Young influencer Brandi Noye continues to create new stepping stones in her career thanks to a passion for learning.
Get a few our tenured industry leaders in a room together at a convention and no doubt, you’ll hear plenty of stories about how much the copier industry has changed. The evolution from the early days of single-function standalone copiers to today’s digital, cloud-based, multifunction world is remarkable, but technology changes so fast that you don’t need to have been around that long to find yourself working in a completely different business than the one where you began.
When Brandi Noye was at Penn State studying business management, she landed an internship at a company whose name is also its mission statement: Doing Better Business (DBB) in Altoona, Pennsylvania. She distinguished herself early and secured a full-time sales job with DBB after graduating in 2005. At the time, DBB’s range of products was pretty simple, mostly copiers, MFPs, printers, and scanners. Brandi would go out and pound the pavement every day, learning how to make cold calls.
“It was just so challenging, just being young,” Noye recalled. “You have to figure out how to manage your time because all of a sudden you don’t have a schedule. You have to be self-motivated and really grind and keep at it day after day.”
If Noye had been selling shoes or cars, her sales career would have been locked in, since sales roles don’t always present many opportunities to pivot. But Noye had the fortune to enter an industry that is in a constant state of technological evolution. In the midst of a digital transformation, single-function machines were evolving into digital multifunction devices that could connect to a network. The technology itself appealed to Noye, who threw herself into learning all the ins and outs of it.
Selling hardware then shifted to selling solutions, something that required a much more comprehensive understanding not only of what the machines could do, but also of what client businesses needed the machines to do with the help of software.
“It was such a transition in the industry,” said Noye. “They needed people that could understand that technology and kind of jump in and figure out how to do it.”
With the knowledge she had acquired in her first sales role from cold calling, as well as her drive and commitment in immersing herself in the technology, Noye established herself as DBB’s first solutions sales specialist, selling hardware and document management and cost-accounting software.
In less than a decade, the shifts in the hardware combined with the increasingly important software and services component, Noye’s sales role had become exponentially more complex. While Noye and other young people were enthusiastic about digital transformation, clients, especially in more traditional sectors, needed more convincing, albeit in a way that actually made sales conversations easier.
“People were a little hesitant, but at the same time, I could easily say, listen, you can print and it’ll provide more functionality to you than just being a copier,” said Noye. “It gave me an easier talk track.”
With a strong foundation from her nearly 15 years in the industry, despite all the changes, Noye’s sales strategy is rooted in the tried-and-true basics: client relationships, service, and addressing specific needs. In January 2018, she was promoted to DBB’s director of business development and is now managing a team of sales reps who need to find ways to differentiate DBB’s products in a crowded market.
Many of DBB’s customers are cost-conscious non-profits. According to Noye, the key to serving non-profits is understanding the way they make purchasing decisions. Many schools and religious organizations belong to group purchasing organizations (GPOs), which use their combined purchasing power to negotiate better deals on supplies.
“If they’re just cost-driven, you can go in with the basics, the lowest price, and you talk about GPOs and how you can maximize their spending,” explained Noye.
Even though non-profits are paying close attention to the bottom line, Noye also looks to explore new features that could greatly benefit these businesses, especially since labor-intensive tasks are a hurdle for most small organizations. Noye and
her team have recently seen success in this small-business category by demonstrating features such as HP’s new folding unit on its color machines, which makes short work of all the bulletins and pamphlets non-profits depend on. It’s a feature that MFPs from some of DBB’s other vendors don’t offer. When Noye’s sales team members bring her their successes like this, she works with her team to exploit that niche and broaden the success.
Today, potential customers are considerably more informed than they were when Noye entered the industry in 2005. She recalled a young buyer who recently wanted a production machine and had researched all her options online, coming to DBB with a configuration all picked out. After a simple Google search, the potential customer was on the phone with Noye ready to get a quote.
“Even if you’ve been in the industry for several years, sometimes production machines are hard to wrap your head around,” said Noye. “She just said, I want a price on this, I’ve done my research on manufacturers, and this is what I decided I want.”
Online research can certainly help with a sale, but it can also cast a cloud over the process. Noye also gets the customers who insist they can get a cheaper price online, no matter the product. DBB recently made the decision to highlight the services side of its business, designing flyers that profile the company’s local service reps. DBB clearly sees the value of underscoring what customers can’t buy online, including skilled technicians.
“We can say, if you buy from us, you’re getting the value of these 25 people who are going to stand by you and support you,” said Noye.
In an ever-changing industry that relies heavily on client relationships and expertise, there are no shortcuts to the kind of knowledge Noye has cultivated over her career. She remains committed to constant improvement and education.
“If you don’t know the industry, well, yeah, you might be good with people, but when you get a question and can’t answer it, knowledgeable people see right through that,” said Noye. “You lose a lot of respect right away from the people you’re trying to help and the people you’re trying to manage. As the industry keeps changing, the only thing to do is keep learning.”
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