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The Master Sales Strategies for Business Funding Pros

Quality Qualification: CHAMP

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What is CHAMP?

 

Simply put, its known as BANT 2.0.  Many have objected to prioritizing Budget first in the sequence and believe leading with the Need is much more effective.  Some have reordered it to NATB, bringing Need up to the front and sliding Budget out to the back – but what has resonated best with sales teams is converting it over to CHAMP.

 

This framework leads with the needs, pain points, and Challenges the prospect/business faces.

 

CHAMP stands for:

 

CHallenges – What challenges is the buyer currently facing?

 

Authority – Is the decision-maker for buying your solution, and if not, who is and how do we get in touch?

 

Money – Does the buyer have financial capacity to buy your solution?

 

Prioritization – What is the buyer’s specific timeframe for implementing a solution?

 

Here are examples of CHAMP questions that have routinely used:

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Failure Factor

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Number one professional fear people carry is the fear of failure.  To fail, however vague that may be, is what strikes the most fear in the higest number of people in the professional setting.

 

Behind that fear of failure is the fear of rejection.  If they fail, they won’t be accepted, they won’t be liked, they’ll be cast out in the cold…goes the subconscious thread.

 

Sales addresses failure and rejection head-on, which when met with perseverance, bestows almost a superpower of immunity of these fears to the Funding Pro.

 

We currently live in a world of negative conditioning.  Fear mostly drives the American sales process.

 

Our society has come to prey on the fear factor.  It’s in about 50% of the ads we see: ads about life insurance, disability, stolen credit cards, tires that grip the road in the rain, brakes that avoid hitting children riding bikes, security systems that prevent your home from being robbed, etc.

 

We are constantly reminded how hostile our environment is, and now with Covid and everything its brought, even more so.

 

Once society conditions you with fear, its only natural you bring it with you everywhere, including sales.

 

According the Jeffrey Gitomer there are degrees of failure in sales:

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Sales Phase 6 – Key Step #2

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Recap:

On our Sales Process map, if each Stage is a mile marker on the highway to Funding, the roadways in between the markers are the Phases.

 

Here are all the Phases:

 

  • Phase 1 – The Prospecting Phase

 

  • Phase 2 – The Consulting Phase

 

  • Phase 3 – The Application Sending Phase

 

  • Phase 4 – The Application Reeling-in Phase

 

  • Phase 5 – The Submitting Phase

 

  • Phase 6 – The Closing Phase

 

  • Phase 7 – The Contracting Phase

 

  • Phase 8 – The Contract Reeling-in Phase

 

  • Phase 9 – The Closing Stip Reeling-in Phase

 

  • Phase 10 – The Funding Phase

 

Each one of these Phases has specific steps to complete to get to the next Stage, and there are Key Steps to take in each Stage to accelerate your sales cycles and closings.

This is what it looks like when we put it all together:

  • Stage 0 – Start:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • We have prepared and are ready to engage our Lead, pick up the phone and make contact.

Next:  Phase 1 – The Prospecting Phase

 

  • Stage 1 – The Prospected Stage:

            How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The Lead has been pre-qualified and confirmed to be a Prospect worth pursuing.

Next:  Phase 2 – The Consulting Phase

 

  • Stage 2 – The Consulted Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The Prospect has been consulted about their goals/needs/obstacles, how our solutions can help them achieve their outcome, and has confirmed they want a quote.

Next: Phase 3 – The Application Sending Phase

 

  • Stage 3 – The Application Out Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The Application has been sent to the Prospect, and it has been confirmed it was received.

Next: Phase 4 – The Application Reeling-in Phase 

 

  • Stage 4 – The Application In Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The Application is in with all supporting paperwork.

Next: Phase 5 – The Submitting Phase

 

  • Stage 5 – The Submission Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The Funding Package/Application has been submitted to Underwriting.

Next: Phase 6 – The Closing Phase

 

  • Stage 6 – The Pitched Approval Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The Approval(s) have been pitched and sold to the Prospect.

Next: Phase 7 – The Contracting Phase

 

  • Stage 7 – The Contract Out Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The Prospect has demonstrated intent to fund, requested contracts and we have sent them out.

