This is the 28th in a series of business tips from industry leaders that Enterprise Times has interviewed.
Enterprise Times recently interviewed Antony Elliott, Regional vice president for EMEA North at Talend. Elliot talked about how Talend enables “organisations to gain the true value from their most important asset, which is their data, by providing various tools and solutions to all types of people inside an organisation to gain true data health and visibility.”
As with most interviewees, we asked him about the latest book he read and its take out for business. His choice was unusual, he read Matilda to his children recently and proved that even children’s books can provide insights. Elliot comes from an accounting background but ended up in enterprise sales.
A tip on Sales methodologies
I asked him what sales methodology he applies within Talend and whether he has a tip for other sales leaders about how to apply sales methodology within their team?
He answered, “Do we have a sales methodology? We have many sales methodologies. I think that would be the tip I would have for anyone. Which is, sales methodologies are a toolbox that you can bring out a tool from, to meet the right requirement at the right time. You will have people talk about BANT and MEDICC. They’re not sales methodologies, they’re qualification methodologies. I’ve got more of a classic challenger training and background, probably because I’m a former accountant and that is my natural lean-to. It’s the way that I work.
“There’s all different tools and tricks that you can bring out at any one time. When I say it’s a trick, it’s more about how do I help the customer understand what their problem is? What the value of solving that problem is? How’s the best way to solve it? That’s really what sales is about. It’s helping people understand the problems that they’ve got, and what the value is of solving it. If you can focus in on that, then everything else will become easy. Because they just become hurdles that people need to overcome and they can focus on the end goal.
“That goes back to business. If you can get your team to understand the vision and where it is you want to go, then they will jump over the river and the obstacles in their path to get there for you. You just got to make sure people understand the vision of where they want to get to.”
