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Connecting business owners with financial expertise to grow their businesses.
Sarah Petty (00:44)
Hi, DeepD, welcome to the Olive Insights podcast.
Dipti Pandit (00:48)
Thank you so much for having me.
Sarah Petty (00:50)
So I should really say welcome back because in complete transparency for our audience, Dibdi and I actually recorded this episode a few weeks ago and we had a great conversation but a few connection issues and unfortunately our recording didn't upload. So thank you for agreeing to come back and re-record with me.
Dipti Pandit (01:12)
I think we are all prone to disasters and challenges. But the best thing out of all of this is we learn. Hopefully this time it's an improvised version of what we speak, but I'm looking for all fun and some great conversations today, Sarah.
Sarah Petty (01:15)
you
Exactly. We've had a practice run now. So this version should be even better. So Dipti, you are the owner and CEO of your own sales consulting business. Can you tell us a bit about your business and what you do?
Dipti Pandit (01:40)
What? For sure!
Sales is my passion and my love. I work typically with businesses who are in B2B or what we call as commercial sales and these businesses are stuck with sales challenges and as a CEO or a sales leader when you are looking at achieving your targets and you are stuck and you got to report to the board and you have a team which is not performing up to your mark that's when it gives you sleepless nights.
And revenue targets and the growth of the company is on top of everyone's mind. So if that's not happening, essentially, your business as a machinery is on hold. It's stuck. That's where, as an expert in sales, having done this for the last 18 years of my life, I come into play.
I work with business owners, CEOs, essentially to give them a better view of what the challenges are. I perform a health audit of the sales and present a roadmap that is going to take them out of this rut. And it's a roadmap that is going to essentially be a transformation.
not only show a roadmap, but I walk them through those challenges, being on the sidelines, being the coach, the mentor, the guide, but essentially the executor of this change. And towards the end, what you see is a whole new transformed process, a change, a complete new team. And many of the times, our businesses complain about, ⁓ the market is challenging. We are not getting enough leads, or we don't get pipeline. 90 % of the times, it is.
your own team and there are small tweaks here and there. So that's essentially what I do. So in sales consulting as we call it, sales coach, but on the sidelines I also do sales training for corporate teams and typical businesses that I work with are the ones in software, tech, services, other top ones, but sales is a transferable skills as long as you are into B2B, I'm happy to help any business that needs help.
Sarah Petty (03:21)
Hmm.
Yes, excellent. And sales is absolutely crucial aspect of any small business, right? I mean, without consistent sales, the business isn't going to be around for very long and often sales is at the crux of the cashflow issues and the profitability because the business struggles to grow. And it's interesting, you know, as a business owner,
and I'm not a sales professional, many business owners are not, but they come into this role and need to be able to sell. So it's really critical that they do get the right support if it's not their area of expertise. And I think learning myself is that sales is actually quite strategic and a skill that you need to learn. It's not really something that you can just wing it and hope for the best.
Sarah Petty (04:34)
So we've had a question from a business owner about inconsistent sales in their business. And Dipti, I think your expertise is going to be very valuable here. So I'll read through the question and then let's jump into a bit of a discussion to see if we can help this business owner and many others who will be listening today. So here's the question.
Dipti Pandit (04:51)
Sure.
Sarah Petty (04:56)
We are an IT and cyber security firm and have built a consistent suite of services. We get great feedback when people work with us, but sales are still inconsistent, which makes it hard to plan ahead. I'd love to secure some larger and longer term clients. I know we need to improve our sales process, but I'm not sure where to start. How can I work out what the problem is and how to fix it without becoming pushy or salesy? So Dipty, this is obviously something you would deal with quite often.
Let's start with, how do you go about identifying what's missing in a sales process when client feedback is great, but sales are still inconsistent?
Dipti Pandit (05:37)
Great question and I see lots of branches sprouting out as you read this. So first step, first approach that I would recommend is a very simple one. Follow the SWOT method, which is your strengths, weakness, threats and opportunities. The great thing about this business owner is about the product and service offering they have. And today when we look at the market for all the challenges
Sarah Petty (05:51)
Mmm.
