Leland Sandler and the Sandler Group discuss effective consultative selling techniques through the use of key sales skills, customer interactions, leadership behaviors, negotiating strategies and more that will help increase the success of your business. Follow Leland: WEBSITE: http://lelandsandler.com/ THE SANDLER GROUP: http://sandlergroup.net/ TWITTER: https://twitter.com/lelandsandler FACEBOOK: http://facebook.com/thesandlergroup

1. 1
Consultative Selling Workshop

2. Slide 2
Objectives
 Conduct comprehensive analysis of key buyers in every account.
 Employ more consultative selling techniques.
 Use better tools to get information about customer needs, and to give
information that is highly relevant to those needs.
 Better deal with objections to Company and its products.
 Negotiate more skillfully.
 Understand the value and uses of Model II Behavior.
 Be able to apply new skills and tools to real customer situations.
 Use practical tools to help you and your TMs manage your customers and
territories more effectively:
 Relationship Matrix
 Account Planning Tool
 Buyer Influence Analysis Worksheet

3. Slide 3
Overall Goals
 Targeted Accounts
– Target High Leveraged Accounts
– Strategically and Tactically Plan to Advance the Sale in
these Accounts
– Penetrate these Accounts with Strong Listening,
Questioning, and Problem Solving Skills
– Close these with Win/Win Agreements
 Model II Behavior
– Making Informed Decisions based on valid, illustrated data
– Working hard (questioning, probing, analyzing) to get that
valid, illustrated data

4. Slide 4
Your Territory is Your Business
What are the qualities of a Business Leader?
 Focused on Key Success Factors
 Detailed Planning
 Targeting Leveraged Opportunities
 Focused Objectives
 Obtain Depth of Information and Customer Needs
 Appropriate Use of Currencies
 Win/Win Agreements
 Measured Results
 Corrective Action

5. Slide 5
Your Territory is Your Business
What are the qualities of a Business Leader?
 Spends Time Highly Focused on High Leveraged
Opportunities
 Spend Your Time with Accounts that have Large Payoff
 Creative Approach to Get Those Accounts to Commit
and to Close
 Uses Data as a Competitive Advantage
 Know What Currencies to Use
 Measures Actions and Results
 Looks for Windows of Opportunity in the Data

6. Slide 6
Leadership
How the Best See Themselves
 Their most important trait is in how they see
themselves;
 Self-Employed: You are your own boss. If something’s
wrong, it is first up to you to challenge yourself and to
change it.
 A Product Consultant: Your job is not just to sell, it is to
identify & solve customer needs & problems.
 A Business Consultant: Examine the account, give a
diagnosis & present solutions.

7. Slide 7
Leadership
How the Best See Themselves
 Their most important trait is in how they see
themselves;
 A Strategic-Thinker: You have specific goals & plans. You
need to know what you must accomplish & what must be
done, and how to measure the results.
 Results-Oriented: You don’t want to waste time. You
choose actions that will lead to results.
 The Best: You have decided that you are the best, and you
will continue to be the best. This decision affects everything
you do.

8. Slide 8
Theories in Action
 Theories in Action determine all human behavior and action
Governing
Values
Action
Strategy
Consequences
Double Loop Learning
Single Loop Learning
 Double Loop Learning is the more effective way of making informed
decisions about the way we design and implement action

9. Slide 9
Theories in Action
Espoused Theories
 Beliefs
 Attitudes
 Values
Theories in Use
 Actual Behavior
 Action Maps
 Unconscious Causalities
Mismatch
• Threatened
• Embarrassed
• Loss of Control
Actions, Policies, Practices
• Cover-up
• Avoid/Deny
• Lie
• Anger
• Rationalize
• Defensiveness
Why???
Protect:
• Competence
• Self-Confidence
• Self-Esteem
• Position

10. Slide 10
Initial Role Play
 How to Assess Yourself
• Took the time to listen and understand before responding or
trying to offer solutions.
• Used strong active listening skills and asked open yet
specific questions that clarified the underlying needs,
values, desires of the customer.

