Understanding the Sales Force
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Manny Being Manny – When to Terminate Top Producers on your Sales Force
- July 28, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Most sales forces have a person – a maverick – like Manny; a top producer who marches to the beat of his own drummer. We have a different set of rules for these producers and as long as they’re not causing difficulties for anyone else we tend to tolerate what they do and don’t do. They don’t attend all the meetings, aren’t held to the same standards, regularly give us a load of crap and we tolerate it as long as they continue to produce.
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Fear Factor for the Sales Force
- July 24, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Your Sales Team Fear Factor.
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The Former Car Salesman That Didn’t Know Why He Failed
- July 18, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
It seems that their salespeople were great when people were spending money but now that people have stopped spending money they’re not really so great after all. He said, “they were great at being near the phone when it rang!”
Then he said, “I tried selling cars once – I wasn’t very good at it so I quit. I went to the same training as everyone else, sold the same products as everyone else, had the same management as everyone else, but got different results. I don’t know why I sucked, but I knew enough to get out.”
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Sales Resistance and the Recession – 7 Steps to Turn Prospects Around
- July 17, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
You learned the three R’s when you were in grade school but selling in today’s economy is about two R’s – resistance and recession – and they are related. While resistance is always lurking in the background, the recession brings it to the forefront and your salespeople must be able to sell – despite it – and therein lies the problem.
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Turning Order Takers into Salespeople
- July 15, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Last week we brought our six-year old son to the batting cages where, for the first time, he hit against little league pitching. Big deal? You bet. Up until last week, he was clobbering whiffle balls with whiffle bats from about twenty feet away. At the cage, he was wearing a batting helmet, swinging a heavy metal bat, and seeing baseballs thrown at 35 MPH from 45 feet away. It was a huge difference.
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Sales Training – Handling No Responses and Negative Responses
- July 3, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
I write for two different audiences. On the blog I write for management, while I write for salespeople over at my Baseline Selling Tips. Today I’m killing two birds with one stone, a case history for both audiences. Click here to read Case History – Dealing with No Responses and Negative Responses.
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Sales Manager Resigns After Reading Assessment Results
- July 2, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Yesterday, one of our sales development experts delivered the findings from the evaluation of a company’s sales team. We looked at their people, strategies, systems and processes. Two of the many findings we reported to the CEO were that
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Hiring Former Fortune 1000 Salespeople and Sales Managers
- July 1, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Executives in small to medium sized businesses have a tendency to become ecstatic when they have the opportunity to hire someone who was with a Fortune 1000 company. They immediately think, “Joe worked at Xerox” or “Suzie used to be at IBM” or “Phil was with Tfosorcim”. And they think, “If they bring some of that big company magic to YSTI-YSTIB, we’ll do great!”
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Fact Based Reasons Why New Salespeople Fail – Data Points
- June 28, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Did you ever have a new salesperson fail? Did you ever have one who was highly recommended fail?
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The Difference Between Salespeople and Account Managers
- June 27, 2008
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
We were also asked to be judges in the Central Mass Sales Awards contest. This morning, I personally reviewed several dozen applications, some of which were very worthy of consideration. Yet I repeatedly saw some of the same patterns in the nomination applications as I see when Objective Management Group evaluates sales forces.