptcy, a betrayal on the job front for my husband and before we knew it we found ourselves on Centrelink [welfare]. We were homeless as we had just lost our two properties and we were flat broke with no money – only 4 years ago! On one hand, it was enough for my husband to think thoughts no one wants to think and on the other hand it allowed me to revisit what I really wanted to do if I got well.

Re-inventing myself meant getting clear on a dream no matter how big. As I lay there I decided I would do what I should never have walked away from but I'd add a little bit more color and juice and lead from the front 'to be Australia's leading female expert in sales' whatever that meant! But the words didn't really matter. What was important was it led me down a path.

And the path it led me to included people I love and respect and have as colleagues, friends and business acquaintances all around the world - people like Tony Robbins and his team of life changers who invited me in as the APAC coach for his business and executive clients, Matt Church and the team of thought leaders who helped launch my ability to capture, package and sell my thoughts, Jill Konrath and the team of women sales professionals who provide me unlimited support as a female minority in the sales space, you (Tony Hughes) and John Smibert and the Australasian team of sales master minders who invited me in to be one of the women leading change in the profession of selling.

So, here I am today doing, a second chance, doing what I love which is working with awesome clients to help them grow their businesses yes, but more importantly helping them bridge the gap between their goals in business and life and their potential to step into their day to day leadership roles. Business people just like me who relish working with someone to call them on their stuff, brainstorm with them on ways to achieve those results that matter the most and most importantly be OK with who they are.

With my husband stepping into a different identity and now in a national sales management role and me standing for a more real and authentic way of selling on a global change making scale, how did we overcome adversity and reinvent ourselves? Five key things:

1. We asked ourselves some pretty tough questions - who were we at our core, what value did we bring to not just our table, but any table, who were we going to hang around and have as part of our lives and who were we going to distance ourselves from - friends and family?
2. We reframed our situation - instead of viewing what had happened as having lost everything, we decided that for the first time in our lives we were debt free, we were, and are young for our age and we backed ourselves and our value. What an awesome baseline to start from
3. We spent every last cent, on investing in our growth - if we were the ones who created the problem, and in fact were big enough to take 100% responsibility, then how could we be the ones to fix the problem to move us forward. We couldn't! We needed fresh perspectives, new voices and new ways of thinking.
4. We looked forward with an intention to serve other people and contribute to their growth, not just because it boosts the feel good factor, because there is nothing like waking up in the morning to a day that has purpose , that helps others and creates an upward spiral. When you look backwards and focus only on yourself then the spiral will, by default, take you down.
5. We held the faith and I don't mean religious beliefs but a firm belief that 'it is written'. We redefined success and were willing to play the long game based on the right rules, the right people and the right values, so that everyone's scorecard is a win.

Times are tough, results don't come as easily, marriages break down more, people stress out, houses get repossessed, businesses go bust and people die. But winter passes and by being the real deal, by being vulnerable and open, you can become whoever you want and create those results that matter the most.

Bernadette McClelland is a sales leadership consultant, an executive coach and an international speaker who works with executives and companies in growth mode looking to jump-start results by quickly bridging their corporate goals with revenue potential. She is passionate about raising the bar for leadership, and B2B sales, to be more 'real' and transparent.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by: Bernadette McClelland

Shut-up and Embrace These 10 Attributes for Success

I recently read Dave Warawa's book: Shut Up! Stop talking And Start Making Money. It's a good read for anyone starting out in professional selling and he identifies 10 attributes for sustained success. With Dave's permission here is an edited excerpt of his ten attributes directly from the book.

1. Ambition: Lazy salespeople are not successful. Unless you have very strong personal aspirations to succeed, it’s not going to happen for you. Success doesn’t go around looking for people. You need to seek it. A very successful life insurance salesperson once told me, “There’s a big bag of money waiting for you out there. You just have to go pick it up.” Do you have the ambition to pick up your big bag of money?
2. Motivation: Motivation, closely related to ambition, is in fact only applicable to those Professional Salespeople who have ambition. If you’re ambitious and motivated, you’re moving in the right direction. Now answer this: “At what speed are you travelling?” That is your measure of motivation.
3. Confidence: Sales is not for the weak or timid. You need to believe in yourself and your product. You have to be able to look people in the eye, listen to their needs and put together a convincing proposition to make them want to buy. While product knowledge can be learned, personal confidence is harder to teach. It is, however, a necessity.
4. Integrity: Focus on your customer’s needs at all times. Professional Salespeople never recommend a product or service that they wouldn’t buy themselves based on similar need. Your personal integrity goes beyond the best interests of your employer’s. Your customer comes first; your company second; you third. Keep those priorities straight and you will always have customers and a career as a Professional Salesperson. If you’re not currently working with an employer who understands that, find a new employer.
5. Respect and Likeability: When was the last time you bought something from someone who you disliked or had no respect for? If customers don’t like you, they won’t give you their business. Period. People will go to great measures and inconvenience themselves to find someone they admire so they can buy from them. Customers who don’t like you will take all the great information you provided and make the sale easy for the first likeable salesperson who sells a similar product or service. You do the work. Another salesperson makes the sale.Perhaps the first lesson of sales should be this:Don’t be a jerk. Don’t give people a reason not to buy from you.
6. Passion: Every successful Professional Salesperson has buckets of passion! You need to love what you do and believe wholeheartedly in what you sell. Passion gets you out of bed in the morning and puts a smile on your face that transfers to your customers. They are swept up in your belief, enthusiasm and positive energy. Passion is the fuel that makes the fire burn bright.
7. Persistence: Remember the word “No” and what it stands for? I’m not interested in what you have to offer at this given point in time. Persistence enables Professional Salespeople to make the most of the essential role of timing in the sales process. Tactful and diplomatic persistence pays off.
8. Work Ethic: Without a strong work ethic, any success you have will be short-lived. Professional Salespeople work hard. They have to build relationships with many people, dedicate the time to understand their needs, desires and feelings and treat each customer with a positive attitude. An intense work ethic is a principle of sales success. Easy sales are rare. For every one that occurs, many other potential sales slip away for reasons beyond the control of the Professional Salesperson. That’s after working long and hard doing everything within your power to convince someone to buy.

