Dave Kurlan

  • Sales Advice Hits the Spot in April Inc. Magazine

    • April 13, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Here’s one quote I liked from the director of supplier diversity from UPS:

    “People will say, ‘I’ve got this really exciting proposal I want you to look at.’  I’ll say, ‘send it to me.’ Then they send it to me by FedEx. It happens every day. Just be smart. Know the company you are pitching to and know their likes and dislikes.  You get such brownie points with me when you come in with a UPS envelope and have an account all set up.  It’s just the little things like that, the icing on the cake.”

    read more

  • Latest Sales Recruiting Breakthrough – Download the New White Paper

    • April 12, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    About six weeks ago, I started a discussion and asked, How Long Should a Salesperson Stick?  I followed that up with a more researched discussion and provided The Top 5 Factors to Predict Sales Turnover.  Over the past six weeks I have continued to research the two subjects and the results of my work are now available in my brand new White Paper, “Sales Longevity – The Science of Predicting Sales Turnover”. 

    read more

  • 3 Sales Approaches of Elite Salespeople

    • April 8, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Great salespeople must be able to easily use all three approaches on their sales calls.  Salespeople that struggle tend to have just one approach and it won’t work all the time. 

    read more

  • What Happens When Sales Expectations Aren’t Met?

    • April 6, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    When your salespeople focus too much of their time and resources on a large opportunity and it doesn’t materialize, you can lose 6-12 months of productivity from them. 

    read more

  • Case History – How Not to Hire Salespeople

    • April 2, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    A company wants to hire 5000 salespeople – but why?

    2000 drop out before completing training, and another 2000 drop out during the first 90 days in the field. Another 500 drop out during the first 6 months, and at the end of the year they only have 500 of the original 5000 standing.  What would it be worth to them from a cost, time, resources and practicality standpoint for us to simply identify, in advance, the final 500, before anyone is hired?

    read more

  • Effect of Optimism and Commitment on the Sales Force

    • March 31, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    I’m reading Sarah Miller Caldicott‘s book, Innovate Like Edison.

    There are some noteworthy quotes which, although written in the context of innovation, apply equally, if not even more to selling and sales management.

    read more

  • Secrets of Effective Sales Development

    • March 29, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    “I’ve heard it all before.”

    That comment applies to the music AND it can be attributed to some veteran salespeople after reacting to their first day of sales training.  No matter  what you read about selling, not much has changed in the last 40 years. Even my book, Baseline Selling, is based on concepts that go back as far as 1935.  Did I improve on those concepts?  Yes!  But Selling itself is not a new concept. 

    read more

  • My Salespeople Won’t Use CRM

    • March 17, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Yesterday, we discussed whether you can really get salespeople to change. I mentioned that the key rule was #9, Consequences, and that I would discuss consequences today.

    There are three primary ingredients to having Consequences.

    read more

  • Can We Really Get Salespeople to Change?

    • March 16, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    People change when they are ready to change.

    For example, I needed to lose weight and become healthier for several years.  I had been reading the literature on healthy eating for months.  I knew that this was important but until the day came when I was ready to commit to being healthy and eating healthy, nothing would change.

    By default, salespeople are the same way. 

    read more

  • A Missing Link to Sales Improvement?

    • March 15, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    I was walking through the Airport when I saw what could be the missing link to sales improvement.

    read more