Coaching Toward Multi Cultural Selling Transcript

Insight on Coaching Coaching Toward Multi-Cultural Selling Transcript

Prepared for

Insight Educational Consulting (IEC)

Prepared by

Ubiqus Reporting

2

Confidential | May 21 2008 Page 2

Coaching Toward Multi-Cultural Selling Transcript

Time Speaker Transcript

001 Tom Floyd Hello everyone and welcome to Insight on Coaching

Insight on Coaching explores the many facets flavors and sides of the emerging professional coaching field

Im Tom Floyd Im the CEO of Insight Educational Consulting and your host for todays show

This week our topic is Coaching Toward Multi-cultural Selling

Well provide an overview in terms of what we mean by the term multiculture wersquoll discuss how organizations are responding to the trends in various multi-cultural populations and the challenges in developing multi-cultural marketing and sales strategies and well also talk about how coaches who specialize in multi-cultural marketing and sales are helping corporations today

With me today to explore this topic are four guests so let me give you a quick overview of who we have with us today

Our first guest Shelly Willingham-Hinton a seasoned sales marketing and diversity professional is the founder and president of The National Organization for Diversity in Sales and Marketingtrade (NODSM)

NODSM works to help Fortune 500 corporations capitalize on the increasing purchasing power of multicultural consumers without using stereotypes and being offensive and to help corporations diversify their sales marketing and advertising personnel

Welcome to the show Shelly

Our second guest Dr Earl Honeycutt is a Professor of Marketing and Sales Management at the Love School of Business at Elon University in North Carolina where he teaches courses in cross-cultural sales and global marketing

Earl is also the co-author of Selling Outside Your Culture Zone and Sales Management a Global Perspective

He has conducted years of research as well as written countless published articles papers and abstracts on the subject of multicultural marketing

Welcome to the show Earl

208 Dr Earl Honeycutt

Pleasure to be with you

3




210 Tom Floyd Our next guest Michael Soon Lee is the President of EthnoConnect a company which provides seminars training consulting and coaching on how to sell more products and services to multicultural markets in America

He is the author of six books on marketing and selling to multicultural customers

For over 14 years Michael has spoken around the world on how to increase sales to Hispanics Blacks Asians Middle Easterners and other multicultural customers Over the past 20 years Michaelrsquos clients have included Coca-Cola General Motors State Farm Insurance and over a thousand other companies

Welcome to the show Michael

245 Michael Soon Lee

Thank you Tom

246 Tom Floyd And our fourth guest Jeff McFarland is executive director of multi-cultural marketing for Verizon Jeff is responsible for the execution of all marketing advertising and sponsorship activities in the African American Latino Asian Russian people with disabilities and the gay and lesbian marketplace To protect and grow the Verizon brand Jeff leads a team that ensures the most effective targeted marketing and branding across the entire Verizon multi-cultural footprint

Welcome to the show Jeff

313 Jeff McFarland Hello everyone

4




316 Tom Floyd As we always do Id like to kick off our show today with some data that our research team collected to set the stage

Some interesting statistics from the US Census Bureau

The Latino population in the United States grew 388 percent to more than 31 million and had a median income of $28330 (2000)

The number of Latinos is expected to reach 44 million by 2010 This Latino segment is a young group with more than half in the prime spending years between 18 and 49

Asian and Pacific Islanders (API) are outpacing the HispanicLatino and African-American sectors Since 1990 the API population grew approximately 43 percent to 108 million By 2010 this segment is expected to increase to 15 million with the highest median income in the United States

Also according to the US Census Bureau The combined buying power of the Hispanic black Asian and Native American communities is currently in excess of $15 trillion

In a recent October 1st 2007 article within the business section of the Denver Post Andy Vuong writes ldquoCompanies across the country are finding that marketing to diverse cultures is good for business Indeed many companies say 2000 census figures spurred their growing efforts Those numbers showed minorities represented 31 percent of the nations population up from 24 percent in 1990 The Census Bureau projects that minority groups will represent 499 percent of the population by 2050rdquo

Michael Id like to start with you

First question (A) how are these statistics landing on you and (B) can you just set the stage for us in terms of what the demographic and makeup of various multi-cultural groups in the US is looking like today

5





I think one of the things that we need to recognize--and I just want to add a couple of other statistics to what youve already said--minorities in the United States buy over $2 trillion worth of goods and services which is more than all but the nine largest countries in the world So this is a huge and growing market and I think a lot of businesses are beginning to recognize this fact

While theyre doing that large companies are marketing to the multi-cultural consumer we have to remember that its not good enough just to do multi-cultural marketing

