What Got You to President's Club Will Not Keep You There | Meredith Elliott Powell - 2013

Meredith Elliott Powell: Um.

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Donald C. Kelly: The truth is, what got you to President Club is not going to keep you at President Club. We're going to give you three things that you must do as a sales professional in order to maintain your status as an elite seller and to dominate and to make some money in the process. Check it out. You're going to enjoy the this one. Hey, hey, hey everyone. Welcome to another great episode of the Sales Evangelist Podcast. I'm your host, Donald C ke, the sales Evangelist. Uh, and I'm so excited for another great episode. I'm so excited to be here with you today. Today we're going to be talking about what it takes to not only get to President's Club, but to stay in President's Club as an elite seller. If this is your first time listening to our podcast, I ask you to please subscribe. We'll notify you every time we drop a new piece of content, whether that's on the audio, wherever you listen to podcasts, or on the video, if you're on YouTube. Appreciate that. Thank you so much. Meredith. Elliot Powell has been on our podcast and um, Meredith, she's a wealth of knowledge. She runs a smooth machine when it comes to teaching sales professionals, working with organizations. She's a keynote speaker globally and has worked with some of the largest companies in the world, training their teams, giving them advice, counseling, and coaching them when it comes to getting and giving value, but also staying on top of their performance. Right now, as a top performing seller today, she breaks down three things that sellers need to do to maintain, because the things that got you to President Club is not going to keep you there. There's a formula that she has that she's seen with hundreds of thousands of sales professionals. Check it out and listen to these three things and see if they can apply to you. Meredith, welcome to the show.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Thank you. I am excited to be here.

Donald C. Kelly: I'm excited to have you back. And in particular this episode. I saw something on, uh, you know, social media the other day, and they were talking about President's Club, and I think so many people and want the idea of getting to President's Club, which is a whole process all in itself. But then when you actually get there, staying there, it's even more so difficult in this era. And I am really excited to pick your brains on this. But before we dive in, I bragged about you a little bit in a teaser. Why is this particular topic so passionate to you, Meredith?

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah, it's. I'm so passionate about it because I've been working quite a bit with elite, uh, sales teams. And I think in today's marketplace, you know, getting to elite status is incredibly challenging, but it's not nearly as challenging as staying there. And I'm watching a lot of really good reps burn out because they're not paying attention to how the marketplace is shifting and how those shifts are impacting buying decisions. They're impacting competition, and they're impacting, really what it takes to get in front of decision makers and to get deals across the finish line. So my job, what I want to do, is help elite salespeople stay where they are by making sales a little bit more fun, a little bit easier, and far more effective.

Donald C. Kelly: All right. And you know, you got me at hello on this one. The three principles that you mentioned, though, that needs to be fundamentally adopted and, or understood, and it's to dominate, differentiate, and deliver. Before we go into each of them, why those three things are critical, would you mind just highlighting us on that and then we'll go into each of them.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. So number one is, I love that you said all three, because all three have to be done and they have to be Done in that order, they have a compounding effect. And dominate means that you need to, number one, own your market. You need to be the one that people are talking about in your market. Because think about it, the marketplace is so crowded today. If you are cold calling and people have never heard of you or about you, you're making sales so much harder than it has to be. I think Gartner released the report and the statistics are all over the place. But pretty much the buyer is halfway to a decision before they ever interact with an individual. And so when they're looking for information, if they're not finding you, then they're not somebody that you're not somebody they're going to give their time to differentiate is about understanding that a sales call is a privilege. You are no longer selling a product or service. I can sit home in my underwear and buy anything I want to without ever interacting with an individual. Now I want to act, interact with an individual because an individual is bringing value to the call. And so you have to realize that you need to be bringing value to that call. You need to be doing something in that time, the time I'm giving you, to make me money, save me money, give me peace of mind, do something beyond the product or service. And last but not, uh, least is deliver means that not only do you need to deliver on the service, but the sale happens in the follow up. It always happens in the follow up. It's the most neglected part of the sales process, and in my opinion, it's the most important part of the sales process. Following up to continuing to sell to your existing customers and following up to get the deal across the finish line. It's probably a little more than you wanted, but that's, that's all three in a nutshell.

