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Welcome to Selling What's Possible, the podcast that's pushing the boundaries of modern account sales. I'm your host, David Irwin, CEO of Polaris I/O and a veteran with 30 years of experience in successful account sales programs.
In each episode, we'll dive deep into the world of strategic account development, uncovering innovative approaches and fresh perspectives that you may not have considered before. We'll be joined by top sales professionals, revenue leaders, and dynamic innovators who are reshaping the landscape of account sales.
Whether you're navigating the complexities of key accounts or seeking to expand value-driven outcomes for your customers, this podcast is your guide to consistently growing your strategic account relationships.
Get ready to challenge conventional wisdom, explore new methodologies, and unlock the full potential of your account sales strategies. This is Selling What's Possible - where we turn potential into reality.
Dave Irwin (00:00)
Welcome to another episode of Selling What's Possible. I'm your host, Dave Erwin. This is a podcast dedicated to strategic account management. And joining me today is Brynn Tillman. She's an expert on social selling and CEO of a social sales link. And it's great to have you here, Brynn. Looking forward to talking about, you know, everything related to social selling as it
as it ties to enterprise account teams and what they're striving to do. So welcome.
Brynne Tillman (00:26)
Thanks, Dave. I'm really excited to be here and I'm looking forward to sharing some insights that can really help people expand their existing accounts.
Dave Irwin (00:35)
Terrific, terrific. the topic today is identifying, mapping and engaging executive decision makers, executive buyers, as you know, there's so much to it.
Brynne, one place to start is just, maybe you just start telling us a little bit about your perspective on social selling, what makes you passionate about it, and then we'll just sort of dig in on the topic and explore it.
Brynne Tillman (01:00)
Yeah,
know, social selling for me is about building relationships through providing value and earning the right to get the conversation. Social selling is not a place to make the sale. It's the place to open up those relationships and expand those relationships. And one of my favorite things, you said, why am I passionate about it? Because the ability to map out our social proximity.
who we know that knows who we want to get in front of and leverage those relationships is a game changer. And LinkedIn is the only tool that can help us map out how we are connected to other people. So that's why I absolutely find social selling to be a must, especially in a complex sale.
Dave Irwin (01:51)
That's terrific. Yeah, I think, you know, as a backbone of social connections, LinkedIn has created this environment where, you can really tie a lot of pieces together. And so there's so much depth and potential behind understanding, right? Networks of people, their connections, what they think, how they behave.
how do you think about it from a social network, maybe just starting with the basics of identifying and then building?
Brynne Tillman (02:22)
So, I mean, the first thing we need to do is first take inventory of our existing clients and really whether it's through just the knowledge that you've gained throughout the sales process, the conversations you've had, sometimes a lot of this information lives in the CRM, right? We've got a lot of here's the pain points that the CFO is facing where it's a very different pain point than the CTO.
So all the different buyers,
Now there's so many people involved, but here's the thing, they don't all have the same agenda. They each have different concerns. Your product, your solution matters in a different way to each of those stakeholders. So it's really important that we first identify what challenge are we solving for each of them? And in some cases, what challenge are we
creating for some of them, which I know that sounds counterintuitive, but let's say we have a software that is going to fix our sales and marketing problem, but and it may even fix the ROI. So our CFO might be bought, but the CTO is so overwhelmed with the idea of how long it will take, what the resources are that will take.
they don't really care about the solution for the sales, that we've just created a problem in the world. So how are we addressing that and even overcoming the objections that we know that CTO is going to have even before they know we're in the moment they know we're in the next. So really kind of taking a full inventory of
the decision makers, their challenges, how we solve that, their objections, before we even go to market is really
important.
And there's a lot of ways to do this. We can interview our current clients. Some of them are really happy to share with us, talk to those CTOs and say, what did you like about our process? What was easy about it? What would we improve if we needed to?
because it's not only going to help your go-to-market message, but it will also help your process improvement side of things as well.
Dave Irwin (04:49)
Great, yeah.
