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Listening Provided the Pivotal Clue for Competitive Intelligence

Posted on April 21, 2017 by ellendnaylor

The Competitive Situation

A glass manufacturing company wanted to know why a competitor was still in the glass business, as its glass business was losing money, and had been for several years. Their ultimate goal was to predict when this competitor would exit the glass business so they could capture the competitor’s customers.

My Mission

My goal was to learn as much as I could about the competing glass company, and most importantly why they were motivated to remain in the glass business. Most of the publicly held competitor’s revenue, and all of its profit, came from their food business.

My Findings

I had found out that the competitor was investing minimally in their glass factory operation, and hired many Spanish speaking immigrants to work in the less hot and less dangerous jobs. There were piles of scrap glass around the factory, but they didn’t bother hauling them away.

It was time for the quarterly earnings phone call, and my client suggested I listen in. I almost didn’t as I figured I could read this later. However, something made me listen. The competitor’s CEO was all cheery when discussing the food business. Then an analyst asked, “And what about the glass business? What are you doing there?” “Ah…the glass business…well…,” uttered the CEO in a dejected and hesitant tone.

Hmmm I thought, it sounds like the CEO is emotionally attached to the glass business. I researched and found out that the CEO’s Dad had bought the glass business, and surmised that he wanted to stay in it for that reason, not for revenue or profit. I called the analyst who had asked about the glass business to learn why he thought the company remained in the glass business, and what might cause the company to exit it. He agreed that the CEO was emotionally attached to the glass business. Thus, he was not likely to leave the glass business for any rational reason, else he would have already done so.

These conversations and research gave me the insight to answer my client’s question: what would cause the competitor to divest or sell the glass business?

While I couldn’t say when, I concluded that it would take a catastrophic event for the CEO to exit the glass business. It would have to be an event that was out of his control. I figured an accident in the factory or something that serious, could be a trigger.

I recommended that my client should closely monitor the competitor since something was bound to push the company out of the glass business. Thus, my client closely monitored the competitor’s activity. The trigger was when a stockholder’s group filed a complaint and threatened to submit a class action suit against the company if they didn’t divest the money losing glass business. Bingo, this was the event my client was waiting for. They went after the competing company’s glass business. The time was right, and they were ready.

Conclusion

All too often we rely only on written digital data. It turned out the CEO’s tone of voice in the competitor’s earnings conference call provided the pivotal clue. If I had only read the earnings report—my original intention—I would have missed it. My lesson learned: in competitive intelligence projects, when you can listen to the human voice, especially the company’s CEO, do so.

Learn more about competitive intelligence

Win/Loss Analysis book; Amazon link to Win/Loss Analysis book

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Filed under: Competitive Intelligence, competitor, Denver, Ellen Naylor | Tagged: | 2 Comments »

Be Smart: Be Human: Be Flexible

Posted on March 22, 2016 by ellendnaylor

I read a moving post about the value of being flexible by my friend and book counselor, Judith Briles. She totally changed gears from talking about her book, The Confidence Factor, on a morning show in Cleveland due to a tragedy where some high school students had been killed the night before. The community was reeling from it. She decided it was time to talk from her heart. She had such incredible empathy from her experience losing her son at age 19, also in a terrible accident. The local community couldn’t get enough of her. The show extended her time by two segments and she was invited back.

manager woman doing yoga at white background

How flexible are you in competitive intelligence and Win/Loss analysis? We usually aren’t in situations where the daily news changes how we’ll be with people. However, it’s likely that no matter how much planning we do, there are surprises.

Flexibility at Trade Shows

In my first Neocon, the largest N America-based commercial interior and design trade show, I was asked to get specific information on three competitors. I had done my homework before the conference: I knew where are the competition’s exhibits were in the huge Chicago Merchandise Mart. I had memorized considerable facts about each competitor, and had my questions all organized in my head. I was sure of my game plan.

I came up to the market leader’s showroom and asked to have a tour of their space which featured some new products. The snooty sales person asked if I had an appointment. “Why no,” I answered. “I didn’t know I needed an appointment just to see your furniture display.” So I walked away feeling dejected.  To add spice to the day, I was rapidly losing my voice.

What was I to do? I could not succeed in my assignment unless I could get into the competitor’s showroom and get answers to our questions. Then I got an idea: “Why couldn’t I find a group who had an appointment and just tag along?” So I stood outside the market leader’s space until I saw a group of gentlemen from a well known software firm, heading to the competitor’s exhibit area. I asked if they had an appointment, and when they answered in the affirmative, I asked if I could tag along. “Sure,” they said. “Happy to have you join us.”

