Transcript
brian: Welcome to another episode of Close Mode. I'm Brian Dietmeyer CEO of Close Strong. And today I'm super lucky to be here with Elisabeth Marino, who's the current president of the Revenue Enablement Society. And I have some questions for you about that.
brian: yeah Held enablement positions with SEMrush and LiveRamp, if I remember correctly. But I also love the work you do with with Journeys End, Refugee Services, and a Girl Scout troop lead.
brian: And I just found out your daughter's and in in the armed services, which is even cooler. So like like mama, like daughter, welcome to the show.
Elisabeth: Thank you very much.
brian: So we you and I were having chat about a week ago, and we were talking about reps struggling with customers diagnose their own problems, usually poorly, prescribe their own solution, usually poorly.
Elisabeth: Mm-hmm.
brian: and And you and I morphed into this dialogue about internal customers tend to do that to sales enablement professionals, that internal customers diagnose their own problem, come to us and say, here's the solution.
Elisabeth: Mm-hmm.
Elisabeth: Mm-hmm.
brian: And then we execute it. And so we're going to talk about how to fix that. But just prior to that, I'd love to hear and in this reasonably new role about Revenue Enablement Society.
brian: what What are your goals for the year? What's what's happening there?
Elisabeth: So the Revenue Enablement Society is taking very seriously the rapid change in the sales market and the procurement market as things are becoming AI boosted or AI entirely.
Elisabeth: So procurement is being done through EMS systems and other systems where AI is taking your buying criteria, such as you have established it, and applying it to what it finds on the internet and then serving you back however many options you've asked for, you know, three, four, five, for you to take a deeper dive.
brian: Yep.
brian: yep
Elisabeth: And what happens is that because of this, buyers are entering the sales cycle even later than they did before. So during COVID, when everybody went remote, we saw people entering the sales cycle instead of at the early introduction process, they started entering the sales cycle mid-discovery.
Elisabeth: And now with folks that are receiving inbound leads from these AI-boosted procurement or AI completely independent procurement the The buyer comes in thinking they're already at the negotiation stage.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: And what that does is it really changes the way that sellers have to sell because they still need to do that discovery.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: They still need to touch on latent pains. They still need to create the life cycle of the use of the project, right? Whatever the product is or whatever the service is, they need to understand, do you have the precursor that you need? And do you understand the dependencies down the line?
Elisabeth: They have to do all of that work, but the buyer doesn't think so.
brian: yeah
Elisabeth: The buyer thinks, hey, I'm ready to pay my money. I'd like to pay 20% than you're asking and let's get on with it.
brian: Right, right.
Elisabeth: So this is a really big shift. Maybe the biggest shift we've seen in sales in more than a decade. that the The COVID shift was big.
Elisabeth: This is bigger.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: So there are, particularly at the enterprise level, There are companies that are being completely boxed out because their web presence is not AI enabled or optimized.
Elisabeth: Remember SEO was the biggest thing for a while.
brian: Yeah. yeah
Elisabeth: And then your site needed to be voice optimized because people were talking to their computers or their Alexa. Well, now you need to be AI optimized or when your AI procurement bot goes searching the internet, you may not be one of those three to five options.
Elisabeth: that gets served up to senior leadership. So we're all in on ai all of that to say, we're all in on AI and we're all in on helping our membership understand what to do about it, how to have the conversation with your sellers, how this can actually seriously increase your closing ratio if you approach it right, and how completely out of a job you're gonna be if you do not know how to assist AI-boosted products
brian: Yeah.
brian: Yeah. It's, it's interesting. I have an investor who is CSO of a huge consumer products company and and he's seeing this, right? He's selling to a lot of retail organizations and and they're seeing some of this.
brian: Yeah. It's in, going to, we're going to jump into our our second topic here in a second, but you just bring up such a really interesting point that I see. that the role of a seller now, given where the buyer has gone based on what you just said is we, we've always reacted to their decision process. What, what is your decision process? And I feel like so something just clicked in my mind that with the buyers that far ahead,
brian: I've ah've been arguing this on this show and and just in regular business conversations that we need to now know better than the buyer, how they should be buying, who should be involved. What are the criteria? Because, and and you just linked it up for me that they're kind of at that stage.
brian: And so if we're going to meet them there, we can't be asking, we need to lead them. So thank you. That.
Elisabeth: So but that's a perfect analogy to something that just happened to one of my friend's daughters. She bought a new house, brand new house, brand spanking new. No one ever did anything there. And she bought a washer and a dryer and the dryer was delivered as was the washer.