Donald C. Kelly: I think we're not going to lose anybody on this episode. Everyone's going to stay tuned to all of them now. So the dominate component, talk to me about as I want to split this in two, but I could be wrong. Is this aside from a sales leader versus a sales rep? Because I imagine leadership need to make certain decisions and then the rep need to do certain things. Or is it just one? Like how do we dominate, become own the market, so to speak, and dominate?

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah, I think of it more as individual producer. Let's think about that person who's in the president's circle right now. You need to treat anything your sales leader does for you and the marketing department does for you as icing on the cake. But you're not going to rely on them to build your reputation in the marketplace. You know, Donald, I think the easiest way to explain this is when I was growing up in sales, we all talked about the sales funnel. And the sales funnel literally looked like a funnel. Right. You would put prospects in the top of them, and we would hammer on those prospects until somebody bought a product. Uh, we'd spit them out, and we'd go get another prospect. It's why most customers have one or two products or services with our company when they have the opportunity to have far more. The sales funnel now looks like an hourglass. We no longer, as sales professionals, control the market. The buyer controls the market. So you dominate because you have to begin by pulling people to you rather than pushing people to you. And understanding that distinction is very important. Because the moment that I don't like you or the moment I feel uncomfortable, I'm out and I'm in control at this point. You're not going to gain control of the buying cycle until we get into the base of the funnel. So dominate is if your sales leader or your marketing department is doing anything for you. Lucky you. But as an individual producer, you need to decide that nobody's helping you and you are going to build your reputation in the marketplace.

Donald C. Kelly: What I like about this idea is one, uh, of the things I was talking to a friend the other day was this concept of nobody's coming to save you. Like, you just have to do it. But how you have worked with a lot of elite organizations. What are some things that sellers are doing to make themselves dominate or to just put it back to attract people to them? What are some of those tactical things that great sellers are doing?

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. So for great sellers out there and anybody in the President's Circle, this is one of the big aha moments I get when I speak from the stage is number one. Let's assume you went to the President's Circle this year. You should write every single customer you had that year a personal thank you note. Thank you. I got into the President's Circle again this year. I could never do it without customers like you. Second is any award or anything that your company gets. Maybe you're named a safe and sound financial institution or your product won number one in, you know, in the market you've expanded into new territories. You want to let your customers know, send them copies of the articles, send them pictures of the awards. And my point is then when somebody like me, if I'm your customer, if I'm on the golf course or I'm at a cocktail party, and somebody says, I need a new financial advisor. I'm like, oh, my gosh. You need to talk to, you know, Noelle. She's incredible. Let me tell you. She won top five in her company five years in a row. She works for one of the most safe and sound financial institutions in the country. You got to make noise in the marketplace by a way of reinforcing with your existing customers. They have made a very smart decision. So you're fueling that word of mouth.

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Donald C. Kelly: Wherever you get your podcasts,

Narrator: You know.

Donald C. Kelly: And what I like about this is I think it ties in some ways to number three, but not. I know we're going to get there eventually.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah.

Donald C. Kelly: Because go back to your definition of how we used to do things back in the days. Right. For me as a sales guy and you a salesperson and sales seller as well, it's like this idea. Everything was a hammer. Like, you just get more sales. Like, that was just the way I looked at it as a business owner, it became so much more apparent that the retention was just as important. But then here's what I saw also, Meredith. Like, people didn't know what I have to offer until they know what I had to offer. Because some of those existing customers, I won them. And I didn't do what you said, because I didn't. I was like, well, let's go to the next one. And I don't want to be too pushy or too salesy, but this does reinforce that you are the dominant, that you are the goat, so to speak, in your space. And people want to do stuff with it. And here's the other part I came up with this theory because the business first started going off. I started sharing a lot more of our wins. And what I noticed was I started getting more opportunities. And then I came up with this theory that people like to do business with winners.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yes.

Donald C. Kelly: And what I meant by, and I think it goes back to this article, is like, they see that things are happening for you, and it's like, you stay top of mind, but, hey, they must be doing pretty well. They can help continue to help solve my problem. I remember they helped us a year ago, and I think there's something towards that. And so I'm just like, I'm in school right now and I'm working this year.

