Understanding the Sales Force

OCTOBER 5, 2023

I believe the analogy works even better when we look at one particular stage of the sales process. If you get one milestone in the Qualification stage wrong, it won’t CAUSE you to lose the business, but you won’t know that you can’t win the business, and therefore, that mistake PREVENTS salespeople from losing quickly.

Sales Process 193

Sales Process Guarantee ACT Exact 193

Understanding the Sales Force

APRIL 11, 2024

We were at our son’s college baseball game yesterday and since it was raining, we started watching from the car which put us right in front of the bullpen. Someone who is resistant won’t even listen. Pick up the phone and call the person you need to be talking with. They didn’t answer? Call again.

Coaching 203

Coaching Decision Maker Scale Hiring 203

Understanding the Sales Force

APRIL 15, 2024

” The one we are most familiar with is, “It ain’t over til it’s over.” The stock market has lost nearly all of its gains and the only thing we haven’t yet seen is massive layoffs. The Hall of Fame catcher Yogi Berra is known for his many “ Yogisms.” What are the twelve biggest challenges?

Hiring 182

Hiring Discount Decision Maker Call-back 182

Partners in Excellence

APRIL 26, 2024

We obsess about how we succeed. We develop strategies, contingency plans, prep and rehearse. We are driven to succeed for those big things. We treat the little things differently. We may skip them, thinking they aren’t important. We may not prepare well, winging it. After all, we’re busy!

CRM 116

CRM Research Meeting Closing 116

Understanding the Sales Force

MAY 8, 2023

On one side of the tree we had this perfectly cut, huge hole, and the other side of the tree had many small holes. So let’s assume that we are talking about a traditional sales organization with traditional salespeople who have responsibility for both finding and selling opportunities. ” “Woodpecker,” he said.

Decision Maker 156

Decision Maker Penetration Account Comparison 156

Understanding the Sales Force

JANUARY 16, 2024

I just make observations which you don’t have to agree with, and if we can leave it at that, you don’t have to stop reading my articles or send hate messages. I just make observations which you don’t have to agree with, and if we can leave it at that, you don’t have to stop reading my articles or send hate messages.

Guarantee 193

Guarantee Discount Face-to-face Course 193

Understanding the Sales Force

OCTOBER 10, 2023

If you need people to like you, if you worry about what they might think of you or what they might say about you, then standing out and behaving differently won’t be your cup of tea. You won’t be in the minority because 60% of all salespeople need to be liked. ” It was Abraham Lincoln. And he should know.

Scale 193

Scale Twitter Policies Call-back 193

Understanding the Sales Force

FEBRUARY 12, 2024

Remembering that Dinger loves Starbucks’ Puppaccinos (whipped cream in a cup), my wife suggested that we hide the pills in a 1/4 cup of whipped cream. In an instant, the resistance disappeared and the meds were devoured. You can read more about Dinger and his great listening skills here. I know, what if your prospect is a woman?

Sales Cycle 203

Sales Cycle Engineering Selling Skills Meeting 203

Partners in Excellence

APRIL 30, 2024

All credit for this post goes to Scott Gillum and his fantastic post: Why Relying on AI Won’t Improve Customer Experience. Reading it caused me to start reflecting on how much we misunderstand about AI and how we leverage it in selling. AI can help us see things about our people and customers that we haven’t seen.

Buyer 92

Buyer Analysis Data Research 92

Understanding the Sales Force

JANUARY 22, 2024

And if you have a professionally built, predictive scorecard, like those we create for our clients, the score might be below 60 and warning you that there is a good chance you WON’T get the business! I asked how many would be able to do everything we talked about – the things they wanted and the things I suggested.

Closing 212

Closing Proposal Discount Decision Maker 212

Understanding the Sales Force

OCTOBER 23, 2023

Half the country won’t vote for the other candidate. Biden keeps saying Bidenomics is working and we’re building back better. Trump keeps saying the election was stolen and we’re going to make America great again. While most Americans can’t imagine anyone supporting Hamas, there are actually 16% who do.

Account 203

Account How To Face-to-face Call-back 203

SalesProInsider

APRIL 16, 2024

Never Accept This Payment: Promises Won’t Pay Your Bills True story: An advisor in NJ had two great conversations with a prospective client who could not believe the services they would receive working with him compared to another option. Or deposit a compliment in your personal or business bank account? Of course not!

