February 29, 2012 – 9:52 am
Firing all the sales managers is NOT a totally crazy idea. CRM systems and collaboration tools (social media-based and otherwise) can do a whole lot of mentoring. That’s two BIG, off-loadable sales management tasks right there….
October 10, 2011 – 10:46 am
Every time I become aware that I have inadvertently annoyed a business associate (i.e., customer, co-worker, colleague, whatever) I try to write down what I did. Writing about something fixes the memory strongly and permanently. This is one of those situations.
Trust me. You do this, and you are annoying.
Time management. There is not enough time. [...]
October 6, 2011 – 7:22 pm
The speech ends with the notion, ”Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish!” Preceding that are five other thoughts I find hard to ignore.
“Connect the dots.” (With the insightful acknowledgement that the connecting is only possible after the fact. i.e., Remember all the dots!)
“Do what you love.”
“Don’t settle!”
“I’ll be dead soon.” ”If today were the last day of my [...]
September 30, 2011 – 9:18 am
It’s so easy to forget to use the right selling tools, and somehow the notion of Total Cost of Ownership is one that gets ignored on a regular basis. AGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!
I got a reminder yesterday during an interview on Business-To-Technology Radio with Sheldon Michaels, President of Southern Office Machines. He talked about “TCO” in terms of [...]
“Work with those ready to be worked with.” Pretty simple advice. Pretty sound too. Especially when it comes to embracing new techniques, technologies and tactics for selling more faster. Or selling anything for that matter.
As usual, I came by this powerfully pithy insight from contact with someone way smarter than me. This time it was [...]
Yes, I know it’s a cliche, but it’s always better to take action than it is to just think about taking action. Another case in point…
13 days ago, an orthopedic surgeon made a 10-inch incision… [I'll spare you the details, but if you're interested this is an awesome video] …and ultimately installed a brand new [...]
Creativity is one of the great strengths of the prototypical sales professional. In fact the only other groups I know that are more adamant about their own amazing creativity are sales managers and sales executives.
In fact, there is little doubt that a surplus of creativity truly is one of the two or three most vital [...]
Make no mistake. There is a gap between your mind and your mouth. Neglect filling that gap before making the call or presentation and guarantee less than optimal results.
Here’s yet another example from just last week. First some background. The meeting was of a small, hand-picked group of the company’s top sales pros and managers. [...]
Perhaps it’s not politically correct to talk about the role of power in business. We all know, however, that dealing with and wielding power is a day-to-day reality for sales reps.
Step one is understanding the four fundamental types of power:
Position Power – derives from rank and/or authority. The title “CEO” carries more [...]
This post was originally published at Bill Cook Online. Bill is Senior VP of Business Development & Sales at CareSouth and shares some clear, sensible, easily implementable advice for sales managers…
We have been directing our sales managers to spend more time in the field with their reps this year. I am always surprised at how [...]