Together, the preceding eight attributes are the cornerstones of success. You need each and every one of them, in no small amount, to become accomplished in the sales industry. Without the ninth necessary attribute, though, they hardly matter. So what’s this ninth, most necessary attribute of Professional Salespeople?

9. Drive: How bad do you want it versus how bad do you need it? Drive is the internal engine that pushes Professional Salespeople. It doesn’t make them pushy; it makes them bear down and do what needs to be done over the long term. Drive is the practical application of Ambition. It gives you theConfidence to believe in yourself. Drive requires Integrity for those who want to like the person they see in the mirror. It pushes you to earn Respectwhile being Likeable to receive the support of your customers and co-workers.Drive reinforces your Motivation. It’s fueled by Passion, enablesPersistence and is apparent in Work Ethic. Drive is the power that determines the height and speed of your sales success.

Take away drive and the other eight necessary attributes have no self-sustaining energy. That’s why it’s the most necessary attribute of Professional Salespeople.

Beyond these nine most necessary attributes for sustained sales success, what attribute could be left to discuss? Only the one that is common to all Sales Superstars... it's attribute #10: Their attitude

Sales Superstars do not wish to recognize hardships as excuses for failure. They attain their goals and then acknowledge the obstacles that were in their path. It’s their perspective and attitude that makes them different. They don’t belong to the coffee club and moan about their challenges to their co-workers. They understand the true meaning of the cliché “misery loves company.” They socialize with positive-minded people only and, because of this, may not be the most popular people on the sales floor.

They are fiercely competitive in one of two ways:

• They either need to be the top Professional Salesperson in their division or they need to be consistently beating their results from the previous year.

• They are the top earners in the company and make incredible commissions. Their annual incomes exceed many doctors, lawyers and those with actual Master’s degrees. They dare not tell their neighbors or family about what they earn for fear of jealousy and alienation.

Dave can be found here in LinkedIn and you'll find a link to buy his book.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo From Dave Warawa's book cover - Shut Up! Stop Talking and Start Making Money

Test Your Social Selling Effectiveness

John Dougan, ex-Huthwaite / MHI Global is now with Sales ITV in Australia and he's initiating some very interesting research that I'll be commenting on in the coming weeks. John thinks that if you believe that 'social' changes selling behavior, then you shouldn’t be in sales!

In his article ‘Evolution not Revolution’, John explains how social selling is very simple and effective for professional sellers to communicate with customers. Social is a component of all that has gone before it and does not work on its own; nothing works on its own. He highlights that even the skills and behaviours that are required to be successful online are consistent with those that are required to be successful offline.

I've long advocated that the best sellers today bring proven old world techniques to new social platforms and tools. We live in the age of mash-ups with methodology, process and tools to drive sales effectiveness. Social is without doubt most powerful for research and connection. John and I agree that new tools are changing how we engage and collaborate and that both buyers and sellers need to be supported differently in today’s complex business environment. But‘Social Selling’ is a mere cliche for many sales people and worse, a complete mystery to others.

John Dougan says, "There is however, a meaningful transition to social engagement where those adept at developing personal brand, and who can develop a select network, can credibly connect to reap the rewards of improved customer experience."

How mature is your organization concerning social selling? Click here to complete a 2 minute survey and watch for the results in coming weeks. Were there other questions that John should have asked in his research survey?

If you'd like social selling defined is business to business (B2B) context, see my 6 part series which covers the 5 pillars of social selling.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Robert Huffstutter

Key Social Selling Metrics. What Should You Measure?

