Sell more in 2025

Sales is evolving, shifting from traditional selling tactics to a more customer-centric approach. In a recent podcast episode, Alan Versteeg discusses the importance of guiding customers with noble intent rather than simply closing deals. He explores how character, authenticity, and understanding the customer’s world are more critical than sales techniques. The conversation highlights key strategies for sales success, including leveraging technology wisely, preventing objections, and focusing on long-term relationships over short-term wins. Let’s dive into the key takeaways from this insightful discussion.

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Takeaways from this episode:

• Takeaways
• Sales manager development is crucial for effective sales teams.
• Top-performing salespeople operate with a noble purpose.
• Character and intent are more important than sales skills.
• Sales professionals should act as guides, not just sellers.
• Understanding the customer's world is key to effective selling.
• Sales is a practice that requires preparation and intention.
• Technology should enhance, not replace, human interaction in sales.
• Cultural nuances can impact sales strategies but the core principles remain the same.
• Sales experience is often more important than product knowledge.
• Objection prevention is more effective than objection handling.

Chapters 

00:00 Introduction to Sales and Noble Intent
02:58 The Shift from Seller to Guide
05:58 Understanding Noble Intent in Sales
08:48 Practical Strategies for Sales Conversations
12:11 Overcoming Organizational Challenges in Sales
15:05 The Importance of Sales Experience
17:52 Leveraging Technology in Sales
20:51 Cultural Nuances in Sales
23:56 Final Thoughts on Selling with Noble Intent

Shifting Sales from Selling to Guiding: A New Approach to B2B Success

Sales is evolving, and a mindset shift is required to stay ahead. In a recent podcast episode, Alan Versteeg explored the importance of transitioning from traditional selling tactics to a more customer-centric, value-driven approach. He emphasized the power of guiding customers with noble intent, focusing on their needs rather than just closing deals. This shift transforms sales professionals into trusted advisors, fostering stronger, more meaningful relationships.

1. Sales Manager Development: The Key to Success

Effective sales teams start with strong leadership. Sales managers play a crucial role in shaping the mindset and approach of their teams. Investing in their development ensures that they can coach their teams to operate with a noble purpose, driving sustainable success.

2. The Power of Selling with a Noble Purpose

Top-performing sales professionals don’t just sell; they serve. Alan highlighted that true success in sales comes from prioritizing the customer’s needs above all else. By adopting a service-driven approach, sales teams can build trust, credibility, and long-term relationships with their clients.

3. Character and Intent Matter More Than Sales Skills

While traditional sales training focuses on techniques and closing strategies, Alan stressed that character and intent are even more critical. Customers respond best to authenticity, and when salespeople genuinely care about solving their problems, they create stronger connections and loyalty.

4. Guiding Instead of Selling

The modern sales professional is no longer just a seller but a guide. By understanding their customers’ challenges and acting as a trusted advisor, salespeople can provide meaningful insights and solutions that create real value.

5. Understanding the Customer’s World

To sell effectively, salespeople must deeply understand their customers’ industries, pain points, and goals. Instead of focusing solely on product knowledge, successful sales professionals take the time to immerse themselves in their customers' world, ensuring they can offer relevant and impactful solutions.

6. Sales as a Practice: Preparation and Intention Matter

Sales is not just an art; it’s a discipline that requires preparation and strategic intent. Alan discussed how top sales performers don’t rely on scripts or generic pitches—they invest time in understanding their audience and tailoring their approach to each unique customer.

7. Balancing Technology with Human Interaction

While technology has enhanced sales efficiency, Alan cautioned against over-reliance on automation. CRM tools, AI-driven analytics, and automation can support sales efforts, but the human element remains irreplaceable. Sales professionals should leverage technology to enhance, not replace, genuine human interactions.

8. Navigating Cultural Nuances in Sales

Different markets have unique cultural dynamics that influence sales approaches. While core sales principles remain the same, understanding and respecting cultural differences can significantly impact success in global sales strategies.

9. Sales Experience Over Product Knowledge

A deep understanding of customer challenges and sales experience often outweighs extensive product knowledge. Customers are more interested in how a product or service solves their specific problems rather than its technical specifications.

10. Preventing Objections Instead of Handling Them

Instead of waiting for objections to arise, proactive sales professionals anticipate concerns and address them early in the conversation. By demonstrating value upfront and ensuring alignment with customer needs, they can prevent objections from becoming roadblocks.

