What does the latest Mission Impossible movie has to do with Regenmaker® Sales & Business Develo

Tom Cruise’s latest movie Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation debuting July 31 is being premiered here at the majestical Vienna State Opera, less than 100 meters away from Regenmaker®’s office.

Yesterday while taking my lunch break walk in the summer heat with temperatures above 35 degrees, I was impressed with all the preparation work and tam tam being done ahead of the premiere and thought to myself: “Let me try an experiment to test if news hijacking can work to increase my social media reach with this article”. As a novice to social media marketing and social selling - to which I was recently introduced and showed that it can work for B2B sales by Martyn Etherington, while I was still working with Mitel and got trained by no one else but Jill Rowley – a successful result of this experiment would boost my morale and belief in this strategy and also put my consultancy practice (Regenmaker) in the spotlight of attention. (Disclaimer: Don’t say I didn’t warn you)

I must admit that I am a fan of the Mission Impossible movie series and a big fan of Tom Cruise. Last time I saw him was when I was still living and working in Dubai, while they were shooting the scenes at the Burj Khalifa skyscraper. After a very busy day shooting stunts, Tom surprisingly invited the whole crew to Fat Burger, which recently had opened on jumeirah beach road.

Now where I am back in Austria, I am again proud and lucky to have seen scenes shot in front of my eyes (Vienna) in this latest sequel. I am wondering: Where will Tom go for lunch or dinner in Vienna if he were as spontaneous and flexible as he was in Dubai? To a typical Austrian hot dog stand selling Käsekrainer sausages near the Schwedenplatz? Or to a Turkish Döner Kebab Outlet right in front of the Bristol hotel near the opera? Or incognito to a typical Viennese restaurant to enjoy a tasty Wiener Schnitzel? Or - as I assume most probable - to the Do&Co exquisite VIP Restaurant in the Haas Haus, just opposite the St. Stephan’s Cathedral.

Enough for the relation to Regenmaker and myself. Still I did not answer what Mission Impossible has to do with Sales & Business Development? This I believe grabbed your initial attention and got you to read so far. Right?

Well as an international sales growth consultant I got inspired by the title “Mission Impossible” which reminded me of a similar tagline “Impossible is nothing” used by Adidas, which I use in my seminars and trainings to challenge and motivate participants to achieve new heights in complex B2B sales. I do sincerely believe that every person has the potential of becoming a rainmaker, bringing her/his organization new customers, new business, growth and prosperity (Amen). You don’t have to be born with the top performer gene in you, nor does an organization have to spend a fortune recruiting these uncontrollable lone wolf artists who have the allure of a diva!

Every sales professional and even engineers can build and sharpen their competencies and skills needed to be successful in today’s complex sales 2.0 environment and dealing with those empowered Generation-Y buyers. You can - as an individual salesperson, business developer or as a small company – now take advantage of the digital and social media for:

a) Establishing yourself as an industry authority and subject matter expert by having a professional and customer oriented (not recruiter-oriented) LinkedIn (or XING) presence, sharing content and writing articles of interest to your target group or participating in group discussions

b) Searching for prospects (matching your ideal customer profile), alliance partners and influencers on social media and connecting with them to build your network

c) Engaging (communicating) with your prospects on Social Media before you call them, so the call won’t be cold

d) Researching your prospects thoroughly on LinkedIn (or XING), Twitter and Google like a private investigator and finding some “goody” of interest to your prospect (insights) before you call them, so the call won’t be boring but adding real “value”

e) Generating leads through inbound content marketing, attracting prospects to your home page (Web, LinkedIn, XING) like a magnet and let them call you for a change J

I am looking forward to seeing Tom Cruise, probably not in person, but on the screen next week.