What does a successful sales team & culture look like?

By / / Sales Culture, Sales Results, Sales Strategy

Creating a viable, healthy, fit, and robust sales team and supporting culture takes effort, consistent effort. It doesn’t happen by chance. We have to be able to hold in our grasp –our thinking, our frame of reference– several aspects including purpose, strategy, performance standards, people, competition, change, technology, and of course, all of the variables outside of our direct control such as PEST (politics, economic, society, technology) or STEER.

The biggest issues that keep most sales teams from being and consistently performing at their best are:

  • No sales strategy to direct and guide the sales team and business
  • The …

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12 Sales Trends for 2014 – The Thinking Sales Organisation

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Education in Sales, Sales Culture, Sales Driven Organisations, Sales Research

As 2013 comes to a close we firstly wanted to thank all our loyal readers for their continued support of our work. We also thought you would like to get a sneak peek of our Annual 12 Sales Trends Report for 2014. With the unprecedented changes we are experiencing as a result of the digital revolution and the commoditisation of quality we can no longer manage sales by processes and numbers alone – it’s become a thinking person’s game.   As a result, the Barrett Consulting Group’s annual Sales Trends Report for 2014 has selected the theme: “The Thinking Sales Organisation”. Sales operations …

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The History of Sales Methodologies

By / / Business Acumen, Complex Selling & Transactional Selling, Education in Sales, Sales Culture, Sales Excellence Acadamy, Sales Research

Have you ever wondered just how many sales methodologies are out there and which ones work and which ones don’t?

Maybe you haven’t given much conscious thought to this subject but then again maybe you have.  Either way, if you are in sales or run a sales team or business and want to be more effective and successful it’s critical that you know what sales methodology will work best for you and your customers.

Unfortunately, the business world has been littered with more dubious sales methodologies than there are effective ones. Our business, at Barrett, is to …

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Why ‘Point Solutions’ ruin sales operations

By / / Education in Sales, Sales Consulting, Sales Culture, Sales Results

What is a Point Solution? A point solution solves one particular problem without regard to related issues. Point solutions are usually called for when there is a need to fix a specific problem or fast-track the implementation of a new service. Unfortunately, point solutions often don’t deliver meaningful or sustainable results. The sales training/consulting industry is littered with point solution providers, all promising ‘sales excellence in a box’ ranging from the latest selling style [1] you must adopt to a New York best seller book promising the golden nugget that will turn your sales around. When it comes to …

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Is your business Customer Focused & Customer Centric?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brand & Reputation, Education in Sales, Sales Culture, Sales Driven Organisations

As with many things these days, words or expressions get bandied about with little regard for what they really mean.  For instance, when we ask people how they define ‘Prospecting’, the overwhelming response is ‘Cold Calling’. Prospecting is far more than cold calling: it can happen anywhere with new, existing or lapsed accounts – anywhere you are trying to uncover and develop new business opportunities.  And with social networks abounding, very few people ever have to make a true cold call.  See what I mean?

And so we enter the confusing world of …

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Does your sales team or culture need a detox?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Ethics & Values, Sales Culture, Sales Psychology, Uncategorized

It doesn’t take much to sow the seeds of discontent in business today, and the potential for creating dysfunctional, “toxic” sales teams and culture is much easier than you think. There are so many things that can and do go wrong.

We at Barrett have met and worked with a great many sales teams across all sorts of industries over the years. In all honesty, we are yet to come across the ‘perfect’ sales team. That doesn’t mean to say that there aren’t great sales teams operating out there, because they do exist, but like every great team, their greatest can ebb …

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How many clients and sales are you losing out the back door?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brand & Reputation, Customer Service, Sales Culture, Sales Driven Organisations, Sales Forecasting, Sales Measures - Inputs & Outputs, Sales Pipeline

Are you aware that it is six (6) times more expensive to acquire a new client than it is to retain an existing client?

Keeping clients onboard and engaged with your business is just as important as your sales team finding new business sales with new and existing clients, however many businesses do not pay enough attention to the back end of their business leaving client retention to chance.

Have you ever mapped the whole value chain of your business and looked at where your clients engage with your company?

How many client touch points are there?

The more …

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How much valuable selling time are you wasting?

By / / Education in Sales, Sales Culture, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Sales Motivation & Rewards, Uncategorized

When it comes to sales productivity and sales performance many companies are shortchanging themselves and, unfairly blaming their salespeople for poor sales performance results.

How can that be? Well too many businesses pay salespeople for business development and then lumber them with non-revenue, non customer oriented activities such as administration, unnecessary internal meetings, service delivery or transactional account problems.  And whilst acknowledging that these are very much a part of managing the client’s experience and classified under the sales portfolio, the haphazard manner in which these are structured does little to encourage optimal live …

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Hot bath turned cold – ditch the Rah Rah

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Coaching, Education in Sales, Sales Coaching, Sales Culture, Sales Results, Sales Skills, Sales Training

Have you ever heard the expression “Hot bath turned cold’? Perhaps not, however if you have been involved in the sales training industry or sales management it is a term that is synonymous with the quick, sheep dip, Rah Rah motivational sessions that business leaders and sales managers run for their sales people in the hope that they will sell more.   Sadly the opposite is true.  At the very best these ‘hot bath’ motivation techniques can provide entertainment value, however at worst they can do more harm than …

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How do your clients really perceive you?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Business Acumen, Communication, Education in Sales, Mindful selling, Prospecting, Role Clarity, Sales Coaching, Sales Culture, Sales Leadership, Sales Relationships

Perception is reality. So what do your clients really think of you? Would you be happy with how they perceive you? Are they thinking any of the following when they think about you and your company?:

  • ‘I’m so glad I’ve met you; my life/business is better off for knowing you.’
    or
  • ‘Oh that guy (gal), yeh they’re pretty good’
    or
  • ‘They’re nice but I don’t always have the time to chat with them’
    or
  • ‘That arrogant so and so’
    or
  • ‘Aghhh, I don’t trust them, get them out of my office now’
    or
  • ‘Who?’

    • Good relationships take time and effort to build and create something really valuable …

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