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00:00:01
Avoiding Sales Bullying: John Lamphiere's Approach to Client Relationships
74 Plays2 years ago
In this episode, Brian Dietmeyer talks to John Lamphiere, SVP of Global New Business and Growth at ActiveCampaign, about the evolution of sales techniques and the impact of cultural values on sales dynamics. They explore the balance between automated outreach and personal touch, how to avoid management and customer bullying, and the importance of guided discovery for today’s sales professionals. This episode is a must-listen for anyone in sales aiming to foster genuine customer relationships and drive long-term success. Tune in for an engaging conversation that redefines modern sales strategies, right here on CloseMode.
Timestamps:
00:00 Shift from aggressive sales to value-oriented approach.
04:41 Marketers trust salespeople to prioritize customer interests.
09:09 Understanding industry best practices for customer personalization.
12:24 Sales reps are crucial aggregators in industries.
15:21 Sales philosophy: deliberate, strategic, and accountable approach.
18:43 Clever approach to sales, emphasizing personalized interaction.
22:36 Fully commit to value for customers' success.
23:53 Grateful for your presence and time. Thank you.
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Transcript
Introduction and CRM Automation
00:00:03
Speaker
Hello and welcome to another edition of Close Mode, the enterprise sales show. I'm Brian Deepmeyer, the CEO of Close Strong. And today, I'm super lucky to be here with John Lamphere. And John's the SVP of Global New Business and Growth at Active Campaign. And if you're not familiar with Active Campaign, it's an automation-first CRM. It gives you everything you need to automate your outreach and and while still keeping it personal, obviously, to close more deals. So John, welcome to the show. Hey Brian, how are you? I am i am well and our producer had had two weeks off and podcasting is favorite part of my job. So I'm happy. I'm happy to be back.
00:00:41
Speaker
Not now that Dan, the producer
Bullying in Sales Culture
00:00:43
Speaker
is back. So a couple of weeks ago, you and I were just chatting in general about sales and, you know, obviously our our goal is always to, to make the number and, and something you brought up, which you disagreed with is that, you know, there's there's a lot of bullying that happens to sales teams in order to get them to make the number. And, uh, what, what is, I agree with you as well. Um, what does that look like and sound like? I think it's, it's probably morphed. It's kind of interesting. I mean, if you go back to like when, when I was a young boy, the notion of like the car salesman who was like, you know, you, what you, you, nobody was getting out of here alive. Right. Without that, without that sale. I think it's kind of changed
Critique of Aggressive Sales Tactics
00:01:26
Speaker
though. Right. Like, I mean, even if I take it from a personal perspective, I mean, my LinkedIn today is a mixture of messages I get from
00:01:35
Speaker
one-liners that says, when have you got time to connect this week? I want to talk to you about something, which which I think is nearly like a new version of that kind of bullion with very little context, with very little kind of like, why would I want to do it? I watched the value in it from me as a ped potentialric customer. and And I think there's also that sort of like element of within sales, it becomes, I don't mean bullying from an aggressive perspective, but like, not taking that potential customer on a journey, not understanding theirs. It's about like, you know, it's three days ago. We've got to close the month. We've got to do this. You're going to buy this now at all costs.
00:02:16
Speaker
And and i think i think yeah like I think that's how it's morphed into today. Yeah. it's So it's interesting. um When you and I first spoke about this, like what came to mind is is sort of management bullying reps. And and and so that that part, yeah, you're nodding, so that part is also true, but you've also talked, you just morphed into bullying customers as well, right?
Management Pressure and Sales Support
00:02:39
Speaker
Bullying to get the deal closed. I think there's a balance because I think it becomes from the environment, right? I mean, if you have a, you know, this kind of like infrastructure where you have management is like, you hit the number at all costs, and I don't really care how you do it. and And I'm not going to be part of the solution and helping you do it or, you know, you've got to drive to it.
