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Hey there! I'd love to hear about how others have gained buy-in from sales leadership to hold their teams accountable to participate in the reference program: 1. through nominating references, and 2. following the correct process for requesting references. Here's our situation:
Nominations: Though references typically come from/are managed by CX, we've realized that the references we really need in our program (executives, who we want to turn into advocates) are owned by Sales. We've tried in the past to ask for Sales to nominate references, providing all the reasoning as to why it matters, to no avail. I don't have quite enough data yet to showcase how reference calls accelerate deals or increase win rate.
Requests: No specific through-line on reasoning here, but it seems to be the classic back-pocket reference situation.
Ultimately, the leaders typically agree with everything we say about why participation is important, but when it comes down to it, there's little desire to follow-through.
We've definitely experienced similar. We had success creating a form for sales people to submit when they had their own reference for a deal. We told them we didn't want to get in the way of their relationships, we just wanted to know what convos were happening so we could track it and make sure we don't burn advocates out. Since it was a pretty low lift ask, most of them were OK filling it out.
Unfortunately, we also got people on board when they started to see the negative effects of their approach. They would burn customers out and wonder why they weren't answering anymore and then come to us to ask for help. It opened the door to a good convo so they understood why we were there to support their deals.
Lastly, we have win slides with AE's talking about deals we set up references for and the impact it had on their deal. Seeing top sellers using our team helped encourage them to do so, too. We also have some key advocates within the sales teams who tell the new hires on their teams about us, how to work with us, etc. I get a lot of new AE's saying "Nory told me to reach out to you" and so it's been great to have key people pushing our message without us having to. Building those strong relationships has been key!
Are incentives an option? For example, offer a gift card (the more $ the better) for the first ten sales reps who nominate an account that results in a deliverable (sales reference, case study slide, Gartner review, etc)
In a previous role (not most current), we made heroes out of those in sales who nominated advocates by doing some extra activities for them and their customers. Simple things like funding a go-live celebration, hosting a champagne toast for the customer to honor their team, etc. Took lots of photos and made a big deal out of it. It's the carrot approach.
At another job, we took the stick approach and went to the head of North America sales, showed him the numbers of how his team used more of our time and references than any other geo yet nominated the least. He gave his team a quota of advocate nominations, which worked for a while (until he left).
@Jennifer Eberhart if you're interested in workshopping - I am just building a program out for our org! Would be happy to zoom.
As a former sales leader would love to offer support!
“Sales will be sales” when asked to change, especially if they don’t see immediate or easy impact for them. They may understand the overarching value, but based on being busy etc, nominating and following the process haven’t been prioritized.
I’d get curious- with them.
Solicit feedback from (1) the biggest pain in the *sses, (2) those with high influence (3) those that follow the process now
Ask why?
The experience.
The resistance.
What would make the change easy
My experience is that it’s generally a combo of some of these factors:
Nominations:
• too many things to think about from closing a deal handoff to trying to close their next deal
• Sales are sometimes more shy or scared to probe customers then you’d imagine
• They don’t think it should be there job 😡
Process:
• potentially too many restrictions
• Just not in the habit
• they need one fast
The key is to really pinpoint the specific challenges and allow them to feel part of the solution
Part of the resell in, is showing them the value- I know, most obvious statement!
How?
• data- and this can come in so many forms but look for stories to help paint the picture you’re trying to paint
• Whisper campaign- get the people using the program to spread the word! When people are back channeling on slack, ping a rep to chime in to say to use the program- or sales leadership at that!
• sell the wins! Share the success stories in public ways. Slaws love seeing their name get positive shout outs in front of their peers and leaders, create the FOMO!
• Have a sales leader tag y’all in the slack deal announcement to share you were a part of it- basically normalizing that using the program is something to celebrate. Sales often feel like they’re supposed to do it all on their own
These are fee thoughts without knowing more context. Happy to have a call of it would help!
Thanks everyone, for your feedback! This is all super valuable.
@Gianna Scorsone I love the thought process of asking for their challenges in order to workshop and then make them feel part of the solution. Also really love the idea of getting tagged in the Win Wire announcements - while we typically have low visibility from Sales on a lot of Slack channels, the Win Wire always gets a ton of eyes and engagement.