Richard Denny – Thoughts on sales and marketing

Would someone out there please tell me why so many sales people are so poorly equipped to win business, while at the same time the government is held to blame for sending our highly trained soldiers into conflict equipped in outdated poorly protected vehicles?

The sales people problem does not lie in outdated equipment but either outdated training or no training at all. Just imagine sending our soldiers into battle with no training, or just as horrific training based on the IRA conflict. Maybe similar but oh so different.

The marketplace has changed, customers have changed, buying behaviour has changed, and expectations have changed, hoped for discounts have changed, negotiation has changed yet most sales people have not changed and it is not their fault but the fault of the employers.

Blame the company for sending their sales people out in Cavaliers with skills that were right 10 years ago, do try not to get frustrated but hold the employer to account.

Now I really must be honest here. I personally get so frustrated by pathetic out of date selling practices. I really do try so hard not to chew the poor individual into pieces and spit them out but I confess this does sometimes happen.

How about naming and blaming the guilty employers? As you know I am passionate about professional selling skills. It is such a winner for the world, for companies, for sales people but above everything else for the customer and it is so easy, oh so easy, to learn the skills of 2009.

Ask an economist and you will get an opinion, but like all opinions it could be right or it could be wrong. I most certainly would not base my life or my future on an economist’s opinion; “bless them!” sic.

So are we in or are we out? Let’s put aside the official government guidelines or systems of measuring economic performance. It’s all out of date anyhow when it’s published. How about some good old fashioned commonsense? What really is happening in the marketplace? Now this may well be anecdotal and possibly challenged as not being scientific but so what, as far as I am concerned it’s real.

Companies are now back re-employing and redundancies have dwindled to the normal healthy trickle. Consumers are spending again as exemplified by the buoyant second-hand car market, always a good indicator. Our experience has shown a healthy growth of interest in business training. Every business person I speak to tells me they are feeling optimistic, and having got the holiday season out of the way decisions will be made. Executives are fed up with standing still; they are fed up with negative retreat. There is a ‘let’s get going’ feeling in the air.

If you have been delivering outstanding customer care over the past few months, if you have been investing by upskilling your people, if you have kept your most valuable asset – your staff, if you are customer led with your product mix you will now fairly quickly experience the rewards.

So in September step up a gear, really now be proactive in your communication in all its forms to your customers, your prospects and most important of all the real diamond mine the ‘No not today’s‘.

The mind set of so many business people is really quite extraordinary. We have been in, and thank goodness are coming out of, the worst recession in living memory yet so many are missing a trick/opportunity.

We have all heard the two clichés which are, “Our staff are our most valuable asset” – yet they are the first to go in a recession (why not the director’s cars?) and the second just as galling, “We value our customers”.

I have been amazed how few businesses have demonstrated customer care over the past few months. They have been and are missing an amazing opportunity to earn and deserve customer loyalty and customer spend. Via Denny Training I have had the experience of some progressive businesses investing just a small amount of money in skilling their people in customer care and developing an excellent service culture, the result of which is phenomenal increased profitability.

The current trading environment is intensely competitive and will remain so. I have been preaching for some time now, “You don’t have to have the best products and even the best prices, but if you provide an outstanding service you will WIN, WIN, WIN”. Tom Peters is quoted as saying “It is the greatest kept secret in the global economy today that if you provide an outstanding service you will need new suitcases to carry all the money home”.

It is not too late, your peoples attitude and skills in customer care will put you ahead of the competition. Invest a small amount now and in a few weeks see how you will have increased your market share and excitingly your profits.

If not how about joining THE FAILING CLUB who blame the government, the banks, the recession, the economy and of course the weather?

Self help books have been the big publishing success of the past couple of decades but it is not just a recent phenomenon. Back in the 1850s, Charles Darwin’s seminal work on the Origin of Species was outsold by a self help book. In an interview with John Humprhys on the Today Programme Radio 4 documentary presenter Kate Williams emphasized the fact that Samuel Smiles the author of ‘Self-Help’ concentrated on how individuals could improve themselves rather than improve their lives by manipulating others as in many of todays self help books. This immediately brought to mind Richard Denny’s books – Succeed for Yourself and Motivate to Win where he also concentrates on the individual determining their own success and espouses the virtues of Motivation not manipulation

Listern to the interview

On yesterday morning’s Today Programme on Radio 4 John Humprhrys discussed the parlous state of our Libraries with author Beryl Bainbridge and wondered what could be done to improve matters. Richard Denny wrote an article on this very subject for ‘Managing Information’ June 2008 which should be added to the debate as librarians from across the UK meet to discuss what can be done.