Meredith Elliott Powell: You're 100% right. Because if we're still let dominate. I always tell my audiences, I always tell my clients that I'm working with when I'm training a team is you need to understand that not only is this building your reputation in the marketplace, but it's giving your existing customers a reason to say no when your competitors come talking, uh, come calling on them. I mean, if you look the same as everybody else and somebody shows up at my door because the competitor is going to call on me. If I know that Donald is a winner and I know that his company has won awards, I know that he has expanded his customer base by 30%. I know that he's had an article published in Forbes and another one published in Fast Company. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa to the competition because you got nothing to show me I'm with Donald. I'm with a winner. But we can't hope that happens. You have to fuel that happening. The other thing that's important about this step, Donald, uh, is the other thing is that you need to realize in today's marketplace, you and I may have the most amazing sales call in the world. I think you are incredible. But before I pull the trigger and do business with you, I am going to talk to one of your existing customers. It's just the way the world works today. I'm going to verify you and you can hope that your existing customers tell me great things about you, or you can feed them the information they need to say great things about you.

Donald C. Kelly: Oh, I love it. I love it. One more thing before we move on. This stock came to mind as you're speaking there on it. Just trigger this. You mentioned that we need to dominate our marketplace, correct?

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yes.

Donald C. Kelly: You said nothing about dominating the world. You said nothing about dominating all industries. You said nothing about dominating your city. You said Your marketplace. And I think that's where some of us get mixed up with. You just need to be a big fish in a small pond and that everything you're sharing doesn't take, like, you know, huge marketing budget. So I think. Glad you. You helped that distinction at the very beginning when I asked that. That the individual seller can dominate their own marketplace. Right.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. And what. Here's why they can really do that. Because all of your competitors are busy selling product.

Donald C. Kelly: Yeah.

Meredith Elliott Powell: They're not building their reputation. You know, you have to realize that buying anything today, including the product or service that any of your listeners sell, has becoming like shopping for water at the grocery store. And it's the most annoying thing to try to buy because there is every kind of water you can imagine. I mean, it's just rows and rows of water, and you stand there overwhelmed. But what do you buy? The water you recognize. Right. You have to be the water that people recognize at the beginning of the sales call. I don't care how good you are. I don't care how cheap your product is. I don't care. Whatever you think you got going for you, if you didn't start with reputation, you're making this so much harder than it has to be.

Donald C. Kelly: Oh, silky sucking. Uh, uh, Meredith M. We can stay on dominate forever.

Meredith Elliott Powell: We could talk about it all day long.

Donald C. Kelly: All right, uh, differentiate now. So I'm dominating. What's the difference, no pun intended, with the differentiating factor from the dominating.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Okay, so let's go back to the hourglass. Right. And so we built this reputation in the marketplace. And. And when I go to make a call, you remember that the two people that you play golf with every single weekend were talking about Meredith. And then you remember, like, seeing me win some award at the chamber of commerce or whatever, so you let me through the door because I'm a known entity willing to take my call. So now we're in the neck of that funnel, and I need to realize that the sales call is a privilege. So I am going to tell salespeople to do the antithesis of what you think you need to do when you are in front of, um, somebody. And that is you actually need to slow the sales process down if you want to differentiate yourself in today's marketplace. I want you to do two things. I want you to ask amazing questions, and I want you to listen. Really, really listen. Because if you just listen, that customer, that prospect, will tell you exactly what they need, exactly when they need it, and exactly what they're willing to pay for. It, they will give you the path to growth and profitability. But it is not about selling product or service. It is about listening to what they need so that you can turn around and sell it. The other thing that what happens when we slow the sales process down and we live in is I signal to you that this sales relationship will always be more about you than it will be about me. And that's differentiating the sales call.

Donald C. Kelly: Yeah. I find that when you say the last part there, I know from, um, my desperate standpoint as an early seller, new seller early in my career was definitely going faster because I didn't want to lose the opportunity or to you saying no. Uh, so I wanted to take as much chance as I could. I didn't want to. I wanted to reduce my chance of that happening. So go as fast as I possibly can to get you to move through cycle. But all that said, it's all about me at that point. I want to get my numbers, I want to hit the commission, I want to close something. There's nothing about you. You're just, uh, a, uh, tool that I'm using. And that's the way that I feel that many of us sellers look at it. But this idea of differentiating, slowing down and solving the problem that they need is important. This also tied back to what you said at the beginning with the Gartner, how the buyers are so much a part of the journey, already doing their research prior to meeting with us. If that's the case, when they do come with us, it's important that we are giving them what they are looking for. And I can't know what you're looking for if I'm not listening and asking questions, right?

