Cold Calling: The Power of Positioning

The time-honored story around the Midwest is “The Wizard of
Oz.” Can you imagine what a shock it would be to go to
sleep in the Midwestern United States and wake up in the
Land of Oz!

The splendor and excitement of arriving in a new land, full
of new possibilities you never even dreamed possible …seems
to be a kindred reaction of sales professionals who, after
years of rejection from the executive suites, seemingly
overnight find themselves regularly conducting business in
the executive suites.

Now, if you’re at all like your colleagues, you believe the
Wicked Witch is personified in gatekeepers. Those executive
assistants who seem determined to keep you from going
through the castle gates and into the presence of the great
and powerful Wizard.

Just in case you’re not used to calling on top decision
makers, you’ll be glad to know executives don’t resemble
the Terrible Wizard anymore than the mild mannered showman
professor did in the land of Oz.

An executive is just a man or woman in charge of a company,
looking for the safest way to navigate the business and its
people through the storms of commerce. And contrary to
popular misconception, the executive assistant is really
more closely aligned with the Good Witch Glenda who can
tell you how to get to the great, powerful, mighty Oz.

When you ask them, executive assistants will tell you they
like to be treated with respect (who doesn’t). They’ll also
let you know that one of her primary directives is to
protect the executive’s time from very draining people who
suck up a lot of their precious time and provide nothing in
return.

It is a little known fact that she is also on the look out
for people who can help the executive. The key to having
the executive assistant to recognize you as a caller whom
she should admit into the executive suites is to use the
words executives use when talking with the assistant.

As businesses grow, the executives’ skill set grows to
accommodate the needs of the business. While incubating the
business many need for the executive to “do it all”, book
keeping; sales; marketing; and so forth. And the executive
is challenged with figuring out “how to do everything that
needs doing.”

Then, as the business grows, the business hires
professionals to do all of the “how to stuff”.  The
executive finds it necessary to transforms himself from
being the “how to guy” into becoming the “what guy.” The
guy who decides “what” the company will be doing as the
years progress, and leaves the figuring out of the “how” to
those at lower levels of the organization.

So when a sales professional calls the office of the
executive and the assistant hears the caller spew out “how
his company can serve the executive ” the assistant
immediately transfers the call down the organizational
ladder.

This frustrates many a sales pro as they conclude the call
was transferred because of the gatekeeper. When, in fact,
the call would not have been transferred had the caller
used the right language.

Most sales professionals have the subconscious thinking of
a “how” person and, to successfully sell to executives,
want to learn the best way to approach the “what” person.

Without a change of language, you’ll sound like a “how”
person who is a better fit with low level decision makers
than executives. Executives know this. Executive assistants
know this.

The overwhelming majority of your colleagues do not grasp
the importance of this kind of positioning. And most of
those who do know, don’t know how to make a change of
thinking that positions them as belonging at the top.

Even better to have the executive assistant on your side …
did you know she is actually looking for people to invite
into the executive suites and present solutions to the
executives business issues?

So next time you hang up the phone thinking, “That ‘Witch’
referred me down.”, know that most likely the reason for
her decision had to do with the words you spoke.

OK, Dorothy, now is the time to own your own power. Examine
the words you speak. Learn the verbiage that positions you
as the “what guy/gal” for your industry and then marvel as
the Wizard says “he’d like to talk with you”.

Your rock solid positioning is to have the executive
assistant as your “right hand person” and strongest ally.

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It costs you nothing to enroll in our Mini-Course
“Jealously Guarded Secrets to Cold Calling Company
Presidents” visit http://www.ColdCallingExecutives.com ! Or
call the office of Your Sales Coach for Extreme
Profitability, author, speaker, Leslie Buterin (like
butterin’ bread) at (316)260-3800 9-3 CST (that’s Kansas
City/Chicago Time)