Next: Phase 8 – The Contract Reeling-in Phase

 

  • Stage 8 – The Contract In Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The signed Contract is in.

Next: Phase 9 – The Closing Stip Reeling-in Phase

 

  • Stage 9 – The Closing Stips In Stage:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • All closing stips UW need to fund are in.

Next: Phase 10 – The Funding Phase

 

  • Stage 10 – The Funded Stage – End:

How do I know for sure I am at this Stage?

  • The deal has funded, great work!

 

*Phase 6 – The Closing Phase*

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Zach’s Cold Call Basics – Breaking it Down III

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In Zachary Ramirez’ video, Cold Call Basics!  What you need to know, he does a great job explaining how to greatly improve the effectiveness of every cold call.

 

From the first second of the video to the 4 minute mark you can see him deliver the first key takeaway from this talk.

 

Zach outlines his 3 Main Goals of a Cold Call:

  1. Application
  2. Get email
  3. Schedule callback

 

In the spirit of starting with the end in mind, he is doing a great job separating out the tactics from the key objectives meant to be achieved on this call.

 

If you know exactly what specific result you are trying to accomplish with every single conversation you have, you will speed up sales cycles, maximize time, get to more deals, and fund more deals.

 

If you get stuck on tactics but aimlessly talk your way through calls, at best, you will waste time, and at worst you’ll lose deals.

 

Time kills deals.

 

At the 4:11 mark, Zach launches his first tip for a successful cold call:

 

When opening a call and introducing yourself, use the merchant’s name, your full name and the full company name.

 

Ex.

 

“Hey John, this is Zachary Ramirez from Select Funding.”

 

What not to do:

 

“Hey John, this is Zach from Select, what’s up?”

 

Why do it this way?

 

Zach’s internal analytics have this opening phrase associated with a 2.1x higher likelihood of success in your cold call.

 

What’s at work here?

 

“Very important people introduce themselves using their full name.”

-Zach

 

This is spot on.

 

Important people – people/professionals who value who they are and what they do tend to state their full name when you meet them.

 

If you think of the alternative, customer service reps in call centers all around the world are often those who will call, only give a first name and even sometimes withhold where they’re calling from.

 

Nothing against call centers or customer service reps, but you are Funding Pro.  Its different.

 

Your mortgage loan specialist gave his full name and commanded your respect.  It’s an important and established process mostly owned by banks, deeply entrenched and well respected institutions.

 

You can use the same principle to your favor, business funding is just as important and worthy of respect.

 

When you don’t take this approach you will often be asked:

 

“Who is this?”

 

“What company are you with?”

 

Now you’re on your heels and things typically go downhill from here.

 

Own what you bring to the table and introduce yourself confidently.

 

At the 5:33 mark, Zach dives into the second tip:

 

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Is There a Chance?

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Tommy John, one of baseball’s most durable pitchers, played twenty-six seasons in the majors.  Twenty-six seasons!  He started his career pitching to Mickey Mantle when Kennedy was president and finished his final season pitching to Mark McGuire with President H.W. Bush in the White House.

 

When asked how he accomplished such superhuman longevity, he answered with questions.  He continually asked himself this set of questions to focus his mind on how he could improve where others weren’t:

 

Is there a chance?

 

Do I have a shot?

 

Is there something I can control?

 

Is there something I can do about it?

 

His commitment was to finding a yes, wherever he could.  No matter how slight the chance, if it was aligned with where he wanted to go and there was that chance, he was going to take it and make good use of it – determined to give every ounce of effort and energy he had to make it happen.

 

In the middle of the 1974 season, he blew out his arm, permanently damaging the ulnar collateral ligament in his pitching elbow.  At that time in baseball and sports medicine, when a pitcher blew out his arm that was it.  It was called a “dead arm” injury.  Game over.

 

But Tommy wouldn’t accept that at face value.  Was there anything that could give him a shot to get back on the mound?  It turns out, doctors suggested an experimental surgery in which they would try to replace the ligament in his pitching elbow with a tendon in his other arm.  The estimated chances of this procedure working were one in one hundred. Otherwise, no chance.

 

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