Social selling is all the rage but poorly understood. All the rules of professional selling in the physical world apply to online social selling. We need to build networks of trust and engage thoughtfully with context and value. In B2B social selling I've nominated 6 pillars for sales success:

• Strong personal brand.
• Social listening and monitoring for buyer trigger events.
• Social publishing for credibility and attraction content marketing.
• Social research for relevance and insight to positively challenge.
• Social engagement to connect in context with a trusted network.
• Social collaboration for accelerating business and driving efficiency.

All of your social selling activites should be focused of getting on the phone with the person!!!!!!

I've written previously about the key metrics to measure in CRM but how do you drive the right behaviors and activities in social? What gets measured gets done yet according to Jason Jordan and Michelle Vazzana in Cracking The Sales Management Code, 83% of what is measured (typically in CRM systems) cannot be managed. That's because you can’t manage results, only activities and inputs. This is a profound point... we must focus on coaching and managing the right activities that feed into objectives (KPIs) that in turn create revenue and margin results.

I’ve worked in large corporations where there has been an insane focus on the forecast call… endlessly asking the same questions of sales people, baiting them to go and blow the deal with inappropriate pressure and also train customers about end-of-quarter discounts that will always be available (despite hollow threats to put the price back up). Opening is far more important than closing and if you want accurate forecasting, then understand the customer’s process and timing for the necessary approvals and administrative tasks. Want more revenue, then coach and manage the activities that create and progress opportunities. We need to earn revenue in the way we engage and by creating real business value for the customer.

In today's world, sales people need to be micro-marketers and value engineers, leveraging technology and tools to greater greater yields in delivering ever increasing revenue targets in relentlessly commoditizing markets. Sales people need to rediscover the lost art of writing... I firmly believe that if you can't write, then you can't sell. I also believe that sales management is the weak link in the revenue chain and sale managers need to coach and also hold their people to account for executing the right inputs the right way, consistently week-in and week-out.

What should we focus on and what should we measure? It all depends on what you're seeking to achieve... what's your strategy? As an example; are you publishing to attract audience or to evidence your credibility? Here are potential input metrics to measure as you take your team on the journey of B2B social selling. Don't try and implement too many... pick the few that will make the difference based on your social selling maturity and strategy.

• Trigger events captured (eg; new decision driver or buyer roles who joining target industry organizations, regulatory changes, scandals, mergers and acquisitions).
• Unique content created (eg; LinkedIn Updates shared, LinkedIn Publisher or other blog posts published, Linkedin Group discussions initiated, Tweets generated).
• Unique content views, comments, likes, shares, retweets and stars.
• Other people's content curated (eg; retweets, likes, shares, comments, Google+, etc.).
• Researched thought leadership papers written, strategies documented, account plans created.
• LinkedIn Sales Navigator 'accounts' and 'leads' created.
• Customer industry associated joined and meetings attended.
• Tailored InMails sent with accept and response rate.
• Phone calls made and meetings booked.
• Emails sent.
• Inbound connection requests (this could be the cornerstone metric for successful content publishing moving from push to pull)
• Referral requests per day
• Profile views
• Monthly LinkedIn SSI (Social Selling Index) change
• Visibility rank in LinkedIn network
• LinkedIn connection count
• Appointments set from all this both on phone and on site

 And specifically for LinkedIn's Sales Navigator:

• Leads saved
• Accounts saved
• Custom leadbuilder searches saved
• TeamLink referral requests
• Trigger events tracked, most important job changes, promotions and lead recommendations

How will you measure each metric? Will you be able to trust the data? Which few have the biggest impact? How will you recognize and reward the leaders who embrace the social selling journey?

This is an excellent post by LinkedIn's Alex Hisaka on Measuring Your Team’s Social Selling Performance. It's a must read on this topic. Here also is a brilliantarticle on social ROI by Kevan Lee from Buffer (an app I use in my social strategy).

The last of the 5 pillars is 'social collaboration' and CRM is an important tool for sharing information across a team as your pursue complex opportunities and manage large accounts.

Bonus content: What to measure in CRM.

Published research nominates the failure rate of CRM implementations at more than 30% with one research paper nominating the figure at 70%! But in my opinion failure has nothing to do the CRM technology. Every organization needs a CRM to be truly customer-centric and it should be the platform on which process automation and deal coaching occurs. Here are the 8 things I recommend you manage in a CRM for complex B2B solution selling because there is an ‘activity lever’ can be pulled:

1. Qualified pipeline as a percentage of target / quota. I recommend 3-5 times coverage and if it’s low, the sales person can execute activities to build the pipeline

2. Opportunity qualification score. A qualification snapshot should be done progressively as deal moves through stages. Poor scores should create actions to gather intelligence or execute tasks that improve the situation

3. Number of meetings that progress the sale (with call plans completed). Call plans should be forms within your CRM, not Word documents, and the meeting notes and actions from the call should also be logged in CRM.

4. Discovery completed. This is different to the qualification process. It’s all the information you need to be able to properly propose a solution. Again, this should reside within your CRM so that when you move from selling to implementing, and then to supporting; you have a single view of the client for all aspects of customer lifecycle.

