Blog

  • The Difference Between CyberThieves, Hackers and Most Salespeople

    • February 10, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    On the one hand, I am shocked and chagrinned that the insurance company would use salespeople as a reference point for hackers.  You could not possibly understand the degree to which It bothers me.  

    On the other hand, you and I both know that if salespeople worked as methodically, consistently, aggressively, effectively, and efficiently as the hackers do, we would double our revenue.

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  • 62% Less Turnover and 80% Higher Quota Attainment When You Hire Salespeople the Right Way

    • February 3, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    If you have a sales cycle of several months or more, subsidize your salespeople until they are self-sufficient, and in early 2022 it takes 3 months to find a suitable candidate, you are screwed before you start!  Once you finally identify a decent candidate, you have hours, not days or weeks, to make a decision and pull the trigger and what’s the worst that can happen?  Six months or more pass before you realize that salesperson won’t make it and you not only wasted a half year’s salary, you lost six months, have an empty territory or vertical, and have to start over from the beginning!

    It doesn’t have to be that way and here’s why.

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  • 10 Prospect Rules That Salespeople Must Learn to Break

    • January 24, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Like I said, this is not a COVID article because if it was, I could write a book about the data, science, policies and hypocrisies.  However, there is a sales equivalent to the stupid restaurant masking requirement and that is what we will discuss in today’s article.

    Have you or your salespeople ever been told by a prospect that they can’t:

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  • Bob Chronicles Part 6 – When Salespeople Suddenly Make Things Your Problem

    • January 20, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Bob was informed 2 weeks ago that an important customer proposal would be due by the end of business today. At 4pm, Bob was in a panic, screaming that he needed pricing in the next 10 minutes or you’ll lose the business.  Suddenly it has become your problem.

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  • Has Buying Changed and Has B2B Selling Adapted?

    • January 5, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Today’s buyers are self-educated and salespeople mistake that knowledge for readiness. Salespeople tend to take the path of least resistance and the knowledge they mistake for readiness lulls them into the quote, proposal and order taking mode.  As a result, they don’t follow their company’s sales process or worse, the company’s sales process has been modified to reflect buyers being ready.  If the buyers were truly ready at this point they would actually buy but the additional options prolong instead of shorten the sales process.

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  • My Most Popular Sales Article of the Last Ten Years

    • December 13, 2021
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Suppose your salespeople hear one prospect say, “This has been a very interesting and productive conversation and we might have some interest in this.”  And imagine another prospect at the same meeting says, “We’ll get back to you next month and let you know what kind of progress we’ve made.”  And still a third might say, “In the meantime, please send us a proposal with references and a timeline.”

    There are three important lessons that arise from this:

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  • Sales Selection Tools: Do You Get What You Pay For?

    • December 9, 2021
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    If you have used Indeed to hire salespeople, they will offer to have your candidates take a free sales assessment.  Doesn’t that sound great?  It is great if the assessment is helpful but it happens to be a useless piece of crap.  Why would anyone think, for even a moment, that there is any value in their lame, assessment-in-name-only test?

    In this article we’ll explore how Indeed’s sales assessment compares to the gold standard in sales candidate assessments from Objective Management Group (OMG).

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  • Top 10 Sales and Sales Leadership Articles of 2021

    • December 7, 2021
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    There are several criteria for choosing the top articles of the year, including, but not limited to:

    Views (Article)
    Popularity (likes on LinkedIn and Twitter)
    Engagement (comments to the article, via email, and on LinkedIn)
    Personal (my favorites)
    Value (insights for the community)

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  • Can You Find The Perfect Sales Candidates for Your Sales Team?

    • December 1, 2021
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

     I am helping one company find a single needle-in-a-haystack sales leadership candidate and it has taken nearly six months.  I am helping another company find 3 sales leaders and received 3,765 applications.  What’s the difference?

    For the answer to be meaningful, we have to look at the entire job market, not just sales candidates.

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  • Salesenomics – Many Sales Organizations Are Stuck in the 1980’s

    • November 22, 2021
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    When was the last time you saw a black and white television or even a console color TV?

    How about an electric typewriter?

    Or a car that didn’t have anti-lock brakes?

    You would have to return to the 1980’s to see those things and when it comes to their operations, some sales organizations are still in the 1980’s.

    For example, check out these statistics from OMG’s evaluations of 30,000 sales teams and more than two million salespeople.

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