So
one of the things that we've talked before, I think even before starting to try to map out challenges, I think about buying centers and first of all, there's always sort of what I would call a hero, somebody that is the primary person who we have to make successful, who's going to sort of drive the energy of the initiative internally. And we have to help them along the buyer journey overcome
right, all these challenges and obstacles. One of the things you told me earlier was understanding the sort of the perspectives, how they think, what they believe. Talk a little bit about that, you
Brynne Tillman (05:30)
So I use a combination of LinkedIn and AI now and to identify, you could identify now a disc, you know, the disc style of someone and how to approach them. But, you know, there is a basic understanding from a role perspective, and that's a really good baseline. So what is the responsibilities of the VP of sales? Well, it's pretty clear.
generally that they have a team to manage, they have to hit their goals, they've got a mentor, they've got to probably hire. generally there's a baseline. But what we really want to do is understand the challenges they're specifically facing. So they might be short staff, they may not end, they still have the same number to hit. So what does that look like?
You know, so and it really depends on who your buyers are and what they're facing but understanding Who they are as a human what they are looking to achieve is really important and that hero Whoever that point person is we often call them a champion but champion is really self-absorbed Champion is what I want them to be for me hero is what I want to be for them. I want to make
the hero inside the organization. So I love that switch in nomenclature, which I may actually take. thank you. But how do we create big wins, not only for solving their challenge, but for making them look good internally? So are they connecting us with other sales leaders that may not have seen or adopted the solution that's bringing them a significant ROI? Maybe it's a sister company.
that they can bring us into. So my goal as a salesperson is always to make my referral partner, whether it's internal or external, look great.
is to make that hero look even more like a hero internally. And so by ensuring that I keep that relationship not just intact but strong will become more wins. even if that internal person doesn't
Dave Irwin (07:43)
Yeah.
Brynne Tillman (07:58)
decide to go with me right now, they're really happy to make more internal introductions into other places for upselling, cross-selling, solving, because I'm making them look good and I'm bringing value into that organization through their introduction.
Dave Irwin (08:19)
Yeah, that's terrific. think, you know, in my experience, the best account executives that have the most cross-sell upsells over time and are almost sort of the go-to resource, you know, from the client's perspective, from the customer's perspective, really lock in on that hero person and not only know everything about them, but really put a, a,
like a wrapper around just sort of understanding their interests, who they're connected to, their backgrounds. And then it's kind of like dropping a rock in the water, right? It's like rings of connections from there, because who do they rely on to influence their decision? Who are they working for? What is their ultimate goal? But I like to think about it as sort of expanding out this
What's the next ring of connections, their inner circle, right? And then outside of that, who's the next ring? Does that make sense from a connections? Cause a lot of these are right on LinkedIn where you have their close allies are right there.
Brynne Tillman (09:31)
So there are a few things, I'm gonna, the first thing is, I just want to talk about a couple of other ways that you can elevate that hero and then we'll talk about their connections. But the first way you can elevate is give them a recommendation on LinkedIn. Talk about how fabulous they were to work with and as you rolled out your program, tell the story as it presents them as the hero on LinkedIn.
that's gonna do a lot of things. It's gonna deepen that relationship. It makes it really hard for them to shop you later on. There's a lot of reasons we wanna do that. The other thing is interview them or create a piece of content around their successes. Talk about their journey with AI, recording on a Zoom or a Teams call and using AI, and then sharing that internally.
send it to their CEO and say, hey, you know, had a wonderful experience with your employee. I just wanted to let you know whether it's just the recommendation you sent for them or just giving them kudos internally, not only helps their reputation internally, but it also helps you to get into those other departments because you are also obviously great to work with.
if they liked working with you. Right? So, I just wanted to share that. Now we could now move to that next kind of their network, right? So on LinkedIn, so I know that one of the things, Dave, that you guys do is you really help your clients map out who the right stakeholders are. Now, once you've figured that out, right, they've used your tool to really build that very strong map
of stakeholders, I want to go in and say, who does my hero know in that list? Like that's that next thing. And you can do that when you are first degree connected with them, you can search who they know inside their own organization. Now, I wouldn't limit it if they're like, they're only connected to two of the seven people we've identified. It doesn't mean they don't know them. It just means they don't, they're not connected on LinkedIn.
