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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Names: Shanks, Jamie, author.
Title: Social selling mastery: scaling up your sales and marketing machine for the digital buyer / Jamie Shanks.
Description: Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., [2016] | Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016023352 (print) | LCCN 2016031884 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119280736 (cloth) | ISBN 9781119280767 (epdf) | ISBN 9781119280866 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Internet marketing. | Selling. | Electronic commerce. | Social media.
Classification: LCC HF5415.1265 .S525 2016 (print) | LCC HF5415.1265 (ebook) | DDC 658.8/72 – dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016023352
My life changed forever on April 18, 2012, in Dallas, Texas. On that particular day, I was a first-time attendee to the AA-ISP (American Association of Inside Sales Professionals) annual Leadership Summit. I was the Toronto AA-ISP chapter president at the time, yet hadn't been able to attend the 2011 event because I had absolutely no money. That year was a disastrous one for my business, which you'll feel a true appreciation for by the end of this preface. At the 2012 AA-ISP Leadership Summit, I felt like a fish out of water. There, at this event, were all the big names of inside sales – Anneke Seley, Trish Bertuzzi, Ken Krogue, Jill Konrath, and hundreds more. Then there was me, from Canada, a 33-year-old absolute nobody in the industry. I remember feeling really awkward at the event because I was there to learn, but I also was very starstruck. My heroes have always been business leaders and now I was in a room with the top sales minds in the world. I kept saying to myself, “I'm meeting the people whose books are on my book shelf at home.” I just wanted someone to pay attention to me.
To better understand my sense of desperation at the time, I'll paint you a picture of my financial dire straits. I'll take the story back three more years, to the summer of 2009. In that year, I was a self-proclaimed, hot-shit sales leader who made magic happen every time I picked up the phone. I was convinced that I was wasting my talents leading one sales team as an employee when I could be consulting to 10 at the same time as an entrepreneur. On January 4, 2010, I quit my job as the director of sales at Firmex (a SaaS software start-up in Toronto) and became a consultant. The first thing I learned about consulting is that there are zero barriers to entry, but 99 reasons why you'll fall flat on your face! I convinced myself that local Toronto technology companies would flock to my greatness. I'll spare you 18 months of terrible stories, but suffice it to say, I had a failing business that couldn't seem to turn a profit. I kept asking myself, “Why is my business such a disaster?” The answers to my problematic start were only clear to me years later:
