Agile Selling

 

Alexey Cherkasov

Jill Konrath‘s book Agile Selling. Getting up to speed quickly in today’s ever-changing sales world talks about the importance of learning quickly and acquiring new skills, about the agile mindset, about how important it is to be flexible in an ever-changing world.

The book consists of 5 parts, which generally contain 62 chapters.

Part 1. The case for agile.

This part is devoted to the importance of speed in an era of change, as in our time constant change is the norm. The sales managers must learn to adapt to this changing world. Buyers have also changed due to the changes. Now if they have a problem, they go to the Internet and study it there.

The sales managers must learn to adapt to this changing world

The sales managers must learn to understand not only their product but also what is important for the buyer. The emphasis is shifted from the goods to the buyer. In this situation, the speed and agility of learning is your only reliable competitive advantage.

Part 2. The agile mindset.

In this part, Jill Konrath emphasizes the need for the ability to think agilely. In order to learn this, it is necessary to change the view of the situation and stop perceiving problems as a negative event.

When you change your perception and see opportunities instead of obstacles, your brain is filled with energy again. The author also advises learning to perceive failures differently. When you see failure as a valuable experience, everything changes.

See opportunities instead of obstacles

Stress almost disappears and your mindset becomes clearer and more creative. Another tip is the ability to set the right goals. You need to convert goals to result in the goal to help you become better.

Part 3. Learn new info quickly.

The third part will help you open the way to fast learning. It describes a strategy for rapid learning. Jill Konrath also gives tips and practical materials on each strategy for more convenient use.

6 rapid learning strategies:

• 1 – Splitting into parts. The brain loves structure. Breaking up large amounts of information into smaller and more digestible pieces is your main task.

• 2 – Definition of the sequence. At this stage, it is necessary to determine what you should learn first and then.

• 3 – Building connections. Linking new skills and knowledge to what you already know is a great way to improve learning and information reproduction.

• 4 – Release. The key to being able to reproduce a large amount of information is to be able to distract yourself from what you are currently learning so that you can safely return to it later.

• 5 – Practice. Whenever you need to learn a new skill, you need to practice consciously and purposefully. When you train a skill, you reinforce a new pattern of behavior.

• 6 – Prioritization. At the beginning of each day, decide what matters most, and then decide them one by one, not paying attention to all the others.

Part 4. Pick up new skills fast.

After rapid learning, you need to learn and quickly acquire skills. Use personal highs to track your progress. Don’t forget the importance of preparation. It is necessary to conduct a study before each meeting.

Study the company’s website, gather information about people, get acquainted with the previous experience of the client with your product, find out at what stage of decision-making it is. Preparation sets the context. You will be able to understand who your customers are and what is important to them. Clarify your desired meeting results. It is very difficult to plan a meeting clearly, but it is useful.

You need to learn and quickly acquire skills

Connect with questions. Questions are the basis of agility in sales. The ability to ask “strong” questions is the most important skill to master.
Sales is a social skill. Role-playing is the only way to improve your sales skills. Deliberate practice significantly increases the efficiency of sales.
Increase your perceptivity.

The essence of sales is in interaction with people. Decisions are made by people, not companies. Watch people pick up subtle signals and adjust to them. If you increase your perceptivity, you can become more flexible and adjust the course right during the conversation.

In sales, the more you think, the better the results. The more you learn, the more resources you have at your disposal. The more you experiment, the more you succeed. The better your thinking, the more flexible you are in meetings. Focus on personal bests to achieve the best outcomes in any situation.

Part 5. Success habits of agile sellers.

First, you need to make sure that your habits and thinking help you succeed. Make a training plan to speed up your professional development. Make sure that your daily routine obeys you, not the other way around. Your goal is to get answers.

Don’t stop improving yourself; it sets you apart from other sellers. Get rid of multitasking to learn faster and think better. Optimize your attitude if it affects sales. Use games for learning. Games involve the brain in a repetitive process, encouraging it to test all new options.

Don’t stop improving yourself

Jill Konrath’s book is full of motivation, full of practical advice. It teaches how to quickly acquire the necessary knowledge and skills to be able to quickly navigate highly competitive markets. It has a lot of simple and effective techniques, ready-made questions that you can ask yourself and colleagues in order to quickly understand the essence of the work.