Dipti Pandit (06:07)
that we see the number one is about cyber security and IT and those threats. So what you have today is a demand. It's I think more of ⁓ pull than push. So as a business, you don't have to push yourself too much because if you have a known product.
and if there is demand in the market, it just makes it a little easier. So quickly do an analysis in terms of where your strengths, weakness, the spot analysis. Then the other thing what I picked is the customer references, the customer feedbacks is excellent. So not just you have a great product service offering, but you're doing something amazing. Your customers are loving you. So grab as much as testimonials, ⁓ references, reference you can.
Sarah Petty (06:49)
Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (06:59)
In a sales cycle,
what we really need and typically what I understand from this business is they are looking for a B2B customer, right? As in providing the IT security threat and service to an organization. So in a sales process, trust and relationship building are the fundamental pillars and trust is first and foremost. If I'm going to procure a service from somebody, I need to see level of trust and it doesn't matter whether you are a 25 year old organization.
on a one euro document.
If you are having a strong product and in a position to build a trust, that's where that's your strength. Okay, so as a business owner having done that the next step is to actually run reports. lot of businesses don't really spend time into running reports. So what I mean by reports are certain specific reports meant for any business reviewing your sales performance. So pull out how many leads do you get? Which are your sources of leads? Then check your conversion
Sarah Petty (07:42)
Yes.
Dipti Pandit (08:05)
From the leads, how many do they convert? What is your sales cycle? How long does it take for you to do the journey between finding a lead to conversion of the lead? So conversion is essentially signing off a contract. Then you look at the touch points for a customer. So these are some basic check analysis and you need to run reports.
organization who's been doing this for a long time. So run at least for three years. If you're a newer organization, it for the time that's most ⁓ sensible. And that report is going to give you a lot of information. Okay, so with that, find out where those gaps are.
For me, sounds like there is huge potential in the market. So getting your leads, where are you getting them from? It has to be a multi-channel approach. You cannot be in today's market just focusing on one channel. In B2B, you have LinkedIn as your primary stock source. Networking is very important. Then it is about some advertisements, whether you are present at an exhibition or you are sponsoring an event. Your messaging has to be loud and clear of what you do. Who's your IC?
Sarah Petty (08:57)
Hmm.
Dipti Pandit (09:15)
Many of the times customers think, ⁓ I have to get everyone as a customer. You don't need to target 1 million customers, you might just need 10. So be very focused with your ICP. An ICP is who is your ideal customer profile. So you got to really put that very clear in yourself. Are you focusing certain sectors? What sort of businesses are you focusing on? Who is the decision maker? What is the employee strength you're focusing on? What is the revenue this business generates?
So when you have a very focused targeted ⁓ approach in your sales, which is your ICP, then a targeted messaging followed by multi-channel approach, that is going to help you get a lot of going to give you the right leads. You do not want to be attracting hundreds of them, but no quality. You may want to focus on quality first and then quantity.
Sarah Petty (10:04)
Mm.
Dipti Pandit (10:08)
⁓ Other factor which is important for business owners is to actually look at your sales people who are actually driving the conversation.
sales pitch. Are they having the right sales conversation? To give you a classic example Sarah, I was at an event and there were these many of these displays you know the events there were many sponsors and they had their own booth and everyone was advertising and somehow I get attracted to you know having conversation and asking them their sales pitch. So I saw this wonderful stall and they've had a prime location with lots of cupcakes and goodie bags
Sarah Petty (10:32)
Yeah. Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (10:48)
Very attractive enough looking at cupcakes I was attracted to. And I saw quite a few salespeople trying to have smiley faces and drive conversation. So I walk into this amazing, handsome young man who welcomes me and I ask him my first question, tell me about yourselves, what do you guys do? And his reply just put me off. He said to me, our software does everything.
Sarah Petty (10:52)
Yeah
You
Dipti Pandit (11:15)
If this is what your sales people are going to do, it is a disaster because as a business owner...
Sarah Petty (11:15)
Right.
Dipti Pandit (11:22)
You have spent a lot of money hiring this person, putting up the stall, spending on sponsorship, getting all those goodie bags. And if you are going to attract leads, but not have conversion, because that's exactly your point of conversion. You're meeting your customers directly. The amount of success you can get from events is massive because you're meeting the customer straight in the face. Plus there are other people who are influencers. When they see you, they would be consultants like me who talk to like 10 clients a week.
