Martial Arts of Sales: tactics

The first post about how to win a fight, when your opponent is much better than you, was about making your opponent feeling insecure by not attacking when you get a chance, but building it up and waiting patiently for the best possible chance. There is also another method and strategy, that you can use, but this requires a bit more skills from you.

When you start a boxing training, you always start with skipping rope. This improves your stamina, but also helps you to train your rhythmic skills. Moreover, this improves your body for boxing steps, which you need in fights, in order to be able to move fluently across the ring.

In sales training, you often train for open-ended questions. Those keep the conversation going on and you get the customer to talk more than you. The better questions you can come up with, the more she values your conversation and feels that you are valuable to her business. But what if, her knowledge much better than yours? Or your competitor is already doing a great job with her? And you just have only single pieces of advice that you could give to her, not the whole picture she wants?

Rousey vs Holm on paper

I watched the UFC 193 main event fight Rousey vs Holm. Rousey being a dominant champion and destroying her last 3 opponents in a mere 64 seconds in total. Holm is a well-rounded boxing champion, who has moved to mixed martial arts. But still, Holm lacked a lot of experience needed for MMA fights and Rousey had previously been dominating with her judo-background in grappling and wrestling. Even though, Holm had been training those as well, she could not have the skills to win a grappling fight against an Olympic Judo medalist, who had a perfect record in MMA of 12-0.

So Holm was better in punching and likely better at keeping the distance (general movement). But it was unsure, if shecould use her skills in the octagon the same way as in the ring. Rousey, on the other hand, had fought well in octagon and had managed to catch all her previous opponents and won them impressively with no full time fights in her career. So what chances would Holm have to beat Rousey, who was dominant and much better in most of the skills required in a MMA fight?

I am sure, you have encountered similar situation in your sales calls. The buyer could dominate you in the discussion and of course, she has more knowledge on her business than you. She might be using your competitor, who has solved her problems with excellent results. It would not be smart to challenge the current solution by trying to attack it directly. But how can you then winback your customer? Do you need to start talking more about your solution or give her more referrals of satisfied customers? Or how do you continue to ask open-ended questions the right way?

Work with your strengths

Back to the Rousey vs Holm fight. Holm was very well prepared to fight the strengths of Rousey. She knew that she would not be able to beat Rousey in grappling, therefore she kept her distance and used her strikes. Rousey wanted to test her skills in stand up, which suited well for Holm. Holm was diligent in keeping the fight standing and often stepped back after a good punch. She didn’t want to get caught in Rousey’s clinch. In the end, Holm managed to take Rousey down for a short period of time, showing that she can wrestle too. She also managed to escape Rousey’s feared armlock, which also gave her mental advantage in the fight. I think, she wouldn’t have been able to do that, if she first hadn’t been successful with her striking and controlling the distance of the fight with her excellent movement.

Rousey got hurt and got desperate. In those moments, you can’t perform at your best. In the end, Holm got a huge knockout victory, which just added the cherry on top of her cake. She would have won the fight in some other way, if not by knockout. What I was the most impressed about Holm’s performance, was the way she managed to keep controlling the distance using her strengths throughout the fight. She may become a dominant champion, but at least when the fight against Rousey started, she was the underdog, who had a only a slight chance of winning the belt.

Strengths in sales meetings

The other day, I was in a customer meeting where I was told that they just had excellent results of an event campaign they had used another service provider. They didn’t even know, that we could have done that campaign to them. I didn’t want to hear, why the campaign was successful and to enhance the competitors excellent results. Therefore, I directed the conversation to my strengths. I started to ask, how did they promote these results in other campaigns and how are they developing future omni-channel campaigns (this successful campaign was run only on one channel). In the beginning, the customer was telling me, she was content with the current service provider. In the middle of the conversation, she started to write down ideas, which she would take to their current service provider and introduce to them, in order to be able to use these ideas with them. In the end, she wanted to end her agreement with her current service provider and start doing business with us. How did I manage to accomplish this? Just like Holm in the fight, I kept the conversation on my field, not letting the conversation go to my competitor’s strengths.

There were times, when I was almost caught, but I managed to step back and ask a new question which directed the conversation to my field of expertise. In the end, the whole conversation was a good entity and gave a lot of insights to her. It may have looked pretty easy for an outsider following the meeting, to see where it was going, but during it sure didn’t feel like it, at least not all the time. I kept the game where I was strong and had the stamina to direct the conversation over and over again to fit better for my knowledge and ideas. It was not a sure case to win, but I managed to win it with a finishing knockout.

The one thing you should be an expert on, is how your products help your customer the best. If you can direct your sales meetings to that, then you should be able to make a deal. But remember, to have a conversation and you talking about your solution, are two different things. For you explaining what you can do, will not provide the same results, as when your customer starts talking about how you could help her to perform better. Solution selling is a lot different than product selling. You should know the difference, before trying to use this tactic.