Discount 126

Discount How To Banking Compensation 126

Understanding the Sales Force

JANUARY 27, 2024

We are only two weeks away from the 2024 Super Bowl and it got me thinking. We’re in crunch time and instead of taking the ball to the hoop it seems like Dave played not to lose, had an unforced turnover, and he’s about to lose the game! But I have to ask, why are we there? I have my theories.

Sports 182

Sports Analysis Outbound Examples 182

Sales and Marketing Management

NOVEMBER 9, 2020

more in Closed-Won deals, which means reps and AEs should prioritize listening for pain points and problems rather than speak at length on something assumed. A deck is a common tactic to overview the discussion and personalize slides to the buyer, but this method hasn’t proven to be the most effective for closed-won opportunities.

Buyer 334

Buyer Strategy Buyer Persona ROI 334

Understanding the Sales Force

APRIL 3, 2024

It wasn’t about whether we liked them as people. Turning the tables, when sales managers need salespeople to like them, sales managers may fail to provide truthful coaching, fearing that salespeople won’t like them if they provide constructive criticism. It wasn’t personal.

Data 130

Data Construction Coaching Face-to-face 130

Bernadette McClelland

MARCH 17, 2023

7 Traits We Can Adopt From Our Irish Friends IRISH BY NAME: IRISH BY NATURE There is something very romantic about the Irish. HUMOUR: The Irish have a well-known sense of humour (even if we’re the ones that say we’re funny – ask my kids!), As a blue collar worker I know my Dad did!

Loyalty 195

Loyalty Face-to-face Travel Up-Sell 195

Sales and Marketing Management

JANUARY 27, 2021

Perhaps this new year can be a turning point, and something we can look forward to. Our areas where we used to recharge have become places of work. We no longer have a clear separation between work and home so it’s important to make that distinction for ourselves and sign off from time to time. Balance meeting times.

Call-back 177

Call-back Forecasting Energy Engineering 177

No More Cold Calling

DECEMBER 29, 2020

When we invest in customer relationships, we get more business from existing clients and earn the right to ask for referrals. That’s why we see so much bad behavior on social media. Why Word-of-Mouth Won’t Propel Your Sales. When we refer, we help three people—the salesperson, the prospect, and ourselves.

Referrals 432

Referrals Customer Social Media Revelation 432

The Pipeline

DECEMBER 8, 2020

We are all familiar with the saying ‘ those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it? ” Ask a rep why they lost and they’ll point to price and product, and they won because of relationship. By Tibor Shanto. In some ways, it assumes that you want to avoid all things that have happened, which is not always true.

Discount 235

Discount Pipeline Opportunity Meeting 235

Partners in Excellence

MAY 1, 2024

.” Neither of us feel we are out of touch with modern selling, the challenges both buyers and sellers face. Both of us embrace all sorts of technologies very quickly, as an example we both are actively developing AI based tools. But every once in a while we get on a call to discuss “What’s happening in selling?

Revelation 73

Revelation Lead Gen Scale Face-to-face 73

Partners in Excellence

OCTOBER 12, 2023

We all know customer retention is important. Creating great customer experiences, making sure we deliver on our commitments, keeping them happy are critical. We are all familiar with the “bow tie” chart, showing the importance of not only retaining, but growing and upselling. But are all of these enough?

Retention 124

Retention Maximizer Account Up-Sell 124

Sales Hacker

NOVEMBER 16, 2023

At Stytch, we realized that having specific stakeholders at specific stages of the buying journey led to higher win rates and more predictability and it all rested on our definition of the “buying committee.” Failure to do this will result in faulty forecasts, wasted time and effort, and missed targets. Examples: CTO, COO, CFO.

Ideal Customer Profile 87

Ideal Customer Profile Collateral Forecasting Face-to-face 87

Understanding the Sales Force

SEPTEMBER 5, 2023

Also last week, we celebrated the life of my best friend and longtime business partner, Matt Hogan, who passed away on Friday, August 25. Over time we became best friends. We were individually his friends and the friends didn’t gather except for perhaps a Super Bowl party years ago. You know, relationships!

Scale 193

Scale Networking ACT Sports 193

Understanding the Sales Force

SEPTEMBER 11, 2023

If you’re a gardener, and you’ve had as much rain as we have received in Central Massachusetts in the summer of 2023, then your plants that prefer dry soil are rotting – just like some of ours. We are currently in scenario 3 with an expectation that scenario 2 will come into play by early 2024.

