Building Successful Sales Teams with Eric Klein, CEO of Sales Results Accelerator

Welcome. Dear listeners to the speak in flow, podcast. Where we dive into strategies to help you and your team achieve maximum potential and flow.

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Melinda Lee: Today I have an amazing leader.

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Melinda Lee: Eric Klein. He's the CEO and founder of sales results. Accelerator.

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Melinda Lee: Hi, Eric.

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Eric Klein: Hey, Melinda, how's it going.

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Melinda Lee: Hey? It's good. I'm so glad you're here. We're going to dive into lots of discussion, deep dive into sales, sales, strategies for you, for the for the audience, member for founders and teams. But before we get into that, I'd like for you to share more about what you do. What makes you passionate about sales results? Accelerator.

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Eric Klein: Absolutely well. 1st of all, thank you for having me. I'm really excited to be here and and speaking with you for me. My entire career has been, I'd say, non traditional. I started in the beer industry. I went into ice cream and then eventually into financial services. And now I'm in sales, consulting and coaching.

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Eric Klein: and for me my company helps companies of all sizes. But I've been focusing on startups, early stage companies and growth stage companies on any aspect of sales. I help with. Founder led sales. I help with sales processes, go to market strategy.

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Eric Klein: And for me, what's what's amazing. And and

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Eric Klein: I guess, gets me really excited. To get out of bed in the morning is helping people who have created something so amazing and important to them, and and helping them get from where they are to where they want to be. And a lot of the time. That's a simple adjustment in their mindset on how to sell, or how to

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Eric Klein: convey value of their company. So it for me, when when I can help a founder kind of turn that switch on and understand how to get their product in front of people and get those people excited about what they're doing. That's what really gets me excited to do what I do.

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Melinda Lee: Right right? Because many of these founders have put their heart and soul into their product into their service, and they have a high technical expertise around it. So it can be very challenging to convey, not so much because we've spent so much time developing that technical expertise. You want to share it all. But then you're going to be there to support them, to convey just enough to to really raise the value.

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Eric Klein: Absolutely. And and I think a great example of that. I I work with some AI companies, and and these AI companies from the back end are are so technical. But the people they're trying to help are not technical and and being able to speak and and convey the things that need to be

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Eric Klein: understood by the buyer or the end user is something that's really difficult for people who are so passionate and knowledgeable about what they're doing and getting that change in mindset to really help them grow their business and get their product or service out there.

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Melinda Lee: Right. And and you mentioned your path is not, says traditional. You also are a cheerleader, right?

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Eric Klein: I was, I was.

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Melinda Lee: Does this help? Does this help with you working with founders.

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Eric Klein: It does. And and what's really fun about sales, and I'd be lying if I said I never used this in an interview before, but the the thing that is so cool about sales and and cheerleading is cheerleading is getting people excited about something. If you're a cheerleader for a football team. I cheered for Syracuse University and the Carolina panthers. The goal was to get the fans involved and and everyone excited about something. Football, basketball.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Eric Klein: Sales is the same thing. Sales is all about getting someone excited about what you're doing. So.

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Eric Klein: Does cheerleading help me in sales every day? Absolutely. It helps me in leadership positions. It helps me in sales process improvement. And the idea is as a coach. I'm a cheerleader for the people that I work with as a fractional Vp. Of sales. I am a cheerleader for the products and services that I'm endorsing. So

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Eric Klein: it's it's all about getting people excited. In cheerleading, getting them off their feet in in sales, getting them to hopefully invest or or pay for a product. And and yes, absolutely. It's something that helps me every single day.

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Melinda Lee: Why not have fun with it? Right? And the thing is, there's so much complexity, chaos, fear, concern. Nowadays. It's like that energy of.

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Melinda Lee: you know, getting exciting about it, getting excited and connecting with the like. You mentioned the community, the people, and bringing that out through your product and service using that energy. I think it's it's gonna cut through a lot of the noise. And the fear potentially.

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Eric Klein: Definitely definitely, and you learn a lot of things in cheerleading that translate to business, humbling yourself. You are. You are one of a sea of tens of thousands of people and and understanding. You have a job to play and focusing on that job and doing it to the best of your ability. Same thing when it comes to running a company or selling a product or a service. It's really.

