News flash – your team’s sales quota is about to go up, not down. So the question you should be asking yourself is, “how can I motivate and inspire each of my salespeople to produce at higher levels?” Here are five sales management strategies you can use to achieve consistent revenue growth: 1. Emulate the … Read full article
What is the sales performance problem? In a webinar I gave recently, 75% of the 150+ sales managers who attended indicated that a significant portion of the performance issues they face on their team are due to bad rep attitudes—or what I call a sales rep’s “willingness problems” (to contrast them with “skill deficiencies”). Why … Read full article
I often get asked about coaching millenials—the youngest members of the sales force (under age 34), who are the fastest growing segment in today’s workforce. While sweeping statements about an entire generation can never be 100% true for any individual, there are a few factors that do separate millennial salespeople from both Baby Boomers and … Read full article
As a sales manager you have a high activity level. You work hard every day to both direct and support the efforts of your sales team to produce sales results. But often, a manager’s high activity level can actually inhibit the development of the sales team. As author Steven Covey says so well in 7 … Read full article
If you’re like most sales managers, you’ve either just completed a round of quarterly reviews or have some just around the corner. Here are three questions you should ask each of your salespeople during your next one-on-one: 1. What are you getting from me that you like and find helpful? 2. What are you getting … Read full article
Creating a more customer-focused sales force is largely a matter of creating more customer-focused sales managers and sales management processes. It won’t happen unless you reshape how to train, guide, and evaluate your salespeople. The change in perspective has two benefits: First, it gets your salespeople to focus on what they want the customer to … Read full article
I have reviewed many sales manager job descriptions over the years. Recently I was retained by a Fortune 500 company to examine their job description for the sales manager position. Fully 85 percent of the duties were directly linked to coaching salespeople. After this review, I conducted face-to-face interviews with a number of the sales … Read full article
Untrained sales managers become buried in “stuff” work, reactive fire-fighting, feeling overwhelmed. They’re working harder than ever, but unable to catch up. Untrained sales managers have no time for what should be their #1 priority, sales coaching—no time to teach his or her talents, skills and energies to those individuals on the team who need … Read full article
In preparing to negotiate you need to figure out what you want from the negotiations and how flexible you’re willing to be on each of your selling points. Then, for each item, develop an explanation that justifies the position you desire. Being prepared to make the right concessions—those that cost you little, but give your … Read full article
Achieving customer satisfaction — satisfaction with your solution’s price, performance, and service responsiveness — is the pre-requisite for developing any long-term relationship with a customer, and especially one that you may want to take to a higher level of mutual commitment and loyalty. Because your customers’ expectations are always on the rise, you’ve got to … Read full article