Listen to the interview                              Article by Richard Denny

I write this blog on behalf of the majority of business leaders and employers who are decent law abiding citizens doing their very best to achieve success. The frustration, sadness and anger that we are all experiencing with the MP’s expenses scandal continues.

There is a small percentage of MP’s who apparently have committed fraud. If they were employees of any normal company they would immediately have been reported to the police, not to mention losing their job without compensation.

There is a small percentage of MP’s who chose not to claim any expenses at all. That is their right and we can all respect that decision. There is a further group who have abused the system and should be held accountable to repay every penny of their personal gain.

Now we come to the majority of MP’s who have claimed genuinely what they believed to be allowable and were told it is right and acceptable to claim. Here of course lies the problem as we all know. If you create a system that not only allows but encourages people to claim expenses with such a broad remit they most certainly will. For goodness sake it is only human nature to take what is offered regardless as to whether it is taxpayers’ money. As it would be exactly the same in business with any employee. Most employees follow the rules as laid down by their employer. In business most expense claims are checked and of course some are rejected. Just normal business practice.

So the media and the press journalists, who in most cases don’t understand or don’t want to understand, and should lay off beating up those parliamentarians who live by the system. Yes of course the system is wrong. Yes I accept that the parliamentarians themselves created the system. In business we all get our systems wrong and our reward mechanisms have to be changed, improved and developed. In my previous blogs I have said that the salaries are too low to attract the quality of MP’s that we would dearly like to have leading the country. And of course it is wrong for them to stop having either income or involvement from other sources. This, as we all know, builds a far greater knowledge and experience.

The Solution

1. All indications of dishonesty or fraud – let the police deal with

2. Each and every personal gain from expenses should be repaid immediately and I MEAN immediately. Seven days or serve them a writ.

3. Put into place an ethical salary and expense system that all of us in business have to deal with every day of our lives.

We recruit executives for our clients and they tell us that we provide the best value in the industry. I say this just to establish a little credibility to this blog.

There will undoubtedly be a great many constituency vacancies very soon as our existing MP’s cut and run. Now if we were asked to put forward suitable candidates I have to say that we would be unable and unwilling to take on such an assignment. The basic salary of £64,000 with no bonus, no commission, no share option and thoroughly messy expense/benefit arrangements would not bring forward any quality candidates that we would submit to our client. Furthermore this job has unsavoury hours, little family life, no privacy, guaranteed press intrusion and a public perception below that of a double glazing sales person.

This has to be solved if we are going to get the calibre of candidates and future MP’s who will have the ability, the intelligence and experience to run our country. So here are my recommendations for a suitable package:

1. Basic salary £80 – £100K dependent on experience

2. For each re-election (long term service award) a further £8,000

3. A reward and recognition system for attendance and contribution to Parliamentary debates. (I am intentionally not specific here)

4. Expense on a par with normal business, but not the public sector. For example business travel should be business class, all reimbursement of out of pocket expenses attributable to parliamentary and constituency purposes. Any Member of Parliament whose constituency and/or home is outside a radius of 50 miles from Parliament has an overnight accommodation allowance. Foreign business travel has to be approved by the Party Leader or nominated executive.

5. Employment of staff can be open to family members but their performance, qualifications and ability has to be approved by their Constituency Party Chairman.

I suppose the above is too simple and too loaded with commonsense to be adopted, all I know is that we could find some good quality people that the public would be very pleased with as Members of Parliament and who would bring back the respect and trust to the Mother of all Parliaments.

Richard told mygoalsbuddy.com “The one thing that all successful athletes, musicians, singers and self-made millionaires and billionaires have in common is an attitude of success. They didn’t acquire this after their achievements.”

1. Expect the best: build your success attitude with a positive attitude. Expect each day to be wonderful. It’s amazing how the interruptions to your enjoyment become fewer and fewer.

2. Make it a habit to be positive: some habits take a while to cultivate and transform into subconscious automatic behaviour. Make it a habit to be positive every day. Avoid negative thoughts – they damage your self image.

3. Use repetition: athletes build muscle by continual repetition. In a similar way, we need to continually send the right messages to the brain. Ten repetitions of a thought will create the foundation on which the skyscraper of positivity will stand.