Sarah Petty (11:43)
Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (11:52)
do not probably share the word if you have the right pitch and if you had something really attractive enough that strikes to me and I remember about it. So it's also about for the business owners to make sure you have the right team. Are they having the right sales pitch? Are they having the right conversation? ⁓ What you call as undercover boss sometimes may work.
Sarah Petty (12:13)
You
Dipti Pandit (12:14)
just to
check the efficiency of how your sales folks are doing. So if you can't really map and get these things in order, it's a cakewalk. It's just a matter of putting yourself, getting yourself, getting ahead out of the busy operations which many sales business owners get stuck into and actually being focused on looking at your numbers, your smart analysis, your salespeople, your ICP and having a focused approach. Sorry if this is too much, but I've tried to get as much as I can from.
Sarah Petty (12:18)
Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (12:44)
from this question.
Sarah Petty (12:44)
Yeah, no, I think that's excellent, deep dear, it gives a lot of avenues and I've just been writing down some notes myself. I think there's a few things in my own business that I can start looking at here. ⁓ And, you know, a couple of the key points I've written down there. So I think the reporting is one, know, often people do understand that they need financial reports, but not thinking about
Dipti Pandit (12:56)
Fantastic.
Sarah Petty (13:06)
like sales metrics. But you're right, needing to track that and understand your performance can help you diagnose where that problem lies. And if it is you're getting lots of leads in, but you're not converting the sales, then you know where to focus. It's not necessarily about finding new leads, but it's something in, you know, could be the team, as you mentioned, or something else in your process that's not working.
I took away from that that cupcakes and handsome men at your booth are great, but won't still make the sale for you. Yeah. The other one you mentioned there was around testimonials and this business owner in particular, as mentioned, they're having great feedback from their customers and how, you know, and.
Dipti Pandit (13:41)
Think twice before you spend money.
Sarah Petty (13:57)
So I guess my question is how do they leverage that once they ask for the feedback and they're getting that fantastic feedback? What's the best way to leverage that in their sales process?
Dipti Pandit (14:07)
I love this question because the thing with testimonial is you got to capture your client. You got to really ask this question to your client when the client is at the peak of experience, when they are having that moment of joy and do it early in the days because as a service provider, you're going through a cycle of starting the customer, the onboarding journey, the implementation setup, whatever that might be, and then the process of providing your service.
So at the start you set an expectation, you do the deliverables and then you get to a point where customers delighted and customers at high of how fantastic you are as a service provider. Just make sure you throw in at times this question to the client. Hey client, would you be okay to give us a testimonial? It'll help us in X. Or we owe you or you it's gonna be amazing.
also ask them if they were okay if they could do a video testimony it works amazing so it's not just about someone giving you a return testimony the times have changed where social digital media has spoiled us where we go on those quick 20 second feels then actually read something so try and ask that in advance and we all are
Sarah Petty (15:09)
Mmm.
Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (15:27)
servicing each other. So every business understands the importance of testimonials. So asking this question early in the days, but actually capturing that at the time that the customer is happy, you it's sort of, you've got to really make sure you're doing it at the right time and just follow up. Just make sure that you don't leave it to the very last. Ask the question, keep them in, let them have it in their head, but just follow up to make sure, make it convenient for them.
challenge what I see is drafting or writing a testimonial is not everyone's favorite thing to do and people though they have the right intentions they would delay it so it just try and think proactively what would help so maybe you want to draft something and tell the customer say hey customer we've another testimonial here is a draft in case if you are short of time if you want to have a look you want to edit this just let me know you're just helping save
Sarah Petty (16:04)
Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (16:26)
hours and hours of brain space and brain capacity for your customer. Second is with videos if you are in a video call like this you could just tell the customer hey do you mind if you could just speak for 20 seconds and proactively maybe just give them a script as well just make their lives easier.