Ironically the snooty sales person was their account rep, who gave us the tour being as informative as she could be. She told us all about their new products, and why they were better than the competition, which answered most of my client’s questions. She glared at me, but graciously answered my questions, since I imagine this was one of her largest accounts as this software firm was expanding exponentially. Meanwhile her client had questions that I hadn’t thought of, as they were steeped in the commercial interior space. Their jobs varied among purchasing, design and decision-making, so you can just imagine how much I learned, all because I hung back and waited for a major customer to get the tour.

Flexibility in Win/Loss Interviews

In Win/Loss interviews, I like to research who I’ll be speaking to, and usually can find something about them from the sales team and social media, especially on LinkedIn. No matter how much you learn, you need to be flexible as soon as you connect with them on the phone, SKYPE or however you converse. Sometimes you cold call these people, especially in B2C Win/Loss interviews.

In one case, I was trying to reach those who used test and measurement tools. When the gentleman answered his phone I could barely hear him and wondered why he had even bothered. I could hear machinery very close by and asked where he was. “I am a crane operator, and that’s where I am.” I chewed him out for answering his mobile on the job and asked to schedule a time when he would not be operating his crane. We had a great interview during his lunch hour the next day.

In another case, I thought I was going to talk to a user of these test and measurement tools, which was the target of this project. Instead I got through to a person who repaired all the brands of these test and measurement tools. I revised the questions on the spot, and asked him about the repair track record of all the manufacturers’ test and measurement tools. This was one of the most informative interviews we had, since he had about 20 years of experience. Not only did we get the current trend in repair protocol and need, but we also got the history of how it had changed, and his future assessment of the industry.

Competitive Intelligence Collection

In another project, I was researching the glass industry. My client thought I might benefit from listening in on the quarterly earnings call. I thought I might just as well read the report later, and look at the slides. But he insisted that I should listen in. I was so glad I did. When the CEO was asked about the failing glass business, his tone of voice changed to a sad one. Yet he didn’t indicate any desire to sell it. A rational business person would have sold it a few years before I was hired to investigate this company. This made me wonder what emotional tie this CEO might have to the glass business. I found out his dad had bought the business, and that he wanted to keep it going for his dad.

So I told my client I couldn’t predict what would trigger the sale of this business, which was inevitable, but it would be a major event where the CEO would be forced to sell the business. Perhaps it might be a terrible accident in the glass factory. A couple of years later, some stockholders filed to force the CEO to sell this unprofitable business and won. My client was ready to capture this company’s glass business.

So the bottom line is as with many things in life. Do your homework and be prepared. Be flexible and swallow your pride, and let your heart speak when it’s needed. That way when the unexpected happens, you will have an ability to shift gears.

Check out our book, Win/Loss Analysis: How to Capture and Keep the Business You Want.

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Filed under: competition, Competitive Intelligence, Denver, Ellen Naylor, trade show, win loss analysis | Tagged: , , | Comments Off on Be Smart: Be Human: Be Flexible

How You Can Become a Conversation Rockstar

Posted on February 25, 2016 by ellendnaylor

So much about life revolves around effective communication.

As a primary research expert, I am always looking to for ways to motivate others to share. You need to understand what makes them comfortable to share.

I recently read Traci Brown’s book, Persuasion Point: Body Language and Speech for Influence. While the book focuses on closing sales deals, the same tactics will work to promote sharing when conducting competitive intelligence collection or win/loss interviews. I will focus on speech, since we are often conducting these interviews over the telephone, so we don’t have the benefit of seeing the other person, although we can surely sense beyond their words.

One quick and easy way to start the connection is to match their speed and tone of speech. This also pushes you over to their side by being flexible, and forgetting about yourself.

Traci describes four communication preferences:

  • Visual
  • Auditory
  • Kinesthetic
  • Auditory Digital

First, figure out your own communication preference, so you learn how to modify your language, tone and pace to match the other person’s communication preference. If you don’t, you’re apt to lose them in your conversation.

Visual people are quick as they are often competent and confident. They think and speak quickly. If you slow down, their mind will wander. They require less detail to process information, and when they change the subject you know they are ready for the next topic. They are interested in how things look or will look. They often focus on the future and have a big picture, strategic focus. They can easily think other are idiots. They are judgmental, very observant and don’t automatically like you or your ideas until you prove yourself.

Words/phrases to use: see, look, appear, show, dawn, view. “I see what you’re saying. It’s unclear. How does this look to you?”