Conclusion: A New Era of Sales

Sales is no longer about pushing products—it’s about guiding customers with integrity, understanding their needs, and building trust. By adopting a mindset of service and focusing on creating real value, sales professionals can foster lasting relationships and drive meaningful success. The future of sales lies in authenticity, preparation, and the ability to act as a trusted advisor. Are you ready to embrace this shift?

Transcript:

Alan Versteeg (00:01.28)
Yes, I looked at a few of the top talkings. Good to go.

Paul (00:01.692)
So it's just a conversation, if you want to ask anything please do, if you want to go down a different path please do. Is there anything in particular you want me to plug or give links to?

Alan Versteeg (00:15.328)
No, nothing specific to plug. think as always, you know, your audience and it's about your audience. our kind of core focus as a business is sales manager development, but we know a lot about sales. We run our own business, our entrepreneurship. So you take it where you think it's most relevant for your audience and, we'll see where it takes us. I always think that those are the best podcasts.

Paul (00:46.896)
right then we'll get going welcome back to avidly talks a mostly marketing sales and hubspot focus podcast but we're focusing on sales today we are joined by alan vestig he has worked with some massive global companies amazon web services bridgestone astrazeneca i've got family couple family members who worked astrazeneca they have a plant not far from here and you prove no matter

how advanced the tech is people not platforms who close deals and you're we're going to be talking about sales today a bit more about you Alan in a moment but how's it going joining us from South Africa

Alan Versteeg (01:24.398)
Thanks for having me. Good to be here. Yes, calling in from Durban, South Africa.

Paul (01:29.36)
How's the weather down there at the moment?

Alan Versteeg (01:31.412)
It is very humid, as always is on the East coast of Africa.

Paul (01:33.116)
yeah it's quite quite different what some of our colleagues are experiencing this tonight the depth of winter inside the arctic circle so send them some warmth for us and you'll be co-founder of growth matters international and he'd been working for over a decade open businesses reach their full potential you've worked with forty five different countries over two thousand sales managers

Alan Versteeg (01:45.847)
I'm sure.

Paul (02:01.467)
There's no replacement for human interaction in your view, that's right, isn't it?

Alan Versteeg (02:05.838)
That's great.

Paul (02:07.149)
Yeah, cool. So we're going to look at today how helping sales and how you help people make their sales team shift from focusing on being a seller to a guide. What does that mean?

Alan Versteeg (02:20.846)
Well, I think the starting point is we have a perception about sales portrayed by Hollywood that doesn't actually tie up with what the highest performing sales performers do. There's a wonderful book called Selling with Noble Purpose, and it highlights that the top performing salespeople have that noble purpose. There's a calling greater than just the product or service. And a good way to punchline that is selling won't help, but helping will sell. And the minute we take on that and we go, what is it I'm trying to help my customer do?

And while I believe what we're doing does that best, well then you operate from a completely different frame of reference when you're selling.

Paul (02:58.277)
brilliant and does this apply everywhere? presume this can just any salesperson can unlock this

Alan Versteeg (03:06.06)
It's a hundred percent plies everywhere. And I'll tell you why. So often we busy focusing on training the competence of our sales professionals, but not working on the character. And if you speak to customers about why they don't buy, they seldom going to mention, obviously to the sales personnel, it'll probably say price. But if you do the actual research, they'll say things that are character related. Well, they seemed a bit pushy or they were too product centric or they were bad. They weren't listening to my needs. And all of that comes from a frame of our character.

If I sell with noble intent, I believe I'm there to serve and operate from that mindset, then the skills start to take care of themselves. Because, Paul, we've got to remember that manipulation and persuasion are the same neuroscience. They're exactly the same. The only difference is intent. So when we bring that intent forward, then we can leverage the skills to be more effective at selling. But also believing that we'd be negligent to denying customers the value we can bring.

Paul (03:53.82)
So when we bring that intent forward, then we can leverage the skills to be more effective at selling. But also believing that we'd be negligent to be denying customers the value we can bring. Because often, C-cells do the same.

Alan Versteeg (04:05.422)
Because I often see salespeople saying, well, I don't have upsell, I don't have a cross-sell. And I'm going, well, you're being negligent because if you know it brings value to their world, why would you sell them three glasses of water a day when you know they need eight? So we need to step up to the profession of selling.

Paul (04:22.787)
What's the noble intent part of it mean? Can you break that down?

