Prepaid Enterprise

14 months and 23 days to cross the finish line

Today I went through my CRM tool as part of a personal celebration. We were fortunate enough to win a new piece of business last week. In late August 2008, I made the first cold call into our most recent customer in hopes of generating interest in our jPOS powered product known as OLS.Switch. It was a nice to see where the conversation started and where it eventually ended up. Such a great reminder of how important it is to ask questions, and more importantly, listen to what the prospective customer has to say. The original proposition was based on OLS.Switch as an authorization host for issuing prepaid MasterCard products. After good number of emails and phone conversations (176 to be exact) over the last 14 months and 23 days, the final directive is to implement OLS.Switch as a conduit to manage transactions between several issuing processors and our customer’s rules engine for value added services. A testament to how OLS.Switch can be used to meet a variety of online transaction processing needs. Hopefully, in the future we’ll win their issuing business… but in the mean time, we celebrate another finish line crossed in the sales cycle.

A huge “thank you” to Andy and Dave for the flawless sales support. The team strikes again.

'Legacy' isn't just about technology

What's the role of the sales, marketing, and business development professional in today's world? I think about this question a lot and how the mind set of the buying world has changed, yet so many organizations still hold on to older beliefs in terms of how these areas of business should be viewed and executed. Sales, marketing and business development functions can be compared, I think, closely to technology. Both have environments and operating systems. Both have varying methodologies and strategies. Both can certainly be executed poorly or positively. And both can become dated and  irrelevant. So when we look out into the published world of the sales, marketing and business development, why is it that we see very little "updating" relative to the changes we seen in the technology space? Even though the social dynamics associated with bringing buyer and seller together can be in many ways far more complex and fluid?

Thoughts:

• To many, the sales guy, is known as just that. The "sales guy" or "peddler." When in fact these professionals can be compared to missionaries, evangelist, front-line scouts responsible for bringing in life-blood and are typically the first in line to take a beating. When viewed in this context it's almost noble.
• Sales is sales, marketing is marketing and business development is business development. These are separate departments working closely together: Every word, every image, every intangible feeling expressed externally about the company should be designed to create positive attraction and result in new business. Tomorrow, next week, next year or in the next five years. In this age the roles have merged. We need new ways to organize to support the convergence of disciplines.
• As sales or marketing professionals, it is our job to persuade, convince and manipulate the environment to generate new business. "Always be closing": Buyers have more options. With more options comes more interruptions. More interruptions equals more ignoring. We need to focus on more innovative ways to locate people who want to listen to what we have to say.
• Sales people need to be power hitters and spew confidence: Sales people need to be sincere and fight for humility (being humble does not mean be a doormat) Side note: I'm the biggest chicken in the world!

The next time you're talking zeros and ones, hardware and software, networks and comm, remember that legacy isn't just about technology. Other areas of your company could need an update, reboot or replacement.

 

Technorati Tags: sales,marketing,business development,prepaid issuing

Nobody sell, nobody get hurt

Today I had an interesting call with a potential issuing system customer. The conversation started out as usual and took a strange turn as we discussed the value proposition and the benefits a program manager can experience by bringing the function of prepaid transaction processing in-house. After a few back and forth's on everything ranging from price, experience and background, it became clear to me the issue was that I had started "selling." Rather than asking questions about the company's strategy and being more attentive, I focused more on trying to "persuade" my prospect that we had what he needed. The conversation turned from being about a possible solution to a subtle debate on what makes for a better card business strategy.

Dealing with the ever present desire to persuade others is the internal battle every sales and business development professional faces. I'm grateful I was able to catch myself midstream and take corrective action. The good news is we were able to leave the call on a positive note and moving forward to the next step in the evaluation process.

The reality is that not every prepaid program manager should or could make the transition to Third Party Processor. Today was a good reminder that my job is not convince the world but to find the organizations on the path with or without us.

 

Technorati Tags: prepaid debit,program management,sales,business development

Inspired business development

With Christmas day upon us, we can't help but feel warm, fuzzy and compelled to give. The spirit of generosity is as infectious as a yawn and it assures us we're good people. What I find most interesting about the result of being giving in the context of business development and sales is that the principal still holds true - if I'm sincere and giving during the relationship development phase of the process, I can inspire true interaction and do away with "selling."  I'm not implying using Love Guru tactics to create a hippy community while losing site of the opportunity. The goal should be to create fertile ground for a real conversation about a problem and solution.