Auditory people learn by listening, and are interested in how things sound. They are easily distracted by noise. Tone of voice is important, and they can be hurt by the wrong tone. They like sequence and order and to be told how they’re doing. They are less interested in how things look, and live in the here and now. Structure kills them as they like freedom. A plus is they automatically like you and your idea.

Words/phrases to use: hear, listen, sound, harmonize, music. “I hear you. That rings a bell. How does this sound? Clear as a bell.”

Kinesthetic people tend to speak slowly, in long phrases and breathe deeply. Slow your speech if you’re a fast talker and be patient as conversations tend to be longer. Listen for their deep feelings to emerge slowly. They’re often in occupations that use their hands: carpenter, chef, mechanic, artist.

They need more extensive detail to process information, and respond to touch. They tend to like you and your ideas, a plus. Like Auditories, they live in the here and now.

Words/phrases to use: feel, touch, grasp, get a hold of, slip through. “Does it feel right? Do you grasp this idea?”

Auditory Digital people like detail, structure and order. They are often lawyers, computer programmers, engineers or financial professionals. They often exhibit characteristics of the other three communication preferences.

They tend to be smart, curious and know a little about most things. They can operate in their own head, are often judgmental and don’t necessarily like you or your ideas, until you objectively prove yourself.

Words/phrases to use: think, learn, process, understand, learn. “So does this make sense to you? This is a great way to learn. Do you think this is a good idea?”

In reality, many people jump among these communication preferences depending on what you’re talking about. Sometimes you can’t detect a communication style quickly enough in a telephone conversation. So pepper words of each of the communication preferences, and note what they seem to resonate most by listening to their tone and words.

Win/Loss Analysis book gives you a process to learn why you’re losing business and how to keep more of it!

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Filed under: communication, Competitive Intelligence, conversation, Cooperative Intelligence, Denver, Ellen Naylor, telephone, win loss analysis | Tagged: , , | 3 Comments »

Outsourcing Win/Loss Analysis? How to Select the Right Consultant

Posted on April 1, 2015 by ellendnaylor

I am excited that my book, Win, Lose or Draw: How to Grow Your Business through Win/Loss Analysis is now in the copy editing process.

This is a follow-on blog to Win/Loss Analysis: Outsourcing versus In-House where I share the pros and cons of doing Win/Loss analysis in-house, outsourcing it, or outsourcing part of it.

If you want to outsource Win/Loss analysis, here are 10 things to consider as you decide on a consulting firm:

  1. Industry Experience
  2. Connection to Sales
  3. Professionalism
  4. Project Management
  5. Team Player
  6. Written/Oral Skills
  7. Project Delivery
  8. Deliverables
  9. Fees
  10. Sharing Win/Loss Experience

1. How much experience do they have in your industry or a related industry? How much industry experience is required or can you educate the consultant adequately on your industry? I have been able to gain enough knowledge about the customer’s industry from client sharing and my own research. It’s mostly needed to probe more deeply on technical issues. Most of what you are asking about does not require technical expertise. It requires an understanding of how sales are made and how buyers find and make their decisions. The consultant learns more about your company, the industry and the marketplace each time they conduct Win/Loss interviews and analysis.

However, there are some industries that are so technical that you will need to hire someone who already has this experience, such as a retired employee or a consulting firm that focuses on your industry. Beware when you hire a consultant in your space that they are not working for your competition. Win/Loss interviews and analysis results are highly proprietary.

2. Rapport with sales and sales management is often overlooked in our anxiety that the consultant will connect well with our customers and non-customers. How well is that consultant going to relate to your sales people and sales managers to get their customer and non-customer (losses) data? Has the consultant ever been a sales rep? Do they speak sales? The ability to connect with sales is essential since the consultant needs to know how the account was left before calling their customer.

3. The consultant needs to be professional and respectful both with your company employees and customers and non-customers. It’s often a challenge to gauge their professionalism. However, you can get some clues from their proposal, website, blogs and other Win/Loss publications they have authored. Check out a couple of testimonials if the consulting firm wasn’t referred to you.

Interviewing skills are much harder to gauge than written skills. Perhaps the consultant gives presentations or webinars that you can listen to in order to get an idea of their attitude, tone and speaking style, although unlike Win/Loss interviews, these are mostly 1-way communication.

4. Project Management is a key requirement for Win/Loss analysis. The first 4 steps of Win/Loss are collaborative:

  1. Coordinate and develop the right questions with the right people at your company.
  2. Collaborate with sales to get customer/non-customer data.
  3. Keep track of each contact in the interview process.
  4. Conduct the interviews and write up the summaries soon thereafter.

