AI Tech Empowerment For Sellers And Buyers with Derek Anniston

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Welcome to the live Better Sell Better podcast with your host, Kevin Dorsey of Inside Sales Excellence, the number one Patreon group and YouTube channel for tech sellers and tech sales leaders, where we dive in deep for tactical advice on how to book more meetings, close more deals faster, and lead sales teams to success. But we don't stop there. We also focus on the person in salesperson. We talk about mindset goals, time management, and so much more. So thank you for listening and if you're interested, head on over to patreon.com InsideSalesExcellence now with that, grab a notepad, get ready, and let's dive into the good stuff.

What up, everybody? Welcome to another episode of the live Better Sell Better podcast. This is your host, Kevin Dorsey, AKA kd. And here's the question. Will the robots replace us? Are we replaceable as salespeople? Sales operations, rev ops, marketing, who knows? Because more and more technology is being put in front of us. But what's crazy is it doesn't seem like results are actually getting that much better. If you look at the tech stack of most teams, it's up to 13, 15 things per individual tools that they're using. And so the question gets asked is how do you use technology in a way that actually empowers people, doesn't weigh them down or make them robotic? And that is why I'm so pumped to have Derek Aniston on the show today with me today. He's the director of operations at American Equipment Financial Services, and we're going to talk about this. What's good tech, what's bad tech, and most importantly, how to properly leverage technology to get the most out of your people. Ready to dive in? Derek, my man, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.

For sure.

My man, it's been a long time coming.

We were trying for a while to make this happen. So we finally got it going and so we're going to dive right into it. Man, like when I hit you up about what topic you wanted to cover, like, this is what you brought up, right? It's like, you know, tech empowerment. So let's start with that. What do you mean by tech empowerment? Right. Using technology to empower people.

Absolutely. So from my perspective, we work in an industry that has been deprived of technology. And so commercial lending is still done very much like you'd expect at community banks where people are filling out a physical loan application and they're waiting a couple of weeks to hear back. There's a lot of back and forth providing tax returns and A lot of physical exchange of documents. And so when I first got into this industry, one of the things I noticed is, hey, there's room for some technology and innovation that maybe has already sort of come to fruition in consumer lending in other places. And so we started down the road of just any technology must be good, right, because it's better than nothing. And eventually, over time, sort of came to the conclusion that technology could actually create more problems, you know, than just not having any at all. So maybe the vacuum of technology wasn't the problem. It was sort of how we were thinking about buyers and sellers and what our role is supposed to be.

Now, I like that call out too, of how technology also affects the buyer. So let's keep going down there because there's so many tools that have been given for salespeople and marketers and all these things, but there aren't always that many tools to make things easier on the buyer. So what are some examples of where you've seen tech actually hurt the buyer or make the buyer experience worse?

Well, it's interesting because we're a commercial lending company, so we lend money for a buyer to buy something from somebody else that's selling them that something. So in a lot of ways we're an intermediary to the transaction and, you know, a normal transaction, buyer and seller. So anytime somebody's in between a buyer and a seller, that can be problematic. So for us, we've thought about things like, hey, here's our upload portal where you can upload the needed items and then we'll convey, you know, some of this over to the seller. And so in some ways we're interfering with that straight line of communication between the two, you know, drip email sequences, when those first came on the scene, it's like, wow, now we can email, email all kinds of different people, timely reminders to do things. But it took away a lot of the really simple straight line communication that maybe is what people expect when they go into a buyer and seller transaction.

So what should people think about that? Because I think it's a really good call out of, like if you're looking to roll out technology either internally or for your team, like, what are some things that you should maybe look at or think about with the buyer? So that that actually is a good experience for both sides.

So one of the first things that we thought about is as an intermediary, if you're not part of that transaction and you're not directly selling them something. And so I always think like a real estate Agent is a good example of an intermediary. The title clerk in a real estate transaction is an intermediary. And so if you're outside of that transaction, what you really want to do is do things that provide insights and information and to kind of like leave the human element at the beginning of the transaction and at the end of the transaction. And so all of that middle ground where it's just helping somebody go through a journey, it's about just providing them with automated information and then giving them tools so that they can keep moving at their own pace. Something, Kevin, and you might relate to this, something we always think about is you can look at it like a buyer is driving down a highway and there are all kinds of different exits that they can get off of. And in some ways, much of the technology stack that exists out there is forcing people to get off the highway and to take all these pit stops that they don't need to take. Already got a full tank of gas, don't need to go to the bathroom, don't need to stop for any checks, mix or Gatorade. I just want to keep moving at my own pace. And so in some ways, if your technology just lets them move as far as they want down the road, get as much information as they need about the transaction, about next steps, and to pursue those next steps at their own pace, it's better than, you know, something that's, that's sort of forced and jarring.

Yeah. And I like that a lot because people, you know, more and more like we force a sales process on prospects without thinking about what the buying process is. Right. The sales stages don't match the buying stages, the methodologies don't match how people buy, which I think is a really important thing to think about. But then especially with technology, right, if it's forcing people down a path, path that they don't want to go down. Multiple forms, different, you know, speaking to an sdr, then an AE and all these different things like that definitely gets in the way. Now you mentioned this at the beginning, right. Of like an industry that still doesn't leverage a lot of tech or is just starting to get there. So it's kind of like a two part question of like, how do you, how do you get the team comfortable with technology? Because that's the first place. But then also then too, like, how do you warm up, you know, the buyer or the, you know, the buyer of your product or the buyer of someone else to technology? That's not how they're used to doing business. So Kind of a two parter there. Like how do you enable the team better to get used to the technology? And then also how do you warm up a buyer to use technology they're not used to?