00:03:03
Speaker
There's, there's, there's a manifestation that can cause. So it's kind of, it's kind of cultural, right? So yeah, if you do that, then it, then it rolls. It's, it's really funny. You just took me back to a long, long time ago. I was in the convention sales business with Marriott hotels and there was an insurance company and I'm talking a long time ago. And they had, they had a lot of their agents in the room and they had the, the room was, this is terrible. This just came back to my head. The room was set up. One side was all white tablecloths and candelabras and lobster. The other side for the people who weren't producing, I'm not kidding, was newspaper, newspaper tablecloths and, and hot dogs. And, you know, they got, they got beer. The other, you know, a team was shipping champagne and it just, it struck me. I'm like, Oh my God, that was bullying the worst possible.
00:03:49
Speaker
You know, more
Public Shaming in Sales
00:03:50
Speaker
public. like absolutely yeah i I don't think anybody does that anymore, but yeah, you just gave me a little PTSD with bringing me back there. So, but you know, a question is, does it work? Maybe people who just push and drive and drive and drive say it it works. do Do you think it really works? I don't think it works in this environment. I think in in this ecosystem are, you know, and and I think there's like, you know, in the, you know, the arena that we operate in, like email automation, It's a competitive marketplace, but I think there's a value in aiding a customer. Like there's a value in, you know, what, what defines a company, especially as like, as, as the competitive landscape gets more and more, the company you want to do business with, the company you want to continue to do business with is the company that you feel has your
Trust Over Aggression in Sales
00:04:40
Speaker
interest. Okay. Yeah.
00:04:41
Speaker
i think I don't think any marketeer today or like any organization or CEO would in a customer like they're not naive. They know a salesperson is doing a job and and they are going to be earning an element, you know, based on the success or the outcome that they drive. But I think outside of that, there's an element of like, I have trust in you that you have my business interests at heart. um And that can't be that element of bullying. And I think for that to be successful, the infrastructure within the organization has to be there to support, educate, um make their teams just just more empowered to take customers on that journey, right?
00:05:27
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's what what came to mind when you were talking through that and it's always been sort of a personal way for me to sell is allow give people the space to lean in. what That's another thing that came to mind. as your're like Sometimes physically in sales meetings, you can see somebody physically lean back when when you're doing that kind of pushing. and And yeah, it's, it's, it takes a certain amount of strength to be able to, to back up a little bit and allow that other person, right. Leave some silence, allow that other person to lean in a little bit.
Effective Discovery Processes
00:06:00
Speaker
Yeah. And I think, you know, I mean, I think like, you know, we've spent a lot of time with our teams here, like just helping them be really good at the discovery phase. Cause I think that's like, that's what you describe there, right? It is, you know.
00:06:14
Speaker
tell me about your business and tell me what your desired outcome as a customer is, or potential customer is. And let me help you get there in the most effective, efficient, cost-effective, you know, like all of the other pieces that go in there, but first and foremost, let me solve this problem for you. That's quite difficult for a salesperson sometimes, right? Like that natural, I will tell you all the features we have, I will tell you why we're so much better than everybody else, but they kind of, they can miss that piece. So it's it's something that an active campaign would be really deliberate about because that customer journey has to be forced. Yeah, I ah wonder when you when you mentioned Discovery, so many sales leaders and sales enablement pros and CROs that I talked to are all frustrated with Discovery. Yet, I was just speaking with someone earlier today who said that she was out ah with the Girls Weekend and many of her pals were sales enablement leads as well. And she said wait wait they were all announcing
00:07:10
Speaker
Discovery Initiatives at SKO. Everybody's frustrated. It's amazing. and It's kind of the basics. But I wonder what you think. um ah they're in In Discovery, there's a zero-based, hey, John, what's keeping you awake at night? And and we've been leading leaning more lately into guided discovery, which is, you know, my way of thinking about branding that is, you know, what's keeping you awake at night versus, you know, this is what should be keeping you awake at night. I'm wondering how you feel about that guided discovery versus just kind of, ah you know, zero-based, open-ended.
Shift to Guided Discovery
00:07:41
Speaker
Yeah. I think, I think it's becoming ever more important in the, in the landscape, all industries are operating in now. You've got like, because I think there's a lot, an element of, you know, the technology is moving so quickly that, that there becomes a sort of a bigger area of you don't know what you don't know. Right. Like, I mean, it's like, you know, so I think that yes, there's the, the again, that open ended discovery, like what is your, about I want more sales.
