Successful Enterprise Sales and The Art of Commercial Success
Tony Maull is a Marketing and Sales expert serving the Global 2000 marketplace. He is also the Managing Partner at McLean Analytica and the author of the eBook, The Art of Commercial Success.
In this interview, he talks about the secrets of selling complex solutions into large companies.
For more information: https://mcleananalytica.com
This is a computer-generated transcription. Please excuse any typos.
My guest today is Mr. Tony Maull, a marketing and sales expert serving the Global 2000. He’s also managing partner of McLean Analytica and the author of a brand new eBook on the topic of selling into that marketplace, that’s called The Art of Commercial Success.
Tony Maull, welcome to Radio Free Enterprise.
Frank, thank you very much. It’s my pleasure being here today. Thank you for inviting me.
Well, you and I have known each other for quite a number of years. We won’t mention how many years it’s been. We’ve gone on some adventures together through the world of business. There’s a little bit of time left at the end of our interview. Maybe we’ll throw in a war story or two for our listeners, but.
Are you willing to do that?
Absolutely, absolutely hey, it’s a wall here. As result, apart accumulated experiences and that’s how wisdom is generated.
That’s exactly right. Well, if we’re lucky if everybody is lucky, will have time to do that near the end. But the reason why I’ve asked Tony to come on the program today is because.
He’s doing fascinating work in the area of marketing and sales.
Now regular viewers of the program know that I love sales unlike most people. I love sales Tony love sales as well. I’ve written about it quite a bit. I’ve done a lot of sales training and I even have online courses trying to help people be better at marketing and sales. But the type of work that Tony does is very specific.
And it’s very difficult because he’s looking to help technical service providers sell complex solutions into big companies.
And I can tell you, man, that’s a hard mountain to climb. It’s also a little bit of a complicated topic, and I want to Tony, I want to do the best I can to break it down South. Everybody understands what we’re talking about, but to give a frame of reference, I wanted to start by asking you to define who the champion is.
In your sales process, an why that person is so important to your methodology of helping your clients succeed.
Well, thank you for that question Frank. My area focus is in enterprise sales. These are corporations. A lot of them are global. They have more than 1000 employees.
The focus with the companies that I work with who are product companies focused on data analytics.
Security, privacy, those kinds of things. What they have to account for it. There are a lot of people within the client organization, their product, they have authority and influence, so we’re trying to identify who exactly is going to be their champion, and then being a bit of a sniping process, they have to identify who is the owner of a particular problem.
Who has who touches that problem? What is the impact of that problem? How does that problem permeate itself across the organization?
And then any one of those people could be the point man and ends up being your champion. But you also have to recognize that there’s a real lobbying effort that has to occur within the organization broadly.
Well, if I could dig into that just a little bit more when you say champion, what actions does a person take within the organization?
That makes them your champion. Are you saying that this is one person who is seeing the value of your solution, and then you need them to champion it as a verb internally? Or what? What exactly do you mean by your champion?
You’re exactly right. Is there somebody who identifies that the value of the product that you’re bringing to them, that they have a particular problem and they believe that your product is able to solve that problem? Now this is going to.
What I would characterize as the Challenger sale. This is different than a a product that the company has already purchased. They’ve identified that this is something that can solve their problems on an ongoing basis, so as a result, they’ve established a process of how to procure that product. They know who owns it, it got it established within a Department so that there is an official.
Quote Unquote owner of that product, and so after it’s been incorporated in the business. If a known entity, they then go through a vendor.
Selection process on an ongoing basis, and then you really get down into the nitty gritty of features and functions. And how are you different? How much do you cost? Where I typically operate it is in what we refer to as the Challenger sale. This would be a new product. It introduces a different way of solving the problem. It may even redefine.
The problem for the organization. So then what the salesperson of that kind of product needs to do is to identify who owns this problem and who will then.
Emotionally, grab ahold of what you’ve got to say and say yes, I believe that what you’re saying applies for me and I believe that you can help me. And then that guy who says that then becomes your champion.
So in the sales process, you’re if I could just paraphrase what you just said you want to 1st identify who that person might be, or perhaps several potential champions within the organization and then through.
Crook find one that does get excited about what you’re saying and then this person almost helps you with the sales process internally. To take this concept and make it manifest because they are convinced that you have the solution to their problem and they want you to come in and fix it.
