Our customers can be incredibly demanding, right? I mean they just want so many things from us as sales people. Let’s take an inventory of all the “asks” that customers make of us. They want product demos, pricing, proof of concepts (PoCs), technical architecture reviews, cyber security reviews, regulatory compliance validations, performance guarantees, user experience…
“I understand.” This is just one of the many classic lines of dialog in the 1979 movie called: “Being There”. There was an amazing cast in the movie starring Peter Sellers giving his most sublime performance ever. The supporting cast included Shirley MacLaine, Melvyn Douglas and Jack Warden. The movie won numerous prestigious awards including:…
BANT is the qualification framework acronym created by IBM in the 1950’s. Virtually every sales person from a brand new sales development rep (SDR) to the grizzled old enterprise sales rep who has been selling for 20+ years is familiar with it and has used it. If for some reason you’ve been under a rock…
I had a breakfast meeting with a prominent Venture Capitalist this morning. Our topic of conversation was the state of technology sales. More specifically, how grossly inefficient the technology sales paradigm really is. And unfortunately, it’s only getting worse. Rather than regaling you with the sobering statistics and trends on technology sales performance, I thought…
First, let me qualify that this isn’t a politically inspired blog post. Instead it is a genuine observation that I’ve experienced in watching the Presidential candidates and debates. Most notably, the surging grass roots popularity of one Bernie Sanders. Who would’ve thunk it? Most political pundits suggest that over the long haul, the Hillary Clinton…
You are a sales rep and you’ve just been notified by your prospect that your product/your company has been “verbally selected” as the solution they want to move forward with. As a long time VP of Sales, I can assure you that one of my least favorite terms in sales is “verbally selected”. Why? Because…
As 2015 comes to a close, I am blessed and humbled to think that the company that I founded, True Sales Results, will be celebrating ten years in business next year. When I started the company, my business plan was drop dead simple. I came up with a short, focused list of consulting services that I could…
During my formative years, there was a public service announcement that would come on TV typically during the nightly news and ominously ask you: “It’s 10pm, do you know where your children are?” (Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_you_know_where_your_children_are%3F) So I’m rephrasing that question for all B2B technology solutions companies and asking you: “It’s 10pm, do you know where your…
When was the last time you were on the receiving end of a sales surprise? Let me guess, it was not of the pleasant sales surprise variety. Our good friends at Merriam-Webster online capture it best by defining the word “surprise” as: “to attack unexpectedly” (source:http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/surprise). When I think of sales surprises, I inevitably think of them all being…
Why Are You Accepting Sales Failure? Think of the ancient Greek mythological figure of Sisyphus applied to sales (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sisyphus) I was chatting about the state of enterprise sales with a long time enterprise sales colleague of mine last week. We’re both grizzled enterprise sales veterans with 25+ years experience, complete with the requisite battle scars…