Sales Coaching

  • How to Get Top Performance From Your Salespeople in December

    • December 5, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Heading into the last week of the month, quarter or year, would you prefer to be ahead of goal or behind?  And what about your salespeople – would you prefer for them to be ahead of goal or behind?  

    Are you sure?  I didn’t ask how you wanted them to finish…

    read more

  • Sales Pipeline – Reality vs. What Your Salespeople Know and Think

    • November 28, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    What your salespeople think or believe – not a data point.  

    read more

  • The Latest Astonishing Findings about Sales Managers

    • November 7, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    This article recently appeared at SalesBenchmarkIndex.com.  The number that stood out for me in their report was 83% – as in 83% of first year sales managers don’t make their number.  Is that possible?  Is it realistic?  Is it believable?  Can you explain it?

    A few thoughts about that…

    read more

  • Embarassed by This Sales Article in The Economist?

    • October 31, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    On October 22, The Economist published an article called, The Art of Selling – The Death of the Salesman Has been Greatly Exaggerated.  Is the Economist really that far out of touch?  I wrote the last of my 5-part Death of Selling Has Been Exaggerated articles 5 years ago!  And how long has it been since anyone referred to salespeople at “salesmen”?  

    read more

  • The Secret to Winning Sales Presentations and Public Speaking Success

    • October 28, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    I spoke to an Entrepreneurial class at Clark University this week, something I’ve been doing once or twice a year for the past 5 years.  It’s much more difficult than working with experienced C-Level Executives, Sales Leaders, Sales Managers and Salespeople because the kids don’t have the context, reference points or experiences that professionals have.  Despite the difficulty, it’s more fun because they don’t push back, they don’t claim to have heard it before, they don’t say that “it” won’t work in their business, they don’t resist, and they are great learners!

    read more

  • Do Your Salespeople Really Understand Pipeline Requirements

    • October 19, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    They sent their lessons but didn’t get it right.  Their takeaway was that it requires 20 opportunities to sell 1.  But that’s not correct.  It requires 9 opportunities to sell 1.  Why is that distinction important?

    read more

  • The Advantage that Focused Salespeople Have

    • October 17, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Show me a focused salesperson – one who isn’t aware of what else is taking place in the office this very moment because he is so focused on getting his sales work completed; one who won’t stop to take a break until she makes all of the required calls; one who won’t go to sleep at night until all of the appropriate follow ups, responses,  CRM updates, paperwork and details have been finished – and I’ll show you a good salesperson.

    read more

  • Time and Territory Management for Salespeople

    • October 4, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Aside from requests for Motivational training, Time and Territory management training is one of the most inappropriate requests I receive each week. And I’ve been getting requests like that for more than 25 years!

    Time and Territory management is what sales managers and VP’s ask for when they:

    read more

  • Top 10 Ways to Increase Sales

    • October 3, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    I’ll bet that every CEO, President, Director, VP of Sales and Sales Manager asks the “how can we increase sales?” question on a regular basis.  Do you?

    There are as many answers to this question as there are politicians running for US President in 2012.  They include but aren’t limited to:

    read more

  • Top 15 Questions That Prospects Ask Themselves

    • September 27, 2011
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Two questions for you:  Are your salespeople consciously aware of the 3 mindsets and two categories, and have you checked as to whether they have appropriate approaches for each?

    read more