Sales Training Success: Tridium beats its own growth plan by 30% using the power of the CustomerCentric Selling® methodology.

Business Problem
In order to convert this group of partners into a high-growth revenue channel, Tridium CEO John Petze began working with CustomerCentric Selling®.

"When CustomerCentric Selling® first made contact with me," Petze stated, "I conveyed that we were facing a plan to grow top-line revenue by 30%. This had already been committed to our Board, however, 4Q results were lackluster and did not show a trend line that would match that growth."

Several key obstacles were uncovered that had been preventing the Tridium sales staff from achieving their aggressive growth plans. They were:

• Spending too much time on opportunities that never produced business.
• Having difficulty helping customers and partners understand why they needed Tridium's technology and how to use it.
• It was virtually impossible to understand where the company stood in the sales process with respect to its sales opportunities
• All of the company's sales people seemed to use a different language to describe the process.
• Though the company had notable successes with a number of early adopters, the difficulty of replicating that success with new accounts and achieving success with the mainstream market was surprising.

The CustomerCentric Selling® Solution
Tridium and CustomerCentric Selling® set out to:

• Standardize a channel development process for Tridium salespeople to follow and repeat, which included how their sellers would recruit new potential partners, assess their progress, and, then, how they would provide sales, marketing and operational support resources on an ongoing basis.
• Through a series of internal workshops, transfer the skills needed to their channel salespeople, so they could execute the process. These skills, at their core, included how they would convert what were previously, very technical conversations with technical buyers, into business-level discussions their salespeople could conduct, so executives at the highest level would understand the potential value of their offerings.

Once they transferred those skills to their salespeople internally, they needed to accomplish the same externally. Tridium developed a customized "How to sell the Tridium Framework" workshop for their channel partners' salespeople to attend. Tridium and CustomerCentric Selling® worked together for several months to customize this course and developed realistic sales scenarios specific to their target market's needs. The combination of CustomerCentric Selling® lecture and Tridium-coached breakout sessions allow attendees to not only learn the methodology, but also practice new skills that are 100 percent relevant to their sales interactions.

 

Tridium adopted CustomerCentric Selling® with the goal of starting early enough in the year to see results and hit its aggressive plan. Results the company had seen by fourth quarter, included:

• Beating its growth plan by 30% in the first two quarters since working with CustomerCentric Selling®.
• The entire team follows CustomerCentric Selling®, so the company is in control of the process and knows where it stands with accounts and what the next steps are.
• By Tridium salespeople following the process, customers have stated that Tridium is a far more organized company compared to other vendors. Consequently, Tridium has won several new customers, which previously decided not to do business with them or "stalled-out."

According to Petze, "Overall, the impact of CustomerCentric Selling® has exceeded my expectations and changed our company for the better. The financial results are there, the salespeople see the value and the company presents a better image to customers: they see us as helping them address their needs and goals."

More information on Tridium, Inc. can be found at www.tridium.com

Benefits to Tridium:

• Beat growth plan by 30% in the first two quarters post-implementation
• Common language and set of tools to guide the sales process for salespeople
• Improved, organized business that has attracted higher number of new clients

Read more sales training success stories by visiting our Customer Showcase.