28
2015
Just-In-Time Sales & Marketing Resources
Most of us will relate to the term “Just In Time” to Supply Chain Management of resources and goods for manufacturing. The concept is designed to eliminate companies ordering and storing all of the items they need in inventory in order to reduce the cost of warehouse space and reduce overhead. So they work with their suppliers to provide the items they need just when…
09
2015
Can you fill the Knowledge Gap when you have Unexpected Vacancies?
What happens when you have an employee that has mission-critical knowledge and all of a sudden they are unexpectedly gone? It’s the unexpected part that always catches us by surprise, isn’t it? I mean who plans to get sick, injured, have a family emergency, be in an accident, or even die? But it happens every day in our business lives. So, can you fill the…
27
2015
What Is It Costing You When Your People Can’t Get What They Need, Right When They Need It?
We all know that “Time is Money” right? Well, how much money do you think your company is wasting when your employees can’t find what they need to do their job, right when they need it? Go ahead, take a guess. There are a number of research papers out there that have said the average employee spends upwards of 8 hours per week searching for…
21
2015
Build a Better Buyer Business Case
Mike Schultz and John Doerr of the RAIN Groupwrote an excellent white paper recently on What Sales Winners Do Differently. In this paper they did some interesting research around what winners of more than 700 B-to-B sales opportunities did differently. The three things they outlined that were significantly different were that winners: “Connect the dots between customer needs and their company’s products and services and…
01
2014Are Your Prospects Deaf, Dumb & Blind to Their Own Problems?
I find it very interesting that there are a lot of people out there who appear to be deaf, dumb and blind to the problems that exist within their own organization. It’s either that or they simply don’t want to hear, see, or talk about them, or admit that they actually have them. When you encounter a prospect like this, it makes you wonder if…
09
2014
We Have Met the Enemy and He is Us!
I was fortunate enough to have grown up with some great cartoon strips and along with Charles Schultz’s Peanuts, the little opossum Pogo, often provided us some insights into our own lives. I personally have used this quote many times to reflect on different situations in my life, causing me to take a deeper look in the mirror and take an honest look at myself….
21
2014Making a difference!
Make no mistake about it; sales people make a difference! Often times though, they need mentors in their lives to help them understand how they make a difference and why that’s important to them and the people they sell to. Notice, that I used the word “mentor” as opposed to Manager or coach, because here is how the dictionary defines the word “mentor”: 1.a wise…
13
2014
Bad Leads or Bad Lead Follow-up
I don’t know about you, but I hear all the time how Marketing doesn’t produce good quality leads. I’ve even heard that Sales only follows up on about 15% of the leads that Marketing provides. Does that sound about right? OK, so our image to the left shows our old friends Sales and Marketing going at it again over this whole over worked argument about…
30
2014Talk about the Problem First, Not the Solution!
I happened to attend a round table discussion recently, that was put on by the Social Executive Council, hosted by Judy Mod, who is one of the Principals at Social Gastronomy. The discussion centered on today’s buying process, from the buyers’ perspective. The bottom line of the discussion was that the key to success for sales people and companies, trying to sell their products and…
05
2014
The Blind Men, the Elephant, and Componentization of Content
I recently commented on a Sales Craft LinkedIn discussion in which Sharon Little with Appcelerator had the following discussion: Enablement and the Content Paradigm, and in her discussion she included an article that was written by Corey Sommers, VP of Business Development at WittyParrot. I was so impressed with what Corey wrote about that I contacted him and asked if I might use his article as…