Alan Versteeg (04:26.678)
It fundamentally means that we think about our customer's customer or our customer's world or our customer's outcome. So we're always operating from a space of what is popularized as business for business. So whether you're business to consumer or business to business, everyone's selling to someone else. Everyone's got a business where they're trying to add value to their shareholders. So Noble Intent says, operate from a place where I treat your business or your personal life as my own. And I consider what I would do in that situation with my knowledge.

And that's my job to bring you to an awareness of a problem you didn't know you had and a solution you didn't know you needed. But it's ethically based because it's with noble intent of something you actually need. It's not based on manipulation.

Paul (05:09.286)
And how do you give us an example of how you can uncover that so instead of like Identifying a challenge does it go further and do you talk about different points of reference instead of like I don't know your Yeah, stick with the eight glasses of water analogy because it's so transferable. Is it because you're third?

Alan Versteeg (05:29.966)
Well, you want to be understanding the world they operate in and the metaphor I like to use is you're a Sherpa. And a Sherpa is someone who guides someone up a mountain who's done it a thousand times. But you're not the hero of the story, the customer is. But you know things they don't know. You've seen blind spots they don't know. To use a different example, I worked with a lady in property finance and she worked with some of the biggest developers in our country. And she said to me, one that she said, I can't be the Sherpa.

These people have so much experience, they're multi-billionaires, they know what they're doing. What role do I play? And I asked her question, I said, your biggest customer, how many property deals has he done this year? And she said he's done three, but they're massive. And I said, great. How many property finance deals have you done this quarter? She said about 35. You can see the penny starting to drop. So said, in his team, you're the expert or the sherpa in property finance. You're an asset to his team, but then you've got to show up as an asset. You can't just be transacting.

You ought to be selling with noble purpose. What is it that he's trying to achieve in this project where I can bring my experience of going up and down this mountain 100 times to his world and help him to what he's trying to achieve? And that's noble purpose. I'm thinking about what they're trying to do and how I can play it all, not just my product or service offering, but my experience to the table.

Paul (06:51.003)
the most what's the opposite what's the not about the world is the opposite of noble intent what would you describe it as and gives an example

Alan Versteeg (06:58.282)
Yeah. Well, the opposite, it's not really the opposite, but I'll call it panicked aggression. So the flip side now, let's go up to organizational management. When we're pushing a quota, when we're pushing a number, when we're pushing a quarterly target, but we speak about customer centricity at our conferences, the salesperson becomes very panicked. And as a result, we become desperate. And that desperation moves us away from the outcome.

and we've become these great talking brochures. Well, these are the features, these are the ones you need to do. I've got this quote. We don't tell them I've got a quarterly target, but it becomes a pressure-based sale and people pick up that energy and they go, I'm not trying to...

Paul (07:29.273)
Hmm.

Paul (07:36.885)
or it becomes i can probably do something on the price because it's close to the end of the month

Alan Versteeg (07:41.902)
Yeah, there we go. So and I always say to sales people, if you're asking for discount, the easiest way to save money is to reduce cost of sale. And the biggest expense of a cost of sale is you, the salesperson. So if the sale's going to happen at any price, well, then I don't need a sales professional. But that's what sales professionals do. They don't sell the product. We have experience in the outcome the customer is trying to drive. We can connect the dots. We can solution here for their world. And even if it's a transactional product, it's knowing how it relates.

Paul (07:58.012)
So that's what sales professionals do, they don't sell the product. We have experience in...

Alan Versteeg (08:10.658)
and is relevant in their world. And Paul, that's the punchline. Relevance is the currency of value. Our job as salespeople is to find the relevance and then bring that to our customers.

Paul (08:21.551)
how can people, what's some practical ways people can start uncovering that then. So it might be a discovery call, it might be early on in talking to potential customers, and this can be anybody, can't it? It's the same, you're talking about neurological steps and buying decisions and persuasion. This applies whether you're buying a new car or a new CRM software. So what are some practical ways people can start going down that path rather than getting them to work out which pricing tier they need from their service.

Alan Versteeg (08:48.622)
Perfect. So I'm going to go high level, then I'm going to get practical, then I'm going to go to the cheat way we can do it nowadays. But effectively, we created something called the Sherpa Canvas, which looks at these 11 areas. Who are they? What are they trying to achieve? What are the challenges and what do they commonly do to fix the challenges? Then the real Sherpa is, what is the unknown problem they don't know and the unique way we address that problem. And then we move to the product. What do we have? What is the change? What do they get? Why are they scared to buy?

