The Ultimate Sales Machine - Chet Holmes [130]
Step 3: We put all this into an “educational orientation” and made that our first offer to every advertiser.
Step 4: We mounted a Dream 100 effort, where we started hitting the biggest possible advertisers so hard, so frequently, and with so many approaches and offers that they got to know exactly who we were in a very short period of time.
Step 5: I rehearsed the sales staff on that presentation again and again and again. Still, there were those who didn’t get the strategy: “Wait. Why would I do all this when all I really want to do is sell advertising?” I took these more tactical executives by the hand, brought them to client meetings, and showed them the awesome power of using market data as a motivator. They caught on pretty quickly at that point.
Step 6: I worked through the time management procedures daily, constantly demanding to-do lists from the staff.
Step 7: I trained the staff on the “Seven Steps to Every Sale” in great detail. I gave spot quizzes, did workshops on every step, and hot-seated the reps on specific accounts and their activities related to the seven steps.
Step 8: I worked the heck out of the follow-up procedures, putting into place more and more opportunities for bonding and building valuable relationships.
Step 9: We worked the trade shows like champions, always being the life of every party and throwing the best parties. Eventually, we started our own trade show for all the advertisers in the industry to come and learn how to market better to attorneys. We designed an award ceremony that celebrated the top executives in the industry and brought them all to a black-tie affair in which we controlled every inch of the experience.
Step 10: We offered many other additional ser vices that gave us unbreakable bonds with our clients. We had a free placement service to help marketing executives get jobs with other advertisers. We gave the entire market the industrywide calendar that every company used for its trade show planning. We designed ads for all our advertisers.
Step 11: We set goals for every area of performance.
Step 12: We measured and tracked every activity and had regular contests and rewards for our top performers.
I use this as a case study even though it was 15 years ago. I don’t think my mark remains on this magazine or any of the programs I put into place. It is simply an example of what you can do with a difficult and challenging situation and it’s one in which I personally had the freedom to swing the bat and make all these things happen.
It was the Ultimate Sales Machine. We outsold, outmanaged, outstrategized, and outsmarted our competition at every turn. Within one year we doubled sales. Then we doubled that figure again the second year and doubled the already twice-doubled sales figure in the third year. For this, as I explained in Chapter Six, I was called into Charlie Munger’s office to hear these words: “Now, Chet, are you sure we’re not lying, cheating, and stealing? In all my years, I’ve never seen anybody double sales three years in a row.”
I laughed out loud. “No, Charlie, we’re just marketing and selling way better than all our competitors.”
And the best part is this: None of it was that hard. The key ingredient, my friends, is pigheaded discipline and determination. If you want to have the Ultimate Sales Machine, you merely focus consistently on the 12 skill areas in the 12 chapters of this book. Here’s my promise to you: if you make this book your sales, marketing, and management bible and study it again and again, you’ll never need to know anything else to rule your market. That and pigheaded determination.
Notes
1. Knell, Eric. “7 Corporate Red Flags.” Business Finance Magazine, August 2002. http://www.businessfinancemag.com/magazine/archives/article.html?articleID=13891.
2. www.entrepreneur.com.
3. Tzu, Sun. The Art of War. Available from http://classics.mit.edu/Tzu/artwar. html.
4. Finklestein, Ron. What Successful Businesses