You have to remember that if people arent treated with sensitivity to their culture when they come into your store or office theyre still not going to buy from you anyway

What my company does is we try to help salespeople to become more culturally competent which means treating people with sensitivity to their culture and basically treating people the way that they want to be treated

611 Tom Floyd In terms of a little bit more of a definition in terms of what were talking about in terms of the various groups that fall within this category of multi-cultural Shelly I noticed a definition of how your organization defines multi-cultural within your website the National Organization for Diversity in Sales and Marketing

Can you tell our audience a little bit more about who were talking about when we say multiculture or multi-cultural

644 Shelly Willingham-Hinton

I think in a lot of cases it really depends

We found some companies when they talk about multi-cultural it may be focused around ethnic minorities

Our organization when we say multi-cultural we mean not only ethnic diversity but also gender sexual orientation ability

We also include the whole multi-cultural youth division baby boomers and diverse religious beliefs

So we understand that when we talk about multi-cultural it stands beyond just race and culture

6




717 Tom Floyd Some of the information that I shared in the beginning was specific to a few groups

When I took a look at your website I noticed it contained facts about a lot of different groups Can you elaborate more on some of the other facts about some of the other groups

For example I saw that women-owned firms employed 191 million people and generated 25 trillion and sales Not only did I think that particular fact was astounding but thats just fantastic

Can you tell us a little bit more about some of the other trends and facts that are going on within some of the other groups that are out there as well


Definitely like you said the womens market is booming and its huge and its a great opportunity for marketers wanting to capitalize on that group of consumers

But also the GLBT segment the gaybisexuallesbiantransgender segment is also a very very growing segment A lot of companies are starting to recognize that and understand that that group has a lot of money to spend especially in financial services and travel

I read an article in the New York Times about Las Vegas really wanting to market more to the GLBT segment because they are recognized and they have a significant amount of purchasing power to spend and they want to go after and get their piece of the pie

As more of these numbers come to effect and people start to recognize and see that these groups do wield a lot of purchasing power I do believe that more companies will begin to market to these different segments

I would say that with the Census Bureau and maybe the next time it comes around well see a change but I know that the numbers for the GLBT segment may not necessarily be that accurate

I know this was the first year that they asked not necessarily if its a gay household but if there are two people living in the household of the same sex so its not very specific

But as we get more sophisticated in that type of information Im sure the numbers will definitely increase

921 Tom Floyd What have been some of the specific things that have really caused some corporations organizations to start to recognize the need to market some of these groups

Has it been a louder voice from each of these various groups or communities kind of making themselves known and making people realize ldquohey maybe I need to pay more attention here and change some of my effortsrdquo

What are some of the things that really caused some of the growth here

7





I think that definitely the Census Bureau information contributes a great deal to that I get this question a lot when I speak to students

They ask well why should a company really focus on multi-cultural marketing if theyre already profitable and thats a valid question

But if you start to look at the numbers and the demographics and the changing face of America by 2050 what are considered minorities will be the majority and forward-thinking companies are starting to recognize and understand that if they dont capitalize on this group that theyre putting themselves at a competitive disadvantage

1020 Tom Floyd

In terms of the percentage just to get a sense of how many companies are starting to do that whats your best guess in terms of if we talk about the Fortune 500 for example in terms of the percent of companies who are really starting to make greater strides there


I wouldnt know an absolute percentage

I will tell you this year our organization partnered with Fortune Magazine on the list for the best companies for diversity and we added a segment around the best companies for multi-cultural marketing and Verizon made our list for doing a great job in the multi-cultural segment

I cant give you an exact statistic but I would say that a lot of companies definitely have a multi-cultural segment

I think where youll find the most forward-thinking companies are the ones that really break down the segments beyond just African American Hispanic or Asian and really try to go beyond those kind of obvious differences to try to make more of an effort in the different segments that are sometimes not equally marketed to

1123 Tom Floyd Has it mainly been something that pretty much the larger like the Fortune 500 or 1000 corporations are looking at or are even small businesses and sectors like that starting to respond too

8





In my experience because we deal mostly with the larger corporations I would say yes because marketing budgets are getting tight all across the board So for companies to invest in a multi-cultural marketing strategy they do need to have a significant amount of revenue

I think for smaller businesses we havent really done much research in that area so Im not really sure if theyre specific

But I think that companies that are in local areas and recognizing the emerging growth of Hispanics in the marketplace or Asians or maybe in their neighborhood the African Americans are definitely doing multi-cultural marketing and dont even realize it

1211 Tom Floyd Earl can you tell us a little bit more about what led you to write Selling Outside Your Cultural Zone and for that matter can you tell us a little bit more about what a cultural zone is