So I used to spend a lot of time doing research around that. What I've done now is I've codified those questions into GPT bots. So many times I can go, this is the industry, this is the customer, he has their website, he has the information, and I get 60 to 70 % of what I need to now have a cheat sheet. But I've still got to apply the human nature of that. What does this mean in the world? How do the dots connect? How do I translate this into a sales conversation? But what I find is we're not using GPT and those kind of things as thinking tools.

We're using those as grammar creators. I use it as a thinking partner, shortcuts that journey. Now I can think again about what's the actual problem. And then to your point, Paul, we've got to ask the customer. So the way we do that is what I found in my experience when dealing with organizations who are trying to deploy HubSpot across the organization, but struggling to because they're not sure how to manage the complexity. Many have tried to fix that through additional consulting. However, what we found in our experience,

Paul (09:57.628)
So the way we do that is, what I find in my experience when dealing with organizations

Alan Versteeg (10:14.304)
is that the right way to do this is actually look at how you find the highest leverage activities to do first, and then slowly and incrementally build that up. Through that, we've been able to help companies maximize their HubSpot investment. Is that something that might be relevant to you? That engineered statement is trying to meet them where they're at, not sell them a thing, but get them to think about this, because we have HubSpot. It's powerful, it's a huge tool, but as anything powerful, the more you bolt on, the harder it is to understand.

And then people go, let's just build more and say, no, let's get this piece working. Anyway, so then you can get into a conversation of your expertise, which is knowing how to go along their journey.

Paul (10:53.927)
Nice like it and Where do people struggle adopting this you know when you're coaching people or

Is it old habits? Is it a fear of not talking about the product enough? What stops people?

Alan Versteeg (11:12.8)
Mostly it's organizational culture. So we are so busy drowning people in auditing themselves. So salespeople are filling out information as opposed to insights. And then we measuring them. Yeah, well, you know, it's almost like we have to justify existence. Go put this information in, fill in this core report, tell me what you did here. So we're so busy turning over our shoulder trying to prove why we exist. We're not focusing on the customer. As a result, we end up in these mindless meetings. So it brings me to the key problem.

Paul (11:23.961)
What do mean? Like, figures, status of leads, that thing?

Alan Versteeg (11:42.306)
We don't have the time. It's not a skill problem. It's we don't protect the time to make sure that we show up, we don't rock up. It doesn't always translate, but rocking up is I just come up and my shirt's untucked and I arrived. But when you show up, you're prepared. So we no longer, specifically in this virtual world going from meeting to meeting, we don't spend enough time in preparation. And as a result, we don't get that across because the customer can pick up. We haven't done our homework. We haven't come in prepared. And I'll just say this.

Sales is a practice. And like a lawyer practices and a doctor practice, as a profession of selling, you're always practicing. And to do that, it's about the preparation. So for me, Paul, it's not skill. It's often we just don't prioritize the time to make sure that we're the most relevant conversation the customer has that day.

Paul (12:31.186)
It's very true that and it's so easy isn't it with these remote calls just put them back to back whereas you wouldn't do that if it was all in person you'd give yourself you know if you're at a conference or something you give yourself 15 minutes to nip to the toilet get a coffee or whatever but

Alan Versteeg (12:40.376)
Mmm.

Alan Versteeg (12:44.704)
Exactly. And before COVID, we used to have the luxury of transit. So in the transit, we'd be thinking through a message, doing some preparation. Now we end a call and start to call me going, okay, who is this? Where am I? What's going on? And we haven't fully prepared. And I say why that's important, Paul. You know, our business is to get onto planes, fly to countries, put people in a room and train them and COVID hits. And you can imagine my panic going, our business that we've kept afloat for eight years.

How's it going to survive COVID at that time, eight years? How's it going to survive COVID? And two or three days of really being depressed about this. And I thought, well, I can't control what I can't control. What I can control is make sure that every call I get on, I'm the most relevant online call I've had this week. And I went and mastered camera techniques and voice tonality techniques and messaging techniques because the medium had changed. I couldn't leverage my personality the way I used to. But guess what it was? I treated it as a practice.

Paul (13:23.067)
Hmm.