This book can be called a step by step instructions for the personal and professional development of the sales managers.

https://tinyurl.com/3psc49rb

The Essential Behavioral Science Reading List for Marketers

I wrote an article here arguing that, to achieve success in 2024 and beyond, marketers will need to be adept at leveraging both the capabilities of technology and data science, and the principles of behavioral science describing how people make decisions. I called technology/data science and behavioral science the yin and yang of high-performance marketing.

Technology and data science have received a great deal of attention in marketing circles. For example, the use of artificial intelligence in marketing has been a hot topic in the industry for the past few years, and the recent tsunami of buzz surrounding ChatGPT and other generative AI applications has been nothing short of astounding.

The use of behavioral science in marketing has received somewhat less attention, even though marketers have been using principles of behavioral science for decades.

Given the importance of technology/data science and behavioral science for marketing, I'll be providing a reading list of the books I've found most useful for learning about these topics. I'll cover books relating to technology and data science in a future post. In this post, I'll describe the books that I think are required reading for marketers who want to leverage behavioral science principles in their marketing efforts.

The following list is by no means comprehensive, and most of the books listed aren't that new. However, these four books will give you a solid foundation in the principles of behavioral science that are relevant to marketing.

Here are my essential must-reads.

Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011)

If you can only read one book about human thinking and decision making, it should be Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman, one of the most influential psychologists in history, and the winner of the 2002 Nobel Prize in economics.

Kahneman can accurately be described as the intellectual "godfather" of behavioral economics. In the 1970's, he and fellow psychologist Amos Tversky collaborated on research regarding the non-rational aspects of human decision making. The work of Kahneman and Tversky laid the foundation for the behavioral science discipline we now call behavioral economics.

In Thinking, Fast and Slow, Kahneman asserts that the cognitive processes people use can be thought of as two "systems."

System 1 (fast thinking) operates automatically, quickly, with little or no effort, and with no sense of voluntary control.

System 2 (slow thinking) consists of thinking processes that are reflective, controlled, deliberative, and analytical.

When we think of ourselves, we identify with System 2, our rational self, but System 1 actually originates many of the impressions and feelings that are the sources of the explicit beliefs and deliberative choices of System 2. Therefore, System 1 exerts a powerful influence on the economic decisions we make, including decisions about the products and services we decide to buy.

The most important lesson for marketers in Thinking, Fast and Slow is that System 1 uses heuristics (mental shortcuts) to generate our impressions, intuitions, and feelings. Astute marketers can use these heuristics to make marketing messages and programs more effective.

Predictably Irrational, Revised and Expanded Edition:  The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions by Dan Ariely (HarperCollins Publishers, 2009)

The original edition of Predictably Irrational was published in 2008, and this book, along with Nudge (discussed below), raised public awareness of behavioral economics and put it on the radar screens of business and marketing leaders.

In Predictably Irrational, Ariely described several experiments that illustrate the many invisible factors that lead us to think and behave in ways that are both irrational and predictable.

Ariely summarized the basic thesis of the book when he wrote:

"If I were to distill one main lesson from the research described in this book, it is that we are pawns in a game whose forces we largely fail to comprehend. We usually think of ourselves as sitting in the drivers seat, with ultimate control over the decisions we make and the direction our life takes; but, alas, this perception has more to do with our desires - with how we want to view ourselves - than with reality."

Nudge:  The Final Edition by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein (Yale University Press, 2021)

The original edition of Nudge was published in 2008, and "nudging" soon became a popular behavior change/management tactic in both the public and the private sectors.

A key lesson for marketers in Nudge is the power of choice architecture, which describes how the arrangement and/or framing of choices or options can affect what choices are made and which option is selected. One example in the book discusses how the order in which food items are arranged in a school cafeteria can lead students to make more healthy eating habits.