When you are a case study, just draft what you think is the case study. Send this to the customer for approval. Make sure you have the approvals and their consent. If you using their logos, then it's okay. Make sure you follow that through. These are a tips on testimonials. Other thing that I might encourage for established businesses is when you are servicing your customer, you may have a few different variety of customers. ⁓
selling into, like for example in my case, I'm selling into a software. So I might have a software customer or I am, one of my client is an AI business, another client is an insurance. So these are different sectors, So having variety of case studies with different sectors and also different challenges.
because you want to service not just one, you want to service as many as you can. So having different case study based on different problems and different sector, so try and target ⁓ varied options and have them, but use them most importantly. If you are say presenting your proposal, put your case studies or those testimonials in your proposal, put them on your website, nothing like it. And also go high about sharing this on social digital media.
Sarah Petty (18:03)
Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (18:03)
memorials
work so massively. Amazing. Can't talk enough.
Sarah Petty (18:08)
Yeah, some great tips there. And you're right, gathering the feedback from your clients, but making it really easy for them to do. ⁓ And I think having those sort of that proof from existing customers is really helpful for new customers as well. So you mentioned before about we've all kind of come across that, you know, pushy salesperson, the used car salesman who gives you a bad experience when it comes to sales, but
What tips do you have for business owners to sell effectively without sounding pushy or salesy as such?
Dipti Pandit (18:46)
One common notion people have is sales being pushy and that's something last in your mind. if I am a customer, the last thing I want someone is to sell to me. It's just human, right? Let's say someone comes across to you and say, hey, buy this. You're like, no, stay away. Give me my space, right? So first of all, such direct approaches don't work. And if you're chasing customer who's not interested, you've got to give everyone space.
Now you got to think creatively as to what exactly there do I do.
First foremost, you've got to study your customers. You've got to understand what problems they have and how can you step in to solve those problems. Because as I said earlier, today's selling scheme has changed completely. It's about solving problems. It's about building relationship. It's about adding value. So as a seller, you've got to think about this. You've got to really understand the customer and then approach. And always see how you can add value. You want to come across as a subject matter expert.
First is the homework, the preparation that you do. Okay, in terms of having the right conversation, it's about, know, how exactly can I solve problems? So whenever you're reaching out to the customer, you're not only talking about, this is what I sell, or these are the great products and benefits that's gonna help you. That's very much like selling me. But instead, if I shift the conversation to say, hey, I understand businesses like you have so and so problem, and you can pull out some statistics
statistics
or percentage just to make that a bit stronger pitch and say 98 % of the businesses struggle with so and so and this is how we can help you. We're going to solve this, we're going to solve that and most of our clients see so and so results. So if your conversation has shifted from this is what I said to these are your problems this is how we can sell. So all of your conversation need to be about problem selling problem solving it has to be about the customer. Now in terms of follow up try and make it
whenever you reach out, provide a booking link so the can look into if they find it interesting they can select a time and a date that works better for themselves because remember in sales it is not about me as a seller it is about the customer and customer is the cable always stand true
That's number one. Second thing we also got to understand is today the customers are far more informed and educated than what they were in previous years ago. And that's again because in flux of social digital media, there is so much of information through Reels, through videos that usually gets through the customer. So why don't you do that? You create some Reels, you create some videos. So when you're sending a message, give a 30 second video or 20 second video
to the customer that talks about your product business. So instead of you trying to write a long draft, you speak about it in such an effective manner that the customer is going to check your message at that time. They're going to see if they really need your help, if they really need your services, and then give them the booking link so they can click in a time. Now in terms of follow up, I would say five follow ups are needed.
⁓ especially if you're targeting via emails or you're targeting via LinkedIn but nothing like cold calling where people really get it wrong is they don't have a right script
Sarah Petty (22:18)
Hmm.
Dipti Pandit (22:19)
And
again, you know, we get a lot of these calls unwarranted once, which we hate someone calling for different services, which you don't need or what we might call a cyber security or threat of fraud. But if you are someone who can really drive a good conversation, ask the right question, nothing can do better than cold calling. But always ask the customer what's the right time to get in touch with you and follow through. Again, remember, you don't have to win everyone as a customer. You've got to win only those customers
Sarah Petty (22:28)
Yes.