5. Number of opportunities reviewed by sales manager. Again within the CRM with your sales methodology integrated and evidenced by a new qualification snapshot score and actions created.(TAS Dealmaker, Pipeline Manager and Sales Pipeliner are excellent plugins for Salesforce CRM. Oracle and SugarCRM also have good solutions to align to process).

6. Proposals submitted (accepted and validated by the customer) following documented discovery process.

7. Deal time in each stage (excessive time in a stage reduces likelihood of winning). This is the most difficult in the list to ‘pull an activity lever’, but we should nevertheless understand the customer’s process and timing.

8. Close plans validated by customer. Close plans are the secret to accurate forecasting. Best practice is to rename the document to ‘Project Alignment Plan’ and then sit with the customer to validate that we are all on the same page and can meet their expectations with resources and timing. (eg; have our legal people available for contract negotiations at the right time, have our project manager available for kick-off planning when needed, etc.)

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Stevie Spiers - Does he measure up

5 Traits That Create Massive Success

Success is illusive for many... mainly because they don't have written goals and also because the human condition is wired to self-sabotage. It's easy to pursue a mirage or slavishly climb a ladder leaning against the wrong wall. Real success does not reside in our conquests, possessions or bank balance. It instead comes from purpose and who we are... the true value of anything we pursue resides is in who we become in the chase (The Joshua Principle).

Success is first about being the person worthy of it and making the decision to get out of our own way. In a previous article I wrote about Leadership Secrets From The Inside and this illustration shows the elements I believe create human success.

We don't get to choose the first three factors of family, intelligence and personality but we can choose our values, beliefs and attitudes. Regardless of your philosophical, political, religious or non-religious beliefs, here are five things that you need to be (embrace and live) in order to have the success that you seek.

1. Humble. If you have to tell someone you're humble; you're not. Humility is the opposite of arrogance. It's all very well to challenge customers and the status quo but it needs to be done with finesse and in the form of intelligent questions that posit a hypothesis of value. Avoid being the challenger bull in the china shop. You can be well informed, strong and assured while still being humble.
2. Grateful. Happiness comes from this trait and it's the opposite of having a sense of entitlement. Rather than demanding what you believe is fair or deserved, you're appreciative of every small blessing or piece of good fortune.
3. Curious. Those who are fascinated by others and also by how things work are magnets for friendship and business. They can create value because they have an innate desire to understand through active listening and research before proposing solutions. Intellectual curiosity is an indicator of intelligence.
4. Courageous. The most successful people overcome their fears and are intelligent risk takers; they know that persistence in overcoming rejectionand failure is the price of success. They embrace the difficult, knowing that difficulty is what excludes the masses. They take massive targeted action and are never single point dependent for success.
5. Generous. Those who give their time and energy to others without an agenda attract the very best from those around them. The law of reciprocity is real

You'll notice that confidence is missing from the list and that's because, in the context of of professional selling, confidence is the paradise of fools. We need to instead be positively paranoid. Confidence is the dumb cousin is certainty. Rather being certain that we have the best solution or that our view of the world is right, we need to be open to new information and the perspective of others. Belief, rather than confidence, is what we should seek to fill our people and [potential] customers with; and we need to achieve it through aligned values. Here is my article on the one anomalistic trait to seek in sales people.

This is all foundational for creating great culture. The best CEOs embrace all this as they obsessively seek to understand best Customer eXperience (CX) and how their organization can deliver it through every channel. For anyone dealing with leaders, we must understand their language and what's important to them. The primary language of business is numbers, and leaders care care about delivering results and managing risk. Here is my article on Decoding The CEO.

Finally, choose a cause and serve it with everything within you. Belief in the value you offer and be clear about the values with which your operate. Differentiate yourself with the people you work with, the approach and methodology your use, and your ability to deliver business outcomes and manage risk. All of this coupled with massive intelligent action creates an irresistible force for success.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Don Burkett Eagle 2014

3.4 Reasons Humor is Explosively Powerful For Leadership

I have a weird sense of humor... it's a gift from my father that I treasure. On April Fools Day this year I published my last ever post in LinkedIn with the gracious permission of Professor Neil Rackham... and some thought it was for real. This month I was published in Sales Mastery Magazine with this satirical piece on Artificial Intelligence Dark Social creating sales career apocalypse.

According to Professor Diculous, “By linking all social platforms together through APIs and metadata tags, dark social can power AI cyber-selling.” When asked what it will mean for the selling profession, Diculous responded, “All the elements are now in place and I predict 65% of inside sales roles with be replaced by AI Cyber Sellers (AICS) by 2018. Many sales people will have to turn to burger-flipping to make a living.”

The second generation robot will become a complete AI salesbot, travelling to customers using a Google Car to deliver Challenger insights. The bot will effectively build rapport during presentations where the audience is handicapped by PDSP (Physically Disengaged by Social Platforms), which is spreading at epidemic proportions.

