I'd like to share with you the BAT triangle. Behavior, Attitude, Technique.
This is an effective way to diagnose some of your improvements as a salesperson.
I've always loved this tool and this kind of thinking process, and I have the really simple version here. But if you've seen the more expanded version with all the different triangles coming off of it, it gives you much more detail. But even the simple version here is really the one I like for diagnostic purposes. So, let's say that you're having a challenge with prospecting or getting to the right decision makers, or the selling cycle's longer than it should be, or maybe it's selling value…
Let's say you're negotiating price more than you should, or you're not planting your feet and standing your ground on your pricing and your fees as much as you should. This is a really good tool to say:
"Okay, I have a gap here. I have to get better. Where could the problem be?"
The reason I love this tool is it really keeps it simple:
Is it a mindset attitude issue?
Is it more behavior in my goals and my planning and my tracking in my organization?
Or is it a technique issue?
Let's use techniques as an example.
Let's say you're not prospecting as much as you should. You know in your heart of hearts you should be doing more new business development. You should be picking up the phone, reaching out proactively. Well, you can look at techniques. I mean, you can go to Sandler online and into some of the tools that are available in the world today, with really good prospecting techniques. The resources are there. There's no question the techniques are proven. But if my mindset/attitude is:
“I want people to like me, I don't wanna get rejection, I really don't have time for prospecting, or cold calling doesn't work anymore” (which is complete nonsense based on the results we see on a daily basis)….
It doesn't matter how good the technique that I'm applying is, I'm not gonna do it because the mindset will always override the use of technique.
It could be behavior:
It could be that I'm not organized
I don't have the right goals
I don't have the right cookbook
I don't have the right plan for achieving my goals when it comes to prospecting
I haven't defined the numbers of dials and conversations
I haven't done that kind of process where I really have mapped out what I'm trying to do.
Let's say you have situation where you negotiate a price, and you kicked yourself later thinking, "Why did I do that? I could have planted my feet and stood my ground and not wimped when it came to the price." Well, there's some great techniques on how to sell value and not negotiate price. But if my attitude and mindset is that I really don't like talking about money, that will get in the way and override the technique every time.
In my pre call checklist, if I know I'm gonna get a money objection, do I have a role play component to my checklist that says ‘practice the responses’? Maybe some flash cards I've developed with two or three money objections I get, so I’ll be able to have the organization to practice that ahead of time. That's where behavior and technique can blend together.
I would say that 70/80 percent of the time, when I sit and do a coaching session using this simple tool to diagnose an improvement for a salesperson in coaching, they typically come to me and say it's a technique issue. And when we talk through it, there's a lot of this going on that's overriding it. So pick one that you wanna address. And then apply this kind of lens to help you diagnose what challenges you need to overcome.
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