11. Slide 11
Consultative Selling Definition
 Consultative Selling defined: Process builds on belief that uncovering
buyer needs on all levels - economic, technical, personal,
organizational - and meeting those needs will drive buying decisions.
 Strengths
 Balances Company product/service line with real customer needs.
 Understands and gets critical customer needs and data, both for total
account and for individual buying influences.
 Gears all product and concept information to account/individual needs.
 Tends to ask great questions.
 Exhibits Model II Behavior
 Traps
 Can sometimes miss obstacles generated by personal buyer issues.
 Model II Behavior can overcome this trap.

12. Slide 12
Advancing the Sale
 The goal of customer interactions is not to close every time
 The goal is to “Advance the Sale”
 “Advancing the Sale” means moving the customer closer and closer
to higher utilization by better understanding their needs, and
showing them how Company products meet those needs.
 Effectiveness depends on:
 Your knowledge of the business/industry/customer
 Your ability to build and maintain relationships
 Your skills in matching Company product/service benefits to real
customer needs

13. Slide 13
1. What they SAY
• Price reduction
• “Done the analysis”
• “Got to reduce expenses”
• “Everyone’s doing it”
2. What they MEAN
• Fear of Change (Try to understand what is behind this fear)
• Too Much Work to Look at Long Term Value (Try to
determine why they feel this way)
• Loyalty to competitor (What is the reason; what do they like)
• Insecure in that they do not fully understand either financial
implications and/or long term value (Do not threaten them;
look for a deeper need and go after that)
3. Their REAL NEEDS (Probe to find this out; Match Currencies to
Needs; Look for Currency Exchange)
• What to be a hero
• Want to achieve a specific goal
• Want to be recognized
• Want the org to be more efficient, effective
• Want the org to be in line with budget
• What to grow professionally
• Look for an
alternative access/entry
point:
• Operations
• Sales
• Admin
4. Alternatives
Don’t Assume
Don’t React…
This is a PROCESS,
NOT an Event

14. Slide 14
Ladder of Inference
I take Actions based on my beliefs
I draw conclusions
Make Assumptions based on the
meanings you added
Add meanings to the data
Select Data from what you observe

15. Slide 15
Key Sales Skills Required To Move
Customers Through A Sales Cycle
Information - Giving Behaviors
 Statements to positively position Company appropriately.
 Clinical and economic data that supports increased product
utilization.
 Statement to respond to objections.
 Next step proposals.

16. Slide 16
Key Sales Skills Required To Move
Customers Through A Sales Cycle
Information - Getting Behaviors
 Account utilization data.
 Climate Building Skills.
 Skills in uncovering and prioritizing customer needs:
Questioning Skills.
 Skills in uncovering and prioritizing customer needs:
Listening Skills.
 Skills in surfacing objections and responding to objections.

17. Slide 17
Difficulty in Changing from Model I
to Model II
 People are skillfully incompetent
 We are unaware of both our mismatches and our
incompetence
 Model I behaviors are taken for granted, used skillfully, and
constantly reinforced
 People often see Model I behaviors as caring and
supportive
 Hard to change what comes naturally

18. Slide 18
Model I Characteristics
 Model I Governing Values
– Achieve your intended purpose
without examining or validating
what you are doing or why
– Be in Control
– Maximize winning, minimize
losing
– Suppress/avoid negative
feelings
 Operationalised by:
– Unillustrated attributions and illustrations:
“I see you are ____”; “You are always
____.” “Obviously;” “I assume”
– Advocate courses of action which
discourage inquiry: “The numbers aren’t
important, I have a feeling.”
– Treat one’s views as “obviously” correct.
– Face-saving moves by leaving potentially
embarrassing facts unstated.
 Consequences
– Defensive relationships
– Assumptive behavior
– Dysfunctional communication
– Reduced production of valid information
– Distortion of Reality
– Little learning