5. How well will the consultant connect with your sales reps and sales management? How well will they collaborate with your company employees? Will they quickly establish rapport with your customers/non-customers? Is the consultant trustworthy? Is the consultant a good listener?

6. What is the consultant’s experience in conducting Win/Loss interviews and the analysis? Decide how you will assess their writing skills. Do they write or blog about Win/Loss?

Be sensitive about asking for a Win/Loss analysis report sample: Win/Loss findings are highly proprietary. Win/Loss is custom research. Your final report will look quite different from a scrubbed sample since it will reflect what is uncovered from your Win/Loss interviews.

7. Win/Loss is a relationship business. You rely on other people’s schedules for the first 4 steps listed under “#4 Project Management” above. To do Win/Loss analysis right, you need adequate time: don’t skimp on it. Don’t reward the hasty Win/Loss consultant, since they usually won’t be able to adhere to a hasty schedule.

8. Be clear on your expected deliverables. What communication do you expect from the consultant on project progress? Do you want interview summaries or transcripts of the Win/Loss interviews? How do you want the quantitative data presented? Do you have a preferred format for the final Win/Loss analysis report? Do you expect an oral presentation of the findings? Would your company benefit from an interactive brainstorming workshop? Often enough Win/Loss findings bring up more questions, so a facilitated brainstorming session with key sales, marketing and product developers can be quite fruitful.

9. Understand the full cost of outsourcing your Win/Loss program. This is custom research so consultants charge differently from each other.

There is typically a start-up fee to learn your industry, your sales process, your sales deliverables, the competition and to organize the Win/Loss template for interviews. There is a cost per completed interview, which might include a written summary or transcribed recordings. Some consultants charge a certain fee for unsuccessful interview attempts to incent clients to give them an accurate list of customer/non-customers to interview. There will be a cost for the final Win/Loss analysis report. There may be an additional cost to present the Win/Loss findings to your team or this might be included in the cost of the final Win/Loss report. There will be an additional cost for the consultant to facilitate an optional half/full day review of Win/Loss findings, recommendations and brainstorming on how/who should implement the changes at your company.

10. Does the consultant write about Win/Loss aside from their website? Is it all just promotional material or does it impart some “how to” knowledge? Does the consultant present or teach Win/Loss analysis? Has the consultant been published in Win/Loss in trade journals, magazines or a book? How clear is their Win/Loss proposal? Is it customized to your needs or just a Win/Loss proposal template?

In the end you need to decide who you are most comfortable working with. Chemistry is important as Win/Loss is a relationship business. If you decide to embark on a Win/Loss program, I hope you’ll consider The Business Intelligence Source as a partner for the parts of the process that you want to outsource.

Research from various sources indicates that a formal Win/Loss program can improve win rates up to 30%. However, there are no guarantees. Beware of consultants who guarantee that they can improve your win rates by a certain percentage. Nothing happens until you take action based on Win/Loss analysis findings. We consultants can only make recommendations for change. We don’t know the culture of your company like you do, which is imperative for making change. Closing deals can be improved by many actions, and not all of them come from Win/Loss recommendations.

Good luck with your Win/Loss program.

Here is a Win/Loss Analysis Slideshare to help you develop your Win/Loss analysis program.

Win/Loss Analysis book gives you a process to learn why you’re losing business and how to keep more of it!

Receive our 6-page Win/Loss Cheat Sheets

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Filed under: competition, Cooperative Intelligence, Denver, Ellen Naylor, win loss analysis | Tagged: , , | 1 Comment »

3 New Competitive Intelligence Books

Posted on February 13, 2015 by ellendnaylor

It is my pleasure to share 3 great competitive intelligence books that came to my attention this week.

Business and Competitive Analysis: Effective Applications of New and Classic Methods, 2nd Edition by Craig Fleisher and Babette Bensoussan, Pearson, 2015.

So what’s changed in this version?

  • They have included new techniques not included in the 1st edition
  • They include Key Intelligence Questions for each technique
  • They give you ideas for other similar or complementary techniques you can use
  • There is a worksheet that you can use for each technique, handy for teachers too
  • They also teach you a better SWOT.
  • Babette Bensoussan promises once you use this improved SWOT, you won’t turn back to the old 4 boxes one.

Craig Fleisher informs that customer orders for printed copies overwhelmed their publisher, Pearson, this week. They should be available again next week. For those of you who need it more quickly, the digital version is available at Amazon and other digital on-line retailers.