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Eric Klein: hey? I'm part of a bigger thing here, and and if my goal is to help the company or grow my own company, I have to understand what is important and what my job and role is to play to really help the organization, or the team, or or the company that I'm I'm with.

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Melinda Lee: I love that. And what is your experience with companies? I'm, I see you have so much experience working with large companies, startup founders. What is your been your experience seeing companies that don't do a good job with their sales, presentations, or sales teams? What happens.

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Eric Klein: Definitely I think I think there's a there's a big, there's a lot of problems that can that can happen, that that are. Some are easily fixed. Some take a little bit more time. But the

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Eric Klein: the idea of being passionate about what you're selling! If if I were selling you something, and I was sitting here talking about a feature after feature after feature. It gets really boring. You get. You get uninterested in what I'm talking about.

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Eric Klein: and then my job is to go to the next person. And and if I'm not fixing that, if there's not someone in on my team that's there to help me fix some of these problems. You get into a lull, and and the team's motivation and excitement around what they're doing becomes stale if you will. And and some of the things that I've done when I've worked with sales teams

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Eric Klein: is A, do they understand the product that that's a huge thing? B,

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Eric Klein: do they understand the problem that they're solving and see? Do they understand the problems that the the customer or the prospect that they're dealing with is trying to solve. And if there's not a connection between the problem that you solve and the problem that they're trying to solve, they are probably not a good customer. There's a lot of people that want to get on the phone and call anybody and try to sell everybody. But

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Eric Klein: everybody is not a customer, and and finding and and getting through all of the the non customers and finding the really good prospects is is something that's important for me when I've worked with companies. And I've seen some problems that they're having a lot of the times it comes down to sales process.

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Eric Klein: Just like if you're playing sports, you need to understand the play that you're doing, and and you execute it, and you practice it, and you do it over and over again until you execute it. Well, sales is the same thing, and you can talk to a salesperson and and not really get the the feeling that they know what they're doing every time, and just fixing that and and coaching them through. This is what you do. This is how you do it. These are the questions you ask.

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Eric Klein: Some of those little things can be so impactful for salespeople of all stages.

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Melinda Lee: And so do you see, with the people that you work with the organizations that you worked with? Those are some of the key challenges that they're having 1st having a clarity about the the client, the problem you help solve.

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Melinda Lee: And then also the sales process, not having the appropriate questions. Those are the key things.

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Eric Klein: Yeah, I think it's a. It's a combination. So I'll give you the example. When I was in the beer industry, I worked for one of the largest beer companies in the world, if not the largest, and at the end of the day people are going to buy beer, and they're going to buy beer from them.

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Eric Klein: But if the goal is to just buy the beers that they know and love and have to buy because their customers already come in asking for it. You will be okay you will not excel, and and you won't be able to get to that next level when it comes to

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Eric Klein: getting more sales and improving your team, having a great understanding of the products that you sell. Maybe the more crafty or imported items that not everyone knows about. And then listening to the the companies that you're selling into the bars, the restaurants, the clubs, and understanding. Where is there a gap? Maybe people are always asking for a specific type of beer. Maybe it's a price point.

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Eric Klein: And then, being able to speak confidently about the products that you have in your portfolio.

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Eric Klein: To those people you're not only conveying value, you're solving a problem, and at the end of the day something as simple as beer

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Eric Klein: is the same as something as technical as AI services. You need to understand your product. You need to ask the questions, to understand the problems that your prospect is trying to solve, and then fill that gap with the value. And and for me, I think yes, absolutely. Those are some of the biggest issues that I see when I go, and I work with

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Eric Klein: some of these companies that I have in the past.

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Melinda Lee: And what happens when we don't train people? The sales team cause.

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Melinda Lee: right cause, cause things are changing so quickly, like you mentioned and just in that scenario like you mentioned, a a company owner can say one day, I'm I'm selling this beer, but now I'm going to sell imported beer. And and then the communication that needs to happen to the same with the sales team does. I could see that that could be quite challenging to keep people up to date with, and what happens if they don't? If we don't.

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Eric Klein: Yeah, so

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Eric Klein: you're absolutely right. Communication is is very important. When it comes to sales, there's really 2 main things that people talk about. And some people say one is more important than the other. I go back and forth. And those those 2 things are relationships and data.