Now, just as they’re helping you, what I’m fascinated about with your methodology is you need to help them help them help you.
And exactly, yeah, and I think that’s really cool, and it’s something I hadn’t really considered before. And hence today’s interview.
So how can you? How can you help the champion, you know, champion your cause?
You know, essentially I think one of the best movies and we think about business as being a very. It is a very deliberate process, but it often times that would be one step removed from the emotional aspect and that we really get into the nitty gritty of a particular apply.
Clients or product. Or you know those sorts of things, but I think the best depiction of what I believe enterprise sales is about is the movie Jerry Maguire, where it is an intent.
Personal relationship between this between the two individuals and the case of Tom Cruise and Cuba Gooding, and you know what? You know? What’s in it for me? Where Jerry Maguire implores people? Good even says help me help you, and it is that virtual relationship. Yeah, is that personal relationship around the problem?
So what you do at this level?
As you market problems in that way, we’re not getting into well. What is it you’re trying to get me to buy and you get the resistance there, but let’s just talk about, let me bring myself around to your side of the table. And what are those big challenges? What do you think about every single debt? Because you’re saying this to your champion or to your prospects, right? You have to have a hypothesis.
You’ve got to have an area where you start, so you’re going to target a role somebody in a particular.
Department of certain level say that you’re discussing issues having to do with security and that and that this is security related to information. So these are digital assets. Intellectual property within the organization. So who’s the individual who has that within their purview? And that’s going to be the Chief Information Security Office.
So what you do is you.
Introduce yourself to the Chief Information security officer. You tell them.
What we see out in the marketplace? So this is the prevailing problem that we see amongst his peers at companies that are like him. And you’re looking for agreement. Now if he says yeah, I’ve got that same thing then let’s get into. Well, how do we solve it? How is it that we knock that problem down and we make him look like hero in getting it done so you haven’t even gotten into the product of what you’re selling?
What you want to do is you really want to frame the problem. You understand what that problem means to him in terms of his own professional career and what it means to him to be able to solve that problem and make it go away. Now, once you get all of that a line, then.
The other are details. OK, let’s go ahead and let’s see what tools you need to make that happen. But if you start selling those tools before you even really define what he’s motivated by what, that problem means to him would mean that needs to make that go away.
You’re wasting your time and you’re wasting his for that.
You know, I everything you were just saying there you, you wrote something recently that I think if I may, if I may quote you right to your face, that I think really hits on this.
You say my personal view has always been that enterprise. Sales is not about features and functions. It’s about the personal agenda of your champion within the prospect company. If you make that person the hero by helping them eliminate their problems, your sale will get pulled through annual, get well paid in the process.
I, I think that really synopsizes your methodology. Would you agree with that?
Absolutely. I you know, all people are political and and then you have to be able to come in and speak to that individual personally and be able to say what’s in it for you. Everybody is making that personal calculation of well if I solve this problem or I don’t solve this problem, what happens to me in terms of my role in terms of my ability to get it?
Bonus My ability to keep my job, my my, the reputation that I have amongst my colleagues and peers within within the business and then also.
Are you introducing yourself? You’re they’re going to be asking the question, is this person incredible? If I bring them into the organization? What kind of impact will they have on people’s opinion of me? Does this person enhance the opinion that others have that I think are important? Their opinion of me of my judgment, of the kinds of people that I have around me.
And so you’ve always got to be aware of that, and then you’ve got. You cannot detract from the Personal Capital that that person has you.
Always got to be enhanced. So that means everything that you say it’s got to be scripted. Everything that you do, the crispness of your actions, the accuracy of your of your answers, and the timeliness of your answers. You know all of those things have a bearing, or that person who is basically representing you into his company and you got to be very, very mindful of protecting that person.
Now that also then carries over into sales training and developing enterprise successful enterprise sales people, you were just saying that everything needs to be crisp, scripted and so forth. And it you and I in discussions previous to our interview today, you’ve talked about how.
You’ve seen where one salesperson might follow one track, and another salesperson might follow another track, and so forth.
And how destructive that can be to trying to close sales. So is this an area that you help your clients with? In other words, I don’t know about training, but it developing those scripts, developing those processes, and making sure that they’re consistent across the sales organization.
Absolutely another one just within fails organization. My view is that there’s product. Do you have the product it was built for? Somebody you had a problem in mind that the product solves.
