Is sustainability just something that salespeople shy away from? Or is it more something that can be an asset in sales? Yes to the final question, according to my guest today. Sustainability presented and packaged correctly is a major potential sales superpower – if they can communicate it correctly to the customer.

My guest today is Amanda Downs, who has more than 35 years of experience in sales. She works with commercial leaders and their teams on strategy and one of her key points is: Sell to the customers “why”. For a sales department, this does not necessarily come easy and without training. All teams in fact, from product development, procurement, marketing, management to sales, need training to understand and communicate about their company’s sustainable products. Get great tips from Amanda Downs in this season’s final episode.

You can hear:

• That unless you can sell to the why, people are not going to buy
• About the cycle of “understand, plan, sell, negotiate and execute”
• That today, people buy before they have even met you and therefore it's key to make sure you sell value
• That a business needs to educate their salespeople
• That all departments need to have a joint vision of success
• That selling is not about negotiating. It's about selling the value story
• About the process called “the seven C's”

Mentioned in this episode:

• Amanda Downs on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandadowns2/
• Email Amanda: amanda@uspire.co.uk
• Uspire Group LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/uspire-ltd/
• Uspire Group website: https://theuspiregroup.com/

Looking for a competitive edge? Invest 3 min answering some quick simple questions about your business. Discover how well you are suited to get business success with sustainability: greenprofit.scoreapp.com International Bestselling Book: If you want a recipe for how to work with sustainability in a way that is good for business and for the world then check out my Amazon international bestselling book “Making sustainability profitable – a leaders guide to growing a thriving business that makes the world a better place”. You can get it from Amazon and other major bookstores. Contact Green Business With Impact: If you have questions, comments, or suggestions for future podcast episodes please contact me at js@bwimpact.com or reach me via LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jsteinhausen/

Like what you hear? Please rate Green Business With Impact: Please help me spread the word about Green Business With Impact by sharing and rating the show on your podcast app.

What is a good partnership and are they easy or hard to obtain? Do partners with a sustainability approach have advantages over “traditional” partners? And what is the D-A-N-C-E framework? Lots of questions and just as many amazing answers when I partner up (pun intended) with the knowledgeable Dave Plunkett on the topic. He is the founder of the company Collaboration Junkie and has developed hundreds of partnerships since the company started in 2020.

Dave walks us through his five step D-A-N-C-E framework that will help the listeners be strategic towards partnerships. Because you need a strategy behind your partnerships to be successful, whether your business is focused on sustainability or not. If you do have a brand with sustainability at its core, you have an advantage over your competition. So, join me and Dave and learn about D for Dance, A for Assembly, N for Nurturing, C for Connection and E for Engagement and much more.

You can hear:

• Dave thinks it’s not our natural way to be in competition. It's our natural way is to collaborate and work together
• When you're speaking to potential partners, you should talk about how you can help them deliver the result that they want to deliver
• It’s important to schedule strategic reviews of your partners
• Some great examples of partnerships - for example Spotify’s deal with Uber and Danish textile company Gabriel’s deal with Boeing
• That partnerships are not about being in competition with other people. It's about being just where there's a right match

Mentioned in this episode:

• Dave Plunkett on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/daveplunkett/
• Collaboration Junkie: https://www.collaborationjunkie.com/
• Danish fabric company Gabriel: https://www.gabriel.dk/

Looking for a competitive edge? Invest 3 min answering some quick simple questions about your business. Discover how well you are suited to get business success with sustainability: greenprofit.scoreapp.com International Bestselling Book: If you want a recipe for how to work with sustainability in a way that is good for business and for the world then check out my Amazon international bestselling book “Making sustainability profitable – a leaders guide to growing a thriving business that makes the world a better place”. You can get it from Amazon and other major bookstores. Contact Green Business With Impact: If you have questions, comments, or suggestions for future podcast episodes please contact me at js@bwimpact.com or reach me via LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jsteinhausen/

Like what you hear? Please rate Green Business With Impact: Please help me spread the word about Green Business With Impact by sharing and rating the show on your podcast app.

In this episode, we take a deep dive into the connection between innovation and sustainability. My guest on the show today is Aileen Boyle who is the CEO of Fortro. For more than 20 years, she has helped companies innovate and create impactful businesses. A key take away is that sustainability and circular economy are effectful platforms for innovation! Aileen also breaks down the concept of innovation and gives a lot of great tips about driving a sustainable business. For instance, we discuss the basic rules you must look at when you bring a new product or a new service to market and you can hear Aileen’s take on the steps that well-established companies wanting to innovate their existing products or services can take.

You can hear:

• Aileen demystifying the word “innovation”
• The questions any business should ask themselves, whether new or existing and wanting to bring a new product/service to market:

-How do you know that this is exactly what people are looking for? -How will they use it? -What will they do when they're finished with it?

• That it’s important to design “the sustainable element” in from the start
• The importance of bringing in an external perspective - somebody that has grown businesses before, who has been involved in developing products and services

Mentioned in this episode:

• Aileen Boyle, LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aileenboyle-ceo-fortro/
• Fortro: https://www.linkedin.com/company/fortro-ltd/

Looking for a competitive edge? Invest 3 min answering some quick simple questions about your business. Discover how well you are suited to get business success with sustainability: greenprofit.scoreapp.com

International Bestselling Book: If you want a recipe for how to work with sustainability in a way that is good for business and for the world then check out my Amazon international bestselling book “Making sustainability profitable – a leaders guide to growing a thriving business that makes the world a better place”. You can get it from Amazon and other major bookstores.

Contact Green Business With Impact: If you have questions, comments, or suggestions for future podcast episodes please contact me at js@bwimpact.com or reach me via LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jsteinhausen/

Like what you hear? Please rate Green Business With Impact: Please help me spread the word about Green Business With Impact by sharing and rating the show on your podcast app.