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Eric Klein: And there's a nice nice I'd call it a fine line between the 2. Some people really just want to know that if you buy this beer this is going to be your profit margin. And this is how much you're going to make. Other people want to know that they trust you. You are a good friend, or a trusted colleague, or someone in the industry that I really trust

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Eric Klein: for me. I think you're you're spot on right being in contact with the people that you're working with, understanding that their business is where it is, and and how can I help them? And being there as someone just like that that I can help. I'm I'm not here to come in.

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Eric Klein: sell you something and leave. I'm here to come in and help you fix a problem, and and I'm there if you need me. When when I was in the the beer industry, I know we keep talking about the beer industry, but if someone was. They're they're having a big event, and they're running out of beer and a lot of sales, people would say.

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Eric Klein: Hey, I'll put in the order, and it'll be on the truck for your next delivery. The the salesperson that says, Look, I will go to our warehouse, and I will get that keg, I will sign it out, and I will deliver it to you, so your business will succeed.

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Eric Klein: Your buyers will remember that the people you work with will no longer think of you as the sales, Guy. They'll think of you as a friend, a problem solver, someone that's there to help. And those things are so important when it comes to almost every aspect of sales. If you're running a service company and someone picks up the phone and calls you as a salesperson if you're not the person to help them with solving that problem. But you can facilitate

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Eric Klein: getting that person in contact with the person in your company that can help them. They will remember that. If they call you and you text them back. Hey? It's not me. This is the person that you should reach out to good luck.

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Eric Klein: It's a very different conversation. So that relationship piece definitely comes into play.

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Eric Klein: On the other hand, so does data. When I was working with really large companies and selling into enterprise companies. They want to know how much money this product is going to make them or save them. How much business. This is going to bring them. And what can I do from them? From a monetary standpoint? That's not relationships that's data. And and like, I said, there's really a

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Eric Klein: a fine line that you need to walk, and you need to pull from both sides of that equation to be able to be a successful salesperson.

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Melinda Lee: So what it sounds like you do such a wide spectrum from the beginning of the sales process all the way to the end and execution. Could you walk me through if I'm a company owner, and I have all these gaps and holes in my sales process? What would like from the beginning to the end. How could you help me like optimize everything.

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Eric Klein: Definitely. Well, I'll I'll start off by saying that I would love to say that I can help every single company. Unfortunately, that's just not the case. And I think one of the biggest things that sales people can understand is that your product or service

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Eric Klein: is not for every single person you talk to someone that I worked with in the past, talked about trying to boil the ocean and and really focusing on everything and everyone and every company.

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Eric Klein: And and what I've realized is focusing on a specific avatar or specific type of company, or a specific problem can be so beneficial for a company or an individual contributor. When it comes to sales. If you're if you're selling financial services, maybe you focus on a specific industry, a company size.

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Eric Klein: and and for me, I I like to say I'd love to help everyone. But I I can't. So what the 1st thing that I like to do is have a conversation and and understand where the company is, what their goals are, what they'd like to achieve from their perspective, what some of the biggest problems are that they're trying to fix and and approach it from a

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Eric Klein: call it an educational perspective. I'm trying to learn as much about the company and the problems that they're dealing with to see if I am a good fit in sales. We call that discovery, and

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Eric Klein: as a as a sales Guy, who's selling sales services. It's really Meta, and really fun for me to. If if I can sell someone on my services of selling.

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Eric Klein: they trust me as a salesperson and as a mentor. So what I would do is a like, I said. Go into that discovery, understand as much about the company as possible.

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Eric Klein: If I think that I can help them, and if there's some.

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Eric Klein: I guess I get along well and understand that I can really fix some of these problems. We move on to the next step, and then it turns into

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Eric Klein: Is this a founder led sales issue? Or is this a team and and salespeople led sales issue or a sales process issue. Potentially, some of these companies are even before that. So go to market strategy. How do they take a brand new product that's never seen the light of day. Maybe it's a an Mvp. And and monetize that Mvp. Some of the people that I work with actually

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Eric Klein: aren't trying to sell their product or service for money. They're trying to get it out there in front of users to get feedback. And and how do you find free users sometimes finding free users is just as hard as getting paid users for a brand new product. So for me. It's it's all about identifying the problems. Figuring out a better way of doing it and and really jumping in head first.st like you said, I have a really wide scope of services.