Dipti Pandit (22:49)
who have a problem that you can genuinely solve but you got to be in the customer's shoes and follow up is important but not to such an extent where customers are going to hate you. They're going to respect you if you can have the right conversation. If you don't know what the right conversation is reach out to someone for help and support.
Sarah Petty (23:03)
Yeah.
Yes, absolutely. A lot of good tips in there and I think.
Two that I've taken away from that is that focus of selling is problem solving. And I think many service provider business owners, we truly believe in the services that we're providing, right? We know that it can help people. We know that it can help businesses grow or help someone better their life or make more money or whatever it might be. Like we truly believe in our services. So it's not about just pushing a service on someone, but thinking about what is that customer's problem and how what we do.
solve it so I really like that that reframe of it.
I think the other point I took away there is just making it easy. know, it's ridiculous how many businesses you come across that make it hard for you to do business with them. You can't find a way to book a call with them. It's difficult to work out how to pay them. It's, you know, it seems crazy, but just those small things that make it easy, make it easy to do business with you, I think can make a real difference in your sales process because you're thinking with the customer in mind again, not about you, but about how what will make
it simple for your customer.
Dipti Pandit (24:20)
And as simple things
as having a booking link, which I think a lot of people are doing. Second is having a phone number. Like trust me, one client of mine, one of the challenges they had was not getting enough pipeline and conversion and blah, blah, blah. And when I looked at their signatures, they did not mention their email ID, not a booking link, not a phone number.
I said, come on, you're a remote organization. You've got to have your phone number in your signatures. If I'm a customer, if I got to contact you, and if you're just going to have the email, I am someone who loves conversations, right? I would love to have your phone number so I can get back to you. So simple things like these do matter a lot. And it's just not emails. But today, you're present on LinkedIn, you're present on Instagram. You've got to be giving your contact numbers.
Sarah Petty (24:42)
you
Yes.
Okay, I'm going to check my email signature after this just to make sure. ⁓ few, few, few, ⁓ All right, perhaps one last question before we finish up.
Dipti Pandit (25:11)
I've checked yours, your phone number's there, so you're fine, Sarah.
Sarah Petty (25:24)
You've talked about you work with ⁓ all kinds of sales teams and sales professionals as well as business owners who are leading the sales process. And a lot of the audience that I have for this podcast are founder led businesses where the founder is still doing that sales role in the business. In your view, is the founder or the business owner always the right person to lead the sales process? Or at what point should they start thinking about bringing on a sales team?
Dipti Pandit (25:55)
Great question and I get this very often. So this is amazing. So when you are starting up as a business, as an owner, you have the passion, vision, you have the motivation and you are the right person to really drive the conversation.
With sales, it's about conviction. So as a business owner, as a founder, you have the right conviction to do so. So in early days of your business, definitely as a business owner, you have to be across all stages of sales. But when you scale up, you want to build a strong machinery yourself so things work automated. Tomorrow as a business owner, when you want to take a quick break, you want to go out with your family. You do not want to be checking your phones and
emails are not really getting the time. Okay, burnout is going to really exhaust your big way. So the vision that you have for your business may have hiccups if you're not putting the right machinery in place. So early days is great, but also start thinking of where are those tasks which you can start to let go of, which you need to be involved.
particularly admin tasks. For example, if it is social digital media, putting posts or managing your diary or if it is simple things like managing your CRM, setting up your CRM. You may start with a virtual assistant, but then you need to start building a team. But allocating tasks to your team is important. Importantly, as a business owner, you need to have certain time in the week or the month which you block out just for organizing yourself.