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. You know, you think about the fact that, you know, money and lack of listening are, uh, the top two reasons people end up divorced, Right. So that is how important listening is to letting somebody know that you care about them. And see, when I've come through the dominate part of the funnel, I like you. Right. I like you, but I don't trust you yet. And that's why the neck of that funnel is so incredibly important. Because, um, if I can get you to trust me, you're going to slip into that base of the funnel. And you're not only a customer for life, I'm going to hard sell you other stuff, and I'm going to get you to refer customers to me, and you're going to want to do it because I went through the steps. So you need to understand that the first sales call that first part is about building trust. And we build trust by listening, really, really listening, and then saying, Donald, what I heard you say was this. Here's a couple of ideas I've got that I think I can help you with. But what that does is it validates that I was not there to sell a product, that, uh, I completely. I understand you. I could care less if you understand me. And that's a huge distinction. You're not there to get people to understand what you offer. You're there to get people to know that you understand them deeply and intimately and therefore you can solve their problem. So this part of the funnel is so incredibly important and you have to slow it down and sell solution and problem solving, but not until you know the problem.

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Donald C. Kelly: The goal of the podcast was to

Narrator: share a wealth of information and I feel that we've successfully done so as a natural byproduct. Listeners like you would reach out and

Donald C. Kelly: ask, could I coach them, could I

Narrator: train their team, Could I come and speak at an sko, Could I consult for them? And that is how we gain the majority of our business. And still to this day. So in 2019, one of our clients saw what we did and asked, could

Donald C. Kelly: we do that for them? We experimented with it and we started a podcast production agency.

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Donald C. Kelly: and our team can show you exactly what we did. It's amazing. How do you get to that point where, you know, the problem? Is that from the client as well, or what can I do independent of the client, my conversation with the client to know their problem?

Meredith Elliott Powell: You know, I think you can do a lot of research, but I got to tell you, I was just in Claude this morning. I had a sales call right before we jumped on this podcast, and it was a referral, and I did all the research, and what Claude spit out to me was wrong.

Donald C. Kelly: Ooh.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. Told me that they were a 100% ESOP company and they hadn't been in Aesop in five years. But listen to this, though. This is really important. You do your research and you do your homework, but you verify that. And what I mean by that is there was no way for me to verify that, really, online, their website was out of date as well. But during, uh, the call, I was said, I said, you know, I've done a lot of research on you. Here are the top three things that I've learned. I want to understand these at a deeper level because there's a lot that I do to help my clients in these particular areas. And I said, one of the things is, I said, uh, I discovered that you're an ESOP company. Is that true? Is that Valid? Are you 100% employee owned? And he was so willing to give me the whole backstory of why they're no longer employee owned, what that meant. And I got up underneath one of the biggest challenges that they've got, and neither here nor there. But my point is, if you listen, you'll hear the pain point, but you have to be so present to listen for the pain point.

Donald C. Kelly: Yeah. Holy moly. I love that, this concept of, uh, do your homework, but you're validating. And I like that idea of coming with the three things that I learn. Is that accurate? That also helps to guide you as well.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. The other thing, I mean, think about this, Donald, and you kind of said this a minute ago, is that it also says, like, I came to this call trying to understand who you are and what it is that you need. I did not come to this call trying to sell you a product or service. I wish I had some way to make that sound more important. I mean, because it is so incredibly important. You have to realize in today's marketplace, this is not 10 years ago. Everybody and their brother is trying to sell me exactly what you're trying to Sell me. If you don't come in from a different direction, you're in the pile. You're in the, uh, pile of vanilla.

Donald C. Kelly: Oh, uh. Oh, my goodness. All right, Meredith, you've been delivering all day so far, which ties into the next one. Again, no pun intended here. Deliver. We dominate, we differentiate, and we deliver. Go deeper on that part.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. So we have slid into the base of the funnel. Good work. Good work, because I am all in now. I am your customer. I have bought a product or service from you at this point, when I slip into the base of that funnel, because I chose you over the competition, because I know you like you, and I trust you. Right. This is where salespeople drop the ball. The moment that somebody buys a product or service from you, is now the time you need to be following up to sell them more products or, uh, services, to get those referrals from them. Because the worst thing that can happen to you in today's marketplace, the absolute worst, is not that you do not get the sale. It is that one of your existing customers finds out about a product or service they need from somebody else other than you. Because if they find out about a product or service they need from somebody else other than you, you broke trust. You dropped the ball. You told them you are not in their corner. But if you take care of them, they will not only buy more from you, they will tell everybody else that you're taking care of them. And we're back up to building your reputation. Absolutely.