Well, from the team standpoint, I kind of go back to your introduction. Are robots going to replace us? It's, it's not really the question that our team asks, but on some level it's like, am I being replaced replaced or is my utility going out the door now that a system can do this? And so part of how we've done it is to position technology as tools to help people do more and better things with their job and their role. And so this is a resource that you can use that will give you more time, which is the one thing we can't get enough of and that we've got a finite amount of, but give you more time to focus on things that add more value for your prospects for your customers, deepen the relationships even. And so with the technology side of things, I always think of it as like, if you're giving the customer insights on an automated basis, but you're also giving your team insights that everybody's better off because there's less asymmetry of information, things can sort of move forward at momentum. And you actually said something that was an inspiration for us in at least a recent airing that I listened to, which is you were talking about how you think the future of phone calls is going to be done more on like a triggered real time, insight driven basis as opposed to just it's time for follow up number three, it's time for follow up number six. And so we've tried to position it in such a way as, hey, this helps you do better for your customer and will ultimately lead to you having a more fulfilling and deeper long term relationship with that customer.

Yeah, no, and I think that's a really good call because that is the case, right? Of like, if you think about how we treat every prospect the same when every prospect is different. We call on day three, we call on day five. Well, one of them has opened three emails, another one has not. So we should probably be treating them differently and we haven't really built those systems and processes out, which I think it's where it's going to have to go because there's so many tools that supposedly are saving reps all this time. I don't know about you man, but I'm sure as hell working just as long, if not longer than I was three, four years ago without all these tools and so it's starting to stack up a little bit. So like, what should a company consider? And then we're going to come back to the buyer for a second. But like, what should a company consider before investing in technology? Because I think a lot of companies think like, oh, if I get this, that's going to solve all these problems. Like what are some things they should be thinking about before investing in a tool for their team?

I think if you step in as a buyer of technology, so if you're not going to build it out, create your own proprietary systems, you almost have to do sort of the reverse of the process, as if you're selling somebody that technology. And so you have to think what are the problems that exist? And also consider that the status quo in some cases could be better than the change. So you sort of have to lay out what are those problems. Most technology comes with some kind of a risk. There's an opportunity cost for the expenditure depending on how expensive it might be to implement and test. It's also, it's kind of hard to like unring a bell. We had a gentleman who worked here for many, many years who used to say, there are some bullets that you can't put back in the gun once you fired them. And so I feel like sometimes when you go down a road of change and you ask everybody to come along that road, if you walk it back and say, nevermind, that didn't work out so well, your team starts to lose confidence in your decision making moving forward. So I really think, you know, an analysis of what are the problems we want to solve, what are the risks of investing in this technology and then also maybe do it on a really, really small micro level first, test it out with one segment or if you're a company like ours where you've got multiple companies underneath a single umbrella, maybe just test it for one vertical or maybe even just one sales rep. Sometimes I get to be the guinea pig and I test something out just for me. And so I think those are the kind of the considerations that go in there. And ultimately for us, we found that in most cases, no technology is often similar to pursuing a technology that you're unsure about.

And I think part of what you mentioned is why I do think product led growth is going to continue to build momentum because that's what buyers want. They want to experience it a little bit, they want to get their hands on it. Right? One rep, two reps. That was always what was so hard for me towards the end of my time. Em at patient pop got 150 plus people and you're asking me to all or nothing like, oh, I gotta sign this contract and try to onboard 150 people before I've even tried it, before anyone has gotten their hands on it. I think that's such an important. Thing. When people ask me where I think sales is going and I talk about these things, it's like I'm talking because of what I believe buyers are going to want. Buyers are going to want to try products, buyers are going to want to experience it more. Buyers don't love long term agreements. And those are the things that we need to prepare for now with the tech that we're using now. I do want to take another step back real quick. We've kind of danced around it a little bit, but I think it's important to think about because oftentimes companies look at opportunities going, oh, this industry is behind in tech, let's go bring it tech. Right, let's. Oh, this is perfect. Right? It hasn't evolved that much yet, but oftentimes that can freak out the industry. Right? Like people aren't ready for it or they're not. So like, how can you introduce technology into an industry that maybe hasn't gotten there yet? And this is now more on the buyer side of like, okay, whoa, what's this tablet or what? Wait, I got to do it on a computer? When they're used to filling it out on forms, like, what are things you've seen to work in an industry that maybe is adapting now to actually make it more comfortable for the buyer to use the technology?

So I think really for us there are two ways that we address that concern. The first one is creating alternate journey and customer pathways that don't require use of the technology. And so, for example, you know, we've built a platform that lets customers pre qualify for financing. But some customers say, I just want to fill out a paper application. Others it's like, I'm going to call your help desk and I want to talk to somebody who can just do this over the phone with me. And so we've built ways that allow people to avoid or sidestep technology if they'd like to. But then I think we've had to swing really hard the other way too. Like, if you're going to do that, then you need to have a journey that doesn't involve talking to a person. And so you also need to have the journey for the guy who says, hey, I want to fill this out and I just want to sign my documents and be done. I don't want to receive a call every week and follow ups. And maybe they don't even want the relationship, they want something transactional. And so we've just sort of thought about it as you have to create a buyer journey, map it out and then think about the fact that technology is going to be foreign to some of your customer base, particularly since it's strange in the industry. So that's one thing that we've done to address it. I would say kind of the other approach that we've taken with respect to technology is baby steps. And so when we first rolled out platform, it's not like this platform is going to pre qualify you automatically, generate your documents, send you reminders, and help you pre fill your bank data and financial data. When we first started it was this platform will tell you yes or no we can help. And so we started with a feature stack that was very, very limited, but that allowed us to get some test data, learn more about the market segment and then expand the technology. Once we saw there was a comfort level there, there are lots of things that we take for granted. We have, for example, a large base of customers that are involved in logging or traffic.