Basically I have been working in sales I used to work for a company called TRW that got purchased by Northrop Grumman and I used to come to LA and do a lot of work out there mainly selling electronic components

But what I noticed is that we were doing a lot more business actually global business and we were having to deal with a lot of buyers and we were having to deal with a lot folks who were different cultures different language groups

One fact that you didnt give out today in the United States more than 110 languages are spoken in the country Thats a tremendous cultural diversity

I think Shelly and the folks have really come up with some good explanations for whats happening in the United States

From my perspective as a business-to-business person there are a lot of engineers a lot of buyers and a lot of owners of businesses that come from different cultures and when you go out there trying to sell to those folks as the panel has already said if you dont understand and if you arent able to be sensitive and to communicate with them in the proper way youre going to make a faux pas a cultural blunder and youre probably not going to make the sale so its really important

And Michael I thought stated it very concisely and well but I use the three Rs which is to recognize the difference in cultural differences to respect those cultural differences and then to reconcile your behavior with the buyer

1353 Tom Floyd Im still just sitting here with my mouth ajar to 110 languages spoken across the US

Thats astounding

Ive never heard that before

9





There are a tremendous number

A lot of people dont realize there in California one of the largest Asian groups is Filipino Americans

Most people think of Chinese or Japanese but the Filipino American group is quite large for a consumer group

I do a lot of work with the Filipino American community and so therefore Im a little more sensitive to that

What Im trying to teach my students at Elon University in the Love School of Business is that when they go out in the world if they dont understand multiculturalism and if they dont understand cross-cultural behaviors theyre going to be at a great disadvantage and theyre probably not going to be as successful in the future perhaps as they would have been 20 or 30 years ago when it was more of a mass market and more of dealing primarily with white people which thats not the US today

1456 Tom Floyd Its funny when you mention California as an example

I live in San Jose its where our business is based too and I love how diverse it is here and how different it is here

When I moved here seven years ago I felt like it opened my eyes a lot

Its interesting now when I see people come and visit for business or it could be friends or family its almost like they go into cultural shock when coming to the Silicon Valley

Its just really an eye-opener

I definitely think its encouraging to hear that more businesses and just across the country in general people are starting to realize that there are so many other groups out there and we have to sensitive and respectful to them

10

Confidential | May 21 2008 0




Absolutely

I dont think we can be an expert on every cultural group there are just too many

But again I think some general lessons to be able to recognize

Starting to recognize someone elses culture is to understand your own so that you dont stereotype and so that you dont engage in ethnocentrism where you feel that your way is the right way

So if we can do that again if we can recognize and then respect and then reconcile something along those lines

Those are just three words that we chose for our book

It can be stated a lot of different ways Its important that we be respectful no matter who were dealing with


I just have a quick pet peeve

1632 Tom Floyd Sure Go ahead


Because you and I both live in California and what Ive found over the years doing this kind of training for cultural competency of front line staff is that people in California tend to believe--and other places like New York--tend to believe that because we all live in such multi-cultural areas that somehow automatically we know how to treat people with sensitivity to their culture which is obviously not true but is a prevalent belief in many areas that have large numbers of people from diverse cultures as well as people who are new immigrants

We just have to keep in mind no matter where we are in the country were not born with the knowledge of how to treat people who are different from us with sensitivity and look at it from their perspective

1718 Tom Floyd Great point


Excellent point

11




1723 Tom Floyd Earl one quick last question

I noticed in your book there was a chapter on stereotyping for example

Can you talk to us a little bit more about why people stereotype and how those stereotypes can impact the way that companies market


Stereotyping is basically a positive or a negative generalization that we apply to all members of a cultural racial or religious group

The unfortunate thing about stereotypes is that theyre inflexible

We tend to believe that all people behave in a certain way when thats just not true and if we fall into that trap as were dealing with customers advertising promoting selling to them we make some pretty bad mistakes

Because even within a group even though they may be religious or they may be frugal or whatever that we might somehow stereotype there are great variations

Some people may or may not be religious or they may be slightly religious where other people are very dogmatic

You make a terrible mistake or blunder when you start to stereotype people because everybody is going to be different depending upon their socioeconomic status perhaps they are professional or worker or perhaps where did they come from did they grow up in a large city or a countryside are they younger or older how long have they lived in the current culture or current country and then obviously the time period whether youre interacting with them in an emergency or just a very stressful period

Stereotyping is very dangerous so you certainly dont want to do that

1910 Tom Floyd Certainly

Jeff I want to turn to you We definitely want to focus on what some companies like Verizon have really done to address and market towards the various multi-cultural groups across our country and for that matter the world as a whole

