The New Rules of Sales and Service: How to Use Agile Selling, Real-Time Customer Engagement, Big Data, Content, and Storytelling to Grow Your Business
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  • Wiley

More About This Title The New Rules of Sales and Service: How to Use Agile Selling, Real-Time Customer Engagement, Big Data, Content, and Storytelling to Grow Your Business

English

Sales and service are being radically redefined like never before. With buyers now in possession of unlimited information, online content is quickly becoming the dominant driver for commerce. Today anyone working in sales or customer service needs to possess entirely new skills. Unfortunately most organizations are still using traditional selling and service models developed for a different time.

In this new book by the author of the #1 bestseller The New Rules of Marketing & PR, David Meerman Scott demystifies the new digital commercial landscape and offers inspiring and valuable guidance for anyone not wanting to be left behind.

Rich with revealing, first-hand accounts of real businesses that are charting this new territory and finding astounding success — a bicycle manufacturer that engages customers with honest and revealing openness; an enterprising network of home basement repair contractors that educates clients with free publications and innovative visual software; and an independent physician who provides her patients with online video notes to help them follow detailed medical instructions — The New Rules of Sales & Service shows how innovative businesses large and small are discovering new opportunities, strengthening customer loyalty, and mastering real-time buyer satisfaction.

Among the topics covered in detail:

Why the old rules of sales and service no longer work in an always-on worldThe new sales cycle and how informative Web content drives the buying processProviding agile, real-time sales and service 24/7 without letting it rule your lifeThe importance of defining and understanding the buyer personasHow agile customer service retains existing clients and expands new businessWhy content-rich websites motivate interest, establish authority, and drive salesHow social media is transforming the role of salesperson into valued consultant

Required reading for any organization that interacts with the public — ranging from independent consultants to established large corporations and small businesses to new start-ups and non-profits — The New Rules of Sales & Service is the essential guidebook for anyone attempting to navigate the exciting and evolving digital landscape.

Note: The New Rules of Sales & Service is neither an update nor a sequel to The New Rules of Marketing & PR; rather it complements the earlier book. Each book focuses on and outlines different strategies: Marketing and PR use online content to reach many buyers at once; Sales and Service use online content to reach buyers one at a time. The New Rules of Sales & Service tailors its strategies and tactics to reflect this difference.

English

DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT is an internationally acclaimed marketing and sales strategist whose books and blog are must-reads for professionals seeking to generate attention in ways that grow their business. Scott’s advice and insights help people, products and organizations stand out, get noticed and capture hearts and minds. He is author or co-author of ten books three are international bestsellers. The New Rules of Marketing & PR, now in its 4th edition, has been translated into 26 languages and is used as a text in hundreds of universities and business schools worldwide. It is a modern business classic with over 350,000 copies sold so far. Scott also authored Real-Time Marketing & PR, a Wall Street Journal bestseller, Newsjacking, and World Wide Rave. He co-authored Marketing the Moon and Marketing Lessons from The Grateful Dead.

A graduate of Kenyon College, Scott has lived in New York, Tokyo, Boston, and Hong Kong. He is a marketer in residence and on the board of advisors of HubSpot, and on the board of advisors of ExpertFile, GrabCAD, VisibleGains, GutCheck, and Newstex. He also advises nonprofits and is on the advisory board of the Grateful Dead Archive at UC Santa Cruz, and a member of the digital media advisory board of HeadCount.

Check out his blog at www.WebInkNow.com, follow him on Twitter @dmscott, or download his free iPhone or iPad application.

English

Introduction 1

The Time Is NOW 5

Living in the Past: The Old School of Sales and Service 7

First Marketing and PR, Now Sales and Service 8

The New Rules of Marketing and PR Are Now Widely Adopted 9

Living Real-Time and Mobile Has Changed Everything We Do 10

Why Sales and Service Are Experiencing a Revolutionary Transformation 11

Restoring the Human Touch: The Compelling Power of Authenticity 12

The Importance of Story 13

Social Media Is All about Connecting and Sharing 13

Content Drives Sales and Service 14

We’re All in Sales and Service Now 14

Online Content That Informs, Entertains . . . and Sells Insurance 15

Learning from Examples: How the Successes of Others Can Provide Ideas and Options for Your Own Organization 17

1 The Old World of Sales and Service 19

The Old Sales Model: “Dialing for Dollars” 19

The Voice of Authority: When the Salesperson Was the Expert 20

The Salesperson Expert versus the Web-Educated Buyer 22

“These Sales Leads Stink!” 24

Tell the Truth: The Power of Authenticity 24

Customer Disservice: The Little Things That Drive Us Crazy 27

“Please Take a Moment to Complete Our Survey”: All Take and No Give 28

“There’s a Robocall on Line One. It Says It’s Urgent.” 30

Receiving an Email Address Is Not an Invitation to Spam 32

Adding Social Media to Old School Sales and Support Is Still Old School 33

The Old Rules of Sales and Service 34

2 The New Rules of Sales and Service 37

Setting Down the Rules 37

Living Up to Their Name: OPEN Communications to Customers 40

The Communications Revolution That Wasn’t Televised 45

Time to Join the Revolution 48

An Invaluable Sales and Service Asset: Your Employees 49

Big Data. Rich Data. 50

An Underground Business Cooks Up Innovative Sales and Service to Discover a Menu for Success 52

