Hiring Sales People: Big Money or Moneyball?
Every VP of Sales and Sales Manager will tell you that the most important thing they can do to achieve forecast is to “hire right.” The question is why so many struggle with this process?
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Prairie Sky Book Review – The Trust Edge
The Trust Edge by David Horsager is a compelling look at how trust and lack of trust can impact an organization. Horsager turns what might be a soft skill into a hard skill by giving the reader conrete steps to build an organization basewd on trust.
Read MoreThink Like a Client
In Norman Maclean’s, A River Runs Through It, he tells a story of two brothers growing up in rural Montana and fishing the Big Blackfoot River in Montana. (The book is a lyrical and beautiful story, and I highly recommend the book over the movie.) In one passage, the older brother, Norman, after watching his younger brother Paul catch an enormous fish and being swept into the rapids, remembers….
Read MoreStep 1: Admit You Have a Problem – Presentations Don’t Work
Many companies still rely on the “presentation” as a sales tool. But a couple recent studies may indicate a major problem with this approach.
Read MoreHow Many Cookies Did You Eat? Micro-Truth.
I just read a survey that said that only 30% of Americans trust corporations. Marketing and sales own this problem. My three year old grandson has an answer for how to deal with this.
Read MoreThat Giant Sucking Sound
I once had a boss that sent me an email asking me to set up a meeting with him. His office was twenty feet away. Lots of passive aggressive thoughts went through my brain before I realized that in a single stroke, he had embodied the two biggest black holes of personal productivity in contemporary business; emails and meetings.
Read MoreOur Segment? Anyone Who Will Buy From Us!
Targeting the right prospects is Sales and Marketing 101. In my experience it’s done poorly by both marketing and sales more than 75% of the time. There are two reasons for this.
How can you make sure you don’t fall into the trap of selling to the wrong segment? Read more.
Read MoreRemember These 29 Things…?
On the eve of the mid-term elections, I am struck by the tactics for messaging used by the major parties and the parallels for Sales and Marketing. The first is that those that keep their message simple and consistent are much more likely to get their point of view accepted. The second thing is that we are all risk averse. Our little medulla oblongata (lizard brains) in the back of our skulls that generate our flight or fight response take precedence over our frontal lobes where reason happens. So messages based on loss or fear tend to trump those based on reason.
Read MoreGiving Thanks
Thanking customers and clients for their business is Marketing and Sales 101. But it’s rare when we do it with sincerity. One of the most successful marketing campaigns I’ve been involved with was sending personal thank-you notes to over 1400 customers. The benefits were twofold…
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