Closing sales online for pharmaceutical

How to create outlook signature

hello friends my name is Michael stava and today I'd like to give you a video about sales calls best practices specifically this one is focused on pharmaceutical and medical device and whether you're watching this video because you're trying to learn more about Mike's tapa specifically or you generally want these tips to improve and that you can use in your own sales career the video will accomplish both of those tasks so let's get started so in terms of you know kind of the primary purpose of the video what I like I said what I want is I want to give you an example of a typical sales call a real-world sales call of the way I conduct my own calls and pharmaceutical and medical device world but also if you're considering getting into the industry this is a great example of what an interaction is like between a representative and a doctor or if you're already in the industry and you just want to add additional skills you know kind of to your sales tool bag maybe some of the things I say today could be things that you could use and on that same regard I'm always learning myself so if you watch this video and you have things that you'd like to share with me by all means please send them my way so that I could lead to need to add my own repertoire now before we get started I wanted to talk about the method that I'm going to use it's called P path which stands for an acronym for purpose proof action and follow-up I've got another video specifically about the PPF method of call planning if you're interested in that I encourage you to watch that video too but that's the the method I'm gonna use throughout this particular sales call and just in case you don't know me just to give you a little background I'm not gonna read this entire slide but you can see I've been in sales for over 25 years I have been blessed to be able to you know exceed my quota a year after year after year I'm on a nice little run right now you know I don't consider myself a sales guru but you know I do like to share what I know that's how I learned I like to share it with you and I do live and breathe this stuff every day I've been involved in customer interactions for over 25 years and what I'm showing you today this is what I do every day and the people that work with me can validate that for you so again there's the method that we talked about the peat path method and you'll see this throughout the sales call so just to give you an example so if the step one is setting up the purpose for the visit so if I'm going to be talking to a doctor for example I might say something like this you know hey doctor I'm here today is I want to discuss with you how you can use Product X to help patient Y with conditions e is this something you're interested in so let's break down that that discussion right there now obviously this is kind of a watered down version we're not talking about an actual product here I mean because you know there are certain compliance regulations we got to stay with overtime talking in generic terms right here but let's focus on what we can talk about and that is this is an example of an opening that I use all the time the reason I use it is because it provides a clear goal we want to talk about product X for certain patients not the actual patient names but just in general these patients that have this condition Z for example and that's the roadmap for the call so I know what the call is about and the doctor knows what the call is about and just kind of has a look a little bit of a pro tip I'm gonna give you like these real-world examples throughout the video I like to set this up before the call even occurs so maybe I talked about this as the end of my last call during the follow-up to my last call or maybe it was over email if your company allows you to send emails maybe prior to this call you send an email hey doc can we talk about this when I meet with you on Tuesday or something like that and then when you get in you know you could say hey remember you know we talked with this on the last call and kind of bringing that that process forward or if remember hey we talked over email we're gonna talk about this patient type so that's kind of like a little bit of a tip right there the other piece I want to talk about it's very important and that is the are you interested portion at the end you know that's kind of I don't say it's a controversial thing but I know a lot of people shy away from asking a question like this specifically asking are you interested in this topic and I believe that's critical to ask this question so you might say well Mike what if they say no they're not interested well I need to know that and you as a sales representative need to know that too because if you engage in a discussion where the doctor is actually not interested in your discussion you're gonna waste your time and their time and you're gonna think they're ready to buy from you when in reality they have a lot of objections that you have not uncovered yet so by asking the are you interested question it does a couple things one if they're not interested then you can find out what the problem is so that you can tackle that objection first so because you're not ready to go to the buying stage yet right but if they are interested it provides a form of a trial clothes right they said they're interested in this if you can provide evidence that backs up the recommendation that you're gonna make then by the time you get to the actual cause later they've already said yes so it's a beautiful thing make sure that you don't skip the are you interested portion of the question got it alright step to the proof right so this is the evidence stage you know I'm talking about a patient that has this condition Z obvious I'm gonna make a recommendation that they use product X but I've got to back that up with evidence right because I'm not a doctor me just going in there and telling them to use the product without any evidence he's not gonna do anything so I might say something like this so again this is you know a generic way to say so hey did you see that article by Bob Evans in the March issue of the New England Journal of Medicine you know dr. Evans he conducted a trial with patients that had conditions II and he found that patients who use product X were able to reduce conditions II by 35% what's your opinion of that research so again watered-down version right but it's it's kind of an example of how you can have a discussion starter and the source the proof source could be a clinical that you use like a white paper it could be a visual