Indian Talent, Global Content
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Indian Talent, Global Content |
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Selling to Americans
When I started selling into the North American market, cities like New York and Los Angeles would evoke a sense of strange awe, like they were the ultimate cities to be roaming in, for anyone in the profession of pounding the pavement.
At that time beyond that romantic notion, I had no idea about the whereabouts of these cities. It took me about a month to get familiar with the strange geographical distinctions. But at the end of that month, I had a sense of east coast and west coast, and like black and white, North America would be viewed as the two coasts and Canada. It took me a few years of living in the US to appreciate that there is the Mid-west , the south and Texas (which had is own regional nationalist pride ). So here I have put together some learning that would help a novice from the Indian subcontinent prepare for a selling orientation into the North American market . Prospecting phase 1. Leverage early evening India advantage: To reach the East Coast and Mid-west markets. This works , because a) North American executives (for the most part) would be in their offices by 7.30 am. I found the biggest hit rate of people picking up phones during between 7.30 am-8 am. For the most part, I have found people who pick up the phone want to talk just because the person on the line is calling from across the globe. This is an advantage I lost in calling after I moved to the US!! 2. Demonstrate courtesy in the cold call: America is a courteous society (by and large), and people will appreciate politeness and business etiquette. Replacing raw sales aggression with persistence would work better. In a prospecting/cold calling situation, this means when someone picks up the phone, you have about 10 seconds to introduce yourself and establish credibility, before you ask for time for a more detailed discussion. It’s rude to go on a long sales pitch when you don’t have an appointment. An elevator spiel script is highly recommended, so the introduction is crisp, powerful and most importantly your accent does not come in the way of a spontaneous extempore. And then you move quickly to ask for an appointment to discuss in detail. 3. Keep your time if you actually get an appointment: Most professionals in America live by calendars, almost all activities have a place holder in the calendar. If you missed an appointment, getting them again would be challenging. When I initially started, it was a culture shock to learn that almost all discussions , including the mundane ones, needed to be “blocked” in a calendar. American work culture has taken the art of organization to whole new level. If you want to succeed selling into the work culture, it's got to be respected. 4. Telephonic “Pounding the pavement “: The proverbial “pounding the pavement “is probably history. This was one big paradigm shift I had to deal with when selling into North America. In most office complexes in US, solicitation of any kind is illegal, and it's just plain rude to barge into someone’s office without an appointment. So from largely one-on-one selling that one is used to in India, where it was OK take chances and call into an office to seek audience, I had to move to depend on reaching buyers via telephone. So get used to “pounding the pavement” on the phone, it’s a different skill set ! What you will need to get trained in telephone selling: a. Develop the ability to create strong elevator spiels. 5. Online presentation tool: Familiarize with online presentation tools like Webex: If “pounding the pavement” is telephonic, it's evident your presentations are going to be virtual. Getting familiarized with an online presentation tool like Webex is a must if virtual presentations have to work. Relationship building phase Once you have moved past the prospecting phase, irrespective of the immediacy of the need, you would move into a relationship-building phase. In this section, I would focus on ice-breaking aspects of the relationship and leave out the need/proposal-development aspects. Before I get into some tips, here are a set of key values that most American buyers value from their salespeople:
Most buyers I have met are usually skeptical about dealing with you around concerns emanating from the above parameters. Having said that and past the prospecting phase, selling into the North America is as much an inter-personal process as it would be elsewhere in the globe. And like any other sales process, ability to take oneself lightly helps in building bridges. Some great ice-breaker topics (I would greatly recommend reading something on these topics before your get in a meeting) that can help in creating the initial opening for relationship-building are:
Topics to avoid (politically incorrect)
These are openings for learning, but hopefully, this article would help aspiring salespeople in other geographies, non-sales people and people new to selling, get some orientation about how to start the process. Chillibreeze's disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the views of Chillibreeze as a company. Chillibreeze has a strict anti-plagiarism policy. Please contact us to report any copyright issues related to this article.
>> Read more articles written by Chillibreeze writers:1. Articles related to Content and Outsourcing
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