I then interviewed Professor Harold Diculous (Rodney Marks) on camera and I'm currently publishing a series of 14 satirical videos on social selling here.

Any time that you have to stand in front of an audience and deliver... take some deep breaths to slow your heart-rate before you stand up; then walk calmly to the podium, look them in eye and smile... grin like an idiot – it's liberating. Deliver your opening few sentences from memory. Know your content and avoid endless boring slides. Here is a great video by Don McMillan on how NOT to use PowerPoint.

If you want to get the audience in the right frame of mind, especially when running internal meetings, consider playing a video to help them to unfold their arms and lighten-up. Whenever I run training courses I open with this, announcing that "it's business time." Lots of laughs... especially from the ladies... even when I present in America.

There are many funny and inspiring videos on my website so feel free to browse here to then go to YouTube and source your own ice-breakers for meetings. And finally, here is the award winning poem from my last ever post in LinkedIn:

All that is told is not Twitter,
All blogs in LinkedIn are not lost;
The told that is true does not wither,
Deep beet roots are not reached by the frost.
From the likes in social we'll be woken,
A goat from the thickets shall spring;
Reviews and shares shall be spoken,
The crownless again shall be king.

Picture above is Sir Les Patterson, Australian cultural attache.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Dai Zaobab - Spinning buugeng

5 Tips For Avoiding Age Discrimination In Sales

In the hiring game, younger is usually cheaper but not necessarily better. Millennials and Gen-Y are renowned for being in a role for just weeks and wondering why their manager has failed to recognize their talent and not promoted them.

Wisdom requires age and has it's benefits especially in roles where buyers seek trusted advice to manage their purchasing risk and avoid implementation mistakes. The best employers recognize that their customers appreciate dealing with those who best meet their needs and who also provide insight beyond mere information. The smartest employers also value diversity (gender, age, culture, etc.) within teams to ensure they're not blind-sided by competitors. There are 5 things mature and older people must do if they hope to escape being typecast as past their prime.

1. Be fit and healthy with high energy. Arnie and Sly have both defied the age stereotypes. Physiology has a huge impact on your mental state so walk, jog, ride a bike, go to the gym. Walk briskly and speak with enthusiasm. Drink lots of water and as Doctor John Tickell once said: "Everything in moderation except vegetables, fish, exercise, laughter and sex... but not all at the same time; it makes a hell of a mess."

2. Embrace technology. The good old days weren't really that good. Be nice to the computers that may one day replace you... young people have more to worry about than you. Be the one who learns new software applications and mobile apps. Software is becoming increasingly intuitive and user-friendly. Have a good attitude toward learning which should be a life-long commitment. New technologies, including the interweb, open the door to an amazing world. Engage in social media, be the most active user of your CRM, and do research online.

3. Be curious and embrace change. Many within the generations below you are not readers, yet everything is at your fingertips online... be willing to go deep and bring something youth does not, context and wisdom. Variety is the spice of life and be the team player happy to be where the side needs you most. Tell your co-workers that you read 'who moved my cheese' every month and that you love uncertainty.

4. Have an infectious sense of humor. It's impossible not to like someone who makes you feel good. No-one wants to fire the person who brings joy and a positive sense of humor to the workplace. Laughter is infectious

5. Carry the culture. The world is losing its way with narcissism and relativism. Corruption in sport (FIFA, cycling, boxing), politics, unions, and big business is rife. Every workplace needs people of good values who act with integrity, reject gossip, build others up, and are force for good. Carry the organization's culture and live the values by driving them forward in your own special way!

Bunnings in Australia is a great retailer and they value the wisdom, patience, stability and loyalty of older mature staff members. My son commenced university this year and has been working part-time at Bunnings for three years. He loves working there and will do so all the way through university. The older staff members mentor and guide younger ones and there is a genuine team culture without discrimination.

Just like happiness, age is a state of mind. Set goals, pursue a passion and be inspired. If these three legends are still going... what's your excuse.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Roberto Rizzato THE DALAI LAMA (The Strength of Faith)

P.S. Yes, the main picture is the Dalai Lama... photo-shopped.

2 Ways To Soaring Sales Using Modern Technology

I don't have a commercial arrangement to say good things about these companies but I provide the examples to show you how to make your results soar by intelligently using technology... there's no CRM here and you'll even see the phone being used! Show these to your senior executive team if they struggle to understand how selling is changing and how people using technology masterfully can be the rocket fuel for soaring results.

Inside Sales: Here's an example from InsideSales on how algorithms can work to drive productivity. It's real and their customers are using it today. This is a powerful example of how lower cost inside sellers are eating into the traditional domain of expensive field sales. The focus today is on buyer/seller alignment and creating best possible Customer eXperience (CX). We need to engage and interact the way that our prospects and customers want us to. This means online, in social, on the phone and face-to-face when they want the meeting. The ability to click a button on your website to initiate chat or a voice conversation is essential today.

