Today is Family Day in Ontario, a new recognized Holiday. Commonwealth Oil will be closed, and re-open tomorrow, February 21, for regular business. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Happy Family Day to all, take a moment and appreciate them today!

Technical Sales Brian Lowe, VP of Marketing & Sales for Wallover Company, Bill Percy, and Jody Early attended the 5th Annual Steel Tube + Pipe Conference held at the JW Marriott Hotel in Houston, Texas earlier this month. This conference is an information gathering and networking event for individuals involved in the steel tube and pipe industry, and allows an outlet for discussing issues directly related to their businesses.

Topics covered included: Opportunities and Vision for the Future Concerning Gas and Oil Shale,   Current Vision of the Industry, Flat Rolled Suppliers Perspectives, Distributors of Pipe and Tube, Welded Tube of Canada Spotlight, Seamless Tube Spotlight, Safety and Technology, Economy, Line Pipe, International markets outlook  and a focus on international mills.

Commonwealth Oil was a gold sponsor at this event, and had the opportunity to mingle with members of the Steel Tube, Pipe and OCTG world which we supply Tube Mill Coolants, Rust & Corrosion Inhibitors and other Metalworking Fluids.

The event is hosted by the American Metal Market (AMM), a popular news outlet for the Steel Tube + Pipe industry. For more information on the AMM, please visit www.amm.com. For more information on the event, feel free to contact Brian Lowe, blowe@commonwealthoil.com or Bill Percy, billp@wallover.com.

Fred is enjoying his new found freedom as Maxine’s pool boy by traveling with his wife Cathy this week. They are in Captiva Florida, and happened to run into Fred’s beloved wooden statue, Joe’s cousin outside of a restaurant at the end of Sanibel Island.

Here is Commonwealth Oil’s new logo, as most of you have heard- Commonwealth Oil is now owned by Wallover Company. For more information on Wallover, please visit their website by clicking here.

We are so excited to welcome the Wallover family to the Commonwealth Oil family and welcome any questions you have about how this may affect your relationship with us (there are no plans to change anything).

If you have any questions, please contact Maxine Watters, mwatters@commonwealthoil.com.

Here’s a step-by-step guide as told by Geoffrey James, Sales Machine.

1. Introduce yourself. When you get through to a prospect, say:

You: Hello [prospect's first name], this is [your name] from [your company] …

2. Obtain permission to continue. Without waiting for the prospect to respond, immediately ask the following question:

You: … Have I caught you in the middle of something?

So, the whole opener should sound like: “Hello, Jim, I’m John Doe from Acme. Have I caught you in the middle of something?” Exactly like that.

In most cases, the prospect will respond one of three ways:

• “It’s always a bad time, but what’s this all about?”
• “No, this is not a bad time. What can I do for you?”
• “I’m in the middle of something. Call me later this afternoon.”

If you get the third response, go to Step 3.

Otherwise, skip Step 3 and proceed directly to Step 4.

3. Reschedule the conversation. If you get that last response, say:

You: Thanks, I’ll call you then.

Make a note in your calendar to call again at that time. Call back at the time that you committed to do so. If your prospect answers the phone, proceed to Step 4.

However, if when you call back, you land in voicemail, leave this message:

You: Joe, you asked that I call you around this time, but it looks like you’re out. Call me at XYZ number, but if I don’t hear back from you by this Friday, I’ll call you on Tuesday.

Then call back when you said you would. When you get finally through, proceed to Step 4.

4. Continue the conversation. If in Step 2 you got one of the first two responses, say:

You: I know I’m calling you out of the blue, but sometimes if I don’t know anyone at the company I’m calling, this is the only way to develop a relationship. All I want to do right now is quickly introduce myself, my firm, and my offering.

As I mentioned, I’m with [your company] and we help companies [what your company does] and I was wondering how to best position myself to determine if our product may be a fit for you?

Most of the time, the prospect will either continue the conversation or point you at somebody who is more appropriate. In either case, you’ve successfully made the cold call and are moving the sale forward. Congratulations!

Your next step, of course, is to qualify the lead to confirm whether or not this is a real opportunity.

Quality Control Technician, Kevin Bryon celebrated his Birthday today!

Happy Birthday Kevin! To send Kevin your Birthday wishes, you can e-mail him at kbryon@commonwealthoil.com

To our valued Friends,

It is with sadness that we inform you that our Lab Manager, Michele Breault passed away on Saturday, January 7, after a 2 year battle with cancer. We wanted to let you know, as many of you have had a direct relationship with her and continued to ask about her throughout the two past years.

Michele started at Commonwealth Oil in 2003, and since then has become a dear friend to myself and the rest of the staff, distributors and suppliers. Michele will always be remembered as a brilliant chemist and the ultimate friend who maintained real integrity in everything she did.

Having traveled and lived throughout the US, China, Czech Republic, France, Germany, the Middle East and Puerto Rico, Michele was truly a remarkable woman. Among her accomplishments was raising her son Braedan as a single-mother and making a home for them in Windsor, Ontario surrounded by her tight knit family.

Michele will always be remembered as a person of contradictions. She was bull headed. She would fight with anyone (even me!) when she thought she was right, yet completely dedicated, always doing what was best for the company, even coming to work after her many chemo appointments. She was blunt, calling a spade a spade, yet incredibly sweet, shedding a tear if you told her a sad story. Even at the end Michele cried when she learned a young child had died in the same hospital room as her. She faced her illness with the same courage and determination as she lived her life. She would not ask for help and had a hard time accepting it when it was given.