So we still want to bring that list to our hero and say, here are the people we'd like to get in front of. Who do you know? The other thing is it will, they'll say, I know that person. And I will just say, that's awesome. That's definitely on the list of the people. You should probably connect with them so they can see the recommendation I gave you, or they can see, right? And so we'll help them build.
their network internally also. And they don't even realize sometimes they're out for sure building external networks. Sometimes they're not as strong internally, but that's really important to their progress inside of that company too. Right? Because now when they share their content, you know, their network is seeing that including internal, that will help their career progression internally. So,
you're helping them in numerous ways while they're helping you and it becomes this big win-win cycle.
Dave Irwin (12:59)
I think that's great. You you brought up the external connections and you use this term spheres of influence, but you know, in a lot of these enterprise accounts, complex sales, right there, there is a network of people around that hero. And even around the inner circle of that hero that is influenced by people outside of their organization that they professionally know that you also may work with.
Brynne Tillman (13:23)
Please read it.
Dave Irwin (13:28)
And so mapping out, hey, we work with, you know, people that you know really well outside of your organization that, you know, have a perspective point of view, a unified, you know, the same problem you're trying to solve. They've also solved over here, but pointing out those things to your hero and providing those connections too is invaluable.
Brynne Tillman (13:50)
us.
Dave Irwin (13:58)
Don't you think?
Brynne Tillman (13:59)
Yeah,
absolutely. And if you are connected with people that are networks, they're in associations, they go to conferences, they're probably connected to a lot of folks you want to have conversations with. The one thing I'm always a little careful with is that I'm not asking them to introduce me to competitors. Not that I don't want to get into competitors, but I don't want to create
like, wow, so much for that loyalty in that part. So I'll often say find parallel companies, folks maybe in the same industry, but sell different things or do different things. It doesn't mean I'm not gonna sell into their competitors.
Dave Irwin (14:32)
I see, yeah.
Brynne Tillman (14:52)
It just probably won't ask for introductions or referrals into their competitors. But one of the things you'll notice often is you may have seven connections, including your hero, to someone you want to meet. So you can certainly go out to other people in your network that know those folks and ask for references. The other thing you could do is quickly review a list of names with them.
So here, know, Ms. Hero, I've really enjoyed working with you. Thank you for all the internal introductions, which you definitely want to start with, right? You want to get all the internal upselling, cross-selling as you can before we go external, in my opinion. But now that we go external, you know, you're connected to 17 people that I'd love to run these names by and get your thoughts. So if there are competitors in there, they'll skip through that, right?
But as we go through that list, you say, know, how about this person? How about this person? Or maybe I'll even say, who on this list should I not reach out to? And so maybe 17 becomes 14. And now I may say, of these 14, is there anyone on this list you'd be comfortable introducing me to? Maybe there's two. And then of the 12, I might say, you know, Ms. Hero, when I reach out to these other 12, can I mention that you're my happy customer? Yes.
So now I've got two really good, strong introductions. I'm not putting my client out to make tons of introductions because it's a lot of work, but the other 12 I can name drop.
Dave Irwin (16:33)
Well, let's talk about it flowing the other way. So I love that, you know, there's, can you help me get introductions to these other people externally? But there's also, I would like you to know the story of how we help someone at an external company solve this very same problem that I'm talking to you about. And I can have them, I can introduce you guys to have a conversation about it since you're similar, you're in the same industry, you're in the same role.
you know, would that be helpful to you? So it's sort of almost like a, you're expanding this sphere of influence to help your hero get, yeah, what do think of that?