Elisabeth: None of those hoses that connect the washer to the walk to the water, none of those tubes that connect the dryer to the outside came with her appliances.
Elisabeth: And those are the kinds of things, the kinds of mistakes that we don't want our customers to make, right? These are very small dependencies.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: You can call the appliance store, they'll have them ready when you get there. But these are real dependencies and no one taught my friend's daughter how to buy appliances, right? And that you need this extra stuff.
Elisabeth: and And we need to do that for our buyers who may also not understand both the preparation and the downline dependencies.
brian: They, they, they do not. And we're cheating into our other topic, but I'm fine with it because I think you and I both agree that like, this is a, this is a really important thing. And one of, you know, it's funny.
brian: I had, I wish I would have said this, but I got this from, from one of my clients who said, you know, buyer buyers are sort of like veterinarians, right? You get a snake, a mouse, a monkey walking in all day long and you have to and treat these different animals where we're, we're sort of like surgeons.
Elisabeth: Mm-hmm.
brian: We're not only surgeons, we're neurosurgeons and we're spinal specialists. We have watched people buy our stuff over and over and over again, where that buyer might be buying this thing once every year or two years. And they're not that good at it, which is kind of the point I just heard you making, which is why it lands back to saying we we do have these best practices internally.
brian: We've watched people. Sub optimally buy, optimally buy, and we can share those. So this this is a huge opportunity. Yeah, it's it's so cool to hear that Revenue Enablement Society is leaning into this because you're right, it it is a massive shift.
brian: So but's let's talk a little bit about, I love this idea of...
brian: those who are leading revenue enablement groups, not simply being order takers, which is what we've asked for our reps, just do not be fulfillment. And that's what you made me think of and when we talked about this last time. So yeah, tell tell me a little bit about that. What's what's the problem with with internal customers of revenue enablement diagnosing their own problem, prescribing their own solution, and we simply react to it and fill that order?
Elisabeth: So when a stakeholder comes to enablement, inevitably they have a pain point that is affecting one of the OKRs that they get measured on for the year. And what most folks think of enablement as is the folks who train and create on the job behavior change.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: And yet, the way we think of ourselves is we optimize processes. So we remove friction points. Is the friction point the product?
Elisabeth: Are we literally selling the wrong thing to the wrong people? Is the friction point that we're now using a tool that's outdated or not functioning properly? Is the friction point communication between two departments? maybe Maybe legal is taking way too long, right, to validate a deal. And time kills all deals, as we know.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: You know, so our job is to be a detective, to go into the the end result that they're looking for and move backwards through the process until we find the friction point that affects that outcome.
Elisabeth: So when we're asked to train something, unless you can tell me that it's not a communication problem or a tool problem or a process problem or a market fit problem, right?
Elisabeth: Then I have a lot of homework to do and my goal
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: is to solve your problem. It is not to give you what you asked for. So correct.
brian: Yeah. Well, and it's even, Elizabeth, I wonder, I feel like it's even helped you diagnose your problem, right? even Maybe even a level up from that. And so it i wonder, like, what what's the process?
brian: Like, if if you're going to interrupt their process, I feel like we as enablement professionals have got to bring back, i say, for okay, maybe maybe that, just like we would with a customer.
brian: and Okay, maybe that's one option, but that means we need to have kind of a diagnostic process in place, right?
Elisabeth: Absolutely. And I am a big fan of having an enablement intake form and whether this is something that you do async or sync, you do need to ask the questions. First of all, who's your executive sponsor?
Elisabeth: Who's going to help you get your point heard by the right people and get your wisdom followed? Somebody made this ask, maybe they don't have the power, right? So you need to go up the chain. So who's the executive sponsor? One,
Elisabeth: What's the outcome that we're looking for? Two. And what's the outcome we have now? Three. All of those things are table stakes. And then I like to leave the process of how we're gonna get there out.
Elisabeth: I don't want someone to say, i need a training or I need a this or I need a that. I prefer, why do you think this is happening? and ask them to diagnose what they think is happening.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: But it's still my job to take a 360 view and just walk my way back through the process. After that, we need a timeline. When do you need this solved by? And we also need to have some options as to who can we involve?
Elisabeth: Can we just involve frontline sellers? Are we also involving CSMs? Are we involving frontline managers? right like How far up the food chain are you comfortable with me going without coming back to you and talking about it again?
brian: yeah
Elisabeth: And once we have that information, then we know what we can go and diagnose. so That's where I like to start.
Elisabeth: And then once I have a look at those things, I'm going to look at related leading and lagging indicators. I'm going to go to RevOps or SalesOps and get as many numbers as I can to see if there's a crack in the foundation ahead of the problem you noticed.
