Authored by Dominic Alles, who spearheads the Global Business initiative at N-able Private Limited. Dominic is well experienced in the domain of Tech Sales, having worked locally and regionally with tech multinationals. In this witty and diversified blog article, he brings together his vast knowledge, gathered over the years, and demonstrates how to leverage experience to stay relevant in the new age.

The fastest evolving technology in the world once referred to as telecommunications to many, references, yet, termed as Communications Services.

Having navigated the journey of mobile communication from the first generation to the fifth, I’ve seen the evolution and transition of selling, that of a mobile connection which at the first needed convincing to the latter pursuing. Back in 1997, you’d had to portray a picture that Da Vinci himself would not have painted to some random individual, to be part of them making up their minds to consider a mobile phone, that which was, at the time a symbol of prestige, now a bare necessity, even more, a household paperweight. You’d come across homes with no kitchen utensils yet, see the latest iPhone or the equivalent android staring at you. Priorities in life have thus taken a turn, you’d rather wear torn shoes yet, opt to have the sparkling communication device in your palm.

Innovation and evolution are of paramount importance in the world of selling, be it consumer goods, technology, or cotton candy.

Rewind to the 90s and the lyrics of this rather hip-hop track would be on opposite ends. A time when your social status would be as larger as your communication device. Selling or sales in the native language, has had its spikes in the spectrum of the game over the years. Cutting short the fairytale of over two decades, from that of making someone believe they’d need a communication device larger than their ego, to the current times of having the phone company that provides the service to ensure seamless and interrupted communication, has taken its toll. If you’re the average non-tech savvy human that wakes up in the morning, with the first sign of the day is the home screen of your phone: Hurrah!! You’re among the top 80-90% of society who probably have the same idea as to who discovered Radium, yes, the chemical compound that glows in the dark... referring to the rear end of a Firefly rather than any other, glow-in-the-dark items.

Science, as in 5th grade, we’d known the honeybees as the hardest working animal or insect on earth, though can be debated to that of the shark, which must keep swimming all its life because it can never sleep. Point being, there are these honeybees that work tirelessly to ensure your communication device, let’s call it the “phone”, connects whenever you need it.

These bees in the hive are the unseen heroes in social life. Jeremy Clarkson once said, the Toyota Corolla, “...is as interesting as the night sky, on a cloudy day”, the sentiment of many in times like these when mobile networks chock on capacity due to excessive volumes of traffic reaching its core switching platforms like a 5-lane boulevard exiting through a toll gate the size of Coke bottle rather the size of Marylin Monroe’s waist: whichever is smaller. Realtime dimensioning and surgical precision allocation of accurate connectivity lies within these working honeybees, to get your call connection through.

Switching back to the reality of what transpires within the honeycomb, is a system of devices that compares to the most densely diversified collection of animals and plants on earth, yes, the Amazon. It’s a network of unimaginable proportions. The new era of selling took a turn from a phone connection to that of whoring at a beauty contest to get your best-suited product to fit in, within that honeycomb of a system, yet the best legs nor the curves qualify. It’s a pageant of technology. Technology the Nissan R35 GTR inherited. Apollo 13 would be put to shame in this Competition. In this time and age, mobile phone networks and their operation are highly underrated and taken for granted. Be growth pace, the acceptance and adoption of technology in Telecommunication would outgrow the fastest-growing plant on earth.

Selling has orbited the above like the last Concord that took off from Charles De Galle to JFK NY on its last flight, never to return, with the sonic boom circumnavigating the globe in the SR-72 as seen in Top Gun Maverick. Yes, the dynamics of selling have leapt, as compared here.

Hence the ask: Are we as dynamic and abreast of the environment that’s fast pacing and revolving around us? From the sales guy who would sit on the sidewalk to have a hotdog on a busy afternoon to the radiant ant (from the famous fable of the grasshopper and the ant), that would skip a meal to canvas a sale, has the world evolved? The answer is yes. Long gone are the complacent, concretive salesman whom you would go to buy a Toyota Corolla, the equivalent of the Gray Hound Stagecoach. The new breed of salesman is those who would drive up to you in your Honda on the freeway, doing 60mp/h, in his BMW and take you on for the rest of the remainder of the quarter mile.