Brynne Tillman (17:09)
Yeah, I love that. will, yeah,
I really, I love that. We will often use our recommendations on LinkedIn. I find that recommendations on LinkedIn are really important. So I might say, Dave, feel free to look through my recommendations on LinkedIn. If there's anyone on that list you'd like to have a conversation with, I'd be happy to make that introduction. And now they see tons of them.
Dave Irwin (17:33)
Well, let me also explain sort of a problem I see a lot. So I'll give you a little story. So years ago, one of our account teams, know, very large media technology company, one of the largest in the world, right? Over the course of four years, developed relationships across seven divisions, probably about 200 plus executives spanning those divisions.
leverage relationships from one to get to the other and sold hundreds, literally hundreds of upsell cross-sell opportunities worth tens of millions of dollars of over, over a hundred million dollars of contract value sold just to that one company across seven divisions by going in and building, you know, almost trusted relationships where these guys helped me solve a problem here. So.
Brynne Tillman (18:11)
when you're saying.
Dave Irwin (18:31)
It carried over. what was noticeable is that the, the new divisions we got into didn't, they didn't shop the, the need out to other vendors every time they had so many problems that they tried to avoid doing that at all costs, unless it was a major initiative and they were required by procurement that they offered just looking for help bringing, you know, a trusted relationship in. so
When I went to the team and said, how would you, how would you build a relationship map, you know, that spanned all the relationships so I could see all of this. And, know, just there's no mechanism with which to do that. It's sort of like static PowerPoint slides and, you know, trying to sort of organize a view, but it's basically, how do you put 200 people, you know, integrated across some.
Brynne Tillman (19:09)
And that's it.
Dave Irwin (19:27)
map view and then show the connections between them all and where executives from the vendor company should focus on relationships and build relationships or where other people that are subject matter experts should build relationships. It's almost like a relationship mapping exercise at such a broad scale that it doesn't, it's not really done. So what happens is people come in and out of these account teams and they don't, they have to start all over with learning who's who.
Just talk a little bit about how you would think about addressing that or helping teams map that out.
Brynne Tillman (19:55)
Yeah.
Yeah, mean,
your solution around that I think is fabulous. I think that, you know, that is probably the best solution out there. From a perspective of coming into this account and seeing all of the stakeholders, and by the way, there are also lots of people in the organization in that account, right? So to be able...
to have one place where you could see all of those internal relationships is great. Now, LinkedIn will tell you when someone leaves that job. And so, you know, as, you know, if you are connected to these folks or you use Sales Navigator and you've saved them, when one of those folks updates their LinkedIn profile because they've left the company and they moved somewhere, that's a really good trigger to like fill in the blank in your map.
Right? now it's like, there's a new person. But typically, this is something I will tell my clients all the time, is you have two opportunities. One is to make sure you connect with the new person that fills that role, but also follow that person. Where are they going? Are they going somewhere where you can start a whole new map? A whole new opportunity, right? So I think it's really important that we're
Dave Irwin (21:20)
Right, exactly.
Brynne Tillman (21:28)
as real time as possible and who's in these positions. you know, I will quickly, if you have someone new in that organization, you're welcoming them. But the whole idea of having multiple relationships in addition to the cross selling and the upselling is retention, right? We have a new person coming into that role
Do they have an existing relationship that puts you at risk? And so it's really important that you've gone wide and deep in bringing value to lots of the departments, to lots of the stakeholders, not just for the more revenue, but you want to have your roots really deep and wide inside of organization. But you also want to very quickly be a resource to that new person.
So, welcome to the new position. I work deeply with your colleagues. I'd love to fill you in on where we are organizationally so that you have an idea of kind of where we fall and where you can take advantage of us, where you can get the best use out of us. just, so you are, and this is the line I love to use, so that you are kept in the loop.
It's a new person. They want to be in every loop they can. So if you're reaching out and say, I want to keep you in the loop of what's going on inside the organization as it relates to the solution, they're going to take your call.
