Author Archives: David Brock
Moving From Value Creation To Value Co-Creation
In the past 15-20 years, we have adopted the view that “value is in the eye of the beholder.” Sales people are now trying to understand what customers value, then present their solutions in the context of what they value. Marketing provides tools to help sales people do this, whether they are questioning guides, justification guides, or other tools.
Intelligent Sales Leads
I was recently asked to share my views of the impact of Big Data, business intelligence, and data analytics in sales. We are only beginning to scratch the surface in leveraging Big Data, particularly in sales. Many other functions have been leveraging big data and rich analytics for years, with great impact.
People Don’t Dislike Sales People, They Dislike Bad Selling!
People don’t dislike sales people, they dislike bad selling! I wish I had said that, but it originally came from Andy Rudin—thanks for the great quote. There’s a lot of data going around about [...]
The Sales Process Is Critical To Customer Experience
Recently I was at one of those giant events, you know, where sales leaders come together to talk about the challenges they face in growing their business. At dinner one evening, I was talking to a three executives, comparing notes on a new tool each was considering buying and implementing in their organizations.
The Sales Process Should Lead To Profitable Customers
Most of the time we look at our sales process and think of it as producing deals, orders, or revenue. Don’t get me wrong, those are still critical outputs of the sales process. However, too often we fail to think about the quality of the deals we close. In our competitiveness or hunger to close business, we sometimes win the wrong deals.
Stop Letting Your Competitor Define Your Sales Strategy!
Recently, I was doing some reviews with a sales team. We were talking about some of their deals and they were consumed with a specific competitor. They complained, “How do we deal with this competitor? How do we respond to the things they are doing?” With those questions, I could see they were in deep trouble.
Are You Building Coalitions With Your Customers?
As sales professionals, we’re supposed to be great at building relationships with our customers. Relationships are important, they are the foundation to doing business. I don’t mean relationships in the “old sense,” but relationships earned through establishing trust and credibility [...]
Passion: Falling In Love With Our Products!
One of the nice things about sales people is we have tremendous passion about whatever it is we sell. We believe in our products, we cannot imagine anyone not being as enthusiastic as we are–or selecting an alternative solution. It’s impossible to imagine a sales person being successful without being excited about what we sell.
70% Of Buying Process Completed Without Sales Involvement!
I’m sorry if I’m starting to sound like a broken record, but I’m getting tired of this statement! Yes, lots of surveys show that customers are engaging sales people later and later in their buying process. There are tremendous resources on the web that provide much information to the customer, enabling them to self educate, get opinions of others, and to narrow their alternatives to a short list.
Finding The Decision Maker
As sales people, we are trained to ruthlessly seek out the decision maker and focus all our efforts on that individual. Whether it’s to understand their needs, provide insight, pitch a solution, our focus is on finding the decision maker and locking in on that individual.
Recent Comments