June, 2013

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Busting Sales Myth #4 - It's the Nature of the Business

Anthony Cole Training

'Over the years, I have been very fortunate to work with a lot of very successful companies in many industries across the US. Over the years, I have found some very common responses to our sales and sales management training programs. Some of the responses I would consider legitimate and reasonable; others I put in the category of myths. Our standard operating procedure of beginning our work with a client is to evaluate their sales organization.

Education 187
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Sunday Morning Blog — Smart Selling Tools

A Sales Guy

'When I was a kid, I used to build forts. I loved it. We’d snag all the scrap building supplies from the houses going up in the neighborhood and build the elaborate forts. They were multi-story, multiroom shanties. These things were a kids paradise. You could never stand up in them, but they would have carpet from ceiling to floor. You’d be able to go from room to room through trap doors and secret cut outs.

Sell 129
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Trending Sources

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Stop Copying Your Competitors: They Don’t Know What They’re Doing Either

ConversionXL

'I hear this all the time. “ Our competitor X is doing Y, we should do that too ” or “ X is market leader and they have Y, we need to have Y “ There are 2 key things wrong with it: The reason they have Y (menu, navigation, checkout, home page layout etc) the way it is, is probably random. In 50% cases it’s what their designer came up with (and most likely not because of a long, thorough analysis and testing) or they just copied another competitor.

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What Google Might Know about Hiring Salespeople

Understanding the Sales Force

'Understanding the Sales Force by Dave Kurlan The NY Times posted a story on June 20 about Google, their recruiting efforts, and big data. The story really doesn''t reveal that much but there is an interesting quote (that I will get to shortly) that is relevent to hiring salespeople. When we help companies get the sales selection piece right there are several components that we tweak.

Education 110
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AI Strategies for Sales Managers: How to Cut Down on Tedious Admin Work

What if you could help your sellers stop wasting 72% of their day on non-selling activities and focus on bringing in revenue? Incorporating AI in your enablement workflows can help you cut down on busy work, get projects done faster, and let your team (and you!) focus on making a bigger impact. We put together this guide to show you how to use AI to cut time and costs for projects, including collateral creation, development of training videos, and automating tedious processes.

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4 Reasons Low-Price Customers Are Destroying Your Business

The Sales Hunter

'Quit kidding yourself! You’re not making any money off the low-price customer, regardless of what you think. Let me give you 4 reasons. Reason 1: The customer who demands a lower price from you is also going to be the customer who nags at you all the way through the sales process and long afterward. Low-price customers are wired to think they can get everything cheap and they can get people to do for them whatever they ask.

Price 110
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Shallowness And Networking!

Partners in Excellence

'It’s clear we’re in a frenzy of networking and connecting. There seems to be a rush to establish connections, friends, whatever. People are reaching out, connecting, racking up the numbers. They’re using every channel possible–LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Google +, and more. But then there’s this odd phenomena. . Somehow, I’m under the mistaken opinion the purpose of networking and connecting is to form some sort of relationship.

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The Cause and Effect of Leadership

A Sales Guy

'Chad Malchow. I’m skipping this weeks WITCE Wednesday (I hate that name, so if someone could please offer another it would great.) to share a guest post. Chad Malchow is Sr. Vice President of North American Sales for Return Path and one smart cat. Return Path is a client and I have been working with Chad for a few months. As part of our work I asked Chad to think about leadership and the work we’re doing and put it into post form to be published here.

Meeting 123
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Get Off the Internet – My Thoughts on the US Government, Google, Facebook and Privacy

Closing Bigger

'Privacy is a Myth on the Internet. Last week news broke globally that the US Government has unfettered access to most social networks and data stored by them. PRISM is a program/mandate that is supposed to protect the USA from outside threats but Germany and many other members of the EU are deeply concerned. This all began with a leaked PowerPoint outlining PRISM.

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Baseball and Selling Revisited - A Powerful Analogy

Understanding the Sales Force

'Understanding the Sales Force by Dave Kurlan How many times has this happened to you? A salesperson tells you about a great looking opportunity that has been forecast to close this month. "We''re definitely getting this and it''s an awesome opportunity for us. We''re going to knock this one out of the park!". At the end of the month the deal hasn''t closed and you question your salesperson about it.

Sell 101
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Sales Prospecting: The Art of Following Up

The Sales Hunter

'Finding new customers is the bane of most salespeople, yet too many times, the reason it is so difficult is salespeople give up too easily. Really, I should say it’s not that salespeople give up too easily — it’s that they just don’t follow-up. For some reason, too many salespeople believe if they make one phone call, send one email or mail one letter to a prospect, then that is all it takes.

Follow-up 103
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Prepare Now: 2025s Must-Know Trends For Product And Data Leaders

Speaker: Jay Allardyce, Deepak Vittal, and Terrence Sheflin

As we look ahead to 2025, business intelligence and data analytics are set to play pivotal roles in shaping success. Organizations are already starting to face a host of transformative trends as the year comes to a close, including the integration of AI in data analytics, an increased emphasis on real-time data insights, and the growing importance of user experience in BI solutions.