Dave Irwin (23:13)
That's a great point. You know, actually I love your roots analogy, building deep roots, because what I see a lot is teams can get very myopic in terms of being sort of in a box, in a department with a group of people that they know really well, they talk to every day and they don't really expand out of that because it's work. But that work is critical because a lot of times, you know, when you move up the ladder and there's people above
Brynne Tillman (23:14)
Thank you.
Dave Irwin (23:43)
you know, there's always some hierarchy of decision making. And so things can be being decided way up here, you know, at a high level that are going to totally affect down here and your own stakeholders don't even know it. And therefore you don't know it. So unless you are constantly expanding that relationship universe and making those roots deeper, you're just going to be more blind.
Brynne Tillman (23:59)
right.
Dave Irwin (24:11)
as to what's hidden around the next corner. And that can be a real problem.
Brynne Tillman (24:14)
Yeah.
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. mean, I think that that may be one of the bigger problems that happens. I actually, I know all this. And I lost an account last year because my champion or hero retired. They were I was they were my client for nine years. My and I love them and all and all of the people are like, Where are you? We miss your training we miss. But I did not. I had
one route to one person that made all the decisions and she retired nine years. So you know we all learn it the hard way right now I'm rebuilding it and I have a feeling they'll be back next year but I lost this whole year because my roots were thin.
Dave Irwin (25:07)
Yeah, I think that's so, you know, LinkedIn is often looked at sort of for prospecting. So much of sales is prospecting, but people often miss that there's huge, what I call an invisible pipeline inside of your enterprise accounts. And when you build those relationships, those expansion, expanding relationships. you should, you know, you really should, should just do research all the time on new relationships to develop in a company as much as you would.
outside of it with prospects, right? And I think it's sort of a huge missed opportunity that teams could really, you could dramatically increase your growth with an account by building new relationships and knowing those spheres of influence.
Brynne Tillman (25:52)
In my experience, two of the best ways to do this is either you're going to loop them in and what's going on. You can even say, Dave, I'm not sure at what point you'll be brought into the conversation. But if you're open, I'd love to loop you in now so that when you are brought in, it's not like brand new to you. Everyone in an organization will say yes to that.
Every, like I don't get people that say, no, I want to stay out of the loop. I want to be blindsided. Yeah, no, right? So when you come at it from, hey, I don't know at what point you'll be brought into the conversation, but I'd love to take 10 minutes and just loop you into where we are right now. Okay. That's number one. Number two is if, if you're working with a hero, just phrasing them up the ladder. Hey, I just want to tell you how exceptional
Dave Irwin (26:25)
Right.
Brynne Tillman (26:50)
your employee is, right? How their follow-up skills, know, we always hear about the bad stuff that happens and I just want to share the good stuff so that you know this has just been an amazing experience and you are very lucky to have him. Those, who's not going to take those calls?
Dave Irwin (27:09)
That's great. Yeah.
You know, it makes me think, you know, inside of a large enterprise account, you see you have a hero, but then you start to think about, who are the other heroes in the other areas I can, I can go into, and then how do I understand their connections and perspectives? And then I start building out these, I love that term spheres of influence. It's, like these
You're basically just mapping the expansion relationships, but it's what you do with it, right? What you're explaining is once you know what those are, elevate the hero up the food chain, share the interests and perspectives of other heroes in the organization to keep people in the loop, share other people you know outside of the company that could provide insights and guidance.
What I find so fascinating is often the client doesn't know when an emerging problem is happening, how to solve it. And so if you're there trying to help them with empathy and genuine interest, you build trust and you can help them a lot of ways, right? Talk to this person. This person encountered the same thing. Here's a sitch, I know I have a perspective, but these other people
Brynne Tillman (28:20)
Yeah.
Dave Irwin (28:33)
do too, but it's really valued by the heroes. And that's kind of what you're talking about.
