sales tips
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The Second Most Important Sales Lesson of My Life
- September 8, 2016
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Earlier this week I posted an article that told the story of the biggest sales lesson of my life. I received so many emails about that article because it seemed to really resonate with my readers. Yet, as much as it resonated, there was one question that several of them asked in their emails. They wanted to know why we were in that tenement building in the first place. And the answer to that question leads me to the second most important sales lesson of my life.
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Remembering The Most Powerful Sales Lesson of My Life
- September 6, 2016
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Which one thing helps almost every salesperson succeed, even when they have other challenges?
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School of Rock the Musical Demonstrates Selling to Existing Customers and Customer Service
- February 16, 2016
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
This weekend we had seats to the new Andrew Lloyd Webber Broadway show, School of Rock. Our son has watched the original movie around a dozen times and didn’t think there was the slightest possibility that the show would be as good as the movie. Did the show meet expectations? I’ll share that in a moment, but first, let’s discuss the dynamic of the show versus the movie and compare that to an ongoing sales challenge. While salespeople have expectations for meeting outcomes and sales results, prospects have expectations too – for the meetings, salespeople, products, services, prices and terms that a company will provide at various times during your sales cycle. In the case of movie versus show, there is a better analogy to strategic account management and even customer service.
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How to Get Prospects to Buy from You More Frequently!
- December 1, 2015
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
It’s a simple concept, really, but 74% of all salespeople aren’t very good at getting most people to buy from them. Even though the concept is simple, it seems really complicated to the group that can’t do it. Of course, most salespeople wouldn’t agree that they can’t do it, even when their win rates are below 50%. And in some tech businesses, salespeople seem to be happy with win rates under 20%. It’s incredible that people can become so darn comfortable with mediocrity! Solving the problem is easy when we have willing participants, so let’s discuss how to solve it once and for all.
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Why Prospects Won’t Talk with You and How to Fix it
- September 24, 2015
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Would you put steaks and burgers on the grill before it was hot? Would a pitcher throw as hard as he could without first throwing some long-toss and then pitching 20-30 slower pitches? Would a runner sprint without stretching? If you were in a cold climate in the middle of winter and your car was parked outside overnight, would you shift into drive without letting the engine warm first? If the concept of warming up makes perfect sense, then why in the world wouldn’t salespeople do this?
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Sales Pros! 10 Things You Must Do Before Leaving for Summer Vacation
- July 1, 2015
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Are you going to the beach? On a sail? On a tour? To another country? To a lodge? To a resort? Regardless of your destination or purpose, make sure you bring some good books, disconnect from your email and social networks, and actually use the time to recharge. That’s good old common sense. But if you really want to kick some ass when you return from vacation, you’ll want to make sure you do these important things too:
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Keys to Improved Sales Performance – Part 3 of 4
- September 14, 2014
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
While the majority of the 1,200 articles that I have written and posted on this blog in the past 8 years are about the sales force, sales management, sales leadership and sales recruiting, I write about selling more than I ever expected to. Nowhere is this more evident than this summer, when I managed to write these 7 articles.
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Leads are Making Salespeople Lazier Than Old Golden Retrievers
- July 7, 2014
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
We all know that the introduction beats the crap out of the lead follow-up 95 times out of 100. If that’s the case, why are so many salespeople spending all of their time attempting to generate and follow-up on the leads that produce results 5 times out of 100?
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The One Sales Question I’ve Been Wrong About for Years
- July 1, 2014
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
I must be a moron. Stupid. Dumb. Blind. Certainly, I couldn’t have been paying attention or it wouldn’t have taken me 28 years to figure this one out!
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The Sales Epidemic That is Neutralizing Salespeople Everywhere
- June 4, 2014
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
The Selling Power Blog published a new article of mine, The Top 10 Steps Salespeople Can Take to Improve. The article includes a really terrific video on the importance of tonality. I thought it would be helpful to expand on item #5, Persistence, because selling requires more persistence than ever before.