Earning the Right to Ask Helpful Questions

Notes:

There is a lot of overlap between sales and sales engineering. If a salesperson does their job right, they make the SE’s life easier, and if an SE does their job well, a salesperson may never need to negotiate. 

So when I talk to a salesperson or a Sales trainer like our guest today, I aim to understand how they think and what they need so SEs can help them achieve their goals. 

Richard Harris runs The Harris Consulting Group, and he’s been training salespeople for a very long time. He jumps on the show, and we discuss the following:

Key Takeaways:

  • Earning the Right to Ask Questions
  • Building Trust in Sales
  • Sales Engineers’ Role in Trust
  • Debating the Buyer’s Journey
  • Sales and SE Collaboration
  • Practicing Sales Skills
  • The True Cost of Inefficiency
  • Effective Sales Conversations
  • ROI and Economic Impact
  • Sales Leadership Problems
  • Personal Growth and Mental Health

Quotes:

“I have a firm belief that there’s no such thing as a buyer’s journey. There’s only a seller’s journey, right? There’s a buyer’s experience.” – Richard Harris

“you’re saying that just because the customer said yes to a meeting, it doesn’t mean we earned the right to ask questions?” Ramzi Marjaba

“Look, I think. And I say this to, I don’t care what industry you’re in or I don’t care if you’re in marketing, IT, whatever, everybody’s in sales.” – Richard Harris

“SEs don’t ask about budget or if the CFO is going to sign on this, but we do ask questions that kind of open up the kimono where we are highlighting their faults and weaknesses and their mistakes that they’ve done so far” – Ramzi Marjaba

“I don’t like that kind of stuff. So first thing is salespeople got to relax. Take control or I’m sorry, let go of control.” – Richard Harris

“We love to go tell everybody about the food poisoning story we got at the really nice restaurant that one time. But we don’t ever tell the other four restaurants we’ve been to in the last month.” – Richard Harris

“Well, why is it a problem? Why don’t you like it that way? Like, what’s it preventing?” – Richard Harris about objections

“It’s not our job in sales to get people to fall in love with us. It’s our job to get them to fall in trust with us.” – Richard Harris

Links from the show:

Music on the show: Watchmaker’s Daughter by Reeder