People often begin their careers in the corporate world and move on to entrepreneurship. Jim Fields, Vice President of Customer Experience at SAP, took the opposite approach and went from the entrepreneurial world into a corporate position. Jim’s background as a serial entrepreneur prepared him for his current management responsibilities at SAP, a multinational software corporation that creates enterprise software for businesses.
In this episode of the Social Business Engine podcast, Jim discusses how he involves people in collaborating on projects. By showing someone a prototype or an example of what something can be, you can get him or her excited about the outcome. His approach is very similar for getting non-digital people involved with social selling. By listening to this podcast you’ll discover tactics to encourage social selling among those with an aversion to social media, strategy on how to gain influence in the social selling realm and more on the positive effects social selling can have on your brand.
On This Episode You’ll Discover:
- How Jim’s background as an entrepreneur prepared him for his management responsibilities at SAP.
- How the self-reliance and multi-disciplinary skills required as an entrepreneur, are put to use as a modern executive.
- How some of the companies Jim worked for in the past were absorbed into the bigger companies he went to work for later.
- How to be entrepreneurial and utilize your experience in large organizations by continuing to innovate and staying within the boundaries of what’s possible.
- How to encourage collaboration by creating win-win situations or through the use of prototypes that will excite people about real-world results not just something that could be.
- Why Jim says, “if your fingerprints are on something, your name doesn’t have to be.”
- Why Jim says, “social selling” is a misnomer, and his definition of social selling.
- How social selling is now a requirement for the modern sales professional.
- Why there is an increasing need for writers as content becomes more important.
- Why you should enable people to be social ambassadors for your brand.
- Why you should listen first when starting to use social media.
- How to build virtual networks with people of like interests providing an opportunity to participate and build your personal brand.
- How to engage with prospects earlier in their decision cycle to build trust.
- Why Jim says to be willing to take some risks; channel your inner Nike and “Just do it!”
- How social selling influence is gained through content, listening, network and voice; these four aspects done well will naturally lead to selling opportunities and revenue.
Be authentic, trustworthy, actively listen and expand your network
naturally to attain selling opportunities and revenue. #socialselling
Tweet this
- How people buy from people they trust, people whose opinions they value and people who are there.
- Why you need to be interesting on social media to get people intrigued about what you have to say.
- How Jim deals with “traditionalists” who are not yet on board with social.
- How the successes of the early adopters are encouraging the laggards to adopt social selling tactics.
- Why Jim says he’s a “50-something millennial.”
- That social media is not just “what the kids do;” people of any age can benefit from the use of social media.
- How Jim’s one thing is about being your authentic self in the business world.
Featured On This Episode:
- Jim Fields on Twitter and LinkedIn
- SAP’s website
- SAP on Forbes BrandVoice
- Jim’s article on Forbes BrandVoice: Why Social Selling Is Not About Selling
- Sign up to receive Social Business Journal, Vol. 5: The Community Playbook
- Subscribe to our Newsletter
- Write a review of this podcast in iTunes
- Bernie Borges on Twitter: @bernieborges
- Social Business Engine on Twitter: @sbengine
- Vengreso’s YouTube Channel | YouTube channel
- Social Business Engine website
- Learn more about Social Selling
There are TWO WAYS you can listen to this podcast with Jim Fields from SAP.
You can click the Listen Now button at the top of this page… Or, you can listen from your mobile device’s podcast player through iTunes or Stitcher.
Subscribe to our podcast to stay current on new episodes delivered to your inbox every Friday!
P.S. Don’t miss next week’s podcast episode with Mark Schaefer, college educator, author, speaker, and social media strategy consultant!