Using Behavioral Science in Marketing:  Drive Customer Action and Loyalty by Prompting Instinctive Responses by Nancy Harhut (Kogan Page, 2022)

Thinking, Fast and Slow, Predictably Irrational, and Nudge aren't specifically about the role of behavioral science in marketing. But these books provide insights into human decision making that are essential for marketers to understand if they want to create effective marketing messages and programs.

Using Behavioral Science in Marketing speaks directly to how marketers can leverage principles of behavioral science to improve their marketing efforts.

Nancy Harhut clearly wrote this book for hands-on marketing practitioners. While she provides clear descriptions of the behavioral science principles discussed in the book, and ample citations to the research relating to those principles, her primary focus is on how marketers can apply those principles in real-world situations.

https://tinyurl.com/mrt7adx7

The Science of Marketing

 

Alexey Cherkasov

Dan Zarrella in his book The Science of Marketing: When to Tweet, What to Post, How to Blog, and Other Proven Strategies consistently leads readers along the route of Internet marketing. The book consists mainly of graphs that are based on the research that the author has conducted. Zarrella analyzes a large amount of data related to Internet marketing, and draws patterns based on this information, and also gives the most effective practical suggestions.

The book is divided into 4 parts: content, channels, middle of the funnel (MOFU) and analytics.

The first part of the “Content” consists of 2 chapters and the author talks about e-books and webinars. The second part is devoted to the main channels of Internet marketing and consists of 5 chapters: SEO, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, blogging. The author on the basis of data gives advice on the more effective use of data channels.

SEO

So, regarding SEO, Dan Zarrella says that this channel as an independent industry is no longer relevant. The function that pop-ups used to take on is now the creation and promotion of good content, which itself attracts traffic and generates links. Nevertheless, search traffic is still important. Search engines are the most relevant tools in finding information and making a purchasing decision. Social networks should be used to strengthen your search engine optimization strategy.

Search engines are the most relevant tools in finding information and making a purchasing decision.

In the list of results of each search engine, there are three main types of text, which can be used to determine how fully the necessary attributes are presented on the website: title, description, and the email address field. Site creators need to think about their content, taking into account not only the relevance of keywords and openness to search engines but also the interests of people. If you write a text for people, the headlines will be short and memorable.

Twitter

As for Twitter, according to the author, it is an ideal platform for the distribution of marketing content. Studying Twitter, Zarrella concludes that the more actively words such as “I”, “me”, “we” and “us” are used, the fewer readers the user has. It is important to remember that Twitter users do not subscribe to you to listen to endless stories about your life. The more negative, the fewer readers. People come to the social network for entertainment.

If Twitter is a marketing channel for you, and your goal is to gather a wide circle of loyal subscribers who will distribute your content, it is much better to focus on filling your account with interesting content than answering each message.

It is important to remember that Twitter users do not subscribe to you to listen to endless stories about your life.

If you want someone to post your content, you have to report something new that readers haven’t heard about yet. To establish yourself as a source of reliable new information is the most correct strategy to attract new readers and get retweets.

Facebook

Dan Zarrella gives the following tips for Facebook: Facebook users like to watch photos of other people – if possible, give them more subjects for contemplation and reasons to put a mark. Experiment with different motivations to convince readers to tag your content, but don’t forget that you can directly ask them to do what you need to do.

Facebook is a place where users relax from the work atmosphere, so you need to adapt your corporate content and talk so that they do not have the feeling that he was back in the office.

If creating videos is part of your marketing strategy, use Facebook to promote your videos and think about how to convince your readers to share them. Do not forget that the call to action in the social network should have a context.

Facebook is a place where users relax from the work atmosphere. So you need to adapt your corporate content and talk so that they do not have the feeling that he was back in the office. The more difficult the language is, the fewer the number of users in the census his Facebook. When you write for Facebook, try to avoid clever expressions and jargon. If your company is in the high-tech industry, try to connect your topics with more understandable ideas and stories.

Pinterest

The following observations are interesting on Pinterest: most repins receive images, the description of which consists of 100-200 characters. Words are used to clarify the context of the image, but it should speak about something.

The most frequent words on Pinterest: love, home, items, style, ideas

The most frequent words on Pinterest: love, home, items, style, ideas. Often found in repins: recipe, chicken, minute, bake, pie, cheese, cut, bottle, stage, mix, favorite, excellent.