The Guide to Online Due Diligence Investigations: The Professional Approach on How to Use Traditional and Social Media Resources by Cynthia Hetherington, Facts on Demand Press, 2015.

Learn “Hetherington’s methods” in this book which provide the information for you to:

  • Conduct an online background on any business, person or entity, foreign or domestic
  • Hunt down online social network profiles and locate assets
  • Set up alerts for asset tracking or any type of investigation
  • Learn how to keep up with cutting edge services that are coming up daily.
  • Expose fraudulent business enterprises, locate assets, and find undercover intelligence.
  • Learn about database resources and online sources for conducting research online.
  • A demonstration of actual Web sites to utilize in their own investigations.
  • Found Online – Learn where and how your personal life ends up databases and how it is sold.

Blue Ocean Strategy, Expanded Edition: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Market the Competition Irrelevant by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne, Harvard Business Review Press, 2015.  Following are excerpts from Amazon reviews.

According to John Gibbs, an Amazon Top 1000 reviewer:

“While not every reader of the book will discover a perfectly formed blue ocean strategy, almost every reader who spends time and effort working through the tools provided by the authors will come up with some creative strategic ideas which might not otherwise have arisen. This is one of my favourite books on strategy and, although the changes between the first edition and the expanded edition are not substantial, they are still enough to justify the price of buying the new edition.”

Another more anonymous reviewer adds:

“This new expanded edition adds new chapters at the back covering unanswered questions from the original. The new chapter on the issue of what the authors call “alignment”, that explains how to get your staff and suppliers on board with you when you decide to make a ‘blue ocean’ move, is particularly useful. That new chapter alone made this a worthwhile purchase for me.”

Zunaira Munar comments:

“The new expanded edition of the book now puts the big picture in perspective by showing how strategic alignment of value, profit and people propositions is achieved to create a successful blue ocean strategy. The new chapter about red ocean traps is particularly insightful as it shows, through interesting examples, what keeps companies stuck in red oceans and how to overcome those mental models. The addition of two new principles of blue ocean strategy for addressing execution risks related to renewal and sustainability answer some of the very important questions that my clients have asked over the years about blue ocean strategy. It is also interesting to see how the case studies described in the original book ten years ago have evolved over the years, presenting useful insights into the sustainability of blue oceans.”

Jacqueline Chang comments:

“My favourite part about the expanded edition is that there is even more emphasis on how Blue Ocean Strategy can be applied to illuminate the human dimension of organisations, to engage people’s hearts and minds in carrying out their activities. The book illustrates how to build execution into strategy and create trust among employees and other partners. I found many useful examples that other project managers can learn from, particularly in terms of how a new strategy can be implemented quickly and at low cost.”

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Filed under: competition, competitive advantage, competitive analysis, Competitive Intelligence, Denver, Ellen Naylor, social media, social networks | Tagged: , , , , | 1 Comment »

Best Sales Intelligence Practices

Posted on December 12, 2014 by ellendnaylor

Sales Team Working Together Reaching Selling GoalThis week I spoke with a competitive intelligence manager in the auto industry, who has engaged about 1/3 of his workforce in his competitive intelligence program. I think that’s pretty awesome! His key audience is sales, and he also serves product management and account managers who service the accounts. I felt a kindred spirit in our discussion since we both came from sales before plunging into competitive intelligence, although that was 30 years ago for me.

I was impressed with what he had accomplished in three years and will share some of his best practices, geared mostly to gaining competitive intelligence from sales people.

  • The company has a technology a lot like Facebook that sales and marketing use to ask and answer questions. There are so many questions that marketing will ferret out those that he can best address
  • He has set up a Sharepoint site for CI since it’s scalable
  • He set up an easy to remember email address with good brand ID that comes directly to him
  • He monitors over 100 competitors, housed in a self-service technology for employees to access
  • When he gets a question repeatedly he puts it in the CI Sharepoint, and reminds users what’s there
  • He gives presentations to sales each month. He has a goal of 10 per month, but so far his biggest month has been 7
  • He is involved in sales conference calls both as a listener and contributor
  • He is the last person on the roster to give new sales rep training. I think that’s great psychology to be last. He follows up soon after the training and they remember him. Many of them engage in the competitive intelligence program right away
  • When he sees a new person engages with the system, he reaches out to him/her to find out how he can help them further
  • He never says “no,” but he does refer non-CI requests to other departments
  • He addresses ethical issues in collection from competitors with his sales force

I appreciated his attitude to try new things. For a while, he tracked which sales were made after he gave a sales rep some information to help. He was looking to show management a ROI for his work. Sales didn’t appreciate this since his guidance wasn’t the only reason they won the deal. He discontinued this practice as soon as he learned that it was not popular with Sales, as they are both his major client and source of competitive intelligence.