Alan Versteeg (13:41.676)
So what I need to go do, go advance the skill. And that was my one goal. I want to make sure that the end of the week, they're going, their call with Alan was really refreshing compared to everyone else they were talking to.

Paul (13:52.954)
that's what you start with as well so when you do this noble intent based selling in quotation marks deliberately and happy customers and picture in all the ones who i knew from the office that i has understood as she just got what we were doing i made a connection with damien or whatever and and it's

Alan Versteeg (14:07.395)
Yes.

Alan Versteeg (14:12.642)
Yeah, you're spot on because the research says Paul and I mean, this comes quite a while back from Challenger selling and the research they did. But if you punchline it, nine percent of the reason they buy price to value ratio, 19 percent product and service, 19 percent brand, 53 percent sales experience. If you punchline that, how you sell is more important than what you sell, who you sell it for or the price you sell it at. The differentiated like you just

said so well, is that actual initial sales engagement where people go, there's something about this that feels different. Now, if you've got a really bad product, that's not gonna help you. If you've got a really bad market image, not gonna help you. If you have a crazy price, we're not gonna help you. But when those things are market competitive, the only differentiator is the sales experience and how we engage with our customers.

Paul (15:05.403)
and people accept it on the customer side already you know when you're people we all understand everybody's messed up with customers everybody does that's fact but if you know that if they like you and they trust you they're gonna stick with you when you've made a mistake so starting it pre-sale basically building that human connection and trust isn't it

Alan Versteeg (15:27.118)
And then Paul, if you elevate that out to the world of marketing, and the way I see marketing and sales is kind of four Cs. Connect, tell the marketer exists, converse, have a conversation of value, convince, give them material to help make a decision. When they love you, champion them so they tell other people about you, right? But if you take that part of connect, the marketing message has to already start priming them for a conversation of noble intent.

So we should be giving value, not taking value. And we know this from HubSpot, right? He has a white paper, has an infographic, he has a assessment tool. These are the things we can do. But there's no point we do that and we haven't trained the sales professional how to mirror that. So the disconnect either happens that you've added all this value, but now that you've warned me as a prospect, the sales conversation is completely opposite. It feels very like you're just taking. Or the flip side is the marketing message never gets to an appointment because it's just...

Give me your stuff, can I connect, can I have your information? Can I drown you in GPT copied messages on LinkedIn? So that's why those worlds connect around that core value story, which is when you're building all that value through marketing, how are you realizing that in the sales conversation?

Paul (16:41.701)
for me one can you just give me not three lives of and steps that somebody can take to get started with this talk to play can you give me the three labs of so if you give us three levels of higher sales team can get started from the first talking to a prospect to unlock that noble intent in them

Alan Versteeg (16:49.688)
Sorry, what's that on?

Alan Versteeg (17:01.708)
Yeah. So before you in the conversation, the first part is, have you considered their world and the value you can bring for them? mean, the starting point is before the conversation. Then in the conversation, are you presenting that as a hypothesis, not as a fact? Right. So what I found in my experience is people like you who are trying to achieve this, but struggling to because of this, and we helped them achieve this. Is that relevant to you? Because that opens up the customer to go, let me share my thoughts.

And then third is be curious to understand what that looks like. So prepare, position, and then unpack.

Paul (17:41.607)
I'm picturing the graphics on your slide decks already the 4 C's, the PPU, the Sherpa on the image

Alan Versteeg (17:44.526)
Yeah, alliteration is memorable, but I love alliteration.

Paul (17:50.652)
and something we touched on was like managing your diary and how we're on video calls even if we're local to each other we hop on calls all the time now rather than driving for if you have to drive more than an extra 30 minutes you're doing a video call these days but that's just one part of technology have you any insights you can share that

Alan Versteeg (18:09.358)
correct.

Paul (18:15.799)
you see around all these different businesses of how people are using technology to maintain that human touch in amongst all these busy days on zoom calls and video calls.

Alan Versteeg (18:28.014)
Well, I think the first part, Paul, is we have to turn technology into our slave, not our master. Case in point, it's easy to set up meetings. It's easy to create double book meetings. It's easy to ignore other people's time and focus. So what happens is we don't protect our own calendar because it's too easy to do that. So the first place you have to start with technology is not something fancy. It's something quite basic, which is your calendar is the advertisement of your availability.