An initial question based on the article in the Denver Post that I shared at the beginning in terms of your experience has data like this not only captured Corporate Americas attention but really has kind of set the stage for changing the way that companies are marketing today

12




1956 Jeff McFarland I think this data has caught the attention of marketers all over Corporate America but this data is not new

This is census data that was started in the year 2000

So we know that by the year 2010 African American and the Hispanic segment will have buying power well over a trillion dollars I believe its about 579 billion for the Asian market

What weve done at Verizon is we recognize that all of our customers are important to us

We also recognize the importance of communicating in a way thats relevant to them and thats acknowledging their culture

So there are some things that well talk about on how we market to them but we take it a step further

Its about having that sales and that service center so that you can really meet their needs and give them solutions that make their life better and weve been doing that for about ten years

13




2400 Tom Floyd

Welcome back to Insight on Coaching Irsquom Tom Floyd

Today the topic is Coaching Toward Multi-Cultural Selling

With me are Shelley Willingham-Hinton Coach Founder and President of The National Organization for Diversity in Sales and Marketing Dr Earl Honeycutt Professor of Marketing and Sales Management at Elon University and author of ldquoSelling Outside Your Cultural Zonerdquo Michael Soon Lee Coach and President of EthnoConnect and Jeff McFarland Executive Director of Multicultural Marketing at Verizon

Well we set the stage in the first part of our show in terms of what multiculture means and discussed how the landscape is looking in terms of some of the trends within various multi-cultural groups

In this segment of our show wed like to spend some time talking about how Corporate America has responded to these trends especially from a marketing and sales perspective

Some more data to set the stage

According to Entrepreneurcom columnist Rachel Meranus writes ldquoAll business segments have an opportunity with multicultural markets But the categories that tend to do the best when engaging in multicultural marketing efforts are food and beverage automotive apparel personal care entertainment sports telecommunications health care banking and finance and insurancerdquo

According to the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) ldquoMulticultural marketing is no longer new it is not an add-on nor should it have a one-dimensional approach (ie have a single message for all African Americans or all Hispanics) Many progressive organizations have incorporated multicultural marketing into their overall business models Meanwhile multicultural markets have not only grown but have become increasingly complex There are issues of acculturation Multiracial marriages are blurring the lines between distinct segments and the ethnic population is no longer concentrated in just the major markets

Shelly Id like to start with you

What are your thoughts on some of the information from Entrepreneurcom

Do some business segments engage more effectively in multi-cultural marketing efforts than others

14





I think that from our experience what we found is the companies that are really starting to do it well and do a good job at it are the companies that are selling business-to-consumer--and maybe Earl you can talk a little bit more about the business-to-business piece--but I think thats where there needs to be a little bit more work done on the business-to-business piece

Business-to-consumer its obvious to see that your sales force or your message needs to get straight to your consumer to make the difference

So I think the companies that are selling directly to the consumer base are really doing a good job of that and starting to recognize that thats needed

But from a business-to-business perspective I think there needs to be some work done And maybe Earl you can elaborate a little bit on that


I agree Shelly Thank you

I think we see that consumers are out there and they have different needs as far as food products beauty products clothing we could go through a number of consumer goods and companies are providing different goods based upon their culture and things like that

In the business-to-business were talking about machinery and other types of goods that are used to produce products

A lot of people have not recognized yet the importance of multi-cultural that there are a lot of women businesses African American businesses Latino businesses and dealing with these folks its a different ballgame from just going in and talking to a European American

Its not the same concept the same way of communicating the same way of approaching the same way of assuring is not going to be the same and so a lot of the business-to-business companies need to start doing more in this way to train hire adaptive salespeople and do whats necessary to approach and serve the customer the way they want to be served

15





What Ive found is that the longer and deeper the relationship needs to be the more important it is to be culturally competent

When youre selling a car certainly the relationship has to be deeper and longer than if youre just selling socks over the counter

Which by the way if you are culturally competent you can sell a lot of socks too but it doesnt have the same kind of profit margin when youre selling insurance or youre selling a home to someone

If you dont build the relationship in a way thats comfortable to the customer obviously they dont feel comfortable enough to buy from you or make that next step or that big investment

So Ive seen the longer and deeper that relationship needs to be the more people need to be culturally competent


Its about establishing trust

And if you establish trust again its being respectful doing whats best for the customer communicating with them the way that they want to be communicated and they feel like theyve won at the end of the transaction or the end of the business buy then theyre more likely to come back because they know that youll take care of them and do whats right


