The Center for Sales Strategy, on April 29, 2021
“Get the right people on your bus and get the right people in the right seat on your bus.”
Jim Collins, leadership guru and author of the best-seller Good to Great
If you have the right people on your bus, how well do they fit into the role you have them in?
Even if you hired the right talent onto your bus, reports show that less than 20% of employees feel they get to use their talent and strengths each day at work which means adjustments are needed. How can you help?
The Center for Sales Strategy, on April 13, 2021
When you start a new sales job, there’s always a transition that includes many different learning curves. You learn how to embrace a new culture, learn to meet the expectations of new leadership, take on new functions within a sales job, and then there's the social pressure.
One of the best ways to ease the pain of transition is to offer new sales hires training—training in areas that help introduce skills needed or training for existing salespeople to enhance skills they may have already developed but can always improve.
Jim Hopes, on March 18, 2021
There is an inherent danger in grouping two items together for conversational purposes, even when they go together. The danger is when they are always tied up in one phrase; they begin to sound like they are the same thing.
Peanut butter and jelly go together, but they are not the same thing. The same rings true for recruitment and selection.
Matt Sunshine, on March 4, 2021
You called. Left a message. "Maybe they're busy," you think. Or, "maybe they just don't return calls." Perhaps it's neither of these. Maybe it's on you.
Maybe you just haven't given them a compelling enough reason to call you back.
If you want prospects to call you back, you need to give them a reason. If the reason you're providing is something along the lines of, "I have a really great idea to share with you," then you sound just like the other 25 calls they've received.
Your prospect doesn't want your ideas. They want solutions to their problems.
The Center for Sales Strategy, on February 23, 2021
How are you working to improve sales?
When it comes to sales, what do you value? If the answer to that question is hitting the numbers, then people are simply stepping stones. When you value people first, you'll watch the numbers stack up. The goal is to invest in people. The return on that investment is huge, because people account for a quality sales operation.
John Henley, on February 18, 2021
There's a lot to get right if you're trying to build a high performing sales organization.
That's because sales organizations are complex systems, like the nervous system. The nervous system contains a network of specialized cells called neurons. Nerve impulses have a domino effect. Each neuron receives an impulse and must pass it on to the next neuron and make sure the correct impulse continues on its path. If something goes wrong in this process, you have problems.
In a sales organization, there's the same domino effect. If you don't get all 8 essentials right, you'll have problems.
Kurt Sima, on February 4, 2021
The old saying “when it rains, it pours” seems to apply to order cancellations, and it seems like when cancellations occur, they occur in bunches. Here’s what many sellers do when they experience a bunch of order cancellations:
1. Have a negative reaction and argue with the client.
2. Panic and go after any account they can sell.
3. Look for ways to close a quick deal to make up for lost revenue—including dropping the price to close a deal.
4. Sell new prospects whatever they can sell without worrying about delivering results.
All items on this list ultimately lead to short term sales AND more cancellations in the future.
The Center for Sales Strategy, on January 28, 2021
So much has been said and written about what top sellers do to set themselves apart from the average and low performing salespeople.
Let’s look at this from a different angle. What things do they make certain to NEVER do?
In order to fully understand what makes a high performing sales person, it’s helpful to recognize behaviors NOT exhibited by this elite group.
Jim Hopes, on January 14, 2021
There's certainly a lot of banter these days about how many contacts a salesperson must make in order to secure an appointment. We all know it takes more than 2 or 3 calls, but how many does it really take, and why?
The Center for Sales Strategy, on December 17, 2020
What do American crime dramas, musical fantasies, and a Canadian sitcom have in common? They can all help you practice social distancing and make you a better person. It’s true! Research provided by Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts found that watching high-quality TV dramas can actually increase our emotional intelligence and make us more empathetic people.
Our team at The Center for Sales Strategy (CSS) and LeadG2 survived 2020, but not without the help of streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, and Disney+. Here are some of the binge-worthy movies and shows that all of us have been watching while staying home and social distancing.
