Stride VHO: Kickstarting Sales

What a great Virtual Office Hours session on Kickstarting Sales.  I want to thank Nitya Kirat from YOSD Consulting for sharing with us his 3X3 (3 ideas / 3 tactics) during the session.  I also want to thank him for sharing his meeting prep template which he has kindly made available for FREE download.  There are a number of actionable sales takeaways that resonated with me.

1. Am I talking to the right person?
2. What am I talking to them about?
3. Am I managing myself to sales success?

We spent a lot of time talking about who is the right person.  We also spent a lot of time discussing how to frame your discussion, not as something you are selling, but how you are helping the prospect buy.  You can only help the prospect buy when they are clear about the problem and that you have articulated the benefits well enough that they understand how their problem can be solved with your solution.

The most actionable part of the discussion from my standpoint was the preparation template.  The point here is that each conversation should have an intention and your questions should be aligned around meeting that goal.  That goal is not always about closing a sale.  It may be about learning.  The point is that the more prepared you are, the better off you will be.

We wanted to organize this VOH for you at Stride because, frankly, sales should be the genius zone of many entrepreneurs.  Our job is to alleviate as much back-office burden as possible to allow the business to be focused on growth and looking ahead.  Nitya helped us do that today.