When was the last time you thought about how to increase your potentials customers' sales? Make it a point to listen to your prospect's needs even when they don't apply to what you're proposing. Chances are there's an organization on your prospect list that has exactly what they need [this happens more frequent than not] When it makes sense broker the introduction and your prospect will be grateful. You're grateful for him listening to what you have to say and he is grateful that you called. The perfect environment for any business development effort.

Sincere gestures inspire business development. Merry Christmas.

 

Technorati Tags: prepaid,business development,sales,marketing

Human connection - a catalyst for sales

Ronnie Chesko is a member of my business development team and is an up and comer in the the payments industry. We met through a mutual friend and he ended up doing some work for a client of mine in a previous work life. Now we are stomping the streets and venturing out to make known to all who live, a next generation payment technology called OLS.Switch.

The most interesting part of a normal work day is going through a list of our sales opportunities. The process is very informal but follows a familiar path every time. Ronnie will tell me about companies he has called on and fills me in on the positive and negative responses. First, we do some high fives on the positive responses, then get to work on the negatives. We take a very inward approach to dealing with negative responses because we can only control our actions. This is very helpful when trying to understand how to make our message more palatable. By taking responsibility for the delivery of our message we can ultimately refine how we make connections with people.

Today was a perfect example. After several attempts to establish contact with a Fortune 500 retail chain, Ronnie received an email from the organization's CFO that would have any seasoned salesman running for cover. The interesting thing about the CFO's email is that he states "I usually do not respond to emails like yours..." After looking back at Ronnie's dialogue with this CFO, it becomes clear why he responded. There was an underlying theme of humility throughout Ronnie's messages which somehow made a human connection. In no way does "humility" mean pansy or indirect. Each message was as direct as can be.

This deal is far from dead. In fact, as I write this post Ronnie is heading over to meet me to discuss how we can keep the dialogue going with this potential customer. After all, we are proposing a solution that would save the company hundreds of thousands of dollars per year in payment processing costs.

I believe the days of Jedi mind trick selling are over. Human connection is the catalyst for sales.

 

Technorati Tags: sales,marketing,payment systems,payment processing,OLS

It all starts with 'Hello'

Today we had an excellent meeting with a company that specializes in Retail Management Systems for businesses of all sizes. I contacted them to see if their mobile POS platform could support The Delegation's requirements in conjunction with an OLS.Switch implementation, and it turns out there are synergies and opportunities at several levels. No matter how many times I make a cold call, deliver a presentation and develop new business relationships, it still gets me fired up when new opportunities organically find their way to the surface. A seed...a sprout... a tree.  It all starts with picking up the phone and saying "Hello."

Payment Systems Gone Blockbuster!

Last week I had an interesting conversation with a potential OLS.Host customer. We talked about all the benefits associated with becoming a Third Party Processor ("TPP") and how in many ways it is the natural progression for any sizable MSP. These conversations usually start out the same way then go down a fairly predictable path:

Conversation Example:

Me: Have you ever considered processing your own transactions?

Customer: Yes. We've been having so many problems with our processor. We've consider becoming a processor before but the cost is to high and we don't have the expertise in-house to manage it.

Me: Our flagship product OLS.Switch provides companies like yours the means to implement an in-house processing solution for the first time with the help of an experienced outsourced team.

Customer: What would be my financial commitment to implement something like this?

Me: That depends on the model you choose. OLS.Switch can be implemented in two ways from a business perspective. 1) You can outright purchase the software and install and manage with internal resources or 2) Pay a monthly fee for a hosted version of OLS.Switch.

Customer: What do you mean by "hosted version?"

Now this is where it gets exciting...

The Hosted Version model referred to in the conversation example above is known as Software as a Service or "SaaS" (aka: Application Service Provider or ASP)

This deliver methodology allows an enterprise to operate as a Third Party Processor using OLS.Switch without the need to house processing infrastructure or specialized human resources. Until now, no company in the payments space has ventured out to deliver an an entire payment switch for prepaid card issuing in this format. It is a very exciting time for smaller organizations because the playing field is leveling out and OLS is a catalyst for this change.

SaaS applications have been around for some time and are widely adopted in the CRM, sales automation and accounting space (as a matter of fact, I use Zoho CRM for work) but a payment system? Absolute genius.

So the next time you are out renting a few DVDs from Blockbuster to blow off some steam created by your current processing woes, remember, DVDs aren't the only things you can rent these days. Rent.... SaaS.... Rent. You get the idea.

 

Peace.