aid it could be your mobile device whatever the case may be right you're gonna have something that's gonna provide evidence to back up the recommendation that you're gonna make in your closed stage now I want to touch on this thing called be brief be brilliant and be gone when I was early in my career I read a book that was something titled similar to this I don't know exactly what it was but it was like this here but the concept is this you know in pharmaceutical and medical device sales well often we're meeting with providers whether that's doctors nurse practitioners respiratory therapists nurses whatever the case may be these people are busy treating patients if they've got time to meet with you they don't have a lot of time right so you got to maximize that time that you have you've got to be brief with them but you got to be brilliant and then you got to be gone right so use the time that you have to get that job done and so why I bring it up here with the proof stage is because what I found over there and myself included when you're early on in your career the proof stage is the hardest piece to be confident with you know you've got a lot of things in your job that you're responsible for and knowing the clinical evidence when you don't have a medical background it can be very difficult so some people shy away from the proof stage I'm telling you don't do that because if you do that and I again I've been there right if you try to you know not know as much as you should know you're not going to be confident when you present that proof and you're gonna know it and the doctor is gonna know it and the recommendation that you make is not going to be believable so spend the time getting to know the proof source that you're using you know I don't have a medical background I have a financial background so it took me a while to learn the medical side of things when I got into this industry in the early in the middle 2000s right I spent a lot of time and effort to learn the medical side of the business and I became I like to think a product knowledge expert and I think it's reasonable for everybody to have that goal even if you don't have the medical background I have since given many many presentations where when I'm done with the presentation people will ask Wow what is your what is your medical background and I don't bring that up to toot my own horn only just to show you that it is possible to be a subject matter expert in your product and when I say to that when people ask me that is that I kind of just laugh it off right hey you know I might be an expert in one thing but you're the expert in many things and I'm only here to support you with the little piece that I know of the pie that can help you in your decision making you know nobody expects you to be an expert in everything right I'm not a doctor I don't pretend to be a doctor right but I can be an expert in the proof sources that I bring and I can be an expert in my product and that's how I can provide value to the customers that I serve right so in terms of the proof source that you're choosing we got to make sure that it's clearly related to the purpose of the visit so I said in that purpose hey I'm coming in to talk about patients that have conditions II so my proof source has to support this theory right the page the people who use product X for conditions II get better right and now I'm gonna verbalize that for the customer and I'm gonna see if the customer buys into that evidence right if they do buy into the evidence and that's gonna make the clothes easier if they don't buy into the evidence and I need to know what their objections are right in addition I'm also introducing a concept here called the key opinion leaders strategy I'd like to say is hey you know doc don't take my word for it that you should use you know product X for condition Z this is what Bob Evans says and Bob Evans is a key opinion leader nationally throughout for this product and if this doctor knows Bob Evans personally all the better right because now we're from validation from a proof source and someone that they know let's take this a little bit forward a little bit more here with some additional stuff I talked about the stumbling blocks already that's you know taking the time to know your material and the fact that you can realist have a reasonable goal to be an expert in the things that you are presenting now does that mean you have to know everything there is to know about this trial from a medical standpoint that's probably unrealistic if you don't have a medical background but your company probably has a medical science team that if they ask questions that go beyond the label or they ask questions that you don't know don't make it up just get them hooked up with the medical science person from your company who can answer those questions right also I think this is very important when you are presenting a piece of clinical information it should be a dialogue right we're not trying to present a piece of clinical information no and then we can go kind of coast to coast page to page all the way through right we want to have a dialogue during that discussion so maybe throughout the presentation that maybe it's a five minute presentation right but you might say something like you know when you talk about how the research was set up hey doc what do you think about how the research was set up or are the patients in this trial similar to yours why or why not or are you using product X in the same way that Bob Evans is dr. Evans is using or when you get to the results you know hey are you getting the same results as dr. Evans is with product X what patients that have conditions here are you getting something different right that's important to have that QA because like I said that's gonna help you uncover those hidden objections and those objections are what you need to know before you can get to the clothes all right speaking of the clothes this is step three right purpose proof action this is the action clothes so you might see something like this so doc you know you've seen how dr. Evans is using Product X to treat his patients with conditions II you said you'd love to get similar results for your patients too so I mean if that's true then is it reasonable for me to ask you to use product X for your patients that have condition Z right again it's a watered down clothes but I use a version of that all the time and I can tell you it work particularly if you've followed that path way from purpose proof to action right what I love about this clothes is a few things it's specific it's easy to understand and it's reasonable right