Hiring 203

Hiring Top of Funnel Company Funnel 203

Partners in Excellence

APRIL 9, 2024

It’s trite to say we live in worlds of growing complexity. But…… To often, I think much of the challenge we face is self inflicted. We tend to make things more complex or more difficult than they need be. We make our work harder than it should be, then as a result find our calendars overwhelmed.

Ideal Customer Profile 117

Ideal Customer Profile Face-to-face CRM Opportunity 117

Partners in Excellence

MAY 10, 2023

Many lifetimes ago, I was the Executive Assistant (today we call it Chief of Staff) for one of the top executives at IBM. They had just won a very large order. He met with the team to congratulate them on their success and to learn more about their strategies and how they had won. ” The response came quickly, “$45M!”

Customer 87

Customer Proposal System Engineering 87

Anne Miller

MARCH 13, 2024

” Be Memorable Here are some examples of imagery that instantly “tattoo” a company’s position and value on the brain of a listener: A financing company: We are like Sisyphus ; we keep working for clients even when it feels like we’re pushing a boulder up a hill. There were 60 attendees.

Lead Rank 118

Lead Rank Networking Face-to-face Follow-up 118

Smooth Sale

MAY 1, 2024

When we talk about ‘business value ‘, we refer to the worth of your business in terms of its assets, reputation, and potential for future earnings. However, when we think of cutting costs, we often limit our spending instead of stretching the money we pay.

Lead Rank 101

Lead Rank Lead Scoring Hiring Licensing 101

Partners in Excellence

APRIL 10, 2024

When we are designing a machine, we specify the dimensions and performance characteristics of each part in the assembly. While we provide exact specifications, “It has to have dimensions of X inches, by Y inches, by Z inches. Let’s imagine we need to fill a 6 inch gap with 3 parts. The parts would be 1.1″,

Case Study 88

Case Study Marketing Qualified Lead Scale Engineering 88

BrainShark

JANUARY 31, 2024

In this case, we want to look at how training and coaching courses created by enablement connect to pipeline, opportunities, and close rates. This view directly positions course and coaching scores next to opportunities won to show the connection between learning adoption, scores, and sales success. We’ve got you covered.

Pipeline 62

Pipeline CRM Training ROI 62

Aviso

MARCH 26, 2020

We would have won, but the other team just gave the deal away” ? “Because we missed intermediate milestones doesn’t mean […]. Those of us who read Nassim Taleb’s book Black Swan know we’re experiencing a major shock event. Here are just some of the things you are likely to hear in the coming months ? “We

Sales 159

Sales 159

Partners in Excellence

JANUARY 16, 2024

Regardless how powerful the business case, if the people buying and using the solution aren’t confident, they won’t buy. Ultimately, the greatest value we create is how we help the customer understand and navigate their change process. Their win rates are higher (we’ve seen them double.).

Enterprise 109

Enterprise Enterprise Buying Cycle ROI 109

Partners in Excellence

MARCH 9, 2024

We managed getting through customs with incomplete documents for our huge modified TV-set in a used card-board box. We finally succeeded, with all gates shut and nobody to enter the premises, to find some responsible customer contacts for demonstrating our system. Purchasing was expecting to place the order.

Engineering 73

Engineering Negotiation System Meeting 73

Partners in Excellence

JANUARY 31, 2024

Summarized, at any point in time, as we look at B2B companies (To help us understand it, let’s imagine the total market size is 1000 companies): At any point in time, 3-4% of companies in an industry are actively engaged in a buying effort. So for the 40 companies that are buying, we or our competitors close only 16 of them.

Opportunity 111

Opportunity Sales Qualified Lead Lead Rank Analysis 111

Partners in Excellence

DECEMBER 21, 2023

As our conversations often go, we were talking about the state of selling and how we improve. 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? We face issues we may not have experienced before.

Customer 113

Customer Face-to-face Buying Cycle Loyalty 113

Partners in Excellence

JANUARY 5, 2022

We know empathy is important in working with others, whether it’s our customers, our peers, or our people. If we can’t understand what they face in doing their jobs, what they care about, what their hopes, dreams, or fears, doubts might be, we can’t connect with them in meaningful ways.

Face-to-face 96

Face-to-face Quota Lead Rank Lead Scoring 96

Janek Performance Group

FEBRUARY 20, 2024

In golf, we bond over an interest. We walk and talk, compete and collaborate. In golf, we set our stance, firm our grip, and focus on the target. I never learned anything from a match that I won. As professionals, we should all strive to improve. The more you practice, the more there is to learn. What did you do?

Decision Maker 62

Decision Maker Follow-up Social Media Up-Sell 62