Sales force management is anxious to learn how they can close more deals, so I suggested that he consider a win loss analysis program. Since his company closes thousands of deals per year, he was concerned that he might have to conduct hundreds to be statistically significant. When I asked what his specific goal for win loss is, we agreed that 100 win loss interviews could go a long way to gather in-depth customer intelligence, which appears to be a weaker link.

He produces videos and said Sales didn’t look at them as much. I suggested that he produce podcasts on competitors, new announcements etc., since sales spends a lot of time in the car. Perhaps he could interview a sales person who just won a major deal, or perhaps a win back.

What are some of your best practices to gather or give competitive intelligence to your sales reps?

Here is a timeless article, Capture Competitive Intelligence from Sales.

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Filed under: Competitive Intelligence, Cooperative Intelligence, customer intelligence, D. Sales Intelligence Articles, Denver, Ellen Naylor, sales people, win loss analysis | Tagged: , | 1 Comment »

How to Connect with Senior Leaders

Posted on November 25, 2014 by ellendnaylor

I was sorry to miss Scott Leeb’s talk, “CI Guerilla Warfare: Winning the Hearts and Minds of Senior Leadership.” Turns out I didn’t: it was videotaped here.

So my Thanksgiving treat is a recap of Scott’s talk. Almost everyone I know in competitive intelligence complains about their lack of connection to senior management.

Many of us in competitive intelligence are our own worst enemy since we are steeped in competitive intelligence DNA and language, and don’t understand how the c-suite operates.

Treat getting in with the c-suite like battle:  “If you know the enemy and you yourself you need not fear the results of a 100 battles.” Sun Tzu, 500BC

Mind your Ps and Qs

Over deliver, but don’t overwhelm. Start with how your insight ties into the business results the executive cares about. Use their language, which is the language of business and know enough about the executive to understand his/her quirks. Their Admin will know these. Scott would schedule 5 minutes with an executive before his talk to make sure he was touching on what the executive cared about. They will find 5 minutes for you: it’s in their best interest, right?

Scott also applies his 7Ps from his military training to knowing how executives operate:

  • Proper
  • Planning and
  • Preparation
  • Prevent
  • Pitifully
  • Poor
  • Performance

Recognize the differences

Most executives live to work. They are under tremendous pressure and you don’t want to add to it.

Pick and maintain a voice, which is consistent and in alignment with the business goals

  • Be Bold
  • Be Brief
  • Be Gone
  • Be Authoritative
  • Be Opinionated
  • Be Balanced
  • Be Flexible
  • Be Careful (politics)

Scott suggests three practices when communicating with executives:

  • BLUFF: Bottom Line Up Front results Fast
  • KISS: Keep It Simple Stupid
  • 4Qs: Quantify Qualify Quality Quickly – Fast and Forcefully make your presentation to executives

Show them the tip of the iceberg from your analysis. Use appropriate language, not CI, and tie your deliverable to business results that you know the executive is focused on. But be prepared with all the supporting data for questions.

Scott’s motto here:

  • Get the analysis to the
  • Right person at the
  • Right time……to Support the
  • Right decision

Be a Salesperson

Build a competitive intelligence brand in your company with a logo and a name to your group that everyone can easily identify with. While many in competitive intelligence have this stealth mode for what we do, we need to be more outgoing in order to be seen and heard. Scott had a catchy name for his CI group at Prudential, PruView.

If you aren’t good at selling, find champions who are. Ideally they should have some skin in the game, that is rely on you for good work. Ideally these champions should be senior, vocal, CI smart and committed.

I recall when I was at Bell Atlantic, now part of Verizon, I gained a VP of Sales as my champion. I didn’t realize he was testing me when he sent me on what I thought was a wild goose chase to lead a competitor response analysis in a highly political RFP that our sales folks had already answered. What would be the value of this, I thought as I drove to their site with very little notice.

The sales team thought if we didn’t win, AT&T would. There were two other competitors: Rolm (now part of Siemens) and Nortel. They didn’t think either of them had a good chance to win the business. I thought that Rolm had the best chance to win as this was a university, and Rolm was owned by IBM, who manufactured PCs at this time. They could sweeten the deal through discounted PCs, which were very expensive then. Rolm won the business for the reason I had suspected, and the Sales VP became my champion.

Provide Insights

  • Focus on what they need and keeping asking “so what” until you get to this.
  • Also get them to think about, “What’s the cost of inaction?”

Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate it.

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Filed under: Competitive Intelligence, competitor, connection, Cooperative Intelligence, Denver, Ellen Naylor, leadership | Tagged: , | Comments Off on How to Connect with Senior Leaders

How Culture Affects the Win Loss Process

Posted on October 24, 2014 by ellendnaylor

Culture in Win LossI continue to write my Guide to Win Loss Analysis book, which is the best of source of customer intelligence I know of. I still need to find a better title: any ideas?

I have had the pleasure of interviewing two impressive Directors of Win Loss programs. Both work for large companies that have done win loss analysis for a long while. Both emphasized the importance of company culture in how they set up their win loss programs; how they conduct win loss interviews—both internally and with customers—and how they write up the win loss analysis.

Culture at a Telecommunications Company

At a large telecommunications firm, the win loss team and sales people work cooperatively. At the outset, the win loss team worked with the various sales organizations and other key stakeholders, such as pricing and product groups, to develop an exhaustive set of testable hypotheses regarding root causes of sales successes and failures. This process had the benefits of buy-in from Sales and other key stakeholders as well as a higher quality analysis.

This telecommunication firm holds a full blown 360 internal company debrief before conducting a win loss interview with the customer or prospect. The meeting is not recorded so people share freely. Lessons learned along the way are noted as well as why those at the meeting think they won or lost the deal.

After the internal company debrief, the win loss person accompanies the sales person to conduct the win loss interview. The win loss team does not want to interfere with the rapport that sales people have developed with the customer. Thus the sales person is a member of the win loss interviewing team.

The win loss process is not a Sales witch hunt. Rather it is more holistic:

  • Why did we win or lose the bid?
  • What are the gaps in the RFP (request for proposal)?

The aim is not to assess or critique the performance of Sales outside of factual relationship questions that can be tied to a win or a loss:

  • Frequency of sales visits
  • Executive alignment from the telecommunications company with the client company’s C-levels

This cooperation permeates the win loss report. The win loss team is empathetic and sensitive to company politics and face saving in their reports on losses. The recommendations you make at the conclusion of the win loss report can impact people’s jobs. In this vein, the win loss team interviews those who are criticized during a loss interview to get their side of the story before publishing the quarterly win loss report.

Culture at a Big Four Firm

Win Loss is particularly sensitive since consulting firms only provide services. Thus there is no product to assess like there is at the telecommunications firm, so it’s entirely subjective. It’s all about the people: their skills, expertise, presentation, communication and project management. Professional services work tends to be long term, and the projects major, so wins and losses have the potential to make or break a career.

The lead sales person is an Account Partner, which adds another level of politics to the win loss process. Thus the Win Loss Director realized he needed to be collaborative with Account Partners to gain access to their accounts. Being a Director rather than a Manager gives him credibility with his company’s Account Partners and their senior level clients.

Every win loss interview is a sales job in this culture, so the Win Loss Director reduces the politics around which clients to query. He will ask the Account Partner if he can conduct a win loss interview with his client, just after the Account Partner has pitched the sale. Since this request is put forth before knowing how the deal with close, win loss is seen as less punitive.

Due to the company culture and the high stakes of most sales, the Win Loss Director assures the Account Partners, while letting them know he needs their help to be positioned for win loss interviews with their clients:

  • I am an internal third party, but I’m outside of Sales. I need you Mr./Ms. Account Partner to gain entrée to your client
  • Remember we work for the same firm so we have consistent client service standards
  • The first person I will get back to is you, Mr./Ms. Account Partner. At a minimum, I will go to you first with sensitive information so you will not be blind-sided
  • If I find damaging information, I will act with discretion, consideration, and a sense of partnership. We use what we uncover in win loss interviews as lessons learned

Recording Win loss Interviews

The culture around recording is different between the telecommunications company and this big four firm. At the big four firm, the Win Loss Director records every conversation, and asks for permission beforehand. This process gives internal clients assurance that the quoted client verbatim statements are accurate. This also gives the Win Loss Director the ability to pull out the conversation that led up to the verbatim. The report makes a great impact especially from direct client quotes which add credibility and authority to the win loss analysis. Since their conversation is being recorded, the client being interviewed feels important. They know that their feedback is appreciated and that they will not be misunderstood.

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Filed under: collaboration, conversation, Cooperative Intelligence, customer intelligence, Denver, Ellen Naylor, interview, sales people, win loss analysis | Tagged: , , , | Comments Off on How Culture Affects the Win Loss Process

Is Mindset Block a Lack of Listening?

