My first sales mentor always emphasized that I needed to build, cultivate and manage my professional network. That was the foundation for sales and business success. Now at the ripe old age of let’s just say a whisker over 50 years old, I’m quite fortunate to have quite an expansive professional network. My network consists…
Sorry to inform you, but the vast majority of B2B enterprise sales teams out there today, are of the stooge variety. Not the sage variety. And that’s a huge problem. What do I mean by this? Quite simply that most sales teams are going through robotic, tactical sales motions and hoping for a positive outcome. Worse, they are forecasting…
My wife and I love Judge Judy. We watch her TV show religiously and apparently we’re not alone, as her TV show is the highest rated daytime TV show and syndicated TV show with an audience of over 7 million people (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judge_Judy). She also earns $47M per year due to her immense popularity, so it’s…
Nothing is more offensive than seeing an enterprise sales team grovel with their customers. According to Merriam-Webster dictionary, the definition of “grovel” is: To kneel, lie, or crawl on the ground To treat someone with too much respect or fear in a way that shows weakness in order to be forgiven or to gain approval…
How well do you really know your customers? Surprisingly, I find that more and more companies are losing touch with their customers at the exact time that it’s becoming more important than ever to get closer to your customers. Everyone talks about how important customer churn rates are, particularly as we transition into a subscription-based…
If given a choice, I’d always prefer to sell the premium priced service or solution. Why? Because quality still matters to a lot of people and they are willing to pay for it. This all may sound a bit counterintuitive these days, given that most things seem to be available for free, or at a…
Good sales reps understand that you will encounter objections and push back during your sales process. It’s inevitable and very much a natural part of any sales cycle. In fact, the question really is not if you will hear “No”, but rather how many times you will hear “No”, when you will hear it and…
It’s seemingly impossible these days to conduct any simple business transaction without the company asking for your feedback as a customer. Whether it’s a non-fat latte from your favorite coffee shop (that would be Peet’s in my case:-), high-speed Internet service from your ISP, or buying a new car from a dealership, everyone wants to…
The New England Patriots just cemented their legacy as one of the greatest football teams of all time by winning Super Bowl 49. They overcame major adversity during the course of the NFL regular season and playoffs to achieve this goal. As a lifelong sales professional and unabashed sports fan, I followed the Patriots all season and observed some great lessons…
An immutable enterprise sales fact: The larger the size of the deal, the higher the likelihood that it will go south or completely off the rails. It’s not really a question of “if” your enterprise deal will go off the rails at some point during the sales campaign, rather it’s a question of “when” and “how…