Blogs

According to the author, blog is the main strategy in social networks. You can design your content like blog posts and then transfer them to social platforms.

As a result of the author’s research, it turned out that for most users, the blog plays a significant role in making decisions about buying. But it must be remembered that it is not enough just to subscribe to bloggers. You have to give something unique and valuable to convince people to give you some of their time.

The number of entries is not as important as the time of publication. If you want to choose the right moment when your audience is most attentive, the easiest way is to send several entries every day at different times. And if you want to experimentally find the perfect day, send notes daily for a week and follow the results.

You have to give something unique and valuable to convince people to give you some of their time.

The more blogs published content, the more views they received. Readers want to hear you talk FROM yourself, not About yourself. Publishing relevant news and starting a discussion about current events earlier than other industry representatives is a great way to provide links to your blog.

Part three “Middle of the funnel (MOFU)” is divided into two chapters.

The first chapter is dedicated to email marketing. The study, which the author conducted, showed a qualitative understanding of the priorities and behavior of email users. According to users, e-mail is a daily task that needs to be performed and which they often do not like. The author also found that the primary way users interact with mailboxes is a dropout. The title of the letter is the main selection criterion. And you also need to mention the sender’s name.

Consider e-mail marketing from the point of view of your subscribers – as a way to give them what they want. When developing a marketing proposal delivery mechanism, try to give consumers something exclusive and do not forget to communicate this clearly.

Consider e-mail marketing from the point of view of your subscribers

Personalization is a classic and still effective solution to this problem for those involved in email marketing. Experiment with images in emails.
Send letters to new subscribers – this is the most grateful audience.

The second chapter in this part is devoted to attracting potential customers – lead generation. The key concept of inbound marketing is that you offer potential customers some valuable content. If you are trying to attract people and offer them something valuable in exchange for their contact information, you need to find something that will interest them.

People prefer content that teaches them something, or tools that will provide them with convenience and success in their work. To take advantage of this information, marketers must first clearly explain what kind of value they offer.

“Free” is one of the most powerful words in a marketer’s arsenal, but they need to be used carefully. Also, landing pages that use the words “competition” or “winner” have a higher conversion rate than those that do not have these words. Try to make your requests look appropriate. Explain the reasons for your questions and explain how you plan to dispose of the data.

“Free” is one of the most powerful words in a marketer’s arsenal

In the fourth part Analytics”, the author talks about the importance of analytical data, and also offers a scientific method in analytics, which consists of the following steps: definition phase, research phase, prototypes, and testing phase.

At the definition phase, you ask and answer the question: “What do I want to improve?”. At the research phase, the question sounds differently: “What does my audience want?”.

At the prototype phase, ask yourself: “What will I test?”. And finally, at the testing phase, you must answer the question: “Which option was more efficient?”. This scientific method is a continuous improvement process, the basis for which becomes your analytical and statistical data.

Dan Zarrella’s book also answers such questions as What to post on Facebook and at what time of the day? How many times a day do tweets? How to use Pinterest to promote your brand? What headlines encourage people to open letters from companies? How to design an effective mailing list? What is better – positive posts or negative? And negative or neutral? All these data are confirmed by studies of the author himself with a large number of graphs, statistical observations, and useful tips.

https://tinyurl.com/24vy9cc8

65 of the best books on planet earth

 Condensed into one list:

If you’re building anything—
a career, a company, or a better life,

These are the books that show up
again and again in the libraries
of leaders, builders, creators,
and decision-makers.

They don’t just share good ideas.

They change how you think, lead, and operate.

Because real breakthroughs don’t come
from more scrolling.

They come from deeper thinking.

And these books will take you there.

Inside you’ll find:

🟢 Creativity tools
🟠 People & EQ titles
🔵 Team culture guides
🟣 Startup and launch books
🟡 Self-mastery books
🔴 Leadership reads
🟤 Strategy plays

One book can shift your values.

One idea can change your decisions.

One page can stop bad habits from repeating.

One insight can build the life you actually want.

It only looks small—until it’s not.

https://tinyurl.com/4apzet9d