The sad thing is though that a lot of businesses insult especially people from other countries and other cultures they insult folks the minute they walk in by trying to shake their hand when they dont want to giving them eye contact when they dont want it standing too close or too far away

Not on purpose and certainly not discrimination but just not being aware that there are these cultural differences that can build trust more quickly and if youre unaware of it can really break trust very quickly


Let me just give you a quick example

One of my friends was a European American and he had an auto dealership and he had a lot of Asian Americans coming in and they always brought their father with them

And so he realized very quickly that the grandfather or the father had a lot of influence and so he would bring his father in who was about 75 on the weekends and the first thing he would do is he would introduce the Asian family ldquooh this is my father and he helps me here and I always listen to himrdquo and right away many Asian customers felt more comfortable because his father was there

16





Thats beautiful

2959 Tom Floyd That is fascinating

Whats the best way just in general for the average person out there whats the best way or resources or places where someone can go to become more multi-cultural sensitive

Are there multi-cultural workshops out there

What is the best way for people really just to learn more so that theyre making some of these mistakes less frequently


I think its quite simple

If youre really serious about increasing your sales to people from other countries other cultures theres plenty of resources out there

Shelly has a great conference that goes on every single year

Earl has a book

I do seminars

There are plenty of resources if you want to find them So thats not the challenge

The main challenge is that people have to just stop assuming that people want to be treated in any particular way that they want to have their hand shaken that they give you the normal eye contact that Americans are used to and start letting the customer determine how people should be greeted

17




3109 Jeff McFarland I agree with that

Its important that you understand who your customer base is and how they want to be communicated to

I know here at Verizon for over ten years weve had service centers set up--my business is a little different

Because although I have some stores that are brick and mortar the Verizon Plus or Experience stores we even have wireless stores

The majority of our customers for local telephone service and broadband service will call us over the telephone We handle millions of calls per month

So its important for us especially when were dealing with our Hispanic and Latino customers or our Asian customers that even in the Asian market we dont just group them all into one market because theyre not all the same

So we found that its very important to reach that customer and give them a way to reach us in a culturally relevant way where were acculturated and we understand their needs

Weve got over a thousand employees that are committed skilled and they go through training and theyre part of the community that theyre serving and weve found that thats been very successful for us


Are you finding that the cultures that are more collective the Hispanics the Asians the African Americans tend to prefer that face-to-face contact as opposed to phone or internet

3228 Jeff McFarland No

I think when youre speaking to somebody thats of your culture they can have a relevant conversation they understand your needs T

he needs for the African American segment may be a little different when youre talking about a broadband product than the Asian segment or the Hispanic segment

So when youve got somebody thats trained and understands your culture those can be very comfortable conversations over the telephone


So it all comes back to that cultural competency training that you provide

3255 Jeff McFarland Correct

18




3257 Tom Floyd Can you talk more about your experience with Verizon as well and highlight some of the things Verizon has done to support its sales team to develop multi-cultural strategies

3314 Jeff McFarland Yes

Our employees are trained in the centers

But one of the things we do we dont call them service centers any longer

Theyre called solution centers Because our employees in all of our centers but especially the multilingual centers they are trained and they understand that we provide solutions for our customers

But weve got to understand their culture and what their need is in order to provide those solutions


Can you talk a little bit about the Realize Campaign that Verizon did

19





The Realize Campaign was a campaign we started 18 months ago

It was very successful in the African American community

It all starts with customer insights

We spoke a little earlier about you cant approach a segment and just assume that everybody in that segment is the same

The target that we were after were those folks that have the entrepreneurial spirit

In the African American community a lot of folks wants to be entrepreneurs

We came up with the campaign Realize which was all about realizing your ambition realizing your dreams realizing the possibility but how you can use Verizon products and services mainly broadband services to help you realize those dreams and possibilities

It was a 360 approach because everything is not done in print and on television

There were grassroots marketing programs

There were sponsorships

There were ways that were developed to reach the African American community so that we could get this point across but also give them an opportunity to experience our products and services

One of the parts that made it very successful is we used real folks from the community our consumers our customers as they told their stories about what dreams and realities they wanted and how Verizon products helped them reach those


I think that was brilliant and I think it speaks to the point when people are going to start a multi-cultural marketing campaign its not okay and its not enough--and Im sure Michael can attest to this too--its not okay just to put an Asian face in an ad or a black face in an ad your same mainstream advertising and put that into ethnic advertising and think thats your Asian marketing strategy or African American marketing strategy

You have to really go much deeper and I think Verizon did an excellent job of that with the Realize Campaign

3533 Jeff McFarland Thats one of the things that we realized the old days of just putting somebody in a print ad that looks like me