Brynne Tillman (28:40)
Yeah, the other thing this does, which I really love, is generally, you should never ever name drop your hero without permission. But if you're going up the ladder to give them a compliment, you're not overstepping a line, right? Like if you start with the looping in, I want to loop you in on what the hero and I have been talking about without telling your hero, you can build enemies.
Right? They're like, why you going to my boss? But if you go to the boss to say how wonderful that hero is, there's no bad blood, right? Like they're like, that's great. And now you can loop in that boss at the right time, but you've started the rapport with them in a way that absolutely does not cross a line.
Dave Irwin (29:30)
Yeah, that's great. Well, we could talk about this forever. Let's just look at the reverse. What should people not do? What are the common mistakes? We've talked a lot about what they should do, but what should you not do?
Brynne Tillman (29:46)
So I kind of just
add that, don't drop your champion, your hero's name without permission, right? It's really, do not reach out to anyone and say, hey, I'm working with hero without hero knowing that you're doing that. Unless it's about telling them how great the hero is. That's the only exception in my mind. And that is the best exception, right, to do that.
Another mistake, and this was mine, and although I'm pretty good at multi-threading, nine years with a client, I got comfortable with my decision maker and there was no upselling or cross-selling opportunity in this particular company. However, I still needed to build deep roots in order to retain the client.
As important as upselling and cross-selling and cross-solving is, the deepening the roots is simply just retaining. I got comfortable. So the mistake is you get comfortable. This was a client that renewed the same contract every year for nine years. And I took it for granted. So don't take it for granted.
She had a new boss's boss that I did not pursue. connected on LinkedIn and let it go. Instead, like I did not, in this case, I got really comfortable. first thing is start with your existing accounts. And if you have not mapped out, first of all, if you have all the opportunities possible inside of that account, you've got to map that out. And if you do not have a system, just talk to Dave.
Right, you've, however you do it, whether you do it in your spreadsheet, which I don't recommend, do it, right? You've got to know all the players and you've got to know how they're connected. The biggest mistake is to single thread. I would say hands down. The next thing maybe, is if you are only responsible for one of the solutions your company
Offers and you're not necessarily making commission on other things. You're not thinking about bringing in other sales people inside your organization and You might go well, what do I care? Well, you care for lots of reasons one. It's probably the right thing for your client Right, but the other thing is the deeper the roots in your company the harder it is to move to change
So if they have five of your solutions, even though you represent one, they're not gonna leave your one.
Dave Irwin (32:40)
All
Brynne Tillman (32:41)
Right, so thinking holistically in what are all the things our company can provide, not just the thing I offer, that's a mistake that a lot of salespeople
Dave Irwin (32:56)
Well, think also account teams in and of themselves, right? They get very much slaves to serving the account and the people that they work for tied to a contract, but they have to put on a new hat every day in this digital world, which is I'm a connection builder and I'm a relationship expander. And I'm going to look holistically and not just come in and take things for granted, but I need to work to take these relationships and sort of build out.
Brynne Tillman (33:13)
Yes.
Yes.
Dave Irwin (33:25)
broader, right? Because you're preventing then, as you said, risk of this person leaves and I don't have the next person lined up or access to their boss or whatever that is. And the more you build that relationship, the more it works, right? I mean, if you're good at it and you work on it, like any relationship, it builds trust quickly.
Brynne Tillman (33:49)
So there are three things that help you land, expand, and retain clients. Number one, that you are representing a really good product. So believe in your product. you don't believe in your product, your client's never gonna believe in you. So that's the first thing. The next thing is you need to detach from what the prospect is worth to you.
and attach to what you are worth to the prospect. When you are showing up with commission in mind, they feel it, they sense it. You need to be a true resource and you need to make sure that at every interaction you are doing what is best for that prospect. The third thing kind of piggybacks on that.
The third thing is, if your solution is the right solution, and you do not propose it, it's malpractice.
Right, so you love your product, you are attached to what value you can bring to the prospect, and you need to let them know when your product is the right solution. If you can embrace those three things, and by the way, in that order, you will win the right business every single time.