Then you have marketing. So after who are those people who match that persona that was originally in mind when that product was built? How do we find large numbers of them at scale? How do we then market to large numbers of them to be able to get their opinion to start throwing at scale our hypothesis out into the marketplace and start gathering market feedback?
Very, very quickly across a large population of people that’s absolutely integral in being able to bring that learning back into the organization and then for sales, then be able to take those.
Leaves those introductions to prospects and to be able to introduce and. So how does the company by who are the people who have authority and influence within the organization that can potentially help or block the implementation of my product so it has to go from product marketing, sales feedback from the customer.
It’s got to go right back up to the top and be able to lose companies that succeed are the companies that are able to take that information.
At scale lots and lots of conversations and iterate like themes through the whole product marketing and sales mix and that those are the people who win.
You know the likelihood of you getting it right from the very beginning is infinitesimally small, so it’s those people who learn have their ears wide open, and then they’re able to react and anticipate based upon the information that the receiving. So what you’re seeing is really, is just.
Uh, a number of very high speed, high volume experiments that are coming together until you feel that OK. I’m really lock this thing down. I know who my prospect is. I know who need. I need to go after I know how we’re going to buy. I know how they approve. Go through this approval process and you constantly you take that initial success.
And you’re constantly compressing it, compressing that time frame to accelerate sales cycles, anticipate the questions and the issues that they’re going to have until you get it down, locked down so tight that you’re just whipping through these things in a rote process.
That’s very interesting.
Somehow my mind then went to Tesla automobiles and how they’ve learned the hard way how to manufacture at scale, and they did it by failing fast, failing forward, trying things going through production hell and which is one of the things that comes to my mind which is.
It sounds like that sounds like a lot of work. Tony and you know, but the payoff can be significant, so I would you talk now a little bit about your E book that you’ve just published the art and science of commercial success and talk about what sort of guidelines you offer in that book.
That could help organizations such as the ones we’re describing succeed.
Oh yeah, no. It was interesting. Is that the idea for the commercial contest came from a conversation very similar to the one that.
You and I are having this gentleman that I was speaking with. You know close friend is a chief medical officer and responsible for growth for 10 billion dollar health care company and he’s also responsible for identifying acquisitions for this company and he related to me that he has a model that he works through and that model is.
Discusses things like market traction, customer retention, patient retention, and the organization of the business.
And so when he says that where I’m not able to see, you know that there’s not much more than a product or a product idea that if they don’t have market traction, they don’t have all the stats that are needed to reinforce efficacy of what they do. Yeah, there’s nothing more than just a really good, potentially good product.
Then that company from a valuation when he’s willing to go out and buy them. He’s only going to pay maybe one times revenue. He feels that the team is at risk. He feels that the CEO tenure is at risk, and they’re not really proven in the marketplace. But if they have all the pieces working that they’re truly executing as a commercially minded business, that there in the marketplace that we’re pushing forward.
That there is retention and that there is referenced ability that’s coming back from the market. Then that company he’s willing to pay 10 times.
More for that kind of company because the confidence that it is a going concern and it’s not something he’s going to have to invest a lot of time and effort in trying to stand up. Just simply having a good idea or a good product. I mean that whole idea that build it and they will come. It couldn’t be farther from the truth and I think that you’re seeing that in terms of acquisitions and the prices that people are willing to pay.
So that that conversation was the basis of building. So what is commercial success is more than just having a product.
Is having a deep understanding about your customer and the ability to support that customer and have them make problems go away so it’s going to be a combination of your product, how you sell it, how you implement it, how you support it, all of those things coming together in a in a comprehensive manner to make your customers problems.
Away, that is the fundamental issue that that product companies have to really get their arms around and nail that down for them to be truly successful.
In the marketplace during the problem business, you’re in the you’re like a thing that you get press control. You don’t really want to know about ants. You just don’t want them then.
And the same thing with error. If you are really in the problem resolution business, you want to be. If you want to quote Pulp Fiction, you want to be the Wolf when the problem hits, you want to be the first guy who gets called.
You know, as you were talking about that, I’m reminded that you and I also talked because of the war stories we’ve engaged in together, and separately, that you know, on a personal level when things aren’t working and customers aren’t buying, it gets pretty scary that there’s fear.
