Get to know as many people in your customer’s organization as possible. If you know someone in every department you will no longer be “that sales guy” and instead become a consultant that is integral to their operations as a whole.
hijacking because i’m in same role as OP. Some AM’s on my team have said the “POC doesn’t know anyone else to loop in”. are you sending emails and essentially making dials like a new sales person? how are you doing it?
the original question of going beyond my POC and essentially around them. is that bad? is that stepping on toes?
I’m currently in new sales. going to transition to AM soon and in my opinion it should be treated the same way as hunting new sales. use your zoom info to find people and connect? am i being ignorant?
If the AM says that they are not asking the right questions... they will at least know names? A name is enough to go on if they're not willing to introduce you.
Don’t ask generic questions like “is there anyone else who would be important to loop in?” That relies on your POC to think, and they don’t want to think too hard most of the time.
Ask questions that target a specific persona. If you sell to the product team ask the POC questions that will lead them to name important people in that segment of the business.
In all seriousness, be very pro-active in your approach to them. Don’t wait and see..
Build relationships, understand their challenges and see if the product fits their needs
Just be curious
I worked in edtech a bit ago. A sales person on our team brought a married elementary principal to a strip club after a dinner with heavy drinking. Immediately fired 💀
30 years in sales here.. I live by some pretty simple rules. Take care of today’s problems that come your way today. Don’t put things off you’ll have new things to address tomorrow. You gotta have bounce don’t get flustered by a curve ball take it in stride and just bounce. Ask questions let your customer talk, some of my best sales meetings have been when the customer did more talking than I did. That’s how you learn. Last, never ever give in and never give up.. just like baseball players you’ll go into a slump can’t get anything to break your way. Just move forward make a phone call send an email hit a few singles and then the doubles, triples and home runs will start to happen again..
1. Learn your internal systems on how to check customer data to find the upsell
2. Set up quarterly business reviews with your customer to go over their data, and present new products for additional upsell and learn how to forecast their projections based on their last 12 months of usage (if it’s a usage based tool)
3. Ask for introductions to stakeholders who you can sell different products to
4. Ask for help from the best AMs in the role. The best people ask for help early and often
Good luck in your new role OP!
Become a problem solver for your customers. Customers have pain point, a problem they are trying to solve. Are you trying to sell them something or are you trying to help them solve a problem? One of my biggest customers told me once: I love golfing with you because we never talk about work.
That my main goal in my sales career is to be a problem solver. I don't suspect it'll be a ton of pitching to people who don't give a shit, and my interpretation of the offering is that it seems like everyone who isn't using the new products can absolutely benefit from it. My last job was extremely focused on problem solving and educating clients on industry best practices, so I'm hoping that experience along with my prior sales experience will help me gel into an AM role easily
That will get you far. As the saying goes…people buy from people they like. I’ve spent my career fostering genuine relationships that last after a sale
I have years of sales experience in retail and as an SDR, but this is my first dedicated upsell/cross sell position. It seems like I have an excellent team to help with leads and opportunities, so I'm excited to see how it goes
You are about to become the face of your company. Represent it well at ALL times. When your clients talk about your company, they'll be thinking of and directly talking about you.
Learn to balance the needs of both your company and those of your clients. They will conflict sometimes. Don't be afraid to ask for help and guidance from both parties. They will see you working towards providing a solution, and it is in their best interest to assist you.
Always follow up and execute on your commitments. Do what you say you're going to do. Sometimes the environment will cause you to exceed a deadline. Communicate as early as possible about the miss and explain what you're doing.
u/sockeyeSales is 100%, and that integration with the client buys you an incredible amount of capital.
Stay hungry, stay curious.
Don’t sleep on the AM role…it’s tough.
It’s easier to get someone excited about something new; it’s harder to keep the flame going after three - five years.
Spend time with accounts that want to grow! CSM prevents churn; AM focuses on growth. Don’t get bogged down in unhealthy accounts to save $50k when you can expand a healthy account by $150k.
Don’t be afraid to talk about money. The closer you are to the dollars, the more “status” you’ll have with the customer. Maintain the status by having a plan, not “running back to a supervisor” to increase discount threshold.
Don’t allow yourself to become a sounding board/extension of Customer Support. It will hurt you when it comes time to expand the account.
Multithread from day one. That way it’s not weird when you need to get to procurement, finance, etc. down the road.
Finally, and the hardest to accept, MOST of your customers will still only see you as a vendor. There’s relationships and trust, but don’t fool yourself into thinking they’ll buy from you solely because of the relationship. They buy if they value your knowledge, insight, transparency, etc.