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Eric Klein: and for some of the people that I work with it is as simple as I'm gonna meet with you once a week we can go over numbers. I wanna listen to how you talk to your customers, and we can tweak some of those processes for other customers of mine. It's really hands on more of a fractional Vp of sales role where

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Eric Klein: I'm managing salespeople. I'm meeting with the salespeople and reporting back to the founder on some of the problems that I'm seeing and some of the problems that I can fix in terms of sales, process improvement, and and how they communicate with people and and the value that they're putting in front of people. So at the end of the day there's no one size fits all for any customer. But the coolest thing about sales that I've learned from selling

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Eric Klein: beer to financial services is a lot of the skills are the same. It's about practice, it's about repetition. It's about understanding the value that you are bringing and the problems that your customers are facing and how you bridge that gap as a salesperson, as a helper, not as someone who's there to collect a check.

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Melinda Lee: And isn't it? Has it been increasingly more difficult to help companies find discover their value with all the competition out there.

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Eric Klein: Yes and no. That's a that's a really great question. And the reason I say yes and no is.

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Eric Klein: if there's a hundred other companies out there a thousand other companies that do exactly what you do. You need to better understand what you do right. If if I'm Starbucks and I'm going up against Duncan. There's a different value proposition. It's not just we have the best coffee. It's we are a place to network. And and we we also you can work here. You can provide.

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Eric Klein: We provide value in terms of a safe place to work a calm, collected environment. Dunkin, America runs on Dunkin. Right? The idea is, it's fast, it's quick, it's good coffee. They're no longer Dunkin donuts. The value isn't their pastries. The value is their speed and their quality. So even though there's thousands and thousands of coffee companies out there being able to identify what makes you different is.

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Eric Klein: Something that should be one of the 1st things as a founder or a salesperson for a large company can understand. I work for Budweiser for Anheuser-busch. We're going up against Miller coors and and every craft brewery you can name, and every import brewery. There's value. There's quality of our products. There's the name. If we're selling into bars and restaurants, it's the idea that

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Eric Klein: these bars. As soon as someone walks into their bar they will recognize our brands and pay those bars for our brands. That's a very different value than a smaller craft brewery who says our value is our quality. We are small, but strong. We use the best ingredients. Our brewers care about every single batch that they make, and they only make a limited quantity.

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Eric Klein: So the the person behind the bar. If someone comes in and says, Give me a light beer. Well, you go to Bud Light. But hey, what do you have? That's Hoppy, fresh and new, probably not going to be a Budweiser or a bud light. So these 2 very similar companies are are providing value and differentiation in in very, very different ways.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah, do you have any tips for startups who are still trying to figure out their value as they're testing the market? What is working any tips to

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Melinda Lee: honing in to stick to it. Yeah. Well, yeah, what can you provide.

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Eric Klein: So so one of the exercises that I've I've picked up along the way that I like to do with every early startup that I work with

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Eric Klein: is something called icp ideation. It's it's at the end of the day figuring out

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Eric Klein: who your ideal customer is, your ideal customer profile, and a lot of the time people say, Okay, my ideal customer profile. When I was in the ice cream industry, my brand that I worked on it was

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Eric Klein: athletic, middle aged women who who care about fitness and health. And that's a lot of the time where these companies stop is. It's the age. It's the the gender, maybe one activity and and a fun fact about these people for me. When I work with a lot of these companies, I I say, go further than that. Does. What is your what is your

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Eric Klein: vitari or Icp do on the weekends? Do they have kids? What's their favorite food? Do they have a favorite movie? What kind of music do they listen to? And then, as you build out this very, very specific person, you start to think, what would that person find valuable? And then you think about what does my company offer? Well, my company offers this.

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Eric Klein: I'm trying to sell to these people? And what are the you know? How do we connect these dots? And and a lot of the time those questions really

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Eric Klein: seem to find themselves to value. What is the value I provide? I work with a I've worked with a company that works in the gaming and gambling industry, and

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Eric Klein: when they started off. The idea was they were going to work with shoes, or they are going to work with collectibles. And and then they started to build out this profile of who they really wanted as their customer, and realized that competition was really what their customer wanted. So they they built out and they pivoted, and they changed a little bit about their marketing strategy. But the idea was at the end of the day

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Eric Klein: that the value they brought was friendly competition with an educational spin to all of their users, and and that really differentiated them from all of the other gaming and gambling companies out there. So it's really important to a

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Eric Klein: know what you do and know what you provide if you provide a thousand different things. Great. But that's not what all of your customers want. So figuring out who your customer is 1st and then differentiating is is a thing that people sometimes do a little bit backwards.

