SeedSeller Academy

If Your Customers Don’t Feel It, You Don’t Have it [Academy]

The late Don Hewitt, creator of the television news magazine 60 Minutes, was quoted as saying, “Television is good, not when you see it, not when you hear it, but when you FEEL IT."  He and his staff created a very successful, long running series because they knew how to get their audience to “feel” what they were saying. Every segment was an emotional roller coaster for the watcher.

I’ve written a great deal about the difference between being mechanical when presenting your sales story and getting customers to actually feel what you are saying.

When they get a “gut feel” for what you are telling them and they are fully understanding the values you’re talking about, they’re no longer just listening, but having their thinking impacted in the process. That level of execution on takes preparation, practice and even role play. It requires that you listen to yourself and analyze each point you’re making. Until you FEEL IT so strongly yourself that customers get excited and shake their heads in agreement, there’s no way you can move them emotionally enough to get them to do what you want them to do.  Unless they FEEL it, they won’t believe in it enough to do it.

From planning to harvest, raising a crop is an emotional event for both farmers and sellers. In fact, emotions often become so strong they become visible. Eyes widen, facial expressions change and everyone gets excited about raising a top crop. But how do you get prospects and customers to “feel” what you’re saying to them? How do you get their blood pressure to rise in anticipation of what’s to come? 

Do It Without Purpose, So You’re Ready When the Purpose Comes [Academy]

Focus on the Process, Not the Goal [Academy]

Focus On the Process Not the Goal

Every year salespeople set goals for the upcoming sales season, but the majority never achieve them. Why? Because they focus on the wrong thing. They focus on the goal instead of what they need to do to achieve that goal. They forget about the process. They focus on the result, not the process. The process is the sacrifice, it’s all of the hard parts—the sweat, the preparation and practice. But most of all it means following every step that takes you to your goal.

How do you intend to achieve your sales goal this year? What processes are you putting in place and preparing to follow to reach your sales goal? And when you have those processes in place, will you make the sacrifices those processes require you to make? Every sales goal can be achieved if the processes to achieve them are in place and followed.  

The problem is, many salespeople struggle with creating and following systems. They often get tired, bored, or distracted and tie their happiness and satisfaction so closely to the outcome that they become impatient and focus only on the goal. The problem with being too goal-oriented is that they can’t always control the outcome. But they can control their progress when they take consistent, deliberate steps toward the goal. They feel better and more in control of what they’re doing...

Don’t Be Caught In a Tie [Academy]

Farmers are becoming more sophisticated every year.

Their understanding of the seed marketplace they’re in, and the methods companies use to get them to buy, has grown tremendously.  In fact, many growers believe their own marketplace IQ, has achieved a level so high they can immediately recognize when there is parity among products and services offered by different suppliers.  Their keen eye for value coupled with an inherent need for value, has caused them to become more discerning than ever when it comes to deciding who to buy from. Most farmers have come to believe that virtually all seed, technologies and services are the same. 

And once that thought gets into their mind, it becomes a tie between you and your competitor as to who they should buy from. 

Of course, the only one who wins, is the one who breaks the tie.

Someone has to break the tie. In sports, a tie is generally broken by going into overtime or sudden death play.  But when selling seed, those are not options. When the competition between two companies for selling a farmer becomes a tie in the farmer’s mind, the companies don't end up breaking the tie, the farmer does.  And it’s seldom based on the value one company offers over the other because the farmer has already tied the game based on parity in the offering...

To Sell Seed, You Need Muscle [Academy]

One of the common complaints I get from sales reps is how exhausting selling to farmers can be. I understand working with farmers can be draining.  There are so many different activities taking place on a farm at one time, especially during the growing season and those activities often involve the seed rep. But it’s not the farmer who wears down a hardworking rep, it’s what the rep sells the farmer, the varieties themselves.

Seed is a living, breathing organism with a life of its own. It’s constantly changing in response to both management and environmental conditions. For example, corn can grow up to 6 inches in a single day during its 6 -7-month life span. That means every day brings a new stage of growth that put demands on both grower and the seed rep to ensure the crop never has a bad day. That requires time, effort, and lots of energy. As a result, seed sellers need to be in shape to sell seed...