Elisabeth: Maybe it's bigger than you thought, or maybe it happens earlier than you thought.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: And then we'll go from there.
brian: Yeah. I, the thing that keeps coming to mind is like, there's there's all these levers we can pull, right? There's a problem in which, which lever, which dial to return and the dial that's turned to a lot. which I think is just based on legacy practices is, well, our salespeople need to be trained.
brian: so So let's just write, you know, here's here's the business problem and let's just go train them.
Elisabeth: Yep.
brian: And that's what keeps coming to mind. And that might be the right thing in some instances, but I feel like that levers pulled a lot or let's just add another tool.
Elisabeth: Yep. And you know what? I'm fine if the answer is training. I don't mean to be down on training.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: I love training, but training is one leg of a three-legged stool.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: If you're going to train something, you cannot do one and done because study after study after study after study shows it doesn't work. You need to train and you need to have a reinforcement plan and you need to have an accountability plan.
Elisabeth: And that's one of the reasons that we get that executive sponsor. When we work out what the result is and it's a training plan, I'm going to serve the training plan and the reinforcement plan and the accountability plan back to the executive sponsor.
Elisabeth: so that they understand that I'm not staffed for this. I'm not staffed for all of the reinforcement and accountability that's involved in this level of behavior change.
Elisabeth: So we need to build it into frontline manager experiences and senior leadership experiences. I'm a big fan of what I refer to as the five minute accountability and reinforcement plan.
Elisabeth: Most things that we ask our sellers to change can in fact be holding them accountable reinforced within five minutes. And that can be added to any one-on-one.
Elisabeth: Once we ask for more than five minutes of a frontline manager's time in their one-on-one, we lose.
brian: Yep.
Elisabeth: They don't have it.
brian: Well, you you and I, you and I were, well, we're just looking at some data, right?
Elisabeth: They don't have a time.
brian: From the the research we did. and And very quickly, like we're looking at high performing teams and low performing teams and what kind of investments they made. and are planning on making this year. and And it was fascinating. If you recall the data we went through, the high performing teams had much higher win rates.
brian: They were meeting their overall goals at at a higher rate. And one of the simple punches that came out of this, it wasn't i was looking at what are they investing in? But what we learned from that research, it's the high and low performers were both investing in similar stuff.
brian: The difference was how they approached it. And you just hit that. Like people who are doing training or people who are who were buying tools.
Elisabeth: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
brian: there was There was a pull through plan. And I feel like that's such a legacy practice in our space of check the thing off, roll it out. And it was crystal clear, like three to five acts, the high performers were were achieving better results and they were taking putting at least as much emphasis on pull through as they were on acquisition of whatever it was they were bringing in.
brian: So I do, go ahead.
Elisabeth: we We do our frontline managers a disservice by not teaching them how to manage reinforcement and how to manage accountability. But these five minute accountability plans that I that i talk about lot actually are as simple as, okay a team, this week, I want you to try the new skill and I want you to send me three snippets of a call that you think you did it well, three snippets of a call that you think it went sideways.
Elisabeth: right? No one knows whether the manager ever listens to those, but every manager has time to receive an email.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: And then you have the opportunity when they come in for their one-on-one to say, now describe the skill to me again. That's reinforcement. You can correct them if they describe it poorly.
Elisabeth: That's reinforcement. And then you ask them about the call that went well. Why do you think it went well? Again, you don't have to have listened to the call. And then We ask them about the call that they think went poorly. Why do you think it went poorly?
Elisabeth: All of this is reinforcement. All of this holds the rep accountable.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: And most managers, in my experience, can do it in three minutes, not even five. This is not rocket science, but we don't teach our frontline managers how to do it.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: We want them to be responsible for it, but I think we expect them to psychically know how it works.
brian: Yeah. Well, but you you you also get after the issue that I've heard for the last year and a half of
Elisabeth: Yeah.
brian: Managers just do not have time to coach, whether it's skill coaching or deal coaching, which we're learning are two radically different things. Let's focus on the individual skills versus let's get this deal closed.
brian: we could have a whole other episode on that one, but managers don't have time.
Elisabeth: Yep.
brian: So you've put it in the perspective of, hey, do it in three to five minutes. It's interesting because I was interviewing a CRO on this podcast and and his response was make time, which, you know, really, no, but it it's, I loved his notion because it's like, what are you doing that's that's more important than,
brian: than pulling through. And, but that's also an easier said than done thing. every Every frontline leader I know is slammed, absolutely slammed, but I did, you know, again, it's, it's, it's a tough statement, make time, you got to do it.
brian: But so I wonder, let's let's go back to the, the diagnosis and prescription to your internal customers.
