Search Results
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Can My Car Uncover Sales Qualification Criteria Better Than Most Salespeople?
- August 8, 2022
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Wouldn’t it be great if salespeople had the equivalent of two camera intelligence to see what they don’t know they need to see?
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New Data: My Top 5 Unacceptable Sales Performance Findings
- February 14, 2025
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
The report says, “87% reported that their sales teams were having difficulty meeting or exceeding quota.” That is so much worse than what has been reported in recent years when the numbers were closer to 55%-60%. This is problematic for more than the obvious reason. When salespeople aren’t hitting quotas, companies need to hire more salespeople, which increases the cost of recruiting, salaries and benefits, not to mention the costs associated with hiring additional sales managers that won’t coach up their salespeople. It also reinforces a culture of mediocrity because when not hitting quota is normal and expected, more people don’t hit quota because their jobs are clearly not in jeopardy.
The next finding explains the previous finding.
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Is BANT a Sales Process or a Man-Made Disaster?
- January 15, 2025
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Last week, I noticed that people are still using this archaic and overly simplistic sales qualifying process, and too many are still writing about the benefits of BANT (Acronym for Budget, Authority, Need, Timing). The first page of a Google search revealed 10 articles were written about BANT in 2024 alone.
How is it that in 2024, people are still hailing BANT as a relevant sales tool?
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250 Best Articles on Sales and Sales Leadership by Category
- April 4, 2024
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
These are the top 10 articles in 25 categories on sales, sales leadership, sales assessments, sales performance, sales excellence, sales process and more.
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Don Kent and My 8 Reasons For Inaccurate Sales Forecasts
- February 15, 2024
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
1960’s Don Kent is like a 2020’s salesperson. Excited about an opportunity, but wrong. And they don’t have to be wrong, shouldn’t be wrong, and honestly, can’t be wrong. The 2020’s salesperson may not have computer models, but they do have technology and it’s not the technology getting the forecast wrong. It’s the salesperson. There are a number of reasons they get so excited and get it so wrong but here are eight good ones:
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Wouldn’t Sales Call Play-by-Play Analyses be Fun?
- January 27, 2024
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Most sales managers protect their salespeople instead of pushing them to improve. Most companies set budgets that formulaically increase year-over-year budgets by just 3.5%. The sales recruiting process and selection criteria at most companies are horrible. Most sales training is product-focused instead of sales development. Most salespeople are not consistently or effectively coached. Most senior sales leaders are indifferent about doing anything about those things.
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Milestones in the Sales Process are Like the Stones in a Wall
- October 5, 2023
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
An ideal sales process has 4 stages, each with anywhere from 4 to 10 milestones that must be met in order to move to the next stage.
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Sales Presentations to Big Companies – the Same as Political Theater
- September 22, 2023
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
What really happens on presentation day? Theater. Salespeople validate what the individuals on the committee already believe to be true. If you’re not the one getting the business, nothing you do on that day will change that UNLESS the one who is getting the business screws up big time.
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Use Music to Understand the 12 Criteria Prospects Use to Buy from Salespeople
- June 12, 2023
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Yesterday, while watching our son play in a summer collegiate baseball game, I missed a step and tumbled all the way down the bleachers. Isn’t that a great analogy for what happens when you miss, or skip a crucial step in the sales process? More than half of all salespeople are missing and skipping important milestones in the sales process each and every day and their egos get more bruised from failing to close those opportunities than my body got bruised from my not so thrilling adventure to the ground.
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The Science of Sales Effectiveness
- March 1, 2023
- Posted by: Kurlan & Associates, Inc.
- Categories:
The Modern Science Behind Sales Force Excellence provides insights, commentary and conclusions reached from our Sales Force Effectiveness Study, conducted during the latter part of 2014.