We had asked, this past summer, that you help us send Michele & Braedan to Disneyland, and we were completely over-whelmed with the response we received. Braedan will always be able to cherish the memory of his first trip to Disneyland with his mother and none of us will ever be able to forget her face the day before she left. She was glowing! Thank you again for your generosity.

It has not be easy saying goodbye to Michele, she has been a big part of my life for the past eight and a half years; I can truly call her family. To view Michele’s obituary, please click here.

We appreciate your prayers and thoughts during this difficult time and welcome any memories you’d like to share about Michele. Neither you or I will meet many in your lifetime quite like her. I will always remember Michele with a smile or a funny story about her versus sadness. We are so blessed that she was such a big part of our lives.

Sincerest regards,

Fred Herdman

Commonwealth Oil is pleased to announce a new distributor. WestPier Marine & Industrial Supply, located in Port Colborne is also a member of the Indica Group.

Welcome WestPier! To learn more about them, click here.

Everyone at Commonwealth Oil would like to thank our distributors and friends for a successful 2011- we are so excited for 2012 and want to thank you for your continued support.

We hope you had a very blessed Christmas, and a wonderful and safe New Year.

Here is a few photos from our Christmas Party:

by Richard Piehler, Technical Sales Representative

Here is a great article I came across entitled ‘Don’t Limit Your Sales Potential: Create a Differentiated Customer Experience‘ by Dave Holt. I wanted to share, great knowledge for all.

“Organizations are continually looking for ways to differentiate themselves in a very competitive marketplace. With fierce competition, it is getting harder and harder for organizations to differentiate themselves on product alone.

Customers demand more from the buying experience. The buying decision is no longer being made only on price; it is also being made on the value they receive from the knowledge, advice, and guidance of sales professionals.

The question then becomes: Is your organization’s sales talent better than that of your competition?

Sales professionals need to continually invest in their skills to become the best that they can be for their customers, themselves, and their organization.

What have I observed from the best?

A differentiated customer-buying experience is built on:

- What the sales professional does before the customer interaction
- What they do during
- And what they do afterward

What do the BEST do before?
They get ready for their customer by:
- Investing time in the customer relationship prior to the interaction whether in person or on the phone
- Leveraging tools and resources that create organizational memory and create a snapshot of the customer’s current relationship with the organization
- Leveraging what is known about the customer, such as their interests, their business, and their career

What do the BEST do during?
The best provide value to their customers during the interaction through their knowledge, guidance, and advice – High performers continually work at getting on the same wavelength with their customers by:

- Projecting honesty
- Demonstrating competence
- Establishing commonality

Helping the customer make the right buying decision is built on the foundation of a trusted relationship and the ability of the sales professional to create value.

Some of the fundamental skills that can be observed by a high-performing sales person during effective customer discovery are:

1. Getting the client ready and eager to participate in the conversation
2. The ability to ask great discovery questions. Asking great discovery questions has many positive impacts on the client experience; customers respect salespeople when genuine interest is shown in their situation, problems, opportunities, and interests.
3. The interchange of ideas promotes a sense of commonality as well as reciprocity. Asking great discovery questions gives the client an opportunity to provide the sales person with the necessary information to make a well-informed buying decision.

High performing sales professionals are not afraid to ask tough questions; however, they ask them in a customer-focused manner. They also know that sometimes what the customer says and what the customer means are often different. They use effective discovery questions to check the levels of urgency and importance in order to establish the reality of the issues the customer faces.

Understanding Skills

High-Performing Sales Professionals are great active listeners. They have the ability to:
- Capture the customer’s energy words through effective note-taking
- Re-present the customer’s needs by including not only the facts, but the feelings behind the facts
- Recognizing the non-verbal cues from the customer which determine if their point of view is truly understood

Solution Skills

High-performing sale professionals do not sell products – they provide solutions. Customers have the right to feel that their circumstances are unique and that their needs require solutions that are specific to them. Ultimately, it is the goal of a professional sales person to demonstrate to their customers that the products and services that they represent will satisfy their needs and provide a solution that will meet or exceed the customer’s expectations.

High performing sales professionals know that product knowledge includes not just the facts about their products and services, but how they are applied and what they will do for their customers.

Commitment Skills

High-performing sales professionals understand that it’s their responsibility to help the customer make the right buying decision. That commitment demonstrates that they understand their customer’s needs, that the solution they have outlined will meet the customer’s needs, and that they believe in their product and services, their organization, and themselves.

Resistance to Commitment

Not all customers are ready to buy. High-performing sales professionals also understand the concept of resistance and the resistance barrier. They know that objections indicate a resistance point for the customer and need to be understood. They also know that the majority of objections are not what they appear on the surface, and if they have stuck to the fundamentals of selling, objections become more of a request for further information or are simply misunderstandings. High-performing sales professionals also believe that objections are caused by the sales person, not the customer.

Keep-in-Touch Skills

High-performing sales people stay in touch with their customers; they measure the ongoing relationship with their customers and implement high value, keep-in-touch strategies.

High Value touch points might include: – Measuring the impact of the solution provided to the customer based on their needs
- Providing valuable insight on topics of interest to their customers
- Introducing their customers to other team members in their organization
- Capturing information about their customers to ensure organizational memory

High-performing sales people succeed long-term with their customers because they proactively initiate contact on a regular basis and consistently create a differentiated customer experience.