So if you're not protecting time to do the thinking work, to do the prepping work, to do the whatever it may be, it's not gonna happen, someone's gonna steal their time. So the first thing in technology is protect your time. The second part is then you jump ahead and saying, in that preparation, you can accelerate things by doing really good prompts in a generative language tool that I call it my thinking partner. I like to 10, 80, 10. 10 % are prompted really well, 80 % it brings me good information, and 10 % are bringing that human component.

And the human component is not editing and spell checking, because that's what's going to happen. As we leverage more on these AI technologies, customers start to trust less because they're going, is this you speaking or is this something you created? So the reason you're using their partner is to help you structure something that you then add that human nature to. But the humanness is this. It's people can read your intention. People talk about body language training and tonality training. These are all master classes.

Paul (19:38.277)
Hmm.

Alan Versteeg (19:54.06)
The bottom line is simple, how you show up. Why do entrepreneurs, Paul, succeed so well without any sales training? And those that fail, by the way, don't realize they have to sell. But they can sell well because they have conviction of their value proposition. And it's that conviction that gives them confidence. And it's that confidence that gives them competence. So the human part is the piece that you can't put in just language, but that people pick up in your intention. I'm trying to help Paul, yeah, I'm trying to help his audience.

The people, I don't have to tell you that. It's innate in the way you show up and the value you're delivering. And that's the human thing. Because everything else can be codified, can be structured, can be accelerated. What you can't do is pick up what's Paul's intention. But man, the human brain can take multiple equations much quicker and pick up the body language, the tone, the intention. And that's why it says, you know, when we use salesy language, people immediately go, flag. Not because my intent isn't right, because I realize,

They've heard this a thousand times. But when I use language that is, you know, I've been working with people like you in industries like yours, immediately it resonates because that's them. But it's the intention that sits behind it. And I think it's intention. I want to say intention, the intention of creating value for our customers, that noble intent that differentiates us from the technology. The technology then becomes a superpower, a tool on top of what we're doing, not a replacement.

Paul (21:17.051)
Nice. And I think you can leverage certain tools as well can't you to make that thinking time easy for you. So thinking of all that layer of that journey you just talked about, there's tools you can use to protect your time. So I know for example, meeting booking calendars will book the 30 minute call and however much you say, you decide to give you the downtime and the brain space. But then you've got tools, we've got more data than ever compiled, but there's tools that can help you organize through that. like your 10 80 10 rule.

uh... and sort of that's a nice process as well isn't it a i can start it you can start with a prompt you can get the ball rolling into a i you can do eight percent of the legwork confiding in organizing but then the final ten percent the real value is last human touch and

Alan Versteeg (22:04.962)
Yeah, it's turning into a story of value that is authentic.

Paul (22:09.797)
Hmm, that's so true. Do you see anything different in the businesses you work with, whether they're a big enterprise or an SME with 10 people? I imagine these challenges are the same, just the scale's different.

Alan Versteeg (22:27.938)
Yeah, it's interesting because the scale of the challenge is much tougher as the organization gets bigger. I think the more we try to standardize, the less we prioritize the impact. So technology can become what they call a tundra, a multi-headed monster. My good friend George from Membrane always says it becomes too much to do. So what happens in large organizations, we tend to lose connection with our frontline because we're trying to overly manage that frontline.

Yet we say we're customer centric. Basic case in point. Organizations will want an account plan. In that account plan, they want to know the data. an account plan should be what specific action do we need to take to close the gap between what a customer expects and what they experience. But that's not what it is. It becomes a tool for data. So now in case Alan leaves, I'm protected. A call planner, instead of being a plan for how we're to be relevant in the conversation,

Paul (23:00.005)
What do mean? What do mean there?

Alan Versteeg (23:26.658)
becomes an auditing tool to make sure Alan has followed the ABCDE step of our new process. So the challenges become the more we scale, the more we audit as opposed to give people guidelines and free them up. And the way we fix it is through the sales managers. When we change the sales manager conversation, we change the sales conversation. And that's why what we believe is without investment into sales management, no amount of training, no amount of consulting, no amount of technology has any sustainable impact because they set the tone for the team.

Paul (23:55.516)
set the tone for the team. And a bad salesperson, you have a bad patch. A bad sales manager, you have a bad region.

Alan Versteeg (23:56.926)
And a bad salesperson, you have a bad patch. A bad sales manager, you have a bad region. You have to work with those managers. So I'd say that's the big thing is that as they scale, it actually becomes noisier. The flip side is when they're small, they're very ad hoc. So there's that fine line in the middle between structure that supports the customer value to structure that is purely auditing and then to no structure, which is, well, we just arrive and hope we're prepared.

