Focus on a Customer-Centric Culture to Become More Productive with Steve Hall, Ep #193

According to Steve Hall, a customer-centric culture boosts productivity because you are able to focus on the right things. It isn’t about you, your sales goals, or your product—but about connecting with and understanding your customers and offering them something of value. 

Steve is a “C” level sales expert, a member of the Sales Experts Channel, and the Managing Director at Executive Sales Coaching in Sydney, Australia. He likes to categorize himself as a corporate storyteller who can help companies craft a compelling narrative. Don’t miss this engaging episode of Sales Reinvented!

Outline of This Episode

• [0:49] What is productivity? 
• [1:50] A lack of productivity is an organizational issue
• [3:25] How to improve productivity 
• [5:07] Attributes of a productive salesperson
• [6:53] Tools or processes to aid productivity
• [7:57] Top 4 productivity dos and don’ts
• [10:35] Steve’s favorite productivity story

A lack of productivity is an organizational issue

Sales professionals are judged by their results. They need the ability to achieve more with the same or less effort while reaching their short and long-term goals. Steve believes salespeople aren’t productive because things are structured incorrectly on an organizational level. 

Sales teams are expected to do many tasks that could be delegated elsewhere. They’re prospecting, wooing the clients, and expected to close the deal—with all the administrative tasks tossed in. This is something that organizations can focus on changing.

A customer-centric culture boosts productivity

Steve points out that most companies overemphasize doing more activity while still expecting quality work. Those two things don’t typically go hand-in-hand. Instead, Steve believes productivity is better served by better understanding your customers. Sales professionals need to be passionate about helping their customers succeed.

If you learn to see things from the customer’s perspective and understand the needs of their business you’re more apt to close the deal. Steve stated, “Rather than have product knowledge, have problem knowledge”. Educate yourself on your client’s business—commit to offering them value. Be nice, be genuine, and help your client succeed. That is the whole goal of productivity. 

Steve’s tools and tactics that make an impact

Steve said to invest in things such as sales navigator and a simple CRM, but that his methods to increase productivity are more strategic. Here are a few thoughts he suggests: 

1. Record your sales calls. Play them back, pinpoint what you can improve on, and use the recording to help make a transcript for calls. 
2. Don’t invest time in busy-work. Don’t spend hours perfecting a presentation that may never happen. 
3. Sell to people who want what you have. There’s no point wasting time if they’re not interested. 
4. Don’t work too hard. Be sensible—don’t work until you reach a point of burnout.
5. Know your objective. Why are you making the phone call? Why are you sending the email?

You need to focus on what’s important and not activity for activities sake. Listen to the whole episode for more suggestions. 

Try team-based marketing and sales

Steve is an advocate for people to work as a team. Most companies have salespeople who work as individuals, with individual targets and goals. They’re less motivated to help their team because it’s every man for himself. But you don’t work in a vacuum. According to Steve, when people don’t work together it’s a “hammer to productivity”. 

He had a client who decided to build their company with a team-based marketing department. They set team quotas and goals. Anytime there was a challenge to overcome, everyone jumped in to lend a hand. This particular company increased its sales by 35% that year. The next year they increased sales by 50%. They now own 75% of the market share in their area. 

The moral of the story is that companies need to create an environment that encourages team collaboration and productivity and a customer central culture. They need people who are focused on doing the very best they can for their customers. 

Resources & People Mentioned

• Together is Better by Simon Sinek
• LinkedIn Sales Navigator

Connect with Steve Hall

• LinkedIn
• Twitter
• Steve’s website

Connect With Paul Watts 

• LinkedIn
• Twitter

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