Posted on April 18, 2014 by ellendnaylor

I read two great blogs in the last couple of weeks: David Harkelroad’s which asserted that the biggest problem in strategy is mindset; and an HBR blog on “What Gets in the Way of Listening?” I think they are related since if you truly listen, you are open to having your mind changed.

There are many reasons people don’t listen well. We aren’t trained on listening from childhood with the competition that seems to thrive in the classroom for the best answer, to be the best, often at the expense of the other students. Sometimes we don’t listen since we’re scared. We are trying to appear confident and assertive and miss others’ perspectives in the process.

I like the flexible mindset shared in the HBR blog, “I do have a viewpoint going in, but I don’t assume or try to show I’m the smartest person in the room. I’m willing to hear them (colleagues) out for the sake of getting the best answer, not just my answer.” Listening is a sign of incredible self-confidence. Back to David’s point about mindset. I think many leaders don’t fully listen since they aren’t confident, but they want to appear confident. In the example cited of Blockbuster’s Wayne Huizenga having the intelligence to get into digital media, there is something that stops many executives from taking corrective action. Maybe the extremely generous pay that executives receive clouds their judgment and reinforces them not to change their mindset.

“Leaders who take organizational conversation seriously, know when to stop talking and start listening.” (“Leadership is a Conversation” by Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind). When you put aside your fear and anticipation, you are more open to listening. You are fully present and ready to respond to whatever gets thrown your way. You’re not thinking about what you might say next. You realize that a critical part of your job is to fully listen. Good interviewers and journalists have known this for years.

Interestingly enough, when you focus on yourself, you can pick out your listening weaknesses.

  • Do you listen to your inner critic rather than your audience when giving a presentation or sharing findings in a meeting?
  • Do you only see your role as an information professional? (fill in your job title)
  • Does your listening shut down when you are emotionally uncomfortable?
  • Are you trying so hard to show confidence and be right that you aren’t listening?

So what can we do as marketing, strategic or competitive intelligence professionals to change our leadership’s mindset as we provide them information and insight to assist in decision-making, which perhaps doesn’t support where they were headed? I have found that many of them possess a major ego. If I can provide them with the intelligence to feed their ego in a way that makes them think it’s their idea, I don’t have to change their mindset, which I think is a lot harder. But they do change their course of  action when it becomes “their idea.”

I am curious as to how others deal with their leadership’s lack of listening ears? I know as a telephone interviewer that there are not enough listening ears and that job disengagement in the US is around 70%, so if they answer their phone, they are likely to be informative.

Win/Loss Analysis book gives you a process to learn why you’re losing business and how to keep more of it!

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Filed under: competition, conversation, Cooperative Intelligence, Denver, Ellen Naylor, interview, leadership, telephone | Tagged: , , | Comments Off on Is Mindset Block a Lack of Listening?

From Competitive Intelligence to Sales Enablement: Free Webinar

Posted on April 16, 2014 by ellendnaylor

Join us for a free 45 minute webinar on April 22 at Noon Eastern US time (11 am Central, 10 am Mountain, 9 am Pacific).

Getting from collecting competitive intelligence to winning more deals from collected competitive intelligence can be tricky if you don’t have a good road map.

  • Companies collect competitive data, but don’t know what to do with it
  • Sales teams waste time finding the data they need to win competitive deals
  • Product selling is not an effective way to convince customers to buy

Join our informative webinar and learn how to turn your competitive intelligence into sales intelligence to improve your sales force’s close ratios and customer retention.

ellenmitchdean

Ellen Naylor of The Business Intelligence Source will share her knowledge on how to collect from your sales force, which helps them win more deals and retain more business. Mitch Emerson of Compelligence will show how you can transform that data into competitive intelligence that your sales reps can tap into for each deal. Dean Davison of Forrester Research will show you how to convert your marketing buzz words into conversation that customers resonate with, so they listen, ask questions, engage and buy.

Compelligence offers the first software solution which targets Sales to input and share competitive intelligence that works seamlessly with Salesforce.com. This is awesome since many sales reps use Salesforce.com already, so are more likely to use a system that builds off of what they know.

For more information on the webinar, check out: http://www.compelligence.com/2014/04/01/webinar-from-competitive-intelligence-to-intelligent-sales-enablement/

To register directly, go here.

Filed under: competition, Competitive Intelligence, conversation, Cooperative Intelligence, D. Sales Intelligence Articles, Denver, Ellen Naylor, sales force management, sales people | Tagged: , , | Comments Off on From Competitive Intelligence to Sales Enablement: Free Webinar

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