00:08:10
Speaker
I want more customer interaction. Great. So do the majority of people, but, you know, to start having conversations about what is the desired outcome and then let me match the technology to do that. So, you know, where there can be a perception, I don't know that i well I've now got a customer database of 2 million contacts, but I need to hire four more marketeers to do that. Well, that's me now we can use like sort of, you know, like sort of AI powered in active campaign to help solve that problem, that it that it becomes more specific than that just that very broad sort of outcome. Yeah. and and And I wonder, just in in general, you happen to be in this business, but but I love on your website, you talk about.
00:08:54
Speaker
automated outreach, but keeping it personal. And that that's like, we've we've been looking at some because sort of a AI generated stuff lately. And and sometimes like, how how do you balance that? That's like, that that's that's
Challenges in Personalization and Automation
00:09:07
Speaker
tricky. How does a rep balance that? Again, I think it comes back to understanding the best in the industry for a specific segment or cold customers. Because again, I think that's the piece that a lot of our customers are missing, right? You know, they will operate within an industry, they have a pretty good idea of like, the results of let's say, their competitor base. But what they don't have time to do, or what they're like resource strapped to do, or what you know, takes is deprioritized is where do they fit in the overall
00:09:46
Speaker
classification in that for the use of technology or the use of just been more efficient, right? So I think that personalization plays into that, to again, to help customers on this journey, to say, okay, well, you know, here is the best in class. This is how they use technology. And this is how they drive this personalized outreach to every new customer that comes to the website or every new contact in their database. But but it comes back to the like, understanding the customer that they're trying to talk to in the first place, as opposed to the kind of just the, here's the 50 features we have and figuring out how you piece it all together. It's like, you know, this is how best in class uses this. This is how other organizations within your space use this. And so it's that kind of knowledge sharing, I think.
00:10:36
Speaker
out with that personalization, R is key to the personalization. Yeah. it's and And there's some there's some ah pretty good evidence in in terms of research that say that's what buyers want. um There was CSO Insights put out a buyer study and it was very damning where it said that the buyer said that reps are the ninth place they go out of 10 for insight. That was the bad
Providing Industry Insights
00:11:01
Speaker
news. And I think a lot of that's based on the things that we're talking about. The good news is they said, i will I will talk to them if they have something to bring to me. And what they leaned into is what you just said. They want to know what's happening. You're you're looking at, you know, hundreds, thousands of people who are using a certain technology or whatever it is you're selling.
00:11:19
Speaker
What are you learning across that space? I completely agree with you. They said then, then I'll talk to you. And I wonder how you think that I have a personal bias, so I don't want to lead the witness. But we we all know organizations, you know, ah decisions have gotten ah complex. It's committee decision making. Organizations are struggling making decisions. And and i I feel like that that's a ah new area of how can we share with our customers the way other customers are are organizing these very complex committee make-based decisions ah for buying technology, again, whatever whatever it is you're selling. I wonder how you feel about that as insight sharing. Yeah, 100%.
Empowering Sales Reps with Support
00:12:00
Speaker
I mean, I think i think it's ah it's a key component of it because, again, it's like the value
00:12:06
Speaker
And it comes back to a little bit of what we were talking about before. It's it's like building that trust. It's building that relationship that, you know, you want a salesperson today to be a key component in the growth of their customers organization, as opposed to just like, I'm going to sell you something and then I'm going to move on to the next one. I'm going to sell more of that. Right. Like it's, they are a key component because if they're doing the, if they're doing this role right, they are the kind of the aggregator of what's happening within the industry or in the vertical or or whatever the case may be. But I think there is also, and and I think this this is the probably the element that nearly gets forgotten sometimes, where there's a there's an onus on the organization to help empower the sales rep to do this. Because that doesn't just happen, like or else it becomes a completely different set of messages. are It's based on an individual's perception. There's an element like there's ah there's a part of an enablement team
00:13:06
Speaker
that needs to be helping shape that overall ecosystem based on all of the feedback back into our, like, you know, if you use our organization as an example. um And that's something that we're really deliberate about, that this element and also ensuring that that we don't have a complacency in the development of our reps. But our salespeople continue on a journey of learning having been armed with like all of the information, whether that's based on, you know again, a vertigo, how our technology is changing, and how the ecosystem and the environment is changing. And and that's something that we're really deliberate about. and
00:13:46
Speaker
um And it comes back to us in a very measurable way. Like when we look at like from customers, like customers value this stuff. Yeah. And it, it, again, I'm going to go back to that thing that struck me about cultural, you know, that, that there's, there's a way things have been done and your culture then drive your internal culture drives your external culture. And, and with the current rep profile, I mean, I think we all know the rep profile has changed there. They're a different breed. Like that that old school culture doesn't work. So how how do you think, well how do we get to our quarterly number and in a way that isn't just pushing, driving, bullying? and And I think you just started leaning into it a little bit with the kind of ah sales enablement support that can be given reps, but yeah, expand on that a little bit. Yeah, I think it's i think it's a number of different pillars to it. I think the enablement piece and um then the like and their enablement is a job that is never
00:14:41
Speaker
finished because that assumes that nothing changes externally. You know what I mean? like you can take it You take a group of salespeople and you teach them, this is the way you do it. And if that industry or environment or external competitive element never changes for a decade, then you're probably good for a decade. But I don't think there's too many industries or verticals or groupings or cohorts that are yeah not changing.
