The Center for Sales Strategy Blog

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"Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other."

-John F. Kennedy

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Is it possible to drive sales performance and keep an amazing company culture during these challenging times? Yes! And Taja Graham, Vice President of Sales for Emmis Communications Indianapolis, provides the proof in her interview with Matt Sunshine.

Episode 5 of the Improving Sales Performance series deep dives into things Graham is doing in her market to drive performance, as well as what she’s doing to keep her team engaged. Plus, she touches on how they’ve modified planning for next year to drive performance.

2020 has been a strange year for everyone. Successful teams who are used to winning find themselves struggling. And managers, who are used to leading successful teams, are trying to coach and help reps who aren’t used to struggling.

If this sounds like a situation you’re experiencing, how can you identify where your team needs help and get them back on track?

It’s been quite a year of change for many salespeople and managers. What at first seemed like a temporary situation has slowly evolved into the potential for a new reality — working from home.

There are many benefits to working from home, such as no commute, which leads to greater productivity, better work/life blend, and looking professional from the waist up... just to name a few! Gartner's recent study shows that 74% of companies plan to shift some of their employees to working from home permanently.

In the past, many deals were built from the foundation of in-person relationships. The pandemic has shifted the sales cycle, and many salespeople have been forced to adjust. Mastering the art of both in-person selling and virtual selling is now a skill seller's must obtain.

As a sales leader, it’s important to ensure your sales team shifts their mindset and has the tools needed to perform at their best no matter what the situation holds.

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"Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow."

-Melody Beattie

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Happy Thanksgiving to all those in the United States who celebrate! We know this year has been rough, but we see your strength and wish you all the best this Thanksgiving.

Even with all the chaos 2020 has presented, there’s still so much to be thankful for this holiday season. One of the greatest gifts this year has given us is a new perspective on the things we’ve been taking for granted all this time. A new perspective on just how grateful we are for the simplest of things.

And while many are still struggling this Thanksgiving, we hope you’re able to take a moment and practice some gratitude for all the lessons 2020 has brought us.

Have you ever heard about Katie Francis, who shattered the 30-year-old world record by selling 21,477 boxes of Girl Scout Cookies in 2014?

On weekdays, Katie worked seven hours a day selling cookies. On weekends, she put in 12 hours a day. What started as a goal of selling 18,100 boxes, quickly raised to 20,000, and then to 21,000. Katie’s a goal-setter — and reaching a goal just motivates her to set a higher goal. She sold a record of 100,100 boxes of girl scout cookies in her seven years as a girl scout.

To be successful in sales, Katie quickly learned you can't take "no" personally. This young lady has a solid ego that rejects rejection along with an agile mind that readily learns and adapts.

Your role as a leader is to drive your people toward your ambitious culture. How do you do that? You must connect with people!

When COVID-19 closed gyms, 58% of trainers lost some of all of their income, and 23% were furlough or laid off (PR Newswire). How did one gym manage to gain more members now than pre-COIVD?

Episode 4 of the Improving Sales Performance series with Tony Hartl, founder of Crunch Fitness Austin and Planet Tan, provides listeners with a few secrets of how he’s getting new members and keeping existing ones amid the pandemic. He also discloses how he keeps his team focused and energized.

"If you don't know your numbers, you don't know your business." — Marcus Lemonis

"It's a numbers game, but I don't know which numbers" — Average Salesperson

Okay — I made-up the last quote, but it's still true. Too many times, I meet with sales managers and salespeople who firmly believe that sales is a "numbers game", but they have no idea what numbers they need to know or even what numbers they should be tracking.

Most sales leaders focus on KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) and while they are important, they do not help produce sales improvements. KPI's are like your scorecard after a round of golf, fun to see how you played, but they can't help you play better for the round you just finished. 

Rather than focus on KPIs, it’s time to concentrate on Leading Indicators so that we can effect change during the game that will help you and your team win. Think of leading indicators as data that allows you to make "in-game" adjustments, so that your team can keep scoring.