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Coffee Is For Provokers
One of my favorite movies is Glengary Glenn Ross (based on David Mamet’s play). In it, the most down-on-his-luck salesman (played by Jack Lemmon) gets up to grab a cup of coffee. The salesman visiting to share his “motivational speech” (played by Alec Baldwin) pounces on him mercilessly, shouting, “Put that coffee down! Coffee’s for closers!”
That one line captures the essence of the sales culture, both as we have come to know it and, too frequently, how we manage it. We still think of “sales” and the star salesperson as the one who “closes the deal,” and gets to “eat what [...] Continue Reading…
How To Stop Overcoming Objections & Double Your Results
Walk into any bookstore, or read any sales oriented magazine and you’ll see the primary focus on strategy and skills is the ability to overcome objections. Last week, I was talking with a fellow executive that I’ve known since I began advising sales teams more than 20 years ago. I was sharing with him how the discoveries we’ve made in developing The 7 Steps to Achieving Effortless Growth have impacted the sales teams we work with.
A couple of days later, he emailed me asking how (or if) our advice has changed in terms of how salespeople overcome objections. As [...] Continue Reading…
Why Your Forecasts Are Always Wrong (Find & Eliminate the False Positives)
The underlying system of sales is designed for failure. This is supported by the way companies manage, track and review their sales pipeline. Inadvertently, companies are making sales growth difficult, choppy and unsustainable as I discuss in my presentation The 7 Steps to Achieving Effortless Growth, I share that one of the primary reasons that is that the underlying system is designed for failure. Below are steps you can take to reduce false positives in your forcasts.
When the focus is on why people should buy, rather than on the barriers to buying, false positives (the belief that a prospect [...] Continue Reading…
Simon Sinek Is Wrong!
I’m a big fan of Simon Sinek’s concept, Start with Why. I even shared his TEDx presentation on this blog. However, I feel as though it’s time to get something off my chest – Sinek is wrong.
DON’T START WITH WHY!
Instead, start with “who.”
The most powerful question every business executive can ask, every day, is “Who do we want to be a hero to?”
The companies that obsess about this question, and orient their actions to that answer, experience disproportionate rewards. Think about all the great companies in history. IBM, Apple, Starbucks, FedEx, P&G, Patagonia, Four Seasons, The Grateful Dead all [...] Continue Reading…
Happy Thanksgiving To All
It’s that time of year again – my annual tribute to promotions and the holidays (with a dash of humor). Have a great Thanksgiving and make sure you take some time to consider all of the great opportunities we have.
Here’s my tribute to Thanksgiving:
I love this time of year. We’ve got the 3-F’s: friends, family & football. There’s the wine, the turkey, the stuffing, the wine. It’s great fun.
And I have a tradition at this time of year that I would like to share with you. I often write about how the old paradigms of business, sales and marketing [...] Continue Reading…
The Pull of Commoditization: Good news & bad news
The bad news first:
Gravity is against you. The gravitational pull of commoditization is constantly working to eliminate your advantage, confuse your customers, hold your prices and profits down, and make you look, feel and sound like everybody else.
The good news?
It’s completely in your control to break free from gravity and enjoy tremendous growth, profit and lifestyle. But, it takes some work – hard work – up front.
What do you need to do?
Ensure you have a consistent message that all team members know how to align with.
Your website is well designed and fully aligned with your message.
Your LinkedIn profile, [...] Continue Reading…
Are Apple’s Days Ending?
There’s an interesting article in USA Today about Apple’s future. The author, Michael Wolff, cites several reasons for asserting that Apple is on the downside of maturity. I figured it’s been a while since I’ve posted insights on Apple, and there’s a lesson for small and mid-market companies, so I’d do a little prognostication.
Wolfe cites four main points for his conclusion:
Its phone market, tablet market and content-selling business — iTunes — until recently practical monopolies, have become, as if overnight, hugely competitive fields. Management, in this strictly top-down company, is suddenly in dramatic flux. And, with its great map [...] Continue Reading…
The Secret to Breaking Free From Commoditization
My very first post on this blog was about the challenges every business faces caused by the increased rate of commoditization. The more I work with companies, the more I realize that the issue is even more critical today.