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Melinda Lee: Oh, totally totally because they want to throw everything out in the spaghetti and then see what sticks. And then it just then it just doesn't come out well, or people get confused. And so you're you're and then you don't give that time that focus time and attention that it requires to hone in like you, said the customer. Profile. And what is it that they like that takes constant refinement and and getting in touch with? And so I think that that is so

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Melinda Lee: valuable about and then that then, therefore, like you said, it helps you stand out because you are

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Melinda Lee: one of a kind in that area. And I love how you provide so many specific examples of how you've done that with different companies, and how it really does work when you just narrow in and commit to bringing value to one specific avatar

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Eric Klein: Definitely definitely. And and the crazy thing is people say, Oh, my gosh! This is too specific of a person. Well.

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Melinda Lee: Right.

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Eric Klein: Too specific of a person. If if that pool of people is a hundred 1,000 people.

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Melinda Lee: Exactly. Yeah.

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Eric Klein: 100,000 potential customers. So the more specific, the more value you can provide to those people that you're trying to sell to.

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Melinda Lee: Right and I. And that's where you come in, because I think that a lot of people will have people will have resistance to it, people will, and having that objective perspective and hand holding to be able to see help somebody to identify that, and then train all the teams to to speak the same

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Melinda Lee: language. So that is amazing. Thank you, Eric. I really appreciate that. Those specific examples. I think any company that gets to work with you is very lucky.

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Melinda Lee: To have you how can they reach out to you? For support or additional sales? Consultation.

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Eric Klein: Definitely. So my website is getsales.us. My email is eric@getsales.us. I I would love to speak with anybody. I I think another tidbit for sales. People out there

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Eric Klein: speaking with anyone is an opportunity to sell. It's also an opportunity to sell yourself in a a

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Eric Klein: a memorable way. So if I go out there and I I'm at a networking event, and someone comes up to me, and they are not a customer of mine. I still want to respect them. I still want to introduce myself and and tell them what I do, because maybe they know somebody that could could benefit from my services, or maybe they know someone who I could benefit using their services. So

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Eric Klein: that's why a lot of people say, your network is your net worth? I think it's really important to understand that every interaction you have with people is you can make a positive interaction for the for the both of you. So I would love to speak with anyone, learn about their businesses, and if I can't help you, maybe there's someone who I know in my network that could help you. So Eric, at Getsalesus and Getsalesus is my company website. Sales results accelerator.

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Melinda Lee: Love it, and you can get the link in the show notes. And, Eric, I'd like to ask you that same question. I asked all my guests. What is that one leadership, golden takeaway, that you'd like the audience to remember.

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Eric Klein: Definitely. I think it's a great question. And and for me, through some of my best mentors I've had. There's there's been some distinct things.

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Eric Klein: one thing that comes to mind is, there's there's a huge difference between managing and leading. And you asked me about a golden leadership takeaway.

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Eric Klein: When I was playing football in Texas.

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Eric Klein: I had the opportunity to

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Eric Klein: meet with a former Dallas cowboy and and speak with them about their successful career.

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Eric Klein: And what I got from that those conversations was every time they spoke about something specific whether it was

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Eric Klein: winning a game or going to practice or spending time with their family. They focused very narrowly on that thing.

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Eric Klein: and to me it it came down to

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Eric Klein: focusing on what's important. Now, if you go on my website. One of our core values. It says, Win.

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Eric Klein: what's important now. And and to me, that means understanding the problem you're trying to solve understanding the position you're in and focusing on that one thing, whether it's in business or or in life. I just got married a couple weeks ago, and when when you get married, whoever said planning a wedding was easy

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Eric Klein: was a big liar, and and what I realized is when when running a business, planning a wedding, trying to keep personal relationships with your friends. If you're trying to do it all at the same time, you won't be able to focus in and do a great job on any given thing. So when I was playing football, what I used to do is I'd write

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Eric Klein: WIN on my wrist wraps, and when I put my hand in the ground

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Eric Klein: I thought to myself, Okay, the last play is over. The next play has not happened. Let's focus on this plan what I have to do to help my team win.

