Soundbites
Sales lessons from overseas service
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nternational development work can teach important lessons for North American sales success. So argues Amanda da Silva, a customer success manager at the Vidyard technology company. da Silva joined a mission to a rural Zambian village to provide solar power for two classrooms. She visited the country quarterly from 2012 to 2015. The group was convinced power would improve quality of life for village residents. They quickly realized “the entire project needed to pivot, because food security was an issue so alarming.” She learned the importance of not imposing an agenda, whether it be on a village or a prospect. “The 80:20 rule should always apply — listen 80%, talk 20%,” she wrote in a blog post. A second challenge was deter-
mining who had authority to do a deal. After negotiating with village Elders, the group learned they had upset the Chief, who had the final say. “Assuming your contact is the decision maker because they’re the one evaluating puts you in a turbulent position as the deal progresses.” After months of research with Canadian agronomists, travel and soil sampling, the group “were ready to plant and had enough corn seed and fertilizer to farm a small village.” Despite estimates their proposals could multiply crop yield many-fold, the fact they had lived in the village for a year, painted schools and introduced solar power, none of the farmers were interested. Only after they did a half-acre, no-till demonstration plot in front of the school and
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the farmers could see the improved germination rate did farmers buy-in to the program. That taught da Silva that relationships are built on trust and convincing. “Whether it’s working in a village or selling technology, I revert back to basic psychology and Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. One requires their most basic needs to be met before realizing other, less essential needs. Listen intently to uncover the most imperative need first, and then provide a solution that can bring immediate value to the table.” Read Amanda’s entire blog, and see pictures related to the project at this link: https://www.linkedin.com/ pulse/how-humanitarian-work-helpedme-succeed-sales-amanda-da-silva-/
The Marketplace November December 2017
