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  • This is What Would Happen if Bob Got Promoted to Sales Manager

    • February 7, 2023
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    For those of you who are familiar with my series of articles about Bob – the worst salesperson ever – you can catch up by enjoying, laughing, and making fun of him here.  12 of the articles that show up on that page are about Bob!

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  • This Company’s Best Salesperson was 2500% Stronger Than Their Worst

    • February 1, 2023
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    It’s been four months since the baseball season ended but college baseball begins in less than 4 weeks and it will be fun to watch our son play for his college team (while freezing our asses off!).  It’s also been a while since the last time I shared a top/bottom analysis but I completed one this week that I had to share.

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  • Sitcoms, Sales Process, Sales Assessments and Sales Competencies

    • January 11, 2023
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Hubspot, an inbound marketing company published a list of 18 Sales Core Competencies which include non-sales competencies like customer service and data analysis.  Job site Indeed published a list of 18 Sales Core Competencies which include non-sales competencies like leadership and change management.  I’m not suggesting that these capabilities aren’t important, but in no way, shape or form should they be considered core sales competencies.  Why would people turn to any of these lists of opinions when there is a widely accepted, definitive list of 21 Sales Core Competencies backed by science and data on more than 2.3 million salespeople? 

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  • The Connection Between Road Signs, Sales Data, Consultative Selling and Sales Recruiting

    • December 6, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Salespeople who are learning to take a consultative approach to selling hear a stated issue – the consultative selling version of a road sign – but think they have arrived at their destination – the compelling reason to buy.

    This is supported by the data.  Objective Management Group (OMG) has data on 2,280,260 salespeople that have been assessed from more than 30,000 companies.  The findings are horrific:

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  • “Spirited” Has So Much in Common with Most Salespeople

    • November 29, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Only 13% of all salespeople take a consultative approach to selling and almost none of them can be found in the bottom 50% – the group that fails to meet quota each year.  A coincidence? On the other end of the spectrum, the top 10% of all salespeople are 4300% more likely to have the Consultative Seller competency as a strength!

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  • Can a New Sales Manager Be a Difference Maker?

    • November 9, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    I speak with so many sales leaders who tell me about the four sales managers they went through in the last two years.  I speak with CEOs who tell me about the three sales VPs they went through in the last eighteen months.

    There is tremendous pressure to fill these roles because your team’s performance will suffer without someone at the helm.  Or is that misinformation?  How much worse could a team perform than how they perform under a sucky sales manager?

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  • How Your Sales Team Can Double its Win Rate in a Recession

    • September 26, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    A client was having great success using OMG (Objective Management Group) to assess their sales candidates and they assumed the sales candidate assessment was the only thing OMG offered.  When they learned that our core offering is evaluating their existing sales team they became excited about what that would mean for addressing their two biggest selling challenges.  

    One of their issues was their 20% win rate was much lower than they thought it should be and they believed their salespeople needed some refresher training on closing.  They also had a large number of opportunities stalled in the pipeline and they believed that training on more effective techniques to conduct follow up calls would help.

    In this article, I thought it might help if I share a bit of what they learned about their sales team.

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  • How Many Authors Does it Take to Screw in a LightBulb Highlighting Selling Skills?

    • September 22, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Dan Caramanico alerted me to this dubious September 19, hbr.com article that explains their 5 Skills Every Salesperson Needs to Succeed.  It took three consultants to screw in the lightbulb that illuminates their five stupid-as-shit skills so let’s take a look:

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  • Which is Worse – The Boston Red Sox or Your Sales Team?

    • August 23, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    The construction of the Red Sox roster is simply a Stupid as Shit Strategy or SaSS. Use of the word strategy means that it’s intentional and is a disservice to the word stupid!

    Sales team construction usually lacks formal strategy and that suggests something accidental is at play. We tend to see the “we already had these salespeople” and then “these are the new salespeople who were willing to work for us.” New is a relative term as the newest 30% of the team continues to churn when and if they find candidates.

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  • The Many Different Selling Roles and How They Differ – Part 1

    • July 27, 2022
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    The same kind of thinking is required when thinking about the various roles of salespeople.  We can name them: Account Executive, Territory Manager, Business Development Rep, Sales Development Rep, Account Manager, Key Account Manager, National Account Manager, Channel Manager, Application Engineer, Sales Consultant, Inside Sales, Outside Sales, and more.

    To further complicate things, in some companies and industries, Sales Managers function as salespeople and Sales VPs function as Sales Managers.

    While the above roles have selling as a primary responsibility, there are as many differences to selling roles as there are differences to the class or style of cars.  Today, we’ll explore the difference between an Account Executive and a Business Development Rep.

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