Paul (24:24.069)
You

Alan Versteeg (24:24.598)
So it's finding that balance in your sales playbooks.

Paul (24:27.771)
and i think companies well and go through that growth from no structure the day in between before they get the big structure into a much structure and i think the person who has carried the growth she might become the sales manager and i spent a lot of time doing what you said earlier making sure these things are filled in making sure all this is the only paperwork side so i guess probably do not be on actually whether it's the liberal not freeing up people to be actually

Alan Versteeg (24:45.101)
Yes.

Paul (24:57.787)
connecting with prospects, actually connecting, not just hitting a connect call number.

Alan Versteeg (24:59.8)
Hold on.

Alan Versteeg (25:03.35)
Yeah, that's it. So when you think about what you said now, most companies take top performing salespeople, promote them to sales management, no system in place to help them, soon they're drowning, but also doing the salesperson's job and not their job. So we help them prioritize the impact by defining where the impact comes from. Then you take that one layer down, which is how do you free up the salesperson to prioritize the impact? And their impact comes from four things. We build the right relationships through relevant conversations that create value and align outcomes. That's our job.

So at least 50 % of our time should be spent on that. So the minute we can teach managers to take control of their space and buffer the front line from the noise, we can free up the salespeople to be customer focused. Not as a placard on the wall, but an actual way in which we run our culture.

Paul (25:51.31)
nice do you spot anything working across different regions do you spot any nuances that i know i do since joining avidly sort of well in in my immediate colleagues for example we've got irish english noegian german sweden denmark finland just in the european team and we're all massively different

are there any sort of top-level regional nuances that you think sales teams should be aware of in your experience?

Alan Versteeg (26:22.658)
I think there's a wonderful book I read called The Culture Code that speaks to lot of the nuances. But before we get to the nuances, I want to kind of give a frame of how we position us. We believe that if you have a model is interchangeable across cultures. So the way we teach is we teach models of thinking. So for example, if you talk about pipeline health to most companies, pipeline health is do I have enough value cover? To us, it's not value cover. Do you have enough value? Do you have enough volume for contingency?

Do you have enough velocity? Is the deal moving? And do you have a healthy shape to protect the future quarters? Now that model is translatable across every single culture. To execute that, you need to do three steps in a process. We call that our method. So model method. And then you get to mechanisms, how you execute that. How you execute that can get nuanced based on different cultures. So for example, in facilitation, if you're training in Singapore, you'll notice in the room a lot of expats and lot of Singaporeans.

The Singaporeans are brought up in a culture of common and control meaning we are highly respectful in a hierarchy. So when you say to them, so what do you guys think? No one speaks until you've identified, could the team leader speak to the table and then? However, when you say, what do you think? All the experts in the room are opening their mouths. Normally the Irish and the English, but sometimes the Aussies, right? But the point is, it's those nuances that you find. But what I do think Paul, think,

Paul (27:43.131)
You

Alan Versteeg (27:49.41)
people sometimes hide behind this and are going, but are you practicing the disciplines? Because even with noble intent, it's transferable. So first, is your model of thinking mature? Is your method working? Do you have the right intention behind it? And then start to master those nuances, because there are nuances, but they're not the game changer. As we grow as a global business and facilitate around the globe, we have to learn this from a facilitation perspective. But from a sales perspective,

I haven't picked up any nuance that has hindered me getting a sale.

Paul (28:21.221)
It shows just how universal and how human these things actually are about somebody connecting with me. If you're spitting facts and figures at me and discounts and this, I'm going to be turned off. But if you're actually listening to me and connecting with me, then I'm going to be invested in and trusting you, aren't I?

Alan Versteeg (28:39.234)
And often guide me. The other thing is they'll say, no, you know, and they'll tell you in our culture, it's slightly different. And we'll get guided by the stakeholders in the business because they bind to the intent. And I think this is the problem is we think that if we show up as a polished version of ourselves, it's the best way. But that a robot can do. What it is, is you've to come authentic and prepared, knowing you don't know it all, but with a desire to serve. And then people pick up that energy quickly.

and they can relate to you whether you're South African or Japanese or American. You take America, within America you've got 42 or 49 different cultures. It's all different. But it's intent that people buy into, I believe.