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My Best Mentor

Partners in Excellence

'I saw a post on this topic today. It caused me to pause and reflect. I’ve been very fortunate to have had some outstanding mentors. Naturally, I thought of my Dad and Mom, they certainly are in the top 5. There have been dozens of people that I’ve considered to be mentors, they’ve been in my life for a period of time, had an important impact.

Territory 103
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Busting Sales Myth #5 - "I've Been in Selling _ Years!"

Anthony Cole Training

'What does sales experience have to do with sales success? "It depends" would be the most appropriate answer. If your experiences in sales - the wins, the losses and the close calls - provide you with lessons that help you grow and change, then your experiences can have a significant impact on your sales success and the rate at which you achieve that success.

Sell 163
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Success Saturdays — 10 Traits of Extremely Successful People

A Sales Guy

'I found this great post on the ten traits of extremely successful people. I thought the list was unique. Many of the traits were different from what we usually see. I also liked the list because it reinforced some of things I’ve talked about on this blog when it comes to hiring, making the sale, identifying talent etc. What do you think of the list?

B2B 121
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How B2B Marketing and Sales Alignment is Like a Relay Race

Pointclear

'At a recent high school track meet I cheered on our team in several heats of the 4 x 100 and 4 x 400 relays and mused that we can look to track and field athletics for inspiration and tactics for marketing and sales alignment. Handoffs of qualified leads from marketing to sales can be as smooth and technically precise as those of the sprinters on a relay track team.

B2B 98
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Don't Let AI Pass You By: The New Era of Personalized Sales Coaching & Development

Speaker: Brendan Sweeney, VP of Sales & Devyn Blume, Sr. Account Executive

Are you curious about how artificial intelligence is reshaping sales coaching, learning, and development? Join Brendan Sweeney and Devyn Blume of Allego for an engaging new webinar exploring AI's transformative role in sales coaching and performance improvement! Brendan and Devyn will share actionable insights and strategies for integrating AI into coaching and development - ensuring personalized, effective, and scalable training!

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Sales Leadership Observations about Pipeline and Terminations

Understanding the Sales Force

'Understanding the Sales Force by Dave Kurlan The Pipeline, The Funnel and the Inaccurate Forecast - It gets a bit scary when people who are experts in one thing write about another. Today''s example was sent to me by OMG partner Mike Shannon. He sent along a recent BtoBonline.com post by Jeff Perkins. Jeff suggests that the sales funnel is a thing of the past but his examples, and therefore reasons, are way off base.

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8 Reasons Your Customers Don’t Care

The Sales Hunter

'If you want to close more sales, you better first do something about these 8 reasons your customers don’t care: 1. Why should they care about you when you don’t care about them? Don’t even try faking it. If you do try to fake that you care, your customer will throw you out even faster. Successful salespeople care about their customers. 2.

Customers 101
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“We Don’t Have The Budget”

Partners in Excellence

'“We don’t have the budget” strikes fear into the hearts of all sales people. Asking for budget is one of the standard BANT qualifying questions. No budget, we disqualify and move on. But in doing this, we walk away from huge opportunities. In fact, a huge number of sales result in situations where there has been no budget. If we are embracing the Insight Selling, many times we are making the customer aware of opportunities to grow, opportunities they may be missing, ways to

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Busting Sales Myth #5 - "I've Been in Selling XX Years!"

Anthony Cole Training

'What does sales experience have to do with sales success? "It depends" would be the most appropriate answer. If your experiences in sales - the wins, the losses and the close calls - provide you with lessons that help you grow and change, then your experiences can have a significant impact on your sales success and the rate at which you achieve that success.

Sell 150
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How to Optimize Call Monitoring: Automate QA and Elevate Customer Experience

Speaker: Laura Noonan, Chief Revenue Officer at CallFinder + Angie Kronlage, Director of Program Success at Working Solutions + April Wiita, Vice President of Program Success at Working Solutions

Are you still manually reviewing calls? 🤔 It's time for a change! The traditional method of manual call monitoring is no longer cutting it in today's fast-paced call center environment. Industry experts Angie Kronlage and April Wiita from Working Solutions are here to explore the power of innovative automation to revolutionize outdated call review processes!

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HELP!!! – This Poor Sales Person Can’t Sell!

A Sales Guy

'It’s not uncommon for me to get emails requesting help from sales people or sales leaders. But, I got one this morning and I felt terrible for this person. They are dying on the vine and are desperate to break the sales code and start selling before they give up entirely. You can feel this person’s frustration and agony. They are clearly not happy.

Sell 120
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The Incredible Power of Connection Using Three Lists to Grow Business

Score More Sales

'If I could give you a sales team of enthusiastic champions to build your visibility and ultimately your revenues without writing a check, would that be helpful? That is exactly what happens through the powerful strategies of connecting to the right people for the right reasons. I am convinced that with the power of connection, nearly anything is possible.

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Personality Tests, Sales Candidate Selection - How Tests Measure Up

Understanding the Sales Force

'Understanding the Sales Force by Dave Kurlan A recent article in Columbus Business First discussed background checks and use of personality tests. The most important line in the article read, " Personality often is the best insight into whether a person is a good cultural fit for a specific company.". Notice that they didn''t say that personality is the best insight into whether a person will succeed in sales.