 

You Will Lose More Than You Win [Academy]

Don’t Put Yourself on T R Y A L [Academy]

Have you’ve ever been on trial?

The word trial spelled t r i a l, comes from the Anglo-French word “trier” meaning, try, or something to be tested. If you sell seed to farmers, you’ve been put on trial and tested many times. In fact, the minute a farmer sees you drive into his yard or place of business you are put on trial. You are judged by how your vehicle looks and by how you are dressed when you get out of it. You are immediately put on trial and judged by how you greet him even though you’ve never met. 

Many put you on trial and judge you by how firm your handshake is, at least that’s how my dad judged many people, especially salespeople. A firm handshake got his immediate attention and sent a signal that the person was strong and deserved respect. My dad was a farmer who spent most of his early days working with his hands doing a lot of physical labor that made his hands very strong. He always bragged about how firm his handshake was and put everyone on trial, judging anyone who didn’t have a firm grip when they shook his hand. He even criticized our minister for having such a soft unworthy handshake.

Why would you expect your minister to be a cow milker, bail thrower or a manure pitcher like my dad was?

But it didn’t keep him from talking disparagingly about someone who didn’t have what he called a working man’s hand. He would comment about how soft those people were and that they had never done any REAL WORK.  But as he got older and did little or no physical labor, his handshake became like those he usually made fun of.

Virtually everyone is put on trial at some time in their lives. No, not for crimes they’ve committed, but for things other people believe they should be judged.

Are You a Head Case? [Academy]

The typical definition of someone who is a head case is a person who is insane or mentally unstable.

However, that is not the context of this podcast. MY definition of a head case is someone who is full of excuses for not achieving their sales goals. 

For 45 of my 50 years in the seed business I’ve been working directly with people who sell seed to farmers, helping them achieve their sales goals. I have been constantly looking for ways to make selling easier for them and for me. I learned all my techniques by having a sales territory of my own even when I was VP of Sales. My boss believed it was important for me to be leading a dealer force and selling direct to farmers where I didn’t have dealers so I could show, as the team leader, I could everything I asked my managers to do.

They could see whether I could get customers to follow me, handle objections and achieve sales goals even during the toughest times. They saw that I never lost a sales contest. They saw that I was a student of the art and learned my way around every obstacle I faced. They watched as I made selling seed seem almost effortless and trouble free. Everything I teach today is still relevant, the problem is, there are too many head cases in the business...

3 Hacks To Unlock Time For Selling [Summer Bootcamp]

To grow your sales territory, you have to invest time prospecting. 

Prospecting? But I’m so busy serving current customers, plus new farmers don’t want to see me until after harvest, right?

Wrong!! 

Well, I know you're busy, working in your sales territory, fulfilling duties within your company and trying to have some time for yourself and your family! With all of those responsibilities, where are you supposed to find time to get new customers? 

Your struggle is real. 

But believe it or not, it's a good thing when you find yourself in that situation. It means you've been working hard. But just working hard is not the only key to growth. Real comes from doing the hard work of finding new clients who will help you build your sales territory...

Simple, But Not Easy [Academy]

Someone once said, life is simple but not easy. That means the route to a happy life is easily understood, but not always easy to follow. In fact, often the simpler something is to understand, the more difficult it can be to do. For example, if you follow a few simple rules for a happy, healthy life, like getting plenty of sleep, eating nutritious foods, having a job you enjoy, and following God’s no.1 commandment to love one another, you WILL HAVE that happy, healthy life. Those principles are simple, but they aren’t always easy to follow. Sometimes for legitimate reasons we don’t get the amount of sleep we need. Cravings can draw us to foods that aren’t good for us. At certain times our job may become stressful to the point where we don’t like what we do. And it’s not always easy to love everyone.

There’s a difference between simple and easy. Simple doesn’t necessarily mean easy to implement...