Paul (29:19.013)
Yeah.

Paul (29:25.819)
one last off topic question uh... before we report the you talked about technology and talked about uh... people sending loads of stuff on linkedin and that's counterintuitive i was wondering if you've come across companies deploying some of the solutions that like a i have a task going and doing videos on your behalf agents answering queries on uh... behalf of the person

Have you seen any of this done badly or done well?

Alan Versteeg (29:59.95)
I mean, I think I've seen the entire gambit. And I always believe that the difference is substance. What are we trying to achieve? So why would we not use bots that can help us answer questions and source a far greater database than what we do? I won't trust a GP that's not asking GPT because if a general practitioner or doctor is not asking a broader scope of data, I don't think you understand your profession, right? But they got to make the decision I'm going to trust.

But then you see the extreme where it's we're removing the humanist from it. So if I create a great story with good substance, good meaning, and I can create that video in 17 languages, that means I'm adding more value to the Right. But if I'm just think I can churn these out like production lines, you're missing the point of connection. You have to understand the narrative in the story and how it connects. So I think it's a it's a yin and yang. You can really abuse this. And a lot of it is abused on LinkedIn.

Paul (30:34.715)
great story with good substance, good meaning. And I can create that video in 17 languages. That means I'm adding more value to the work. But if I'm just thinking I can churn these out like production lines, you're missing the point of connection. You have to understand the narrative in the short run. So I think it's a yin and yang. You can really abuse this. A lot of it is abused on LinkedIn. But then you see some people that just use it with mastery.

Alan Versteeg (30:57.816)
But then you see some people that just use it with mastery. And even sometimes you kind of know it's AI, you know they put the effort into the structuring of their technology, not just, hey, how do we do this at mass? Because you can read it now when you read people trying to connect with you on LinkedIn, you're going, my word, what human speaks like that, or what about means in this equation? And it's crazy because the ability for these things to help create relevant messaging is there. What's missing, Paul? Start again.

Noble intent. You've got to know what you're trying to do for your customers and then technology is powerful. Otherwise, it just accelerates the inefficiency.

Paul (31:36.925)
Yeah exactly yeah you just get them you get to blocked quicker yeah use it but don't abuse it okay so lastly what can somebody listening or watching do this week to get started so they can start selling with noble intent rather than pressure

Alan Versteeg (31:54.36)
think the number one thing they need to do is to understand the value they play in the equation. So many salespeople are undermined by Hollywood, undermined by their bosses, undermined by society. We seem like the job you get when you can't do anything else. It starts with our mindset. So the first thing you look at and going, understand something. The only reason a business exists is to sell something. If we don't have salespeople, we don't have economies or markets.

One in eight Americans is employed in sales. This is a profession. If you treat it like a profession, yeah, one in eight, right? Inbound sales, outbound sales, whatever it is, it's got to happen. But you have to come back to what it is you're trying to do that differentiates you. And it's simple. It's knowing that you're trying to serve, right? So the first thing they can do is think about their customer's world and what's the actual problem they're solving, right? I'll give you a practical example.

Paul (32:27.451)
1 in 8. Wow.

Alan Versteeg (32:51.694)
I don't believe in objection handling. I believe in objection prevention. How do I do that? When I realize the customer's keen, I say, Paul, I've had a couple of customers that have been here before and pretty much as excited as you, but then they step away from the call and a couple of questions pop into their head. What about this? What about this? What about that? Or any of those questions running around your head. They go, actual fact L1 is. Okay, which one? Then they tell me. I go, well, it's interesting you say that. Let me tell you how we've helped other people overcome that.

I don't wait for them to object because I'm trying to sherpa them through this journey. So I'd start by, if you say one thing to be noble purpose, realize that you can be a sherpa, the value you can bring. But then the last moment, if sales is a profession, treat it like a profession because it's the world's worst paying lazy job and the world's best paying hardworking job, as long as you sell with noble intent.

Paul (33:43.151)
Fantastic, what a note to end on. So if you've enjoyed listening to Alan like I have, please leave us a rating. Leave us a comment with any queries and if you've got, want any suggestions, Alan's your man for helping you sell with noble intent. So leave us a comment on Spotify, five star review anywhere else and hit that follow button not to miss future episodes. Thanks for coming on Alan, speak to you soon.

Alan Versteeg (34:02.606)
Thanks, Paul. Great to connect.