CliffsNotes for Sales Success

Why does Jonny consistently crush his quota? What is he doing differently?

How did Natalie close that big deal?

Sales leaders should identify the winning strategies their reps are using and share them with the rest of the team.

But if you tried to capture the collective wisdom of your entire sales force, it would probably fill up a novel. Or maybe a whole series of Encyclopedia Britannicas.

Nobody is going to take the time to read all of that mumbo jumbo – no matter how valuable it is.

That’s why we broadcast bite-size summaries of all of our big wins. It allows our sales reps – and the entire company – to learn from one another in a quick, convenient format.

We call it Win Wire, and it’s kind of like CliffsNotes for Sales Success.

We use Win Wire to share effective sales strategies in a fun, engaging way. We’ll describe how we do it and provide examples, in case you’d like to try it, too.

What is Win Wire?

Win Wire shows the name of the new customer, the sales rep who closed the deal, other teammates who assisted, contract size, key points of the deal and notes from the rep.

Below are some examples of what this might look like. Names, facts and figures are fictional and are only for illustrative purposes.

Win: Vandelay Industries
Account executive: Barry Kramer
Sales engineer: Bonnie Burlington
Contract value: $135,000

Key Points of the Deal:

• Created urgency by comparing “do nothing” with adoption of the platform.
• They were interested in increasing revenue, but they weren’t sure how to get there.
• Showed them how increased revenue is a result of increased calls.
• Deal required patience and nurturing.

Deal notes from Barry:

“They realized that their sales process was broken and they weren’t maximizing their effort. The key problem they faced was how to quickly increase revenue. I showed them that the way to increase revenue was directly related to the key metrics they cared about. The ‘fat part’ of our bat is increasing revenue through increased contacts. Once they could see how we could increase revenue by increasing conversations, it became an easy decision.”

Win: SaaS Masters
Account executive: Connie Brinkerhoffer
Sales development rep: Zach Goldwater
Contract value: $52,000

Key points of the deal:

• Strategic value assessment showed the value that existed for SaaS Masters and sister companies.
• Positioned offering as a whole platform solution, which made it easy to crush the competition.
• Deal opened the door for future business opportunities with sister companies.

Deal notes from Connie:

“A little more than a year ago, we approached SaaS Masters with the product offering we had at the time. They really liked it and were in the signing process when their holding company stopped them and decided to choose a different solution for them and their sister companies. As soon as they were up for renewal with that solution, Zach Goldwater, our sales development rep, called. We engaged our Momentum Strategy Team for strategic value assessment positioning at the sister companies and engaged our executives to position XANT at the holding company level. The value assessments showed the value of our complete platform, giving us an easy win over the competition.”

It’s easy to see the lessons and takeaways from these bite-size Win Wire reports:

• Sales is a team sport; get others involved in every deal.

• Demonstrate value to clobber the competition.

• Be pleasantly persistent and follow up with prospects, even after they’ve said no.

Win Wire has been a huge success at XANT. Would it be beneficial to do something similar for your sales teams?

Image credit: Chris Combe