You might be brilliant at strategy, product development or marketing. You may have a fervent belief in your mission, vision and product. If you want to be a great CEO, though, you need to be (or become) the best salesperson at your company.
Want to bring in customers? You’ll need to sell. Plan to hire people, and keep them engaged? Sales is a daily practice. Need to raise money? You’d better perfect your sales pitch.
So much of what you do as a CEO involves selling, and most people aren’t good at it. Sometimes that’s a perception thing, and they don’t think they should be selling. But it’s also due to lack of attention to developing sales as a skill. It’s a difficult art to master but will make a bigger difference to your success than almost any other.
You’re probably aware that personal brand is becoming more and more important every day, especially when it comes to building trust. People trust other people far more than they trust companies — this is apparent in research which shows that 82% of consumers are more likely to trust a business if the CEO is visible and active, especially on social media. Elon Musk’s efforts at Tesla are a textbook example of this — even before they began to turn a profit, the electric car company were valued at $75bn as a result of Musk’s constant selling of the future they’re building. Daniel Ek has turned Spotify into $28bn business, despite never generating consistent profit. He’s been able to sell a story of growth to investors and the market, despite the company now being almost 20 years old.
A sales-focused CEO also drives revenue growth. If you’re out winning business, closing deals and generating high-level opportunities, your sales team will be motivated, inspired and engaged in delivering on the leads you generate. If you’re entering into a major partnership or securing a multi-million (or even billion) dollar deal, then the other party will usually want the CEO involved — so you’d better be able to sell them the dream and get the deal over the line. Marc Benioff famously drove many of Salesforce’s early business wins, building momentum in the company and spreading their story.
Your ability to attract, engage and secure top talent also rests on your ability to sell — in this case, to sell your vision and create excitement around the future of the business. Top performers want to progress, grow and make a difference, and they can only do that in environments where they believe that growth is likely. The best people can also be cynical on this point, so if you want to convince them to come on board and help you to realise your vision, you’ll need to create conviction and overcome their natural skepticism.
When things get difficult, as they inevitably will, it’s going to be down to you to keep everyone calm and steer the ship through the storm. Reassuring your team, managing investors, maintaining and growing customer relationships despite market conditions and securing deals that safeguard the future of the company are essential tools that keep your business afloat and on course. If your business model is in question, or major incumbent competitors are out to get you, you’ll need to take a leaf from Jeff Bezos and Brian Chesky’s books — in the former case, securing $1m in investment from 20 individual investors when everyone though Barnes & Noble would put Amazon out of business, and in the latter selling to investors who couldn’t understand the concept of a hotel company with no hotels.
So, it’s not just about closing deals — although that’s a key part of the equation — but about communicating your vision, hiring the best people, and generating the resources you need to be successful.
Whether you’re a salesperson (trained or natural) or not, there are some key steps you should take to sharpen your skills and elevate those of your whole organisation.
First, get sales training from the best. I’ve been a professional salesperson for nearly 20 years, but I decided earlier this year to up my game and take on board as much sales input as I could. It’s been invaluable in terms of understanding alternative approaches, refining the tools of my trade, and developing a system that’s right for our business.
Every organisation is different, though, so once you’ve gained the knowledge it’s crucial to test what you’ve learned, keep what works, combine disparate techniques and discard the rest. Get out there and sell. Meet customers, pitch to potential clients, and go to networking events. Try new things, be prepared to fail, and get better at the craft. It’s highly likely that you’ll see results very quickly, but if you don’t, keep adjusting your approach until you do.
Finally, train your team. Being amazing at sales is like having a superpower — imagine if your whole team could deliver new business better than any of your competitors. What difference would that make to both your top and bottom line?
One last thing — when you start getting good at sales, it’s a whole lot of fun. Despite your reservations, you might just find yourself enjoying it. So why not give it a try?