Elisabeth: Mm-hmm.
brian: And this struck me after our last conversation.
Elisabeth: yeah
brian: So for, for folks that are sitting in as a revenue enablement lead, This requires you to push back on people a level or two levels, maybe three levels above you.
brian: and And it occurred to me when you and I were talking like that, that's kind of a diplomacy skill, right?
Elisabeth: film
brian: What guidance would you have for people? How how do you challenge someone and say, and in essence, you're not going to say you don't have the problem right. You don't have a solution right. What's a diplomatic way to change that conversation with those internal executives?
Elisabeth: i would I would suggest a couple of things. First off, think of yourself as anything but sales enablement. Think of yourself as a mechanic or a plumber or a doctor.
Elisabeth: If somebody comes in and says, you know, my stomach's very upset, give me some aspirin. right? You would readily say it doesn't work that way. Or if somebody hires a plumber to fix their toilet and they say, I don't want it to cost more than $25, the plumber would say it doesn't work that way, right?
brian: Yes.
Elisabeth: So so have some comfort and some respect for the fact that you are an expert and you do know that some things don't work that way. And ultimately, every time that you give a bad answer to senior leadership, they lose more faith
brian: the
Elisabeth: in enablement.
brian: yes
Elisabeth: If you want enablement to be respected, if you want enablement to have all of that trust from senior leadership, you got to tell them the truth and you got to tell them what works.
brian: if
Elisabeth: So let's just make that table stakes, right? Let's just pretend we're not going to tell them what they want to hear anymore because we want to be respected and we want to be trusted.
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: And then you explain you know, I appreciate your input and I'll look into that, but I'm also going to look into X, Y, Z because I've found that sometimes that's cheaper and more effective.
Elisabeth: These are two words that our senior leadership love, cheaper and effective, right?
brian: yeah
Elisabeth: And then they're very open to you having a different idea if it's going to save them money and if it's going to save them time, right? Another thing that I'm very fond of saying is I want to make sure we only solve this problem once and that it doesn't come up again.
Elisabeth: So give me some time to validate your concern. Validate, another word they love, right?
brian: I love that. Yeah.
Elisabeth: So you got speak their language to some extent, but you also have to start with the respect for yourself and your your expertise that says,
brian: Yeah.
Elisabeth: The first answer is often not the right answer. Senior leadership could be 100% right, but if you don't validate that, you're never going to know, are you?
brian: Yeah, well, and it's it it sure elevates the role.
Elisabeth: Right? So...
brian: And strangely enough, what comes to mind is I've i've done some work in procurement organizations and and there's this thing in procurement you're probably familiar with, share of spend. How much of the company's spend goes through procurement? And and I remember talking to to the CPO at American Airlines. How do you increase share of spend?
brian: and And it's by being a more strategic resource to the people who are buying stuff. And that's what just came to mind. It's the same kind of shared service that that procurement might be. and And we want to increase, maybe it's not sheriff's been left to figure out what it is, but yeah, it's, you become a more strategic resource to those folks.
brian: They come to you earlier in the process, which is also a procurement,
Elisabeth: yep
brian: Frustration. They come to me at the end and go put this deal together with this supplier. And it's the same thing. It's building credibility of the function to say, I need you involved earlier because I'm i'm going to have a better solution.
brian: And yeah, you you also made me think of that old notion of measure twice, cut once. Yeah.
Elisabeth: Absolutely.
brian: yeah
Elisabeth: And, and, you know, Why are we building these great resumes? Why are we learning five different sales me methodologies and getting all these certifications? If we're just going to pretend we don't know any of that nod and smile when somebody asks us for the wrong thing, let's stop that.
brian: yeah yeah
Elisabeth: You know, let's do the job they're paying us for. They don't always want us to do it. They want the answer that they think is the, is going to do it. But what they want more is they want the right answer.
brian: yep yep this is this is a really good and powerful message i mean that as sincerely as i can say and and And I think that that's a great note to end on. It's give us that confidence to do that. You've been super gracious with with your time and your ideas getting ready for this and and executing today. And I really appreciate it.
brian: And I think we need to follow up and talk about this AI shift. You're onto something there. And I'd love to hear, obviously, you're thinking about it at the Revenue Enablement Society level. and And i think yeah I think we should talk about that more because I agree it's a great shift. But again, thank you so much for your time.
Elisabeth: You're welcome. Thank you so much for having me.