Ownership and Deliberate Sales Approach
00:15:08
Speaker
I think there's that like, that's element number one. The the other one, though, is, I mean, and it's kind of interesting, even even the interaction with like a sales ops team or, you know, a finance team or whatever, I think, you know, the day, the days of that been just very deliberate and one way traffic has kind of dissipated. And, you know, I mean, certainly an active campaign, we have a philosophy of, like, each salesperson owns their own business.
00:15:37
Speaker
So, you know, not hitting the number today and you look at like average days to close and you talk about like, we need to have X amount of conversions or conversations here to have this outcome further on reps needs and all that stuff. And it's like, you know, so then you don't have this scramble or you don't have this like ability to get dried down into, Oh my God, I got to close six sales in the next four days. How do I do that? Like. it becomes much more deliberate or approach um and and and that type of approach. And I think the third pillar of that of that is, I think you've got your enablement, you've got like your understanding of your own business, but I think that empowers sales to elicit help much earlier. And and to be humble about like, I am struggling in this element or I have these customers and I'm i i'm trying to demonstrate value, um
00:16:34
Speaker
that that they tend to be that that they're more empowered to bring it in because you look at it as an overall business, like not just a individual sale that's worn and done. Yeah. you know And that, that what comes to mind as you say that is that that's got to be the, I love leaning in on these podcasts to to the human element of what we all do, right? It's so damn stressful. Um, but that there has to be a safe environment for someone to do that, to raise their hand and say, Hey, I need help. I think especially with, with the the profile of the reps that we're getting today. Yeah.
00:17:10
Speaker
and and And they're more informed, right? Like they're more, they generally, I mean, I think the talent across sales is incredible, um ah but it's about nurture and it's about that growth and that empowerment and ownership um to, which means that there's there's an element of, of course, you know, there's times when every organization has to go a little bit more in terms of motivation or, you know, depending on what's happening, against the number or what you know and external forces are impacting that at any given time. But generally speaking, you want a rep coming in to say, I know the way to be successful is to do this work with this outcome in mind for a group of clients.
00:17:57
Speaker
um and And that typically means that they're pretty self motivated.
Drive, Humility, and Collaboration in Sales
00:18:01
Speaker
Yeah, that that's interesting because there, yeah, there is, when, when we first had this discussion about sort of, you know, bullying, pushing, you know, uh, interrogation, whatever the hell we want to call it, it, it, there's a certain, even with the change in the profile of a rep, there's a certain personality, a certain drive, um, who chooses sales. And, and I had an old leader say to me many, many years ago when I became a first time sales VP said,
00:18:28
Speaker
You know, you you kind of don't have to beat them up because they're probably doing two acts to themselves of whatever. right yeah and that And that's the, that's the part that kind of blows me away. And if they're not doing that, then we we've got the wrong person in the job. but Yeah. 100%. But I think if, again, that that's sort of like when I talk about the home humbleness and the culture and, and everything else, it is, they become clever because they say, right, well, how is my colleague positioning this? How is my colleague driving value for their customer base? How do I take those small pieces and wrap my personality around it? Because it can't be a script. like i mean No sales can be, you know this is what you say and you know here's the cue and then you say this, because then it just doesn't work, it falls apart. right like it's like that I remember back many, many years ago when I worked in Facebook and my myself and a colleague of mine, and we had this like
00:19:25
Speaker
with this big, you know, it was like a marketing sales deck and it would in each section would be four slides for for every talking point. And, you know, I'd say to my colleague, like, which slide do you use to to articulate this piece? And he'd say that. And I'm like, I can't pull that off. I've tried it 50 times. I can't pull it off, but I can pull this one off. You know, like it just sounded manufactured. and And I think that's the same in terms of like, in, in this environment, to have that it has to be if there's an element of self-learning, there's an element of like humbleness to say, I need to put my client first. I need to demonstrate value. How do I do this in this scenario? And whether that's you know technical solutions or whether it's other salespeople or leaders or managers or marketing or whatever it is.