You feel alone. You’re concerned about your future and how you’re going to pay the mortgage at this. All of this stuff sounds great at a high level commercial and corporate level, but it comes down to individuals as you were just saying who have to get this thing across the finish line an? I think that’s one of the levels of experience that you bring to this that not every pundit is able to share.
I’ve been a I’ve been a founder. I’ve been SVP of Marketing a very large companies have also been with venture capital funded startups. Oh yeah, yeah, it really comes down to one guy whose credibility is absolutely on the line.
And then whether it be enterprise sales or being the head of the company. The emotional toll that is, you know that hits people is incredibly high and I think that that’s part of what we what I want to lay out in this eBook is How do I make decisions quickly because what happens is that the period of indecision?
The longer that you stretch it out, the more it begins to chip away at your ability to persevere. Your enthusiasm that you then have to convey to investors.
I mean how many times do you want to go back to investors and go back to your employees? You believe in me, you know, let’s go up this Hill one more time. We can win this time I I honestly and this time we’re going to get it right. It’s funny. I heard Steve Young when he was talking about his history with 49ers that he had run out on the field and he’s.
Organizing the offense, he’s calling plays and then he throws an interception.
And then you’re hearing the chatter from the OR team is they’re saying stuff to him and they’re running back to the sidelines, so they get the ball back and he runs back out on the field and he says OK guys, it’s going to be different this time. You believe in me? We’re going to call this play and we’re going to make it happen. And on that first play of that second series of downs, he throws another interception.
And then he really hears that as these areas heading back sidelines and.
If you think about that’s.
Just the Sunday afternoon in the Professional Football League.
However, if you are the CEO or founder of an organization and at quarter after quarter, year after year, and after a while, people lose their enthusiasm for you. Your ability to lead. They don’t believe that you can make it happen, and they leave you. And that is a you are very alone that those memories are painful.
And I think the faster you can get through these very critical decisions and engage with the marketplace and bring that information.
Better off that, you’re going to be, you’re going to be bringing in market stories that people can grab ahold of. It’s going to coalesce the decision-making process within the organization, and the qualitative learning has incredible value and the fact that you’re engaging people are sharing problems with you and that that also makes the employees enthusiastic. And you can.
Demonstrate to investors we’re making progress, and that when I say.
Believe in me, let’s get up this Hill because we’re getting this traction.
Having those stories is going to enhance your credibility. You need them.
And Lord knows, you and I have those stories from the past. You know, it’s funny, which would I rather have five 300-pound men.
Snarking at me running off the field or one angry investor calling me at 2:00 o’clock in the morning. That’s a hard call there when that investor call comes in, I almost wish I was out there with those big guys, but it’s pretty tough out there.
Now, yeah.
Well, please go ahead and finish that thought.
Oh, you know the stories.
Of investors who have had to reboot their legendary and in the back, and it’s incredibly hard. It’s incredibly hard. We know from the statistics that you know the number of companies have to pivot, and this water statistics that I bring up in the book is that 97% of companies out there. Product companies that are launching new products have to pivot their strategy.
Only 7% survive.
Now that’s when you really could flip. Side of that is because only 3% get it right.
Right out of the gate it’s almost luck. I mean it is luck that they got it right and then as you’re saying of the 90% who didn’t get it right out of the gate, only 7% of those 97% will successfully pivot an that’s a strong point and I think part of what you drive home in the book is they probably weren’t willing to do.
The work that you describe.
Right, yeah, absolutely. And that and that is I. I think what happens is that you grab ahold of what happened.
You confirm your thinking with a couple of stories that are in the marketplace and you start to furiously run down a path without really validating against larger amounts of information. And what happens is that six months ago by you’ve invested in the sales and marketing team you’ve grabbed ahold of your original hypothesis. You’ve not brought enough information to really challenge your own.
Thinking, and that’s really what it is, you’ve got to be open minded and open minded enough, but then also close minded enough to persevere, so right you.
You can’t believe so much of what you’re thinking, but once you get to something that you can be confident in, then you have to then drive down that path aggressively so it is a very much balancing effort that is can be difficult, but the way to make it easier, emotionally, intellectually, how you are able to drive from a leadership perspective.
With investors that employees is to be able to gather this information at scale, make sure that you attack the marketplace on a continual basis and then you’ve got.