Donald C. Kelly: M. Love it. Love this. The follow up component.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Uh-huh.

Donald C. Kelly: Tie that back into a little bit deeper.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. So let me talk about the reasons we don't follow up as salespeople. And you mentioned one just a minute ago.

Donald C. Kelly: I don't know if we have enough time for this.

Meredith Elliott Powell: We think that people are not interested. Right. Or we're worried we're going to be annoying. Well, if you reach out to me every couple of weeks and go, meredith, how you doing? I've got a couple of products or services I think you could benefit from. You're annoying. You are so annoying that I will never buy another product from you. Or we think people aren't interested because they don't return our phone call. That's not true. People are busy. You know, they are so incredibly busy. So follow up needs to be 70% value add and 30% asking for the business. That means that, Donald, the moment that you buy a product or service from me, the conversation I'm going to have with you is, say, donald, now you're in my camp, I'm going to take care of you. I'm going to reach out every couple of weeks, every month or so, see how you're doing, see what you need. Don't worry about getting back in touch with me. I know you got a lot on your plate. I just want you to know that when you're ready to buy or you need something or I have a product that could benefit from you, I'm going to be taking care of things on my end now. See what that does with that? Is it. It lets people know I'm going to be reaching out a, uh, lot. So I'm not annoying. It gives you the permission not to respond to me, but it makes sure that I am visible when you have a need and I'm the one you're going to choose.

Donald C. Kelly: Oh, love. Love it. Meredith. I wish I can go deeper and go longer for an episode, but I want to respect your time. If there's one major thing you want a seller who is trying to dominate, trying to become that elite, maintain their elite status. They got to President's Club in 2025, now 2026, they're trying to maintain that and stay there and go even further. If there's one major piece of advice from everything we shared today, what's that one piece of advice you want them to leave with?

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah. Then one piece of advice. I would say stay in touch and add value to your existing client base. Your business will grow from the inside out. Take care of your existing customers, listen to them, they'll refer you business and buy more from you.

Donald C. Kelly: Love it. If folks want to get in touch with you, Meredith, or to have you keynote or come to one of their sko, what's the best way for folks to get in touch with you?

Meredith Elliott Powell: Yeah, I'm a big believer. Build your network. It will change your life. So if you reach out to me, I will definitely reach back out to you. They can reach me at my website, valuespeaker.com, just the words valuespeaker.com as well as, uh, find me on LinkedIn. It's probably a social media channel I'm on more than any other.

Donald C. Kelly: Meredith, thank you for the time today. Thanks for breaking this down for us. We appreciate you.

Meredith Elliott Powell: Thank you. Enjoyed it.

Narrator: Man.

Donald C. Kelly: Meredith came, she saw, and she delivered some good stuff. Again, I want you to connect with those three things and connect with Meredith. It's dominate, differentiate, and deliver. If you haven't done so already, connect with her. And if there's an opportunity for you to work with her, I recommend you do so. You're not going to be disappointed. Whether you're a sales leader looking for somebody for your SKO or to speak at a conference, or if you're looking to hire a consultant, she is top notch and I highly recommend her. If you are trying to improve as a sales rep, apply these things. Please apply them and I promise you you're going to see a, uh, wealth of improvement and also knowledge continue to how your your clients see you as that wealth of knowledge, so to speak. You bring in value every single time. But Meredith's details in the show notes as always, I want you to thrive. I want you to succeed. I want you to raise your level of thinking. I want you to subscribe to this podcast and tell somebody else. Most importantly, I want you to go out and do big things. See you on the next.

Narrator: The Sales Evangelist Podcast is created by the Sales Evangelist Sales Training Organization. It is produced by TSE Studios. Our podcast production manager is Nancy Paul. Our audio engineer is Jershan Obayol. Our video engineer is Dassan Cunado. Guest management is done by Jill Vito and Christy Vertus. Our content writer is Carlisa Galbraith, our graphic designer is Jirvish Savilea and I'm your host and executive producer, Donald C. Kelly. Sales podcast network.