19. Slide 19
Model II Characteristics
 Model II Governing Values
– Validate information before
acting on it
– Making informed choices based
on credible, well-thought our
information, no matter how
threatening
– Vigilantly monitor choices to
correct errors (internal
commitment)
– Engage embarrassment and
threats
 Operationalised by:
– Attribution and evaluation illustrated
with hard data
– Surfacing conflicting views and
inconsistencies
– Encouraging public testing of
evaluations
 Consequences
– Minimally defensive relationships
– Quality decisions and actions
– Increased likelihood of learning

20. Slide 20
Defensive Reasoning
 Premises you develop to support causal explanations are
tacit and/or soft
 The inference process by which you go from your premises
to your conclusions is also tacit
 Very vehement and defensive about your claims, offended
by or will rationalize a call for validation
 Blame others or the environment, thus absolving self
 Look to others who will reinforce your Defensive Reasoning
 “If my behavior is driven by my not wanting to be seen as
incompetent or weak, this may lead me to hide things from
myself and others, in order to avoid negative feelings.”

21. Slide 21
Productive Reasoning
 Premises you develop is based on valid, confirmed
information
 You can illustrate a basis for your inferences
 Conclusions based on informed choice
 Data used is hard data
 Evaluate choices for potential correction and adjustment
 “If my behavior is driven by wanting to be competent, this
may lead me to encourage honest evaluation of my
behavior by myself and others.”

22. Slide 22
Content vs Context
 Content
– The words you use;
sentences and paragraphs
– The words you use:
unconsciously ineffective
 “Obviously…”
 “Always…”
 “Never…”
 “We think…”
 Context
– Tone/Speed/Volume
– Non-verbals
– Extra-verbals
– Location
– Timing

23. Slide 23
Theories in Action
 Theories in Action determine all human behavior and action
Governing
Values
Action
Strategy
Consequences
Double Loop Learning
Single Loop Learning
 Double Loop Learning is the more effective way of making informed
decisions about the way we design and implement action

24. Slide 24
Territory
Strategy
Account Targeting
• Link Information in
Account Profiles with
Territory Objectives
• Criteria & Categories
Account Tactics
• Diff Customer Needs
• Alternative Currencies
• Action Plans
• Call Objectives
• Handling Objections
Making the Sale
• Ask for the Order
•Closing Tactics
•Closing Options
Measurement
• Appropriate Use of Tools
• Qualify/Quantify Performance
• Know Why We Won and Lost
• Taking Corrective Action
Sales Process Model
Account Profile
• Key Information
• Alternative Currencies
Territory Plan
• Opportunities/Challenges
• Territory Objectives

25. Slide 25
Data Points
 Weekly Scorecard
– New Accounts that Meet
Strategic Intent
– Strategic Account
Development
– Weekly forecast/variance
– Flex contracts
– Call value
– Appointments (Objectives
and Outcomes)
 Daily Sales Sheet
– Actual sales
 Account Plan
– Objectives
 Field Visit follow-up
– See Tool on page 19
 Assessment of Skills (e.g.
Problem Solving)
– Data-based discussion of
problem, using specific
illustrations and valid
information
– Presents well thought our
alternatives and
benefits/risks
– Recommends an informed
choice that is measurable
 Assess Inquiry and
Consultative Skills
 Assess Negotiation/Closing
Skills
 Other (return phone calls; # of
complaints)

26. Slide 26
Feedback
 Monthly Review
– Performance Feedback based on
articulated data points
– Follow-up on Set Expectations from
the past
– Setting new Expectations
– Setting Strategies and Tactics with
Territory and with Key Accounts
– Dealing with Internal/External
issues
 Informal (phone call, email)
– Recognition
– Customer issue, objection, report
from the TM, or response from RM
– Internal/External issue from the TM,
or response from RM
– Information
 Problem (focus on only one issue)
– Active Listening
– Specific Feedback (validated with
productive reasoning)
– Set Expectation
– Discuss resources needed, RM
commitment
 Field Visit
– Agenda set, both in terms of time
and activities
– Objectives for BOTH the visit, and
for each account call (from RM and
TM)
– Feedback prior to call (pertaining to
pre-visit prep), after each call
(regarding account call), and at the
end of the visit (to summarize,
possibly set new expectations)