Understanding the Sales Force

SEPTEMBER 20, 2023

I’ve written more than 2,000 articles on my Understanding the Sales Force Blog and there are hundreds of other sales blogs. 5 Ways to Build (and Lose) Credibility in Your Sales Emails Why is it Important to Align Your GTM Team? Should marketing understand what salespeople really do? Absolutely.

Sales Leadership 203

Sales Leadership Hiring How To Account Based Marketing 203

Sales 2.0

JULY 8, 2022

I don’t understand why it is acceptable for a process like cold calling (now often started via email) to work one in a hundred times–or in email efforts one in a thousand times. This post describes a framework that I have found over the last two decades can really change the math on prospecting. Do you know how you help?

Prospecting 370

Prospecting Outsourcing Services Cold Calling Hiring 370

Zoominfo

NOVEMBER 18, 2020

Or you might prefer spaghetti and a meatball.) . Whichever way you slice it, Jake Shaffren, former Sales Development Representative (SDR), Account Executive (AE) and current Director of Sales and Brad Metz former SDR and current AE made a pretty dynamic duo. And how do you ensure that your SDR is in the loop?

Hiring 246

Hiring Scale Account Intent 246

The Pipeline

OCTOBER 4, 2021

Based on commonly cited data, that’s not really working out these days. Simply saying you grind 22% more/faster, or the average amp doesn’t go to 11, hardly engages a prospect. If you want the numbers to capture your prospect, engages them to the point of acting, you need to weaponize your questions.

Data 368

Data Objections ACT Lead Rank 368

Mr. Inside Sales

SEPTEMBER 11, 2020

We’ve all been there – you call your prospect back at the appointed time for your presentation and they tell you any of the following: This isn’t a good time, OR. What to do? First, understand what’s happening here: Remember the law in sales: Leads Never Get Better! What’s number one for you?”.

Face-to-face 320

Face-to-face Sales Qualified Lead Scale Call-back 320

The Pipeline

MAY 14, 2019

You hear it said a lot in different fields of endeavour, “their numbers” or “his numbers” suck. Told in the abstract about a ballplayer you can understand what they mean. However, when a manager tells their rep, “your numbers suck,” it has an immediate and lasting detrimental impact.

Sage 313

Sage Quota Coaching Proposal 313

Partners in Excellence

JANUARY 12, 2024

I want to accomplish a lot, but I want to do it with minimal effort. As I look at selling, today, it requires far too much effort—far more than I’m willing to do. After all, we have to send 1000s of emails a day, we have to make 100s of calls, we have to spend hours doing outreach in LinkedIn and other channels.

Face-to-face 106

Face-to-face Commission Up-Sell Discount 106

SalesLoft

APRIL 8, 2024

The best reason for adopting a new sales technology is to find a solution to your organization’s pain points. Pain point 1: Understanding how campaigns performed For Ron, the number one issue he and his team had was centered around understanding and analyzing exactly how their campaigns worked.

Inside Sales 86

Inside Sales Face-to-face Campaigns Exact 86

Partners in Excellence

FEBRUARY 29, 2024

He researched others, understanding their roles and what their companies did, creating personalized emails. He tried to connect what he learned they were doing with his prospecting efforts. How do you know if he has the problem? How do you know if he cares? “What is he interested in talking about?

Ideal Customer Profile 117

Ideal Customer Profile Face-to-face Trade Show Prospecting 117

SBI Growth

MARCH 29, 2020

Scott shares his journey navigating the digital landscape and how to begin visualizing how making your number happens. Segment 1: Understanding Digital Strategy. Building a consensus of understanding your strategy. Segment 2: Integrating Product into Your Digital Strategy. You need to take the time to do it.

Segment 320

Segment Strategy B2B Sales Operations 320

Partners in Excellence

APRIL 17, 2024

If we don’t understand change, how can we ever expect our customers to understand it and want to navigate the change process? But, I can count on one hand, the number of sales enablement programs that include any significant training and development on change. Or do we have a case of the blind leading the blind?

Lead Rank 109

Lead Rank Analysis Incentives Incentive 109

Partners in Excellence

JANUARY 23, 2024

It’s finding the time to do these things. Understanding the impact of these disruptions, developing strategies to leverage them impact our priorities, strategies, and time. With each new initiative, identify two initiatives you are stopping. We don’t understand our priorities.

