Dan Martell - How To Evaluate a Great Enterprise SaaS Sales Person

00:00:00.000 Hi, I'm Dan Martel, serial entrepreneur, investor,

00:00:01.840 and creator of SaaS Academy.

00:00:03.120 And in this video, I'm gonna teach you

00:00:04.400 how to evaluate a great enterprise SaaS salesperson

00:00:08.280 so you don't end up paying somebody a huge base salary

00:00:11.440 just so that they can drag their feet

00:00:13.520 and not get you new customers.

00:00:14.600 And be sure to stay at the end where I share with you

00:00:16.880 an exclusive download called the Revenue Maximizer Worksheet

00:00:20.520 where I'm gonna walk you through the four pillars

00:00:22.640 of adding specific features to your product

00:00:25.400 to increase your lifetime value.

00:00:30.000 So hiring your first enterprise salesperson,

00:00:42.740 especially if you have a background

00:00:44.060 in more marketing or technology,

00:00:47.360 is a scary endeavor.

00:00:48.900 They usually want some level of high base salary.

00:00:51.620 They tell you they've got all these connections

00:00:53.340 and knowledge and industry experience,

00:00:56.160 and there's this big feeling of hope.

00:00:58.500 You know, when I was building my company Spheric Technologies,

00:01:00.900 we sold to the Fortune 500 companies out there.

00:01:03.700 I was 24 when I started the company

00:01:05.300 and I had to figure things out quick and through that process,

00:01:09.400 I realized there's six specific areas

00:01:12.500 that you need to evaluate that I had to learn

00:01:14.800 how to get really good at even though

00:01:16.800 I was not a natural sales person.

00:01:19.200 I didn't understand the concept of objections,

00:01:21.800 any aspects whatsoever and I know this to be true

00:01:25.600 because one of my clients, Reg at Stormboard,

00:01:28.740 even though they have a freemium product

00:01:30.600 where they have hundreds of people sign up every day,

00:01:33.540 within their customer base,

00:01:34.940 they get these big Fortune 2000 companies

00:01:37.840 that want to deploy it to all their staff.

00:01:40.520 So that sales process is totally different

00:01:43.560 than obviously an SMB sales process.

00:01:45.720 It requires understanding who the buyer is.

00:01:48.020 It understands how to sell a POC, a proof of concept,

00:01:52.520 how to get early commitment,

00:01:53.820 and how to negotiate pricing at an enterprise level.

00:01:56.980 So I wanna walk you through the six steps or criteria

00:02:00.760 as to hire an incredible enterprise salesperson.

00:02:03.420 Step number one, navigating decision hierarchies

00:02:06.280 in large organizations.

00:02:08.560 Probably the most interesting thing that you will discover

00:02:11.640 if you've ever tried to sell to an enterprise company

00:02:13.940 is the fact that the person you're talking to

00:02:16.120 that wants your product is not necessarily the person

00:02:18.320 that's gonna write the check and is not necessarily

00:02:20.840 the person that's gonna approve the purchase

00:02:22.600 in the long term and there's probably several other people

00:02:25.540 along that line that need to sign off at certain degree.

00:02:29.280 It could be compliance, it could be security,

00:02:31.360 but the best enterprise SaaS salespeople

00:02:35.460 understand how to uncover all the different buyers

00:02:39.600 and the decisions that need to be made for your purchase

00:02:42.160 or your product to be adopted by that company.

00:02:44.460 Step number two, find the buyer ASAP.

00:02:47.800 Now if you've ever had a customer on a call

00:02:50.200 or doing a demo and they're all hot and bothered,

00:02:51.900 They're excited, they want the solution

00:02:53.400 and then you quickly find out they A, don't have a budget

00:02:56.900 or B, don't have authority to purchase your product.

00:02:59.500 It is the most frustrating thing you can uncover.

00:03:02.180 So what you want is to find somebody

00:03:04.520 that knows how to ask the questions to find the buyer ASAP

00:03:08.680 and it's not always the first person you have contact

00:03:11.060 within that company.

00:03:12.280 Step number three, articulate your value prop.

00:03:15.060 Now I don't care what kind of product you're selling.

00:03:17.500 Is it workflow software, notification software,

00:03:20.000 you know, ERP software, at the end of the day,

00:03:23.140 a great salesperson needs to be able

00:03:25.140 to articulate your value proposition.

00:03:27.200 And I'm not talking about just like selling

00:03:29.680 in regards to, hey, here are the benefits and features,

00:03:31.980 but really understanding what the customer's needs are,

00:03:34.780 what their pain points are,

00:03:36.380 talking about their potential vision,

00:03:38.320 and then in the center of those two areas,

00:03:40.820 the problem and the promise of your solution,

00:03:43.620 discussing the value of your product

00:03:46.360 in regards to solving and delivering on that promise.

00:03:49.500 That needs to be evaluated, needs to be understood,

00:03:52.780 so when you find that incredible enterprise salesperson,

00:03:55.780 test them on that fact.

00:03:57.900 Step number four, handling objections.

00:04:00.840 Now, if you've ever done sales,

00:04:02.680 you know that the number one thing you need to get good at

00:04:05.160 is taking rejection.

00:04:06.360 Now, what usually comes up, it's not like,

00:04:09.120 no, I don't want this, or this will never work.

00:04:12.020 It's never as to the point as that.

00:04:15.760 What typically comes up from a sales process

00:04:18.600 is objections like maybe this isn't the right time for us

00:04:21.900 or I'm not sure that this is gonna solve our problem

00:04:24.280 or maybe the way that you guys are building the product

00:04:27.920 or the way it would work wouldn't work

00:04:29.360 for our kind of company.