That was the start of diversity and thats about representation

Multi-culturalism takes it to that next step where its not just representation but youre communicating me to me in a relevant way something that I can relate to

20





I think that also brings up one important thing

We talk about not stereotyping but we also have to let our audience know and remind them that for example Hispanics are not just one culture called Hispanics there are at least six different groups that call themselves Hispanics including the Mexicans which are the largest group but then youve got South Americans Central Americans Puerto Ricans Cubans and of course people from Spain and theyre all very different

Asians are 17 separate different cultures that all speak different languages have different foods

And when you say dont put an Asian face up there if youre trying to attract Chinese people you definitely dont want to put a Korean face up there because Chinese people know the difference

3639 Jeff McFarland Youre absolutely right

One of the things that we do at Verizon weve got a website that highlights our broadband products and we have it in Chinese and in Korean

In our call centers we not only handle just Chinese but Mandarin and Cantonese Korean Russian and Vietnamese

So it is a difference


One other thing Id like to just point out is for the African American segment there are a lot of companies that think well because African Americans speak English we can market to them the same way and dont take into account the cultural differences within that segment

Yes African Americans speak English but the culture is very different

Maybe Michael you can add onto that as well

A lot of companies often struggle with that

They put money into a campaign thats about language but when you talk about groups of people that speak the same language really digging in and understanding that there are actual cultural differences that you need to take into account outside of just language

21




4018 Tom Floyd Welcome back to Insight on Coaching Irsquom Tom Floyd


With me are Shelley Willingham-Hinton Dr Earl Honeycutt Michael Soon Lee and Jeff McFarland

In this segment of our show Irsquod like to focus on how organizations are using coaches to help build multicultural marketing and sales strategies Some data to set the stage

Now according to one of our guests on todayrsquos show Michael Soon Lee ldquoMulticultural marketing is not enough to sell to Latinos African Americans and Asians in the US To sell to minorities in America your sales staff must be trained to provide culturally-competent sales presentations and customer service or they wonrsquot buy from you Questions to ask include

How can companies increase sales to multicultural customers

What do companies do wrong when it comes to multicultural marketing

What is ldquocultural competencerdquo and how does it affect salespeople

Michael to start with you just a general question first

What are some of the typical challenges in developing or rolling out a multi-cultural marketing strategy

22





I think the first thing one has to do is recognize that you just cant place ads

Because if people come into your store or office and arent treated appropriately theyre not going to buy from you anyway

The second thing youve got to recognize is youve got to help your front line staff whether it be cashiers or salespeople or others

What is their own cultural lens

What assumptions do they make about certain people

What words do they use

Because some words can be very very appropriate with some groups some words can be very inappropriate

Let me just give you one example

If youre working with an African American customer for example the word unique or special could be very attractive to them

Again we dont want to stereotype anybody but youre going to look at the words that they use and if you hear them using similar words those are the features that you want to emphasize with that particular consumer

Whereas with other groups such as Hispanics and Asians theyre a little more collectivist they tend to want to fit in or belong or be part of the group so you wouldnt want to use special unique one of a kind

You might want to say things like ldquothis is our most popular modelrdquo things of that nature

So just being aware of the words you use your body language things of that nature can really help you to be much more sensitive to people and theyll trust a lot quicker

4255 Tom Floyd How are coaches typically able to help address challenges like this with organizations or with individual leaders within organizations for that matter

23





With the individual leader you want to make sure that everybody is being provided with cultural competence training

Anybody who is going to have any kind of interface and thats not just with salespeople we tend to assume thats the place to go but its also people who ring up the register cashiers people in the back office who might answer the telephone service personnel is a whole other issue but youve got to make sure that everybody who has interface with the consumer who might be different has that kind of training

A coach can help coach these folks to be aware of their own cultural lenses their own biases their own prejudices and just to help them be aware that differences are not wrong theyre just different

How people do things that might be a little different from the way you might do things is just different and its not wrong and donrsquot let it put you off or hurt your sales

4400 Tom Floyd When youve worked with some people from a coaching perspective what are some examples of goals or are there typical goals that you helped clients put in place for developing or improving their multi-cultural sales and marketing efforts


I think the first mistake that a lot of people make when coaching is they kind of get very vague and general I want to be more culturally sensitive

How do you do that

As a coach you know that you need real specific and measurable goals

What cultures do you want to learn more about

Would you like to learn more about just how to make people feel more comfortable

Do you want to build trust quicker

What are the specific areas that you want to work on

One of the best ways to find that out is to do a cultural competence survey many of which are available online Ive got one on my website at EthnoConnectcom