The algorithms and integration that drive the level of sales execution in the video above is real and affordable. Cloud computing and Software as a Service (SaaS) is changing the game for smaller companies to be able to compete with industry giants for elegant and seamless service with efficient processes.

Field sales: This video was produced by LinkedIn in their New York office recently when they had 3 real world customers provide case studies of how they're delivering real sales transformation.

LinkedIn is without doubt the most powerful tool on the face of the planet for researching prospective customers and elevating the sales profession. The speakers here talk using social to sell and I define the term Social Selling hereincluding five pillars for execution:

• Social listening and monitoring for buyer trigger events.
• Social publishing for credibility and attraction content marketing.
• Social research for relevance and insight to positively challenge.
• Social engagement to connect in context with a trusted network.
• Social collaboration for accelerating business and driving efficiency.

I've been doing work for Oracle in the last few months and their suite of CX solutions is incredibly powerful. What's your strategy to use technology to drive revenue growth, operational efficiency and better Customer eXperience? 

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr:  Jimmy Baikovicius

5 'Dark Social' Concerns For Online Leadership

Last week I was running a training session for one of my IT industry clients on how to use LinkedIn for strategic social selling. "No thanks; I don't use LinkedIn" said an uber-intelligent pre-sales solutions architect as I was rounding-up the team to get them intothe boardroom. As someone reached over and lifted my jaw shut, he continued in response to my dumbfounded expression... "Seriously, I don't want my personal meta-data being harvested and being used in ways I don't authorize."

Wow; I'd always thought everyone had decided that resistance was futile and that assimilation into the collective was inevitable. This week I had a coffee with the resistor and, after assuring him he would remain anonymous, I listened to his very valid concerns.

As a professional, Google and LinkedIn are his main concerns and here are his main ones:

1. He can lose control and ownership of his content.
2. His data can be used in ways in which he does not approve.
3. He can be profiled using meta-data (data about activity and content. eg; the IP address of a computer or the location of a device) without his consent.
4. He will be blasted with advertising in ways he does not like.
5. He will be approached by people he does not want in his life.

What is 'dark social'? I define it as the unwanted consequences of our content and meta data being aggregated and analyzed for reasons we do not understand and have not authorized.

Corporations and governments are both actively engaged in the process of tracking and profiling users of the interweb. Have you ever browsed looking for a particular car to buy or retail item only to have advertisement for these exact things then pop up all the time?

Facebook famously lured business and communities into their world to build groups only later to turn these into money-making walled gardens where business needed to pay for access and members are bombarded with advertising.  Google is the most powerful meta-data harvester in the world for profiling individuals and predicatively pushing paid [advertising] content at them. LinkedIn is now embarking on a similar journey with feeds becoming cluttered with paid content. Mobility, wearables, proximity beacons, the ubiquity of GPS, the internet of things... it all driving it to a new level. We won't even discuss Artificial Intelligence but imagine IBM's Watson super computer working with Google to digitally profile individuals.

You may think that the commercial gathering of our data is limited tospamming annoyance but Marc Goodman has written a provokative book, Future Crime, which highlights a sinister end-game where everything is connected; and in ways that we can neither imagine or manage.

People tend to create a persona on different platforms (my business life on LinkedIn, my family life on Facebook, My party social life is on Instagram or Snapchat, My political views on Twitter). But although these separate personas reside on different platforms, the APIs and web services provide points of external data harvesting.

Big data analytics can join the dots (URLs) and build a very complete picture on an individual past and an accurate predictive picture of their future. Medical, financial, behavioral, even political and religious views. Forget age or gender discrimination as a problem for the next generation; even now people are being rejected for employment because of their composite social profile... almost always without even being aware of the real reason they are so 'unlucky' when applying for jobs.

Have you ever read the terms and conditions of the social platform companies? Some are literally hundreds of pages long and in legal speak. Who really owns the content and data associated use of their platform? Instagram is a poignant example... millions of pictures in there and then Facebook acquires the company meaning that Facebook now owns hundreds of millions of photos which they can on-sell or use with advertizers.

Google started with search, then maps, then mobility with Android for free... they can now track you, scan all of your email content, search Google Docs, transcribeGoogle Voice, analyze Google+ content, etc.  I've been the regional VP for multi-national content management software vendors and I understand the latent power of content repositories... information transformed into intelligence is highly valuable. 

And then there is the Patriot Act which is currently under review but allows the United States Government to harvest anything within data centers on USA soil or in the overseas data centers of US corporations. What do they do with all this data you ask? They keep us safe because intelligence is the most powerful weapon against organized crime, fraud and terrorism. But the NSA facility in Utah is possibly the biggest data warehousing facility on Earth. It's been built on a scale that even Google envies. The computer cooling requirements alone for the mostly underground Utah facility consume almost 2,000,000 gallons of water every day... that's a huge amount of computing power being managed.

The power of all the social platforms being connected and the meta data (website tracking, timelines, social post activity, geo-location tracking, relationship mapping, etc.) being aggregated is Orwellian. The 'internet of things' creates huge amounts of data that can be harvested and hacked but no-one in business today can stay off the grid despite Minority Report style concerns.