Face-to-face 102

Face-to-face Coaching Strategy Consumer 102

Zoominfo

JUNE 28, 2023

You’ve got butterflies, your team is excited, and you know your customers are going to be impressed. In order to make the launch a success, it’s crucial that you set clear goals, plan future steps, and earn a competitive advantage. When Do You Need a Go-to-Market Strategy? What is a Go-to-Market Strategy?

Ideal Customer Profile 130

Ideal Customer Profile Strategy Lead Rank Marketing 130

Zoominfo

AUGUST 18, 2020

The more calls you make, the more deals you close. If your goal is to increase sales productivity, start by asking yourself: “how much time do I waste on non-selling activities?”. On a typical day, we’d be shocked if you spent 8 hours on the phone. How much do you know about each prospect’s professional background?

Ideal Customer Profile 264

Ideal Customer Profile Analysis Decision Maker CRM 264

Zoominfo

JANUARY 11, 2021

Maybe there’s a product out there that can automate most of the work you spend half your day working on. Ultimately, your sales and marketing strategies depend on it. Which is why actually identifying these pain points often requires putting yourself in your customers’ shoes. The list, sadly, can seem endless.

B2B 277

B2B Intent Signal Customer How To 277

Partners in Excellence

MARCH 11, 2024

There are prompts for “researching and understanding” any role you might be selling to. If we understand our ICPs, we already should understand: (If you don’t, reassess your sales enablement strategies.) Our playbooks and tools are already focused on helping us understand these things.

Ideal Customer Profile 107

Ideal Customer Profile Face-to-face Engineering Industry 107

Zoominfo

DECEMBER 17, 2020

What do you do when all your plans fall out from under your feet? It’s what humans do best and this year that effort took center stage. Does 2020 really have to take away all of our favorite things? "My only rule is you don’t touch the gong. Great question.

Incentives 234

Incentives Incentive Travel Motivation 234

Partners in Excellence

NOVEMBER 2, 2023

As you might expect, the calendars are packed with meeting after meeting–on all sorts of things. Endless discussion on “the numbers” and the challenges of achieving them. One on one’s are irregular, and easily pushed off when something the manager prefers to do. ” I ask to look at their calendars.

Coaching 104

Coaching Lead Rank Pipeline Data 104

Zoominfo

MAY 21, 2020

But to crush cold email outreach, you have to do it right. We looked to one of our internal experts, our Sales Development Rep with the 60% response rate, to show you how (and when) to write a perfectly personalized BASHO email. When you can’t get your target on the phone. When your prospect is a decision-maker.

Examples 264

Examples Account Based Marketing Decision Maker Ideal Customer Profile 264

Zoominfo

MAY 7, 2020

You are working with a decision-maker who has some skin in the game, and they’re taking your proposal seriously. That’s exactly where you want to be. “We You might think that positive language is a good thing, but it’s not. “You You might think that positive language is a good thing, but it’s not. DO NOT DO THIS.

Objections 213

Objections Decision Maker Case Study Face-to-face 213

Partners in Excellence

JULY 28, 2021

All of us focus on the “numbers.” ” We are driven to “make the numbers,” because those are our goals and we are driven to achieve our goals. When we miss the numbers, we panic, we whip ourselves into a frenzy of activity to do more–all in service of making the numbers.

Face-to-face 114

Face-to-face Competition System Relationals 114

Zoominfo

JANUARY 11, 2021

Maybe there’s a product out there that can automate most of the work you spend half your day working on. Ultimately, your sales and marketing strategies depend on it. Which is why actually identifying these pain points often requires putting yourself in your customers’ shoes. The list, sadly, can seem endless.

B2B 246

B2B Intent Signal Customer How To 246

Partners in Excellence

JANUARY 22, 2024

I ask: “How does your customer make money?” But then I ask again, “How does your customer make money,” few can provide any deeper understanding of what their customers (as enterprises) do to make money. “What work does your customer do? . “What work does your customer do?”

Customer 101

Customer Face-to-face Enterprise Enterprise 101

Partners in Excellence

JUNE 24, 2020

When we talk about business, we quickly get to talking about the numbers–revenue, profit, EBITDA, EPS, growth, market cap, market share, customer retention, customer satisfaction, headcount, productivity, inventory, cash flow, assets, liabilities, and on and on. We have to understand their performance against those numbers.

Churn 143

Churn Quota Influencer Retention 143

SalesLoft

APRIL 25, 2024

Join us live as go-to-market experts share their best advice and insights from the frontlines of revenue — with tactics you can immediately implement at your organization. Chris Turner and Rebby John get this question a lot: what does a sales engineer do? But we’re doing it from a slightly different lens.