There are many many other resources but find out first of all what are your areas that you might need improvement on and then which ones would you like to work on and thats where a coach can really help you to improve yourself and hold you accountable

4506 Tom Floyd What are some of the methods or categories within a survey like that that the data really targets

24





Its number one adjusting your sales presentation to meet the needs of other people the words you use your body language Everything from A to Z Just how can you be more sensitive to peoples culture how do you meet them how do you build trust do you get referrals and how do you approach that process Because thats a crucial issue

People from collectivist cultures like Asians and Hispanics love giving referrals and as Jeff knows this is the absolute best way to get business but we dont always know how to ask for those referrals in a way that someone from another country or another culture would feel comfortable and obligated to giving you a referral

Those are all measurable issues

Anything in a survey would be able to give you those rubrics

4602 Jeff McFarland I kind of build it up as relationship building

Youve got to be able to build a relationship and in order to build a relationship with a multi-cultural customer youve got to understand them

4617 Tom Floyd Really understanding what theyre about and whats important to them can only help build that relationship and take it further


If you dont understand whats important to them its going to be hard to communicate to them

4632 Tom Floyd A question that I wanted to ask about coaching at Verizon

Has Verizon or did Verizon use outside coaches or other resources in developing its overall multi-cultural marketing strategy

4647 Jeff McFarland When we look at our multi-cultural marketing strategy I look at coaches as some of our advertising agencies that are external

They helped us to build some the marketing strategies and campaigns

We also have extensive internal staff

When we look at our sales force we have an internal training department that works with all of our sales and solution consultants in the company

25




4713 Tom Floyd From your perspective what benefits could a coach offer leaders of your sales team or just sales teams in general if youre speaking to other leaders out there in Corporate America

4726 Jeff McFarland The thing to understand in the multi-cultural marketplace is that it is ever changing

The way that you communicated to African Americans five years ago is not necessarily the way you communicate today

I look at my household personally

A lot of my purchase decisions are based on my 17-year-old teenager

I didnt get cable or television at my house until my teenager said it was time

I didnt get broadband services until my teenager said it was time

So a lot of decisions that we make in the African American marketplace may be based on the children in the household families with children

When you look at the Hispanic segment it may be based on the rest of the family how do we communicate with the family or how do we keep the family in touch with each other

But these cultural insights are changing all the time so therefore youve got to go outside sometimes and make sure that youre up to date with that relevant information

4824 Tom Floyd Its really keeping the pulse up to date and making sure youre understanding how each group is changing

4830 Jeff McFarland Exactly

26





One of the things that our organization does the way we approach diversity and multi-culturalism is just strictly how it affects the bottom line so how companies can leverage diversity in their entire business strategy to positively impact the bottom line

One of the things that we definitely work with our partners on is ensuring that when they institute a multi-cultural marketing campaign or decide to spend millions of dollars on this campaign that its not getting diluted when it hits the field

As Michael was talking about having that cultural competence

You have to make sure that your field sales team and your other front line people know whats out there being marketed to make sure that your external and your internal communications match up

There have been several cases where there have been wonderful multi-cultural marketing campaigns so you definitely got the attention of your consumer but when they got to your store or your bank or your dealership as Michael said before they werent treated right so you didnt make a sale

A lot of companies will take a look at that and say ldquookay multi-cultural marketing doesnt workrdquo

It does work but you have to make sure that you have it implemented throughout your entire business structure definitely at your front line so you can see the results of the actual campaign

Thats something that we really try to drive home with our marketers is to make sure that youre not going to be able to judge the effectiveness unless you make sure that the people that are delivering it are culturally competent enough to do that

4956 Jeff McFarland That is so important

Because if youve got a campaign out in the marketplace and your sales force doesnt know about it or doesnt understand it when the phones start ringing or people start visiting your location youre going to lose that opportunity for the sale

27




5012 Tom Floyd Another question related to the sales force in the field

Where do the needs for multi-cultural marketing come from

I see different scenarios out there

I see situations where the field communicates back to corporate We need more training on this we need more education on this help us

I see other situations where it could be marketing or HR or other groups determining ldquoWe think you the field needs training on this so you will go through training on thisrdquo

How does that normally work for multi-cultural sensitivity and things like that

Is the sales force within various companies typically realizing ldquowe need more training on thisrdquo or is it more internally the organization realizing based on metrics and changes in the marketplace things like that ldquoI need to get my people up to speed more on things like thisrdquo


From our experience its really kind of been driven by recruiting

We have built a lot of our relationships around diversity recruiting and helping companies find more diverse sales and marketing talent

Because if you think about putting together a multi-cultural marketing campaign if everybody in the room looks the same how are you really going to be able to deliver a creative and insightful campaign for a particular group

