Understanding the Sales Force

  • You’re Afraid to Sell Because You Think There is Hope

    • November 24, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    It may have been in episode 4 or 5, in season 1. It was definitely in the HBO series Band of Brothers. Thanks Chris, for recommending it. I can’t believe I’m a decade late watching this!

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  • Top 5 Sales Issues Leaders Should Not Focus On

    • November 19, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Did you ever watch Peyton Manning, Tom Brady or Aaron Rogers have a bad day at Quarterback? Did you notice that the following day, everyone was saying that he sucked? While it’s possible that these three Quarterbacks could have a bad day, most of their bad days are less about them and more about whether or not their offensive lines gave them the time and protection they needed to find an open man and make a good pass. It could also have something to do with whether or not their receivers were able to quickly get open.

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  • Why This Salesperson Failed to Close the Deal

    • November 17, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force
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  • Achieve More Accurate Forecasts and Sales Results Today

    • November 12, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Last week, a new client was explaining how he called several of the nearly 300 opportunities that one salesperson had in his pipeline.  My client identified 7 opportunities that had no recent activity, but had been in the pipeline for several months and were supposed to close.  Imagine my client’s surprise when:

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  • Second Secret to Sales Force Excellence

    • November 10, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    One of the stand-out findings that jumps off the pages of our new White Paper is about sales training.  Over the years, many reports have highlighted all of the money that has been wasted on ineffective training.  However, the study on which this White Paper, on Sales Force Excellence, is based was equally clear about this subject.  Most of the companies in the study reported that they offered sales training to their sales force.  But when we looked beyond the obvious, what became most clear revolved around three important distinctions:

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  • Leading a Sales Force is Even More Like Baseball

    • November 6, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    I’ve written plenty about the similarity betwen baseball and selling, but today I’m writing about the similarity between baseball and sales leadership.  If you’re not a baseball person, you might not see the same things that I see, most of which can be applied to leading a sales force.  For example,

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  • Surprising Social Selling Secret Drives Sales Revenue

    • November 5, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    If you’ve been reading my Blog, then you are probably aware of OMG’s big Sales Force Effectiveness Study that we’ve been working on for the past three months.  One of the things we studied is the impact of Social Selling. At face value, one might come to the exact same conclusion as we did in 2013, that it’s having limited impact on sales.  However, this time we looked wider and deeper and beyond the obvious and we were extremely surprised by what we found.  We discovered that

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  • Sales Success is Like Making Great Tasting Soup

    • November 3, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Sales success is no more about any one competency than great-tasting soup is about one ingredient.  If you omit one ingredient, like salt, the soup will taste bland.  If you omit one competency, like Qualifying, your sales effectiveness will suffer.  While you can’t leave one ingredient out of the soup, it’s also not possible to make soup by focusing on and including only one ingredient.  Likewise, with sales, you can’t expect to succeed, dominate your market, and celebrate your results if you focus on and include only one of the competencies on my list.  

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  • Why Prospects Don’t Buy From You Today!

    • October 29, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Engagement.  There is a huge connection between what I experienced with the World Series, and what prospects experience with salespeople.  If you can understand and apply this analogy it will make a huge difference in the quality of your calls and meetings.  Here are the four most important things for you to know.

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  • The One Thing Most Salespeople Are Unable to Do

    • October 27, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Can you guess what it is – the one thing most salespeople are unable to do?

    Based on what I most frequently write about, you might think that it would be consultative selling, but that’s not it.  You might also guess that it’s the sales equivalent of eating right – not doing demos and presentations so early in the sales process. But that’s not it either.

    However, there really is one thing that all but the most elite salespeople are unable to do.  It is partly a result of their inability to sell consultatively while continuing to demo, present, quote and propose too early.  Can you guess what it is now?

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