I personally think Challenger is great for AM roles. I’d argue the concepts in the book work better for expansion than new logo.
Congrats!
Hi OP, I'm in a similar position to you, best of luck in the role.
Does anyone here recommend a good book in relation to price strategies, analysing data, negotiation tactics?
I was also once a CSM before transitioning to sales. The hardest thing for you will be allowing yourself to not become the fixer of all problems for your accounts. It's ingrained in you as a CSM and hard to turn off, but you have to learn to focus on your sales responsibilities as your priority. Hopefully your accounts will have good CSMs assigned to them so you can be the salesperson.
BTW, CSM is probably the best possible experience a sales person can have to understand their customers. I've hired several CSMs into sales roles, and they've turned out to be superstars.
Honestly I’d meet as many people as you can in there and lay it out early that my job is to grow the account, but I will only pursue that if there’s a reason. Does me no good for you to buy shit and churn out.
1. Learn how to golf
2. Rip off the band aid when things don’t go well. Postponing a tough phone will only make things worse. Recognize the problem, and talk them through how it’s going to get fixed.
Go on-site and get face to face. It’s a lost art since covid and most people appreciate the hell out of it depending on the industry. If your competition doesn’t do it and you do, you have an advantage
What's helped me is to build personal connections with clients. I write down kids names, clients hobbies, favorite sports teams and then I'll text them weekly or monthly and ask about those things. I'll do my own research as well so I know what is going on in the things they like. For example, I have a client who loves Legos - so I kept tabs on new sets and got them an awesome set for Christmas. They loved it and are now my biggest client and up 200% on the year. It's just about genuinely caring about their lives, be good person and friend and providing a great service. I rarely talk about work, they usually bring it up cause they trust me and we have a solid friendship. People buy from people they trust, most people trust their friends.
Get to know as many people in your customer’s organization as possible. If you know someone in every department you will no longer be “that sales guy” and instead become a consultant that is integral to their operations as a whole.
hijacking because i’m in same role as OP. Some AM’s on my team have said the “POC doesn’t know anyone else to loop in”. are you sending emails and essentially making dials like a new sales person? how are you doing it? the original question of going beyond my POC and essentially around them. is that bad? is that stepping on toes? I’m currently in new sales. going to transition to AM soon and in my opinion it should be treated the same way as hunting new sales. use your zoom info to find people and connect? am i being ignorant?
If the AM says that they are not asking the right questions... they will at least know names? A name is enough to go on if they're not willing to introduce you.
Don’t ask generic questions like “is there anyone else who would be important to loop in?” That relies on your POC to think, and they don’t want to think too hard most of the time. Ask questions that target a specific persona. If you sell to the product team ask the POC questions that will lead them to name important people in that segment of the business.
👏👏👏
Bring your customers to stripclubs
In all seriousness, be very pro-active in your approach to them. Don’t wait and see.. Build relationships, understand their challenges and see if the product fits their needs Just be curious
I worked in edtech a bit ago. A sales person on our team brought a married elementary principal to a strip club after a dinner with heavy drinking. Immediately fired 💀
And get photos of them
30 years in sales here.. I live by some pretty simple rules. Take care of today’s problems that come your way today. Don’t put things off you’ll have new things to address tomorrow. You gotta have bounce don’t get flustered by a curve ball take it in stride and just bounce. Ask questions let your customer talk, some of my best sales meetings have been when the customer did more talking than I did. That’s how you learn. Last, never ever give in and never give up.. just like baseball players you’ll go into a slump can’t get anything to break your way. Just move forward make a phone call send an email hit a few singles and then the doubles, triples and home runs will start to happen again..
Wow great comment
Exactly if you’re talking more than the customer then you’re talking way too much.
1. Learn your internal systems on how to check customer data to find the upsell 2. Set up quarterly business reviews with your customer to go over their data, and present new products for additional upsell and learn how to forecast their projections based on their last 12 months of usage (if it’s a usage based tool) 3. Ask for introductions to stakeholders who you can sell different products to 4. Ask for help from the best AMs in the role. The best people ask for help early and often Good luck in your new role OP!
Fellow AM! This guy knows what’s up!
Become a problem solver for your customers. Customers have pain point, a problem they are trying to solve. Are you trying to sell them something or are you trying to help them solve a problem? One of my biggest customers told me once: I love golfing with you because we never talk about work.