So recognizing that as corporations they need to definitely have their workforce be as reflective as they can of their consumer base

In a lot of cases when we get involved with recruiting a division or diversity recruiting teams is when were able to filter through the rest of the organization and they can kind of see the disconnects sometimes between your sales force and the marketing divisions and the light bulb kind of comes on ldquookay if were going to have this diversity recruiting strategy then maybe we need to take a look at how were marketing to these different consumersrdquo

28





I would agree that a lot of this is driven by HR and trying to find people of diverse cultures

The challenge is number one there arent enough people to go around

For example in the National Association of Realtors only five percent of their realtors are currently people from diverse cultures and over a third of our country today is composed of people from other cultures

But also recognize the fact that while its a great thing to try and bring a few people from your target audience into your staff in the meantime while youre doing that recognize that people from other cultures dont necessarily have to or want to work with somebody from their own culture

Many people in fact look deliberately outside of their own culture because of privacy issues and other kinds of things where they may not even want to work with somebody from their own culture

Which is why most of my work for the last 15 years has really been in the area of training Caucasian salespeople on just how to be a little more culturally sensitive and theyre finding that it works very very well in addition to trying to bring in folks from other cultures as well

5322 Tom Floyd Interesting

Earl anything that you would add


Yes

I agree wholeheartedly with everything thats been said because I think good salespeople have to be adaptive

You cant match up certain cultural groups with the people that are going to sale to them or vice versa salespeople and customers cant be matched up precisely so we have to have adaptive salespeople who are again accepting respectful and willing to sell to people the way they want to be sold to

5355 Tom Floyd A huge thank you to the four of you for joining us today

And always a big thank you to our listeners as well

For more information about our show you can look us up on the Voice America business channel you can visit our website at wwwieconsultingbiz and you can always feel free to drop me an email at tfloydieconsultingbiz

You can also access the podcast version of this show as well through Apple iTunes

Thanks everyone well see you next week

2

Confidential | May 21 2008



001 Tom Floyd Hello everyone and welcome to Insight on Coaching

Insight on Coaching explores the many facets flavors and sides of the emerging professional coaching field

Im Tom Floyd Im the CEO of Insight Educational Consulting and your host for todays show

This week our topic is Coaching Toward Multi-cultural Selling

Well provide an overview in terms of what we mean by the term multiculture wersquoll discuss how organizations are responding to the trends in various multi-cultural populations and the challenges in developing multi-cultural marketing and sales strategies and well also talk about how coaches who specialize in multi-cultural marketing and sales are helping corporations today

With me today to explore this topic are four guests so let me give you a quick overview of who we have with us today

Our first guest Shelly Willingham-Hinton a seasoned sales marketing and diversity professional is the founder and president of The National Organization for Diversity in Sales and Marketingtrade (NODSM)

NODSM works to help Fortune 500 corporations capitalize on the increasing purchasing power of multicultural consumers without using stereotypes and being offensive and to help corporations diversify their sales marketing and advertising personnel

Welcome to the show Shelly

Our second guest Dr Earl Honeycutt is a Professor of Marketing and Sales Management at the Love School of Business at Elon University in North Carolina where he teaches courses in cross-cultural sales and global marketing

Earl is also the co-author of Selling Outside Your Culture Zone and Sales Management a Global Perspective

He has conducted years of research as well as written countless published articles papers and abstracts on the subject of multicultural marketing

Welcome to the show Earl


Pleasure to be with you

3









Thank you Tom




4













5

















6



















7








1020 Tom Floyd








8

















Thats astounding


9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








3









Thank you Tom




4













5

















6



















7








1020 Tom Floyd








8

















Thats astounding


9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








4













5

















6



















7








1020 Tom Floyd








8

















Thats astounding


9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








5

















6



















7








1020 Tom Floyd








8

















Thats astounding


9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








6



















7








1020 Tom Floyd








8

















Thats astounding


9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








7








1020 Tom Floyd








8

















Thats astounding


9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








8

















Thats astounding


9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








9
















10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








10





Absolutely















Excellent point

11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








11


















12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








12











13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








13




2400 Tom Floyd












14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








14















15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








15




















16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








16





Thats beautiful









Earl has a book

I do seminars



17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








17





















18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








18












19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








19























20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








20



















21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








21














22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








22



















23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








23












How do you do that









24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








24




















25
















26















27

















28














Yes








25
















26















27

















28














Yes








26















27

















28














Yes








27

















28














Yes








28














Yes








Coaching Toward Multi Cultural Selling Transcript

Business

Transcript of Coaching Toward Multi Cultural Selling Transcript