4. Smile: you will find it so much harder to have negative thoughts when you are smiling.

5. Try not to burden others: despite enormous pain and discomfort or other difficulty, some people remain positive and avoid burdening others with their problems. They demonstrate a success attitude and are a joy to spend time with or chat to on the phone.

6. Plan doing something positive each day: positive actions equal positive results. By planning and doing something constructive each day, you will progress towards your goal. Seeing ourselves progressing motivates us.

7. Be honest: by being honest with other people and with your self, you will become more self assured and more confident. Honesty with yourself allows you to know where you are and what you believe. Honesty with others enables them to know where you and they stand.

8. Discard negative thoughts: when you’ve taken photographs, you discard those that are out of focus or where badly lit and keep the quality images. Your mind works in the same way – cast out the negative images and replace them with positive ones.

9. Think of problems as challenges: use the word “challenge” rather than “problem.” Your mind positively embraces a challenge whereas a problem is a de-motivator. In Chinese, the world “wei –chi” literally translated means “crisis” and “danger.” The same characters together also mean opportunity.

10. Managing change: during your lifetime and mine, change will be with us. You can view it an s threat or an opportunity but you cannot stop it. Embrace change positive, enthusiastically see what might be and not what was.

If customers are such a nuisance, at least stop wasting their time and yours and invite the administrators in – they equally are not interested in customers.

At a time which some claim to be the worst trading conditions for 70 years wouldn’t you think that every business and employee would be enthusiastic to meet, see or hear a customer? Kind of obvious really and probably even common sense!!

Well as we all know, sense is very uncommon and sadly, customers for many businesses and their staff are an interruption to their work. Customer care and service is non-existent. Yet no doubt their corporate website and literature claim “we pride ourselves in our service.”

Bob Wilson, one of our specialists in customer care development for our clients tells me of two experiences last week.

1. He went into a motor retailer to consider changing one of his cars and you would think, wouldn’t you, that a car salesman would be really excited and enthusiastic to have a real live customer on their forecourt? Well after approximately 5 minutes of him standing around, a salesperson appeared and said “I’ll be with you in a few minutes, I am finishing some paperwork.” Bob, being the charming delightful chap he is waited with his wife for a further 5 minutes. The sales person appeared again and said “I am sorry to keep you waiting, but I am nearly finished and will be with you soon.” Bob and Mrs Bob were now no longer feeling quite so nice and after a further 5 or 6 minutes left out in the cold on the forecourt they decided that changing their car wasn’t really that important. They got into their car, which now had a whole new attraction and drove home. They were genuinely a customer with money.

2. The same Bob working with our clients stayed in a reputable hotel in the North of England – it begins with an M has a couple of r’s in the middle and ends with a t. He went into the restaurant and was shown to a table and given a menu. He waited and waited and waited. After what seemed like an eternity of reading the menu front to back, staring at the ceiling, trying to attract attention eventually a person appeared to take his order. He made his selection and the order taker told him that his selection was off the menu at which point Bob replied “and so am I.” He walked out and went some where else.

If ever there was a time to invest in developing the skills of customer care, it is now. (yes I do have a vested interest because this is one of the things that we do) However, we put our money where our mouth is by guaranteeing our clients profits on a small investment.

It is tragic that so many people are losing their jobs because of gross incompetence in management towards the customer care culture.

Bonuses paid to bankers have attracted hysterical abuse not only by an aggrieved public but also by journalistic comments.

Now let’s get real. . Big bonuses paid to directors and departmental heads should be forgone. The chiefs are at fault not the Indians as they are paid to carry out orders and deliver. They are incentivised to perform and over-perform and they of course should be rewarded. When I educate directors and managers on the subject of incentives and performance enhancement I start by laying the foundation “you will get more of whatever you reward and recognise” so be careful in what you do recognise and reward. If you reward or recognise long hours of work you will get people doing just that but not necessarily enhanced performance.

A few years ago I was asked to sort out a problem with a major parcel carrier. They were experiencing a high level of customer complaint of non-delivery with too many parcels returned to the depots. A bright young executive put in an incentive programme for the drivers. If the parcels were not returned to the depot – the drivers earned more money. You can guess what happened – a good incentive but rewarding the wrong result

This is exactly what has happened to the chiefs in the banking fraternity. The right incentive but for the wrong result. The vast majority of the Indians who have performed well and who have had little or no impact on the mess that the banks are now in should be getting their bonuses.