This this information flowing in all the time so that you are confident that the representations that you’re making to do everybody involved that they are as close to fact based as you can get, is not opinion or innuendo, but it’s really the voice of the marketplace that that you’re responding to.
That’s great stuff. I feel like you and I could sit here and talk about this all day, but unfortunately we’re constrained by time. I did want to bring up.
A war story that I think is applicable. At least an example of something where you and I charged into a very large company and tried to convince them to do something that was new IT was a new solution. I’m sorry to be vague, but you know, it’s a big company. Everybody would recognize the brand name and we just don’t, you know.
Obviously, confidentiality is a very important part of being a consultant. An helping people. So in any event, it’s large company. You’d recognize the name.
And we were coming to them with, of all things, the idea of producing a television show that targeted their target market and also had ancillary products that would be sold and marketed through the show. And they were sufficiently interested to give us a meeting. And so we flew out to the Midwest and we sat down with the Vice President of Marketing in this company and his whole team was there, and.
We’re trying to tell them you know something that they never really thought of before, and in any event.
We were unsuccessful in closing that deal, and I’m wondering if anything comes to you now. This what we figured that was 15 or 20 years ago or something like that, right? In any event, is there any lesson that we can be that you have drawn, or we could draw or our viewers and listeners could draw?
From that presentation that didn’t succeed, that connects with the message that you’re sharing with us today.
You know the irony of the situation that you’re referring to is that product placement of integrating product into a television show or a movie, or some form of entertainment where you’re reinforcing the user of that product and the value of that product and the enthusiasm around that product is now so commonplace that it’s become yeah well.
We’re surrounded by it brand images all the time, so in a little bit we were a little bit early. I think in that aspect you know we have a we have a great idea.
But it was interesting in that they had.
Such huge market share that their view was not. How do we expand that market share and become a more dominant brand in the marketplace? Their view was well, why don’t? How do we hold on to what we’ve got so they weren’t in a growth mode, which is what we were really advancing to them. What was it? How do you penetrate new market segments? How do you reach?
Unreached population how do you do those sorts of things and so understanding what their motivation for is like? Well, what keeps you awake at night and their particle?
Interview is how do I prevent my numbers from slipping? You know, I was in a defensive mode, not in a in a growth mode, so I thought that was interesting in in, in and really analyzing who is my customer knowing who is it that I’m trying to sell to? What are their motivations and what do you think their problem is an? I believe that looking at it.
His view of his problem was different than the problem that we were trying to follow.
And I think the lesson I get from it is.
If I had just asked him ahead of time, well, are you interested in growing your sales?
Instead of I’ve got this great television program and you got to see it, which is, you know, thinking inside the box, thinking about the features and functions, and not I. I thought it could do great things for him, but it wasn’t what he wanted. And so you still got to wonder why did he take the meeting with again? We could go on and on about that forever.
Tony, I really appreciate you taking the time.
To be with us today and share all this great knowledge. If somebody wants to reach out to you, maybe get a copy of your E book or ask questions about how you could help their company. What’s the best way for them to do that?
I welcome them to visit my website, McLean Analytica MCLEANANAL ytica.com and my contact information.
Is there the ability to download the book is easy? What I often welcome people to do is you’re able to reserve 30 minutes with me and you know part of my giving back and.
Trying to help other people through the hurdles that I see so readily is given 30 minutes and let’s just jump on a call and talk about how you’re executing in the marketplace and what are those things that you might be able to do that that are easy and quick to make your life easier.
I will put links to the website on the show notes wherever you are hearing this, watching this, either audio or video, and they can also reach out to you by email. Tony at McLean Analytica.
Absolutely, please don’t ianmacleananalytica.com that email will come directly to you.
Great, well Tony, I really appreciate you being here today and it’s really great information you’ve been able to share.
Well, thank you very much Frank, and I wish everybody the best of luck. This is a very difficult period with Pandemic, but you know, please keep your eyes and ears open and listen to what the marketplace is telling you. Execute religiously and just don’t be afraid. Attack an and if the market is not telling you listen to them.
They’re giving you good advice. Don’t be afraid to pivot and you need to do it quickly on data and facts.
Great stuff alright Tony, I will see you soon.
Thank you very much, Frank, and best to everybody.
Thanks again to Tony Maull and thank you for joining us until next time I’m Frank Felker, saying I’ll see you on the radio.