Sometimes, in martial arts you are facing an opponent, that clearly you should have no chance in winning. He is better in skill, more versatile and even quicker than you. He is even more experienced and has developed into a champion in no time. Your odds aren’t good, but there is still a chance to win with a perfect tactic. What could that be?

In sales, you might meet a person, who has much better knowledge on your business field. She has worked for years and has a great team supporting her. She has bought similar products and services and is highly valued among her colleagues from different companies. How to close a deal, when she clearly knows more than you and really into her business? You can’t afford to go down on price, what other options do you have?

Master knows the solution

My master in martial arts, explained me years ago about a tactic that not so many use in these kind of situations. He told me a story about the best goalkeeper in the world and how to score a goal against him. Often, coaches say that shoot as many times as possible and you will eventually score a goal. If you, as a hobby player, get a chance to shoot against a real pro, for instance, a goalie from NHL, you will not score, even if you get a chance to shoot 100 pucks. He will not make a mistake, because he has trained his whole life and the level his goalkeeping is so high, that by just trying, you will not succeed. Not even, if you try harder.

I was really surprised about how the story was going. I always thought, that you should just try harder and in the end, you would succeed. He asked me: “what technique would you use?” I answered: “I don’t know”. He continued: “you are right. You don’t know and that is the trick”. Then he explained that against the best opponent, you shouldn’t think about your technique, but make him insecure about his. You should try to dribble, use fake attacks and make all kinds of movements, but not really attack before you have made him nervous. The best fighters (and goalies in his example), need a feeling of winning and if you can challenge that, they become insecure. A goalie with no shots coming, doesn’t have a feeling of winning and gets frustrated. His head will turn against him in the long run and you have to be patient to get to that point.

How to apply the method in sales

In sales, don’t worry about your knowledge, challenge the knowledge of the buyer. Ask good questions and continue the discussion. Make new questions, based on the answers given and push the conversation further. Try to get to the limit of her knowledge and still push further (the questions have to be good and challenging) This will make the buyer more insecure of her knowledge and she will start to think that you know more than she does or at least that you have something that she doesn’t know about. She will end up by asking for your help. That is the right time to offer your solution and she will buy it. Too often, junior sales people start to talk about his solution and not getting the buyer thinking and questioning her knowledge. That kind of sales meeting will not result in sales and the buyer will not start trusting you as a service provider. In business, one way to build trust is to show that you have something that she needs. One way to build this need is to make her question her current solution.

What do you think? Can you pull this off? I have tried it many times in fighting and in sales. Sometimes I have succeeded, but not always. It sounds a lot easier than it is, but if you don’t try this method, you will not win an opponent who is much better than you. What do you got to lose?

In a fight, when the opponent is attacking you, basically you have three choices - to evade, block or counter. Evading gives you a chance to monitor the situation and you stay unharmed. If you chose to block, there is always some contact, but the attack breaks or starts over again with another attack. With counter attack, you chose to take advantage of the situation and try to strike where you seen an opening.

In sales, you have the same options when your customer is trying to object your sales pitch or starts questioning you before agreeing to buy. You can try to evade the situation and lead the conversation to another direction. The second option is to answer the (sales) objection and show that you are an expert in the field. The third option is to challenge your customers thinking and by using your knowledge, outwit your customer.

Like in a fight, in sales you can’t always use the same tactic. You need use all of these approaches in a single sales conversation. The big question is when to use which?

Evading (try to find the rhythm)

In a fight, the first thing I try to do is to find the rhythm of my opponent. This means, that I try to find out how fast he is with his attacks. How well does he moves and what kind of sequences is he trying to use when trying to attack me. Evading and keeping the distance is the best way to feel comfortable and avoid risks. With full contact fighting, it is better to avoid the contact, before you feel comfortable. In the beginning of the fight, the surprise attack is the most dangerous. You don’t know what to expect, therefore it is better not to take any risks. But still, it is wise to get the opponent be the first one to attack. From there, you can start to find his rhythm and adjust your speed to his. The one who controls the speed, is the one who will succeed in his attacks.

When starting a new sales conversation, the first impression is very important. You can lose the sales in the first few seconds, if you don’t play your part well. The prospect often waits for the sales person to start the conversation, but don’t push it too far. Try to see how she wants to play it. Start with being polite and ask simple questions. When you introduce yourself, try to get her to talk more about herself. Some people are easy to lead into conversation and some more difficult.

Open questions are good to start with, but if she gives you short answers, you are have not found her rhythm yet (meaning that you have not connected in the conversation) or you are asking too difficult questions. If it feels like interrogation, then the flow is lost in the beginning. Your body language, words and other expressions should invite your prospect to a warm and intriguing conversation.

Evading also means that you lose the tension. In a fight, it gives you time to relax, but at the same time you have no chance of attacking back. In sales, the conversation feels nice, but gets you nowhere. When you have found the rhythm, you need to start getting points. More about this in my upcoming posts.