If you want to sell to the “C” suite it’s important that you understand how they think and how they operate. Here’s a peek into a day in the life of a typical CEO.
“I get into the office at 7.00 am to get a head start on my emails before the sales calls begin. As usual I have over 200 sales emails. I read each one carefully in case there’s something in there that my company desperately needs. You can’t afford to miss anything in today’s competitive world.
“Many of these emails include compelling offers – enthralling White Papers, riveting Case Studies, innovative polls – often unmissable Special Offers. Each time I excitedly click onto a link I reach a form I have to fill before I can get my eager mitts onto someone’s content. I always carefully fill out all my details to make sure the inevitable follow up calls and emails get my name right. Sometimes there’s an offer with time limit – they always seem to be at midnight that day so I have to hurry to take advantage before the offer runs out.
“Often the emails are hard to understand and it takes me a while to work out what they’re talking about. This slows me down but it’s important to make the effort to understand these things.
“When I’ve finished I turn my attention to LinkedIn. It takes me quite some time to work my way through the dozens of new connection requests from total strangers, many from exotic foreign places. It’s so thrilling to discover how many people in places I’ve never heard of so desperately want to follow me.
“Next I move on to the messages. About 75% of the 160 messages I typically get are from the people I connected with yesterday. I enthusiastically absorb them because who knows when I’ll need to have someone to rewrite my LinkedIn profile, develop new apps, provide me with exciting software services or deliver me dozens of qualified leads every week.
“I wrote an article last week and dozens of sycophants – sorry, I mean valuable connections – have “liked” it and even make outstanding and in-depth comments like “nice article“. Of course I check the profiles of all these people because they obviously love me. It’s fascinating to see how many of them crush their quotas and are Amazon number #1 best sellers – impressive. I make a note of them all in case I ever need to hire gun salespeople.
“I get a lot of videos too and I watch every one, even the 15 minute ones that don’t actually say anything. There may be a hidden gem near the end.
“By now it’s after 11.00 am. My progress is slowed by the stream of sales calls I get my EA to put directly through to me. It’s important to keep up to date with what’s out there on the market. I listen carefully to the SDRs that call me. I feel sorry for the ones I can actually understand. Most of them are 14 years old and know nothing about me or my business. I know they have targets to meet so I feel obliged to help them qualify me to see if I’m rich and important enough for one of their proper salespeople to bother with.
“Once I’ve finished I go back through those who have sent me their calendar to book the free 15 minute discussions they’re offering me.
“Then I reluctantly pause for lunch. I have to squeeze a few unimportant things into my lunch hour – board meetings, executive meetings, conversations with my biggest customers, talks with government ministers, reviewing sales, planning strategy, etc. – before I get back to answering sales calls.
“Finally, at 6.00 pm I’ve cleared my messages, answered dozens of sales call, had four of those 15 minute “getting to know you” phone meetings and read 17 White papers, 11 Case Studies and filled out 3 polls.
“Reflecting on another successful day I get on my unicorn and gallop contentedly back kiss my princess and wake her from her 100 year sleep, reminding myself to get those pesky dwarves out of the garage.”