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Eric Klein: And the same thing works in business. If I'm running a company, what's the biggest problem that I need to fix and focusing on fixing that problem. So one is the what's important now thing. And to me, I'd say, if I had to say. One extra thing is, don't underestimate

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Eric Klein: the value of friendly competition. I think friendly competition is one of the most valuable things that I've learned in my career as a salesperson, as a now husband, and and being playful in relationships.

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Eric Klein: I'll give you the example of when I was running the marketing team in my last role with Anheuser-busch. There were 3 teams that fell under my my team, and it was the supermarket team, the convenience store team and the bar team.

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Eric Klein: and one of the biggest challenges that I had was getting all of our salespeople to

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Eric Klein: a use. The right marketing material. B be excited and C sell more product at the end of the day, and I didn't have a very big budget. But what I did have was $15 and an Amazon gift card, and I went on. Amazon and I bought a Wwe plastic belt.

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Eric Klein: and I brought it into work one day and I turned it upside down. So the W. Became an M.

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Eric Klein: And I said, Look, this is the marketing belt, and whichever team does the best job in sales, presenting our company well and putting out the right marketing materials will win the belt. And that 1st month the teams were somewhat excited about it. What was really exciting was when the team won. It was the the supermarket team.

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Eric Klein: I said to the the head of the supermarket team, you need to make a big deal out of this. It's a $15 belt, but you need to playfully rub it in the other team's faces that you won this belt, and so, without my knowing the large format, the supermarket team came out and made a rap video, dissing the other teams, talking about how they were better because they won the marketing belt.

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Eric Klein: That next month was our single best month of sales in the in that team's history, all because of a $15 Wwe Belt and a lot of people on the supermarket team that were having a lot of fun, and you bet every single month that the team who won the Belt.

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Melinda Lee: Oh!

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Eric Klein: Rubbed it in the other team's faces and our sales just improved. And it's it's a Testament to

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Eric Klein: focusing on a what's important. Now, the idea of increasing sales putting out the right marketing material and making sure that our teams really represent the company. Well, but be having fun and and putting those things all together really made a huge impact on that team. And and my perspective on how a team can function. Well, with something so simple, so.

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Melinda Lee: I love. What's a.

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Eric Klein: Important now, and friendly competition is really.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah.

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Eric Klein: I think we we can improve.

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Melinda Lee: That's great. Great cause. It's like what's important now. So you're helping the whole team focus. What's important now? But then you're bringing in the comp. The competitive element to really

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Melinda Lee: bring in the juice like, bring in the fire, bring in the the action around it. So that's awesome.

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Melinda Lee: Great, great, great great leadership. Golden takeaway. Really appreciate your time. Today, Eric, I got out a lot from today's call and today's podcast in particular. Just that last bit. And then also helping and really thinking through what makes me unique as a company. And also I think it's encouraging for other companies to know that each, even though there's a lot of competitors out there. People you think that are doing the exact same thing. But really

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Melinda Lee: you can. You can narrow in and really stand out, taking that time to do that and getting support from people like you to to really showcase what we're about, especially all of us entrepreneurs who are doing the day-to-day grind, remembering that you have what it takes to be special and unique. And so

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Melinda Lee: I'm so glad for you to share that that tip, that tidbit, and encouraging us to continue on

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Melinda Lee: on the journey

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Melinda Lee: absolutely.

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Eric Klein: Well, it was. It was an absolute pleasure getting to speak with you, Melinda. Thank you so much for having me.

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Melinda Lee: It's great. Thank you so much. And, Eric, congratulations on your marriage and also sales results. Accelerator. It's gonna do great yeah. Lots.

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Eric Klein: Thank you so much.

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Melinda Lee: Yeah, to to be in around your expertise. So it's great.

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Eric Klein: Thank you. Thank you.

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Melinda Lee: Thank you. Alright listeners. I'm so glad that you've been here. I I trust that you got some golden takeaways today until I see you. Next time I'm your sister in flow, may con may flow. Continue to

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Melinda Lee: flow into you through you and to others. I'll see you next time.

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Melinda Lee: Bye.

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Melinda Lee: All right.