I'm not asking my doctor to use Product X for every patient under the Sun no I'm asking them to use it for patients that have conditions II and it's based on evidence that backs that up right that is a reasonable and easy to understand request to make and when you use a request like that you're going to increase your percentage of getting a yes I mean this specificity this works right it's not rocket science it's you know I didn't make this up and I'm just telling you it does work what I love about this action like I said is the action track back to the proof which tracks back to the purpose and that's what makes it reasonable so a few things you know kind of continue this forward right here variations so especially this works great if you're in the hospital right and it's a clinical critical care unit or something hey so doc do you have any patients right now that have conditions II know you have some in the in the unit right now maybe can we try product X with them and and let's have you monitor the results that works great okay if maybe there's an outpatient setting here what's the next time you're gonna see a patient with conditions II whatever whatever the case may be right maybe a week or something from now so hey when they come in or you be willing to try product decks with them alright here's another good one let's do this how about the next time you get a patient with conditions II you try product X right then on my next visit we can discuss your results and see if you get in the same success and the same outcomes that dr. Evans is that reasonable here's another one okay and this I'd like to use this one for all of them right so listen keep in mind especially if this is a new person using your product this is very important look I'm here to set you up for success right so if you got questions about the use of the product both myself and my medical team in my training team we're here to help you in your staff so you're never gonna be alone in this process we want you to be confident but if you're gonna use this product and you use it in the same manner that it's recommended by the package insert and by the evidence that you're gonna have success it will help set you up for that success okay now let's take you to the next level all right I love this one here so hey Doc what do you think about this one how about you trial product decks on your next few patients with conditions and we'll monitor the results together right meanwhile I'll reach out to dr. Evans and I'll see if he has any availability to meet with us live and if this is something you're interested and I can work with your group admin we'll set up like an interactive forum discussion we can kind of have a night out together with you one of my companies you know on label case study slide deck presentations and then we can all have a good discussion with dr. Evans would that be a value to you and the rest of your team see what I love about that approach is now I'm continuing that key opinion leaders sales tactic right and I'm also providing further encouragement and support for the customer to proceed down the path that we all want to get to right that is true value add right there and I've used that for years it is the most successful strategy that I use I encourage you to try it so what's the final thing let's start bringing this home here right this is the follow-up purpose proof action follow-up look something like this okay so we're closing up the call here now right okay doc you said you're gonna give product exit trial for your next few patients with conditions II right you said you think you'll have maybe three to five patients so you can try this approach on the next couple weeks so how about I stop back in two weeks and we see how it goes right what's a good time for our next meeting let's look at the calendar here with the 14th at 7:00 a.m. be good that's I think that's before you have your first patient right if not how about the 16th at 4:00 o'clock after you finish your Hospital rounds right whatever you can make make that fit however you need to but the point is this is the strategy for long-term success you know anybody can close a sale right but if you're gonna have long-term success the people have been in sales for a long time we're gonna tell you it is that long-term follow-up that call continuum that helps you to have success over time and so we don't just want one sale we want a string of sales we don't just want one use of the product we want that product to be continually used because the doctors having great success with it and that's where the follow-up comes into play so let's take this to the next level so if I have action that I need to follow up on I can't drop the ball I got to complete those action and I'm if I have a customer particularly a new customer that starts to use my product I want to make sure that they are successful I want them to be a repeat buyer I want them to love the product so much that they tell their friends right because it's a much easier path to more sales by having current customers use more of product than it is to always try to develop new customers I'm not saying you're not chasing new customers certainly you are but once you've got a customer using the product expand their usage if it's appropriate if they have the patients that need it it's much easier to do and hey for all you know this person that you're developing now is a new customer maybe they're gonna be your next key opinion maybe they're the next Bob Evans right maybe they're the next researcher or maybe they're gonna be a personal friend to you that you do stuff with outside of work that's not even related to work right so all those things are possible right because you're following up with the customer and that's how business is done so let's just summarize here right the sales call method that I use is called P path if you want to know more about it I've got a longer video about that in detail I also have a printable that you can use that you can have it laid out for you you can get that from my website that helpful dad comm but the point is if you use this method consistently you're gonna be able to watch the quality of your sales interactions go up you're gonna build better relationships with your customers and you're also going to get more consistent results over time that's the end of the video I appreciate you watching like I said hopefully these tips are helpful if you have tips that you can share with me I would love to know them if you want to know more check me out on LinkedIn or go to my website that helpful dad com thank you for watching and have a great day