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Your Customer Has Changed. Have You? 6 Questions You Must Answer.

The Sales Hunter

'What parts of your sales process are you still using that your customer couldn’t care less about? Below are 6 questions you must ask yourself about your selling process: 1. What percentage of my customers have done research on the internet before meeting with me? At what point during the sales process are they doing this? If they’re doing it before you meet with them, I would refer to this as exploratory.

Customers 100
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How to Improve Email Deliverability and Optimize Each Send

Learn how to optimize email deliverability and drive greater email ROI. What lands your email in the customer’s inbox? Understanding those factors, otherwise known as email deliverability, is critical to getting the most return on your campaign investments. But the “rules” around which factors land you in the spam folder aren’t always easy to keep up with.

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“Hiding” Behind Social Selling

Partners in Excellence

'The post, “ What’s All This About Social Selling,” provoked a lot of reaction. As I started reading the discussions, I started thinking more. Do the “social tools,” make us less social? As you know from the article, I believe “social selling” or “social business” starts with a set of beliefs or values about how you want to connect with, engage, and create value for the customer and prospects.

Sell 102
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Sales Success - The Perfect Formula from Jonathan Farrington

Pointclear

'You can read more from Jonathan over at his award winning blog The JF Blogit , which attracts thousands of visitors every day, and of course you will constantly find fresh resources on Top Sales World. I had the pleasure to sit down and chat with my colleague and friend Jonathan Farrington. Jonathan is Senior Partner for Jonathan Farrington Associates and CEO of Top Sales World, based in Paris and London.

Finance 85
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What You Challenge Matters — the 3 Areas Where Sales Can Challenge its Customers

A Sales Guy

'Unless you’ve been under a rock in sales, you’re keenly aware of the growing popularity of the Challenger Selling approach. The Challenger selling approach is the result of a substantial study by the CEC (Corporate Executive Board) that showed; sales people who challenged their customers and prospects out performed those who didn’t.

Customers 119
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Invest in your Network to Build Sustainable Business

Score More Sales

'In a world where business people and sellers are working to stand out and make a difference, there are a lot more people telling then showing exactly how to do so. It must have been fate that got me in front of new author Porter Gale at the IBM Smarter Commerce Global Summit held recently in Nashville. She gave a wonderful keynote talk on the main stage and then I listened to her talk at the IBM Superwomen’s Group Luncheon where she was a panelist.

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Brick & Mortar Retail Relevance: How to Stay Ahead of the Curve

Speaker: Jay Black, Senior Account Executive

Let's set the record straight: in-store retail isn't dead - it's evolving! Faced with the digital age and the demands of omnichannel shopping, some retailers are thriving while others are struggling to adapt. Join Jay Black in this exclusive session as he explores the strategies that set successful stores apart, including: Crafting unique and unforgettable in-store experiences 🛍️ Mastering the art of retail demands 🛒 Navigating inventory challenges in today's climate 📦 an

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Sales Leadership Challenges to Having a World Class Sales Force

Understanding the Sales Force

'Understanding the Sales Force by Dave Kurlan World-Class Sales Organization. We hear those words a lot. Some companies aspire to it. Others claim to be there already. You are more likely to hear claims like those from a large enterprise, but you have better odds of actually finding it in a small to midsize company. World-Class Sales Organization. Some would say it''s a description of a company''s people.

Sales 92
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Customers Buy Features at COST. You Sell BENEFITS at a Profit.

The Sales Hunter

'Why would anyone pay more for something? Unless they see some sort of value or benefit in it, they wouldn’t. This is why customers simply won’t pay more for anything they view as a commodity or — in sales terms — ”a feature.” If that is the case, then why do so many salespeople spend their time doing nothing but selling product features to customers?

Sell 98
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Lean Sales And Marketing, The Cornerstone To Accelerating Revenue Growth

Partners in Excellence

'So much of the writing about lean focuses on waste reduction. That’s great stuff, we want to make sure we aren’t doing unnecessary work or producing waste. But, at least for marketing and sales professionals, that’s not the real reason to start your lean journey. (I know I have some lean professionals groaning, but hang in there).

Growth 101
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Good Reads for B2B Sales - Are You Drowning in Sales Quota?

Pointclear

'Keeping up to date on the latest innovations and opinions in sales can be time-consuming, especially in the the digital space. Sales Sphere features relevant blog articles from PointClear''s online B2B sales circles. Will Google Glass Revolutionize Buying and Selling? In this article, Gerhard Gschwandtner raises an interesting question about Google’s latest technology, Google Glass.

Quota 85
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How to Prove Marketing Value: Demonstrate Content ROI and Contribution to Sales

Every marketer knows how important it is to prove their efforts drive sales opportunities, but that’s easier said than done. When problems like sales and marketing misalignment, lack of data, and wasted efforts persist, marketers can’t measure, prove, or increase their impact on revenue at a time when demonstrating marketing value is critical. Using analyst and expert data, this guide to marketing impact and content attribution explains: How B2B buyers use content The most common types of conten