Commoditization occurs when your customers/prospects stop listening, eliminate what you perceive makes you special and reduce you (and your competitors) to the lowest common denominator, which is typically price (or something equally arbitrary and harmful to you).
Most companies attempt to do one of three things in response. They differentiate, innovate and/or value-add. Unfortunately, all this really does is throw more noise [...] Continue Reading…
Thoughts on Fear
Last week I was speaking before a CEO group. The leader of the group started the meeting off with a conversation about fear. It was quite interesting to hear 12 successful business leaders talk about their relationship with fear.
As I listened I found myself thinking about how fear impacts an individual’s ability to do what they know they must do. I realized that we all deal with fear in general, and a fear of commitment specifically.
What is it that holds us back from fully and totally committing? I see this challenge every day as we work with companies and [...] Continue Reading…
The Single Step to Double Your Closing Impact
I remember it like yesterday. There were 600 people in the crowd, and I was center-stage where noted sales trainer Tom Hopkins was quizzing me on closing techniques and overcoming objections. As I recited the closes word-for-word, I was well on my way to being what I thought was a champion closer.
I have to admit my ability to recite 30 closes on command gave me a lot of confidence when entering sales situations. I’d go into meetings ready for a “no.” I felt as though the prospect would have to have at least 31 ways to say no, because I [...] Continue Reading…
Creating B2B Lead Generation Campaigns That Work
Unequivocally, it is time to focus on growing revenue. To do that, businesses must transform their lead generation efforts into predictable, sustainable and leveragable pieces of their go-to-market strategies. Think about this:
What impact would a steady stream of high quality leads do for your sales efforts?
How much time, money and energy have you expended in an effort to develop such leads?
If you’re like most small and mid-size (SME) B2B companies your answer to both questions is: ”A lot!” The question is, why are high probability leads so difficult to get?
Over the last three years, we have been studying, breaking [...] Continue Reading…
Your Sales Presentation Is Commoditizing You!
We’ve all been there, and we’ve all done it more times than we’d like to admit. Like pulling out the slides from the family vacation, we begin our sales presentation. Sales presentations are quickly catching up to sales brochures for the lead in traditional sales tools that make selling harder.
Both pieces suffer from the same root problem. The focus is on communicating value, rather than creating it. They’re both designed to tell prospects/customers what you will do.
But think about it (and be honest); can’t your competitors say they will do the same basic things you say you do? My [...] Continue Reading…
Should Social Media Be Part of Your Strategy?
I guess it’s time to start talking about social media here. Over the last three months the frequency and consistency that I’m asked about social media has multiplied (I was even interviewed by Strategic Coach on using social media), and I’m regularly seeing growth companies make some crucial mistakes with social media.
The promise and potential of social media is astounding…when it’s done right. Here are some important pointers to determine if you should be taking advantage of social media, and to ensure you do it right.
Social media is one of the last steps in an effective outreach effort; it [...] Continue Reading…
Focus On The Problem
It amazes me how much time people spend developing, understanding and explaining their solutions, while spending little to no time actually understanding the problems their customers have. If there’s a single message that traditional salespeople need to grasp to break free form commoditization it’s “your solution is not your customer/prospect’s problem.”
As author Simon Sinek shared, people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it. Your solution is your “what.” The problem you solve for your target market is foundation of your “why.”
Whether you’re a salesperson or an executive of a growing business, the second highest leverage [...] Continue Reading…
Scarcity vs. Abundance
I had the pleasure of spending an evening this week with two of my favorite entrepreneurial advocates – Dan Sullivan and EO. Dan was sharing his thoughts on creating a 10x mindset, and he made two points that I think are critical for all of us. A Front Row Seat to Creative Destruction We live in crazy times today. Let’s face it, things are messy. Messiness never creates comfort, and in today’s 24-hour news cycle that discomfort is multiplied. But the reality is that, that’s what progress is all about. As new innovations kill old standards. It’s never pretty, [...] Continue Reading…