Hire Sales Reps With a SMB Mentality

Small business owners like to buy from companies that they have a personal connection with and your sales team can often be the only people your SMB prospects meet with before making a purchasing decision.

The difference between getting a sale or not is often how well that salesperson can relate to the entrepreneur. Companies looking to sell to small businesses should therefore hire salespeople who have had direct or indirect entrepreneurial experiences in their careers so they can better connect with their SMB prospects.

Andy Birol explains this concept in an interview with Anita Campbell:

[Y]ou should always give your small business accounts - whether they're prospects or customers - to individuals that have had at least a close encounter of the second kind, if not the first. For example, Lowes and Home Depot always hire individuals in their stores that have been contractors, so that when a contractor comes in, they're speaking to somebody that can identify with what it means to be a small business. So, if you can't hire ex-small business owners yourself, or retired ones, look around and see if you can at least hire their kids. Or hire folks that have already worked in a small business.

Advice To Sell To Entrepreneurs

I recently came across an article Andy Birol wrote on selling. In the article he gives advice for selling to employees, C-level executives, and small business owners. Here is what he wrote for selling to entrepreneurs:

Owner entrepreneurs are in many ways the most unusual to sell. Regardless of their success, they go through the following stages towards success:

1. Owners first dread the potential of failing, particularly if it makes them miss a payroll, threatens their independence, or ultimately results in having to work for someone else.
   
   
2. Once an owner's fear of failure is over, their next focus is on increasing their company's wealth by producing quality products purchased by grateful customers.
   
   
3. After gaining this success, owners turn their attention next to creating their legacy, first as a successful business owner and thereafter as a creator of greater social good.

Those most successful at selling to owners know to sell to the right "step" for their prospects. They are most often other entrepreneurs like attorneys, financial planners, consultants, or coaches. Why? Because entrepreneurs often turn to those like themselves. Unlike the corporate market, entrepreneurs respect and respond to the success, individualism, and risk taking of those vendors who walk in similar shoes. Therefore, the lessons learned when selling to entrepreneurs are:

• Sell to your prospect "owner-to-owner".
  
  
• Sell as much to the person across the table as to his or her company; they are indivisible.
  
  
• Appeal first to their business needs to gain their attention but understand their egos and personalities.
  
  
• Display both empathy as well as the ability to lead them to success.