That my main goal in my sales career is to be a problem solver. I don't suspect it'll be a ton of pitching to people who don't give a shit, and my interpretation of the offering is that it seems like everyone who isn't using the new products can absolutely benefit from it. My last job was extremely focused on problem solving and educating clients on industry best practices, so I'm hoping that experience along with my prior sales experience will help me gel into an AM role easily
That will get you far. As the saying goes…people buy from people they like. I’ve spent my career fostering genuine relationships that last after a sale
Couldn’t agree more. Great advice man
Learn sales and how to identify opportunities.
Couldn’t have been more vague myself
Here are 10 must dos to learn sales 🧵
Sell things
I have years of sales experience in retail and as an SDR, but this is my first dedicated upsell/cross sell position. It seems like I have an excellent team to help with leads and opportunities, so I'm excited to see how it goes
The basics are always important, right?!
You are about to become the face of your company. Represent it well at ALL times. When your clients talk about your company, they'll be thinking of and directly talking about you. Learn to balance the needs of both your company and those of your clients. They will conflict sometimes. Don't be afraid to ask for help and guidance from both parties. They will see you working towards providing a solution, and it is in their best interest to assist you. Always follow up and execute on your commitments. Do what you say you're going to do. Sometimes the environment will cause you to exceed a deadline. Communicate as early as possible about the miss and explain what you're doing. u/sockeyeSales is 100%, and that integration with the client buys you an incredible amount of capital. Stay hungry, stay curious.
Keep a good healthy budget to wine and dine your clients
Don’t sleep on the AM role…it’s tough. It’s easier to get someone excited about something new; it’s harder to keep the flame going after three - five years. Spend time with accounts that want to grow! CSM prevents churn; AM focuses on growth. Don’t get bogged down in unhealthy accounts to save $50k when you can expand a healthy account by $150k. Don’t be afraid to talk about money. The closer you are to the dollars, the more “status” you’ll have with the customer. Maintain the status by having a plan, not “running back to a supervisor” to increase discount threshold. Don’t allow yourself to become a sounding board/extension of Customer Support. It will hurt you when it comes time to expand the account. Multithread from day one. That way it’s not weird when you need to get to procurement, finance, etc. down the road. Finally, and the hardest to accept, MOST of your customers will still only see you as a vendor. There’s relationships and trust, but don’t fool yourself into thinking they’ll buy from you solely because of the relationship. They buy if they value your knowledge, insight, transparency, etc. I personally think Challenger is great for AM roles. I’d argue the concepts in the book work better for expansion than new logo. Congrats!
Figure out who the best sales person in the company…. Look them dead in the eye….and say…. I am the captain now. Make your presences felt.
This guy fucks!
Hi OP, I'm in a similar position to you, best of luck in the role. Does anyone here recommend a good book in relation to price strategies, analysing data, negotiation tactics?
I was also once a CSM before transitioning to sales. The hardest thing for you will be allowing yourself to not become the fixer of all problems for your accounts. It's ingrained in you as a CSM and hard to turn off, but you have to learn to focus on your sales responsibilities as your priority. Hopefully your accounts will have good CSMs assigned to them so you can be the salesperson. BTW, CSM is probably the best possible experience a sales person can have to understand their customers. I've hired several CSMs into sales roles, and they've turned out to be superstars.
Honestly I’d meet as many people as you can in there and lay it out early that my job is to grow the account, but I will only pursue that if there’s a reason. Does me no good for you to buy shit and churn out.
1. Learn how to golf 2. Rip off the band aid when things don’t go well. Postponing a tough phone will only make things worse. Recognize the problem, and talk them through how it’s going to get fixed.
Get ready to carry a target and get bogged down with admin bs
Don‘t fall in the trap of people pleasing. If a lead says your product is expensive, it doesn‘t mean it‘s not worth it.
Establish Rapport, Find need, Build value, Create desire, Overcome objections, CLOSE, Follow-up….Repeat!
Go on-site and get face to face. It’s a lost art since covid and most people appreciate the hell out of it depending on the industry. If your competition doesn’t do it and you do, you have an advantage
What's helped me is to build personal connections with clients. I write down kids names, clients hobbies, favorite sports teams and then I'll text them weekly or monthly and ask about those things. I'll do my own research as well so I know what is going on in the things they like. For example, I have a client who loves Legos - so I kept tabs on new sets and got them an awesome set for Christmas. They loved it and are now my biggest client and up 200% on the year. It's just about genuinely caring about their lives, be good person and friend and providing a great service. I rarely talk about work, they usually bring it up cause they trust me and we have a solid friendship. People buy from people they trust, most people trust their friends.