What exactly is a sales pipeline? Having a precise answer to this question can spell the difference between success and failure for a sales team. Put simply, a sales pipeline is a precise expression of a company’s sales process. It consists of the individual steps taken by salespeople from the initial contact with a prospect, ...
I believe there are two ways to negotiate: manipulatively and collaboratively. You could call it “win‑win” versus “win‑lose.” Manipulative negotiating sees the participants as adversaries. Tactics include exerting power, using subterfuge and hiding your own nonverbal communications. There is a lot of mistrust, tension, and suspicion. The manipulative negotiator’s goal is to win. There are ...
Achieving quota is stressful for every salesperson but there are some actions you can take to not only mitigate the anxiety, but also to be successful year after year. 1. Understand the strategy of the organization intimately. If you don’t understand what the strategy means in terms of what products, services and solutions need to ...
Blogging is a great tool to connect and share information with the world. Never has it been easier to share your expertise in such a direct and concise way. Writing a blog is a perfect platform to strengthen the connection between you as a professional and your audience, customers, and colleagues. Besides the obvious benefits ...
People don’t respond as well to data as they do to stories, it’s been shown. Take powerful data, put it into a story that creates an emotional response, and you’ll find that it has much more impact. That’s why companies prefer to have their products actually be part of the storyline in successful TV shows–going ...
Shockingly and sadly, I see the ‘Re-active’ approach all the time. How can this be when your largest customers are providing the lion’s share of revenue for your company? Consider the following consequences of a re-active approach: Leaving money on the table due to lack of strategic account planning that is proven to lead to ...
Earlier in my sales career, I was asked to set up some high level appointments at Turner Broadcast Systems. But back then, we didn’t have social media or a bevvy of tools to assist me in getting in the back door. I had to try and get to the person’s executive assistant, or know someone ...
Momentum is a vitally important part of sales management. What could be slowing your sales team down to a dead crawl?