00:20:15
Speaker
that you can elicit this help because it's like my business to depends on it. And this is what I'm trying to achieve. So I think that's it all sort of syndrically
Authenticity and Personalization
00:20:25
Speaker
links together. Yeah. And yeah it's interesting too, because i've I've been hearing more these days about peer sharing, peer sharing, which you just leaned into as well. Um, and I think that, that again, as a profile of the type of people that are coming into sales today, that they're open to saying, Hey, Amen. What are you, what are you guys doing? That's working. And, and also that, that, uh, to, to use kind of an overused cliche, but that authenticity of, okay, I got him, I gotta make it mine. I gotta, I gotta to believe the way the words are coming out because then the the other side's gonna, I just think people value authenticity and customers, especially in a reps gotta find, all right, I hear what you're doing. That's great. Let me personalize it. And then, uh, you know, I'll bang it out my way.
00:21:06
Speaker
Of course. And and that authenticity it like comes back to what we talked about in the first place, which yeah like earlier on is which is the customer has to feel that they have a valued partner that they're dealing with. um And if there's an element of non-authentic conversation or, yeah, that person is reading from the deck and here's the 10 features and here's what they're promising, it just It's not, it doesn't have the same outcome. It doesn't drive the same yeah value of customers. And customers are, customers are savvy these days, right? Like it's not, again, it's, that you know, company wins by trying to pull the wheel over the road. Yeah. maybe Maybe in the short term, a couple of deals with not in the long haul.
Caring as a Business Strategy
00:21:50
Speaker
it's Yeah. In the long run. And it's a long term game, right? Like because again, it it ever, you know, competitive is hard, competitive environment will always change.
00:22:00
Speaker
You know needs will change about business so it it it has to be that it's in my previous company we want one of our our sales meeting themes was um sort of caring more than everybody else and and it's it's funny because i I remember and this is probably ten years ago and I remember talking to the team and saying, Caring more is actually a ruthless business strategy. Like if you really, really care more than the other people, like that's, that's, that's pretty hard to compete with, but it's gotta, it's gotta be legit. You really have to care about, about the customer and the impact. you Yeah, you're going to have on them. Yeah, no, absolutely. um And I think, you know, again, whatever, like, whatever the strategy, like whether it's caring more or whether it's having like, the better product to demonstrate better value.
Sales as an Extension of Customer's Organization
00:22:47
Speaker
You have to go all in for it. like As I say, with our sales organization, it would the entire sales organization
00:22:53
Speaker
it is fine value for your client. that you're you know You become part of the solution for that customer um because all of use cases are different. like you know Our platform is pretty vast. It adds a normal amount of value like ah across the entire platform. but we have to find the pieces where the real value is. And that's nearly our salespeople have become an extension of that organization. And you know when that organization finds success, success for us naturally follows.
00:23:25
Speaker
Yeah, this is, I love leaning in more and more to to the human side of this.
Internal Culture's Impact on Customer Interactions
00:23:30
Speaker
So i I love having this discussion with you. You've been super generous with your time and your ideas. And a big takeaway from me, some light bulb that really went off was this notion of that internal culture or how it's driving. If, if the way we drive people to do their jobs is going to impact the way we're talking to our customers, that, that lit up for me. So thank you for that idea. great i Appreciate having you here and appreciate your time. Thank you very much