Engineering 52

Engineering Industry Face-to-face Education 52

Partners in Excellence

MARCH 6, 2023

Most of the time we actually fail to do discovery. Look at your inbox, I suspect 95% of the prospecting mails you have say, “Organizations like yours have this problem–we solve it. When we do try to do discovery, too often it’s “discovery with an agenda.”

Face-to-face 107

Face-to-face Buying Cycle Customer Positioning 107

Partners in Excellence

AUGUST 7, 2023

I’m amazed at the number of sellers that really don’t believe their value proposition or value creation. How do I know this? They can’t challenge me with the impact of doing nothing, not changing. They don’t know and, possibly, shouldn’t know how to do this.

Face-to-face 95

Face-to-face Discount ROI Training 95

Allego

MARCH 28, 2024

For David Ashe , director of sales development at Allego, it’s about ensuring your SDRs retain their human approach. We have to lead [buyers] down that path to understand they have a problem that they didn’t know about, even if they don’t have any obvious ailments,” Ashe said. You didn’t know it, but it is.

Strategy 62

Strategy Top of Funnel Lead Rank Lead Scoring 62

Partners in Excellence

DECEMBER 21, 2023

The conversation got me thinking about the issue: “Our customers desperately need help, but do we want to be helpful, do we know how to be helpful? And when we do, we are overwhelmed with information and data about what we might do. And when we do, we are overwhelmed with information and data about what we might do.

Customer 112

Customer Face-to-face Buying Cycle Loyalty 112

Partners in Excellence

DECEMBER 2, 2021

All the things you would expect came up in the conversation, absence of targeting, lack of understanding about the company and the individual, poor writing, lack of relevance, constant pitching and prospector focus on themselves and their products. Aren’t they doing the same things?” Is it different?”

Social Media 113

Social Media LinkedIn Prospecting Groups 113

Allego

AUGUST 11, 2022

So, it’s really important for marketing and sales teams to be 100% aligned,” Olcay said. But you know the saying about assuming things. Therefore, it’s important to confirm everyone agrees on the goals, go-to-market strategy, and what’s expected from your sales teams, he said. Understand the Sales Math.

Hiring 116

Hiring Sales Enablement Webinar Metrics Face-to-face 116

Partners in Excellence

MAY 3, 2022

Over the years, I’ve acquired a number of his pieces. When I meet with managers, I ask them, “What data do you use to monitor performance?” We have huge amounts of data we use… ” Then I ask, “Can you show me one of the reports that you find most useful?”

Data 90

Data Report Quota Pipeline 90

Alice Heiman

NOVEMBER 15, 2022

The obvious advantage is being close to your customers and making sure that your product is solving a real problem for them. Highlights of this Episode: [1:45] We connect you with brands that are better for your health and better for the planet no matter where you shop. [5:24] Where are they doing well?

Hiring 131

Hiring Cost per Acquisition Sage Real Estate 131

Partners in Excellence

SEPTEMBER 29, 2023

Do you genuinely care about the people you are prospecting? Do you genuinely care about your customers? Do you genuinely care about your colleagues and peers? Do you genuinely care about your people? Do you genuinely care about what you are doing?

Channels 97

Channels LinkedIn Media Opportunity 97

Hubspot Sales

JANUARY 9, 2024

So, if you can master the art of door-to-door sales, the juice is worth the squeeze on the income front. The skills you learn on the job may also help you climb the sales career ladder. Keep reading to learn 20 D2D sales tips that can fast-track your growth. And the only way to get really good at selling is to sell.”

Face-to-face 101

Face-to-face Up-Sell Research Sales 101

Smooth Sale

JANUARY 2, 2024

Photo by Geralt via Pixabay Six Effective Ways To Ignite Personal Motivation For Growth Attract the Right Job or Clientele: Personal must-dos and career projects can be overwhelming, requiring us to motivate ourselves to complete what is on the agenda. For example, if you want to write a novel, begin by writing a page or two daily.

Motivation 113

Motivation Nonprofit Hiring Sports 113

Alice Heiman

MARCH 7, 2023

In my conversation with my long-time friend Joanne Black, we explore the reasons for the decline in the effectiveness of this strategy and we explore the benefits of a formal sales referral strategy and how to set one up in your company. Over the past three years, there have been a number of seismic shifts in the market.

Referrals 131

Referrals Top of Funnel Closing Strategy 131