The outcome boils down to proactive selling. In our kindergarten teaching days, we’ve learned, “The early bird will get the worm”, yet, in adulthood, the nursery teaching smacks us in the face to the point that the learning hits us smack in the back of our head like a curved bullet off the six slingers fired by Clint Eastwood, “the second mouse gets the cheese”. Civil and social circumstances may shatter our modus operandi, the lesson of the Pied-Piper and vice versa, ability to adapt to the current context in a similar manner. Be ahead of, and in charge of the game. which in this context, is dynamic and an absolute necessity in mapping out the potential business areas as done by a reconnaissance marine crouching in the dust on enemy territory. Vigilance and the motion sense of a leaf moving in the subtle southern wind are the required alertness of a mouse, in proactive alertness and action.

Innovation and evolution are of paramount importance in the world of selling, be it consumer goods, technology, or cotton candy. The dynamics have changed to the point where the seller must create an opportunity to sell a product. A classic example is data connectivity or broadband...

There is no defined rule of selling skills, neither is there a penned script to scooping out a secured safety in the highest-held financial institution of a country. The ideal salesman of this century would come off as being your neighbourhood milkman or the FBI agent that pulls up at your door with a “cock n bull” story. Adapting to one's surroundings is a biological inheritance. As much as I hate the creature, the Cockroach, survived thus far, with no competition. That said, in the sphere of selling, competition may reign on you like 300 Zeros that dawned on Pearl Harbour on a Sunday morning, with that of a sledgehammer effect on one's head. Counter sale tactic should be no more than a prick of a needle where it matters most, at the competitor. Knowledge and assessment of your crippled positions should be to your advantage. The attachment on “Mid-Way” should be the result

The element of surprise, we never spoke of the untold story of WW2, well, it hit both ways. Come 7th December, 1941, I’d walk into a Japanese bar all guns swinging, yet, the Summer in August 1945 won the deal for the USA, purely on tactical warfare. Sealed the deal. Knowledge of your competition, strengths, and mindset… paved the way. The secret to success is never to give up. Colonel Sanders saw light at the end of the tunnel when he turned 73. Ennio Morricone won his first Grammy at the age of 81!

Innovation and evolution are of paramount importance in the world of selling, be it consumer goods, technology, or cotton candy. The dynamics have changed to the point where the seller must create an opportunity to sell a product. A classic example is data connectivity or broadband.

Below is a snapshot of the Global mobile network data traffic (Exabytes per month), which is an apt example which illustrates how the communications industry is still growing at the same trajectory as it did back in the 90s, or even since its inception; in sharp contrast to many dot com era industries, that have either matured or declined.

Back to my previous reference of Communication Services being, probably the fastest growing technology in the world, it wouldn’t be correct to ignore the fact when considering the growth and opportunities it brings to the industry.

The hidden message here is: evolution. Keep up the pace, and stay updated with what’s going on out there. Mobile operators are gearing up for the next boom in data consumption the same way data-hungry applications such as Facebook, YouTube, Instagram etc. have gotten us on a hook. Evidence of it is given in the illustration below.

That said, the opportunity to sell in this domain has been and is being created by the growing demand for better user experience, achieved by higher data speeds.

 Subscriptions and Subscribers (billion)

Consolidated feedback from communications service providers who have commercially deployed 4G/LTE networks highlights a set of business, network technology and operational drivers for their deployments. A common driver is the sense of urgency to transform the network into a new service delivery machine as the foundation for creating new business opportunities for top-line revenue growth. Another is the importance of overcoming learning-curve barriers related to new operating models, business strategies and service innovation.

The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese. The first-mover advantage in business provides market leadership (the front runners). Those that do not evolve as fast as their competitors risk falling behind.

Key Drivers for navigating Tech Sales in the New Age:

Business Drivers:

• Ambition to be seen as a market leader
• Address a wider range of potential business opportunities such as Enterprise, Government and Society
• Opportunity to become a service/solution creator by moving beyond box selling
• Enhance customer mobile broadband experience.

Technology Drivers:

• Introduce automation, supporting high reliability and time-sensitive applications or those requiring guaranteed minimum bandwidth
• Support and accelerate enterprise transformation and industry digitization to offer higher reliability for critical applications

 Evolve with time, respect your competition, and aspire to be ahead. Also, as I always say: “Keep your feet on the ground and reach for the stars”.

Until next time!