Amazon are working on a Machine Learning service to be offered to developers deploying applications on their AWS infrastructure. It seems Scott McNealy was right when he said "You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it." Interestingly, a study by Pennsylvania University has revealed that most Americans have given up hope concerning the privacy of their data.

When I was young, the worst thing that happened at an office party was someone sitting on the photocopier, pantless... LOL and forgotten with the image fed into the shredder. Now every photo or inappropriate remark is tagged and uploaded to remain somewhere forever... nothing online is ever truly erased. Forget flushing your cache and deleting cookies... all that does is make you feel better... if you visit inappropriate websites... it's all being stored on servers somewhere.

Here are my recommendations:

1. Embrace technology and social because you cannot avoid a profile being created on you anyway. Positively and authentically manage your digital presence.
2. Be VERY mindful of everything you post. Before you upload that photo, imagine your mother and boss will see it! True story: A friend of my daughter ditched school in Sydney and caught a train to the city with her partner in crime. They took photos and uploaded them to Snapchat to impress their friends, then they quickly removed them... but others had screenshot the images. The evidence burnt them. Everything uploaded or done online is recorded forever.
3. Live your life on social platforms and the internet like you do in the real world. Be an authentic person. Online violence and porn desensitizes you and makes you a lesser person. Endless hours of mindless crap reduces your IQ. Instead, the internet can be wonderful with all of its libraries, TED videos, creative thinking, ideas and connections to people that can change the world for the better.
4. Be hyper security conscious. Always check the URL if you click a link to take you to your bank, Gmail, or anywhere else.

Hacking is a far greater problem than how our data is used by our authorized platform providers. Anthem is a health insurer in the USA who was hacked resulting in 80 million people's private medical records exposed. As a footnote... the internet is increasingly becoming encrypted which is helping to make data more secure BUT those who control the encryption algorithms will hold the power.

We live in amazing brave new world... one in which we need to trust those with whom we engage.

Footnote: Techopedia defines dark social differently here.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Roberto Rizzato EMOtion!

Global Top 50 Sales Influencers Revealed by Top Sales Magazine

Top Sales Magazine is a brilliant publication and part of the Top Sales World website and online community. Jonathan Farrington is the driving force behind it and they make a huge contribution to elevating the sales profession globally. For the last three years they have published a list of the Top 50 Sales Influencers in sales and marketing. To my great surprise I made the list for 2015 and was the only person from Asia-Pacific. 

Earlier this year I was recognized in the top 100 social sellers globally by Onalytica and if you want to know the secret to achieving these kind of results... it's content publishing. I regularly do speaking work in the USA and am humbled to be in the company of luminaries such as Daniel Pink, Professor Neil Rackham, Dr Tony Alessandra, David Meerman Scott, Anthony Iannarino and others. Here is the list reproduced from Top Sales Magazine which you can view along with full details and bios of the winners.

I encourage you to follow all these people in Twitter, LinkedIn and their blogs. I'm especially pleased with the balance of women and men on the list and the mix of industry giants such as Marc Benioff (Salesforce) and Koka Sexton (LinkedIn) along with academics such as Neil Rackham and Tony Alessandra.

I've had personal interactions with Neil Rackham, Koka Sexton, Dave Stein, Tibor Shanto, Robert Terson, Jill Rowley and Anthony Iannarino.... and they're all brilliant.  There is genuine diversity in the list and clearly much thought and research went into selecting the top 50 winners. What was Top sales World's criteria? This is an extract from their website:

 We have again endeavored to take a scientific approach this year, utilizing the services of a small research team ...

When considering credentials, we have deliberately looked across a broad spectrum of sales “disciplines” – from lead generation to sales enablement, social selling to sales management, inside sales, external sales, consultative sales and collaborative sales. Our list contains authentic thought leaders, who are prepared to stick their heads above the parapet and discuss the future of selling, as well as some who are less experienced, but nevertheless are making a telling contribution.

The definition of influence? We like this very simple one:“The capacity to have an effect on the character, development, or behaviour of someone or something”

Well done to Top Sales World's research team and thanks for recognizing my contributions here in LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter and as a keynote speaker at international conferences. You can subscribe to the magazine here... it's free.

To see who the Top Sales Influencers are in Australia, simply join the Strategic Selling Group within LinkedIn run by John Smibert or become a member of Strategic Selling website for free. Both forums are excellent communities for B2B sellers.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr:  Matthew McConaughey at Academy Awards by David Torcivi

Closing Is Usually Not The Problem In B2B Sales

I'm working with a client at the moment that provides brilliant cloud solutions with a compelling business case. When I asked what their biggest challenges were within the sales team they said: "Many of them can't seem to close... they want better closing techniques."

