I’m not a sales person but I have to sell. What do I do?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Call Reluctance, Self Development, Self Promotion

After thousands of hours of study and many years honing technical skills to be a competent professional in your chosen field, it can come as a rude shock that you now need to sell your services and capabilities as well. In today’s busy market, a competent selling capability isn’t a nice-to-have it is an essential business and life skill.

Interestingly, the topic of selling and growing a business often doesn’t feature in those university lectures does it? In fact, selling is in many cases covered over and, if spoken about at all, was only mentioned as an unsavoury aspect employed by …

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Measuring and managing the right things in sales

By / / Performance Management, Sales Coaching, Sales Excellence Acadamy, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Sales Motivation & Rewards, Sales Results, Sales Skills, Sales Training, Self Development

Who wants to work with accountable, responsible, and self-directed sales people? Of course we all want these types of sales people in every sales team. Yet, most businesses do not support this by setting up their sales team to clearly measure and manage their sales performance.

Sales performance management begins with accurate role descriptions and perception, data collection, and measurement in line with set goals and strategy, however many organisations measure only one variable, sale results (outputs measures).

This type of approach leaves businesses and sales teams in the dark about how they arrived at their sales …

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What do your sales people really need to know and apply?

By / / Business Acumen, Sales Assessments, Sales Pioneer, Sales Planning, Sales Skills, Sales Talent, Sales Tips, Sales Training, Self Development

In today’s market selling skills training does not equal product training or pressure tactics. If product training or pressure selling (the hard sell) are on the top of your sales training agenda or the only training you offer your sales people then you may want to rethink your sales training strategy.

What is expected of sales people today by way of skillful thought and action goes way beyond the product or the hard sell.

Let’s first look at what clients want. This will then help us determine what sales people need to be able to do.

Clients today …

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4 valuable life skills that make for success in sales and any other role

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brain Science, Business Acumen, Communication, Emotional Intelligence, Mindful selling, Prospecting, Sales Excellence Acadamy, Sales Skills, Sales Talent, Sales Tips, Self Development

There are many things written and said about effective sales people, effective leaders, successful entrepreneurs, great teams and so on.

Many descriptions are in circulation. There is an overabundance of experts recommending this approach one day and that approach the next.

Those of us who want to be effective and successful often follow the advice of those experts however we are at risk of turning ourselves inside out and losing sight of what we are really here to do if we keep trying to bend to the winds and whims of the latest management trends, fads, findings, …

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The Entrepreneurial Sales Person

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Education in Sales, Emotional Intelligence, Neuroscience in Sales, Prospecting, Resilience, Role Clarity, Sales Excellence Acadamy, Sales Motivation & Rewards, Sales Relationships, Sales Talent, Self Development, Success

As part of my ongoing professional and personal development I belong to a CEO leadership group where we meet monthly and discuss a whole range of topics to stimulate our thinking and decision making.

Recently we discussed the concept and qualities of Successful Entrepreneurs. Besides making the obvious comparisons with ourselves as to whether we met the criteria of successful entrepreneurs I found the content translated extremely well into what I and other research is seeing in successful sales people today.

It seemed to me that successful sales people had a lot in common with successful entrepreneurs who are often the main …

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An ideal sales week

By / / Prospecting, Role Clarity, Sales Motivation & Rewards, Sales Pioneer, Sales Planning, Sales Results, Sales Skills, Sales Tips, Self Development, Time Management
  • Are you finding that you are over servicing your existing clients and not bringing in new business?
  • Are you running out of time each week to do the important sales jobs such as prospecting?
  • Are you at risk of not meeting your sales budget?

In my many interactions with sales people I have found that many find they have problems prioritising their week. They often get caught up in activities that do not produce revenue, leaving them vulnerable.

Let’s look at the key activities that should feature as priorities in most sales people jobs:

Revenue Generating Activities
Direct

  • Prospecting (phone calls, etc.)
  • New business client meetings (with …

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Leading a healthy sales career

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brain Science, Emotional Intelligence, Neuroscience, Neuroscience in Sales, Sales Culture, Sales Psychology, Sales Talent, Sales Tips, Self Development, Time Management, Wellbeing

It is well documented that being healthy (physically, emotionally, and mentally) is vital to leading an effective and productive life.

In sales your health is a critical factor to your success. Many highly successful sales people I meet are self disciplined in all aspects of their life ensuring they are fit, healthy and well trained in their profession.

Having a healthy sales career is underpinned by the individuals healthy life style, and a well managed business which includes good sales support, clear goals and leadership.

I have written before in a previous post Healthy salespeople, healthy …

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What’s in a relationship?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brand & Reputation, Collaboration, Communication, Ethics & Values, Sales Relationships, Self Development

 

 

The term ‘Relationship Selling’ is often bandied about by sales managers and sales people without properly defining what it really means.I often hear “We are in relationship selling” or “We need relationship sales people” however what I do not hear being asked is:

  • What type of relationship are we talking about?
  • What type of relationship are we looking for?
  • What do we mean by relationship selling anyway?

Relationship selling happens in any place where relationships are important. Thus when a husband and wife are negotiating about something, they will be more successful if they both consider the relationship as well as whatever it is …

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A Test of Character

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brain Science, Ethics & Values, Mindful selling, Neuroscience in Sales, Resilience, Sales Psychology, Sales Talent, Self Development, Success

I can honestly say I did not enjoy the early years of my sales career. I initially found it hard, relentless and sometimes really distressing. I was asked to do things I didn’t always understand that significance of. I often felt overly scrutinised by the constant monitoring of activity and performance by my managers. I worked in tough markets in tough times and sometimes wondered if it was worth it. I felt under pressure and sometimes wished I didn’t have to sell at all, however I came to realise that this tough introduction to …

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The Dark Side

By / / Assessments, Attitudes & Behaviours, Brain Science, Coaching, Emotional Intelligence, Neuroscience, Neuroscience in Sales, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Sales Psychology, Self Development, Uncategorized, Wellbeing

How well can we manage ourselves, our teams and businesses in a crisis or tough times?

Are our actions and behaviours putting us, our people and our businesses at risk?

As leaders and managers we are on show and our actions often speak louder than our words. In challenging times this is even more evident. Under pressure cracks may appear and our leadership is put to the test.

How do we cope under pressure? What happens to us when we crack? When placed under high levels of pressure, most people will rely on coping mechanisms or their strengths …

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