Does One Sales Methodology Trump Them All?

Krissy Manzano: Hi, and welcome to another episode of the Blueprint Roundtable. I’m going to be your host today, Krissy Manzano, and I’ve got Emily Bell and Matt Leweres with me. And today we’re going to be talking about selling methodologies, right? Does one sell sales methodology trump them all? And we’re going from MEDDPICC, you know, versus Spend, to Challenger, to Sandler, you name it.

Krissy Manzano: There’s a lot of them. They are, you know, very much like this is the one. And so, curious your thoughts on this.

Matt Lewers:: Yeah, short answer. No, I don’t think I think it’s helpful to have certain sales methodologies outlined that you would like your team to adhere to. But I don’t think finding somebody that has already gone through that training previously or has been certified in a certain model is going to yield a significant difference in results in their performance.

Matt Lewers:: I think really, this is mostly a sales training, right? My, my perspective on it, having been in sales, managed sales teams and now recruits for sales teams. If you can identify, like, key personas you know, ideal, ideal sales cycles, and deal sizes, those, those type of things naturally are going to follow a similar progression as whatever your current team is doing, whether or not they’re using Sandler where candidate A is coming from versus Challenger for candidate B, and then maybe you’re running MEDDPICC internally a lot of those, if you’re, you know, interviewing and assessing for history of quota attainment and ability to navigate complex long sales cycles and you find that out in the interview process Those individuals can can adopt whatever methodology you want to do.

Matt Lewers:: Yeah, there’s certain ways to to get to a certain outcome, but it’s it’s different vessels for the same destination. I wouldn’t disqualify a candidate because they don’t follow or haven’t been trained in a specific methodology, assuming during the interview process that all of the skills and competencies and relevancy that we’re assessing for check the box.

Emily Bell:: Here, here.

Matt Lewers:: Yes.

Emily Bell:: like it. I would agree with it. I mean, some adds to that. I mean, I mean, absolutely would agree that, you know, there can’t be a singular sales methodology that like dominates the field. I think that by far oversimplifies how complex sales is and sales, I think, can be kind of interpreted as one of those professions that are like, so easy and like, you know, things just come in and close on their own. And depending on what industry you’re selling into our solution or selling, like you can make a lot of people can make those assumptions. And my whole thing is like, if it’s easy, everybody would do it. There’s a reason why not everybody’s in sales. And I think that there’s a lot of different factors on why you can’t subscribe to just one.

Emily Bell:: And what’s interesting is if you read the books on different methods, like the Challenger cell or solution selling or MEDDPICC or MEDDICC, and they’re all, there’s so many that like over laughing things that it’s like. Anytime I’ve ever read any of those, like, Oh, I do some of that. Like, and I do some of that.

Emily Bell:: I think the true incredible sellers that are able to repeat success, no matter what they’re selling, no matter who they’re selling to are the ones that are highly adaptable, that are highly engaging. They know how to build relationships and real trust quickly with people to establish rapport because trust is everything in sales.

Emily Bell:: Whether you’re going to buy from somebody or not, trust keeps the door open in like, but like it absolutely is a fact and any type of sales methodology is great, but in action, if it’s not, if it doesn’t feel natural to the seller, you’re not going to be you. And even if it’s not a malicious reason to not present yourself as who you naturally are, your buyer is going to notice that like we are just innately designed to notice when something is real or not in front of us. It’s a survival instinct. And so I mean, sales is like an anthropological study of the human species of like what works and what doesn’t. But I think the biggest thing is the people that I’ve seen that have done sales for like 15 plus years. I’ve never been on a team of more than three people where we all hit our numbers, but we all do it differently. We all go about doing it in the way that works for us. And I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been given advice. I’m like, Oh, I would say it this way. And it’s like, look, if I say it that way, it’s going to sound weird because I don’t talk like that.

Emily Bell:: So I’ll get to the same end result. But like, you got to trust me that I have confidence in my process and like. It is cool to read about all the different methodologies because it’s a way to kind of organize the noise and realize the patterns of what’s been working and why and where you have seen success, but I’m definitely not a subscriber of one over the other.

Emily Bell:: I think borrow and choose and make your own and make it organically fit to how you communicate with people and you will find far more success than feeling like you have to be rigid into one singular type of process.

Krissy Manzano: Yeah.

Emily Bell:: I clearly have an opinion about it. I know, I know,

Krissy Manzano: Very successful.

Emily Bell:: but yeah, I mean, I think it’s sales is an art.

Emily Bell:: There’s a lot of data and numbers and it’s a numbers game to a certain degree, but it’s an art and it, you do refine those skills over and over again over time and a career in it and do what feels comfortable to you because you will be more successful. And if one particular methodology doesn’t feel right, then don’t do it.

Emily Bell:: Find something else that makes more sense for you. But the really, the big three things is like, know thy product, know thy market, know thy competitor. And however you go about figuring that out, it’s great. Do what makes sense for you. But if you know those three things and whatever you’re doing, like you will be successful in your role. That’s all I got.

Krissy Manzano: Yeah, I think that’s very well said. I look, look, I think all of those, I mean, Charles’ points, like they provide structure, right? And sales is something very much that it’s an art and also you have to have structure because you’re getting so much information, right? Like you always have internal departments that are like, well, sales is the ones that they’re the ones that get paid the most and all these things like, yeah, because they have the most risk that they have to take and they have to understand everything from the product to the marketing landscape to the sales motion and their buyers and all that kind of stuff, right?

Krissy Manzano: It doesn’t mean they work harder. It’s just a lot of information and so those methodologies can help kind of condense that information to add some more structure, but to your point like you’ve got to be comfortable with it, right and even as a leader, the only thing I would add is I remember having a very clear view of like how I was selling and I wanted other people to sell that way.

Krissy Manzano: And like, that’s not, you know, people can’t be lone wolf and just not give updates. That doesn’t work and that’s not okay. Or have no plan. But they can have a different plan than how you plan. Attack things, right? And like, if you think it’s going to fail, you have to let them. If you really think that what you’re doing is better, if not, you might be surprised that they actually can pull through.

Krissy Manzano: So I think those are all good points, but that’s all the time that we’ve got today. So until next time, we’ll see