Here's the thing I've learned from three decades in the trenches... the problem is rarely the problem. Inability to close is usually a symptom of a deeper problem. In complex B2B selling, or even with simple or transactional small to medium business (SMB) selling where there is one decision-maker, there is a universal truth that must be embraced if we are improve results: Opening is far more important than closing.

The way we open the relationship determines the likelihood of success. We need to set a vision to establish the right agenda and anchor three key areas to earn the right to close:

1. Establish trust and rapport (by being authentic and transparent).
2. Agree compelling business value (as defined by them).
3. Understand their timing and priorities (and their process for evaluation, selection and procurement if in complex enterprise environments).

Once these three things are in place, the date for purchasing commitment becomes clear to both buyer and seller and contracting or finalizing the purchase becomes a 'next step' rather than a white knuckle adventure. For many in sales they feel like they need to lock their customer in a room or go sit in their lobby for days on end until the purchase order is secured... desperation is the worst way to attempt a close. I recently wrote a post about waterboarding your prospects for commitment... don't do it.

Symptoms are rarely causes. Difficulty in closing is almost always a symptom rather than a root cause. Closing must be earned. Objections usually evidence that the seller has made mistakes by pushing before trust and value has been established and without the necessary understanding of their timing, priorities and processes.

For managers; remember that you cannot manage by results; only by activities and actions. Ask the right questions of your sales people right at the beginning of the quarter and help them identify and execute the right actions that create progression throughout the quarter. Firing-up the blow torch with just days to go in the quarter after neglecting the inputs that create success is a sure-fire way to damage relationships and drive-down price and margin.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Washington State Dept of Transportation Contract Signing

7 Strategic Social Selling Hunting Skills

New business development has always required finesse and the ability to strategize, prepare and plan before making contact with the right people at the right time. The way we sell is more important that what we sell and that's because, in the minds of buyers, you're solution looks pretty much the same as your competitors. Buyers have never been busier but they have also never been more empowered with 'social buying'. Their ability to research and run a reverse auction process with the selected few is potentially very dis-empowering for sellers.

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Social buying is the other side of social selling. The smart buyers do their research online before engaging with the selling organization or sales person. You only have one chance to make a first impression and this includes your online presence where you can build trust and establish your value before you ever meet with your prospective new client.  Here are 7 tips for effective modern selling.

1. Transform your LinkedIn profile to provide 'social proof' of the business value to offer and the values by which you operate. That way, when people check you out before agreeing to engaging with you or before a meeting; they'll see someone worthy of their time and trust. What do buyer's see when they look at your LinkedIn profile?... quota crushing sales predator ready to pounce or insigtful expert who can assist them?

2. Become a high value content creator and content curator to attract your prospective customers. What do buyers look for online before they would ever look for you, your company or your product? The answer to this should drive your content publishing strategy. LinkedIn Publisher is ideal if your in the B2B world and Facebook is perfect for B2C. Importantly, be where your customers are rather than expecting them to come to you on your website.

3. Hone your social listening / monitoring skills. Meet with your marketing team and ask for their active assistance in this regard. Talk with them about the types of trigger events that indicate downstream opportunity well before any feeding frenzy leads appear on your website. These could include scandals, mergers and acquisitions, new executives being appointed, changes in regulations, competitor announcements, etc.

4. Change your settings in LinkedIn to 'go dark' and be anonymous when you engage in a sting of research. But also go 'lights on' when you want your potential customers to know that you're taking the time and making the effort in doing your research to prepare and make the best use of their time.

5. Join all the dots and triangulate multiple sources to turn information into validated intelligence. Invest time on the target company's website, individual LinkedIn profiles and Twitter accounts. Analyze their connections, determine your social proximity and position for a warm introduction rather than a cold call. Most importantly, do all you can to map the power base and political structure beyond the organizational chart. The point of entry is vitally important otherwise you couldbe aligned with a losing agenda or blocked by someone without real clout.

6. Connect in context and with relevance. Never send generic connection requests so send the message from within their actual profile so you can change the automated text. Join the groups that they are part of and then read, listen and monitor. Feel free to 'like' but only weight-in when you have something worthwhile and constructive add. Think like a business person, not a sales rep, and work to become a valued hub amongst the spokes over time.

7. Engage with insight provide value. The cardinal sin of social selling is to 'connect and sell'... don't do it! Instead, always connect and engage with good manners and then send interesting articles, blog posts or other information that they will value. The time will come when you can naturally ask for a meeting or for information.

Here is an overview of strategic social selling with links to posts on the 5 pillars. I was recently ranked in the Top 50 Influencers worldwide in professional selling by Top Sales Magazine and then interviewed by Kelly Riggs for Biz Locker Room Radio where all of this is discussed.

If you valued this article, please hit the ‘like' and ‘share’ buttons below. This article was originally published in LinkedIn here where you can comment. Also follow the award winning LinkedIn blog here or visit Tony’s leadership blog at his keynote speaker website: www.TonyHughes.com.au.

Main image photo by Flickr: Spreng Ben Color Key Week – The Eye Of The Tiger