00:04:30.660 There could be a list of 50 different types of objections

00:04:33.840 and what you want to find in an incredible salesperson

00:04:36.860 is somebody that knows how to systematically

00:04:39.660 unpack the underlying objection

00:04:41.840 because you might have somebody say,

00:04:43.160 well we don't really have a budget

00:04:45.060 so you think it's a financial objection but it's not.

00:04:48.280 great enterprise salespeople know how to unpack, 0.99

00:04:51.180 target, get confirmation, answer in a non-argumentative way

00:04:57.620 and then get buy-in from the customer

00:04:59.460 that that would actually solve their problem

00:05:01.060 and then move on to the next objection.

00:05:03.800 I actually have a whole training called

00:05:04.960 The Objection Overrider that I teach my SaaS Academy clients

00:05:08.040 but that whole cycle needs to be present in a salesperson

00:05:11.360 if they don't know how to do that.

00:05:12.780 And one of my favorite things I remember in a book

00:05:15.540 called The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes,

00:05:18.040 He talks about when you hire A-player salespeople

00:05:22.240 is to actually say to them, if they're great,

00:05:24.780 say, hey, I'm not here in Superstar or Rockstar.

00:05:27.420 I'm just not feeling like you've got what I'm looking for

00:05:31.060 to hire a world-class salesperson.

00:05:32.980 And if they aren't able to come back to you

00:05:35.520 and systematically deal with that objection,

00:05:38.760 then they're not in the right mindset

00:05:40.560 to come and sell your product.

00:05:41.800 So push them back in a hiring process

00:05:44.440 to see how they come back and deal with that.

00:05:46.300 If they crumble and fall to the ground, they move on.

00:05:49.480 Step number five, can they position you? 0.98

00:05:52.880 When it comes to sales, it's not about talking crap

00:05:56.140 about other products in the market.

00:05:57.920 It's about saying, hey, here's what I heard you say,

00:06:00.780 here's what result you want to achieve,

00:06:03.980 and I believe our product can solve those problems

00:06:07.120 with this feature, this feature, this feature.

00:06:08.760 And if a competitor comes up in the conversation,

00:06:11.200 well, we're talking to this company

00:06:12.500 and we think that they have a better solution around that,

00:06:15.160 your salesperson needs to be able to kind of handle that

00:06:20.380 but also deposition where they're weak at.

00:06:23.400 So understanding all the competitors in the market,

00:06:26.320 not pretending like there's nobody that competes against us,

00:06:28.040 we're the only ones that deliver this kind of solution.

00:06:29.840 That's just crazy talk.

00:06:31.600 Know where they're weak and be able to deposition

00:06:34.420 your competing solutions out there in the market

00:06:36.600 and position you as the only option for your competitor.

00:06:39.900 That characteristic needs to be present

00:06:42.320 in a high-performing salesperson.

00:06:43.980 Step number six, know how to deal with IT.

00:06:47.020 Yes, the company's buying your solution

00:06:49.140 because they want an outcome,

00:06:50.280 but at the end of the day, it's software,

00:06:51.940 and especially at an enterprise level,

00:06:53.860 there's gonna be some integration.

00:06:55.460 Maybe it's single sign-on, maybe it's security,

00:06:57.660 maybe it's the infrastructure

00:06:59.580 that's gonna be installed or hosted on.

00:07:01.300 Maybe they want a single edition of your product.

00:07:04.300 Regardless what it is,

00:07:05.500 if you're hiring an enterprise salesperson,

00:07:07.220 they need to know how to talk the language,

00:07:09.620 how to move that decision process forward,

00:07:12.140 and how to deal with IT so that they are on board,

00:07:15.980 they're a champion of yours and not being a roadblock

00:07:19.340 for that sale to go through.

00:07:20.820 Quick recap, number one, you need to find somebody

00:07:23.320 that knows how to navigate decision making hierarchies

00:07:25.680 in large organizations.

00:07:27.080 Two, find the buyer ASAP.

00:07:30.320 Number three, articulate your value prop.

00:07:33.220 Number four, handle objections.

00:07:35.560 Number five, position you versus deposition the competitors.

00:07:39.700 And number six, know how to deal with IT.

00:07:42.740 As I mentioned at the beginning of this video,

00:07:44.500 I want to share with you the Revenue Expansion Maximizer

00:07:47.600 so you have other product lines, modules, add-ons to be able

00:07:52.480 to sell to your existing customer to increase

00:07:55.180 your expansion revenue.

00:07:56.840 Essentially, you need stuff for your salespeople to sell,

00:07:59.880 especially if you only have one product.

00:08:01.720 So below, in the description, there's a link for you to

00:08:03.920 download that worksheet.

00:08:05.000 It's going to walk you through the four key areas that you need

00:08:07.960 to consider about adding on some expansion

00:08:09.960 revenue opportunities, that's super powerful

00:08:12.540 and I know it'll really serve you.

00:08:13.960 If you like this video, be sure to click the like button,

00:08:16.740 subscribe to my channel, and if you know somebody

00:08:18.540 that could benefit, please share this with them.

00:08:21.440 Thanks for watchin', I'll see you next week.

00:08:23.540 Ya know it, and if you got it, you gotta show it.

00:08:29.120 Show it, don't hide the magic.

Dan Martell - June 18, 2018

How To Evaluate a Great Enterprise SaaS Sales Person

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