Navigating Your Sales and Service Plan 55

3 Your Story 57

Storytelling 57

“Let Me Tell You a Little Bit about Me”: The Story Customers Tell Themselves 58

Call Larry: How One Entrepreneur’s Story Defines a Company 59

The New Model: The Salesperson as Consultant 60

Mastering the Art of Effective Storytelling for Any Organization 64

The Health Club That Tells Its Story by Exercising an Attitude 66

“What Happens Next?”: How a Compelling Narrative Builds a Following 69

4 Integrating Marketing and Sales with Buyer Personas 73

Creating Magic by Adding Context to Content 73

The Power of Content That Provides Exactly What You Need 75

The Nobis Hotel Sells to David Meerman Scott 76

Making Stuff Up 78

Annoying Three out of Four Customers 78

Egocentric Nonsense 80

Buyer Personas 80

No Red Alfa Romeo? 82

Multiple Personality Order 83

The Buyer Persona Interview 84

GoPro Keeps Its Buyer Personas in Focus and Sells Millions of Cameras 88

Close the Gap between Sales and Marketing 90

Buyer Persona Interview 92

Buyer Persona Profile 94

Midnight Oil 96

Sales and Marketing Working Together 97

People Reaching People 98

5 The Sales Cycle Is Now the Buying Cycle 99

We’re Buying. So Stop Selling. 99

The End of the High Pressure Zone 102

Mingling with Buyers at the Learning Party 103

Educate and Inform 105

The Buyers’ Journey 106

Driving People into the Buying Process 107

The Collective Intelligence of a Million Mechanical Engineers Creates a Unique Marketplace . . . and More 108

Now Raise Your Hand (Please) 109

Got Square Footage? 110

The Merging of Sales and Content to Facilitate the Close 111

A Customer for Life 113

Lead Generation Calculus 113

Growing Business in a Shrinking Industry . . . without Leads 115

Please Don’t Squeeze the Buyers 117

Can I Have Your Phone Number? 117

Lessons from the Grateful Dead 118

The Hybrid Lead Generation Model 120

Defining Your Business in the Marketplace 121

Are You Watching Your Direct Competition or Your Customers? 123

Learning from Outside Your Comfort Zone 124

Do You Even Need Salespeople? 125

The Product That Virtually Sells Itself 127

Good for You, but What about the Rest of Us? 129

6 Agile, Real-Time Social Sales 131

The Quickest Wins My Business 131

The Ideal: Agile Sales 132

The Decisive Advantage: Speed 134

Context: The Key to Unlock Every Buyer 136

Newsjacking to Find Buyers 137

Ronnie Dunn’s Real-Time Disruption 138

The Art and Science of Newsjacking to Reach Buyers and Create Real-Time Sales Opportunities 139

Newsjacking: One Lawyer Considers the Legal Implications 142

Automation Runs Amok 143

When Real-Time Sales Put You at the Front of the Line 146

Who Is Selling Whom? 147

Agile Sales Require a Real-Time Mind-Set 148

Agile Sales Mean Going Off Script 150

Big Data Plus Real-Time Technology Drives Sales 150

Predictive Analytics 152

Social Selling and Your Customer Relationship Management 157

Brawn or Brains? 160

Buying Signals! 162

7 The New Service Imperative 163

Busted Dishwasher. Great Service. 163

What Is Customer Service Anyway? 165

The Elements of Customer Service 166

Customer Service and Corporate Culture 167

Content Creation 167

Great Customer Service Drives Sales 168

Getting Sales and Service into Alignment 168

Poor Customer Service Is the Norm 169

Teaching Customers to Wait for a Sale 171

A Clear Picture of How Great Service Generates Additional Leads 172

A Nonprofit Changes the Rules of Charitable Reporting While Also Changing the World 173

“I Hope Everyone Who Works for Your Company Burns in Hell” 176

Great Customer Service Starts in Person 179

Customer Service “Wow!” 180

First, Educate and Inform Your Customers 181

Surveys: Your Opportunity to Gather Real Data 182

Using Customer Feedback to Grow Revenue 186

How to Conduct a Survey That Helps Grow Revenue 187

8 Agile, Real-Time Social Service 191

Embracing Change 191

The Real-Time Customer Engagement Mind-Set 192

How Boeing Used Real-Time Communications during the 787

Dreamliner Crisis 193

Putting Your Customers First 196

Customer Service Using Social Media 197

Vodafone Egypt Proves Social Customer Service Works Worldwide 200

People Want to Do Business with Other People 202

Lost in Clinical Gobbledygook 203

Terrible Healthcare Customer Service 204

Healthier Patients through Video Customer Service in Healthcare 205

Making Clients Feel More Connected 208

Making Healthcare Personal 209

Customers and Business Growth 212

Implementing Agile Customer Service 213

9 The Social You 215

When the World’s Attention Turns to Your Expertise 216

Getting Social 219

Why Social Networking Is like Exercise 220

People You Know 221

You’re Already Online 221

Building a Fan Base One Download at a Time 222

Don’t Hide in the Shadows 223

You Are Not a Cat 225

Building a Following 226

Tweeting Yourself into a Job 227

Inbound Job Search 229

Achieving Your Dreams 230

10 Your Social Company 235

Building the Social Selling Process into a Large Organization 235

Hiring for Social Success 239

Sales Managers Must Adapt, Too 241

Training for Social Success 242

A New Kind of Company 244

Your Sales and Service Ecosystem 246

Your Turn 247

Acknowledgments 249

About the Author 250

Index 251

Have David Meerman Scott Speak at Your Next Event! 260

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