If you're not a good thinker and if you're not a good planner and you are someone who just looks at your inbox and chases email after the other, then that's not going to help. You've really got to park out some time for yourself and you really got to focus on these are all my tasks. Which one can I offload? Which one can I bring in specialists in? For example, if sales is not your forte and you are
wanting to scale up, you need to build a team. If that's not your forte, then get an expert like me, but importantly, someone who really knows things, who can, you know, take away all of the weight, but who will do it more efficiently. So you can focus on the things that matter the most. Second is again, with your own skillset, where your skills lie. Okay, for example, you're managing finance and if that's not a skill set, get a virtual CFO or if it's legal, ⁓
Get great people who can help and maybe pull organizations like Olive and yourself in. Get those experts. And there are so many of them today who focus on the niche areas to manage things. So as a business owner, you do not want to be head deep down and swimming without having a view of which direction you're going. So if your goalpost is on your left and your head is deep down, stuck into operations, just managing data.
and you're swimming on the right side, then you're far away from your goalpost. It's just going to exhaust you and you're going to drown. So rather, have time to duck out your head, look where your goalpost is, make those corrections, and start focusing in that direction. So that would be sort of the example, but as you scale up, you need to have a team, you need to have specialists who are right for the job, and look, this isn't a cost, it's an investment.
Sarah Petty (29:05)
Hmm.
Dipti Pandit (29:25)
when you invest in the right people, in the right systems and tools. If you can do that early and have a roadmap for yourself, that is great. Because you need the right tools. CRM is most important. There are other tools like having tools for managing your finances. Then if it is your calendar, things like Canonly, if it is booking your meetings and having a good booking tools. If it's about your marketing, making sure you have enough tools, but also supported with the right people.
That would be my control. Hope that answers the question.
Sarah Petty (30:00)
Yeah,
absolutely. So I think it's depending on the phase of the business and how fast and how you want to scale the business is when you might consider bringing in a sales team. I think a good point you made there though is even when you're transitioning to a sales team, you need to have some processes and systems to be able to back that up.
because I've probably seen, you we work with businesses that are scaling and often growing very quickly. And we have seen that where the founder or the business owner has led the sales process. It's all in their own head. And then they bring on a salesperson too soon without actually fleshing out some system and process. And that person just...
isn't successful because they don't have the process, they're not set up for success. Or I've seen the founder own that process for too long, then they get to the point that they're thinking about an exit from the business and they can't take themselves out of the business because it's all with them and they're the only person that knows how to sell and has all the relationships. So I think that system and process side of it in that transition is really, really important from.
all aspects of the business, sales, operations, finance, all of it. Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (31:08)
Absolutely.
Exactly and I think as business owners you got to be aware that awareness is very important. I'll give you a classic example of a client I was working with. think that's going to be apt for this situation. This amazing guy, buys a 20 year old commercial cleaning business and they used to do like million dollar of sales. After he has bought that business, he has been barely able to cover $20,000 as a monthly revenue.
Sarah Petty (31:17)
Yeah.
Dipti Pandit (31:40)
And that's when he brings me in. And my initial questions are, okay, who's driving sales? He's like, no, we wait, we wait for courts and we submit codes. So he's given me a very ⁓ answer that was not great. But essentially his challenge was that he was not comfortable making calls. Then I asked him who else? And there was nobody. So these are things which businesses got to understand that if you don't have that expertise, bring in the experts, get those people in.
Sarah Petty (31:50)
Yeah.
Yeah, right.
Yes.
Yeah, absolutely. We'll look deep to there's probably a million other questions I could ask you because this is really interesting for me and I feel like I've got some learnings to take back to my own business. ⁓ But unfortunately, we are out of time. If there are many listeners, I'm sure got a lot out of this conversation and if they are looking to work with you, where can they find out more about you?
Dipti Pandit (32:32)
I am super active on LinkedIn and I do reply to messages really quick. So I would say LinkedIn and at LinkedIn you can search me up at dipti.com.au and my last name is PANDIT. If you want to send me an email you can reach out to me at ⁓ diptypti.com.au
I do lot of content on sales and strategies. So if you are someone who loves to read, ⁓ follow me on LinkedIn. That would be your first go to. I'm also on Instagram, so you can check it, sales underscore, pundit underscore, something.
Sarah Petty (33:19)
Excellent. We'll put those links in the show notes so people can easily find you. But thank you so much, Dipti. I think it was very worthwhile re-recording this conversation. ⁓ I feel like we've got even richer conversation in this second time around. So really appreciate your time today.
Dipti Pandit (33:36)
Thank you so much, Sarah. It's been amazing. I've been blessed today to get some really great questions, and I love answering all of this. So thank you so much for having me.
Sarah Petty (33:49)
too kind. Thank you.