Is it Strategy or Is it Illusion? Do you have a strategy to grow your business? Be honest? If yes, are you using it? Is there a Sales Plan in it? Are you executing your sales plan? Are you on track to meet your goals? Are you measuring your results? Are you accountable to your results? Where can you improve?...Read More
A couple of years ago, I had a big meeting. A really great prospect for whom I had finally found the right opening accepted a request to meet to talk about his problems and my potential solution. Getting ready that morning, I put on my favorite suit. You know the one, THE suit, that makes ya feel good,...Read More
What might seem like polite, considerate or clever technique to win favor or influence your target audience might be turning them off to your message. Whether you’re asking for an appointment, asking for their business or asking for a donation, reconsider using the following: 12 Phrases to Avoid in Sales Emails BY GEOFFREY JAMES in this Inc. Magazine...Read More
Are you waiting for someone else to take the reins of Leadership? If you need a helluva compelling reason to take charge here and today, here’s to inspiring you: There’s a reason the former proper noun, “Google” is now listed as a “transitive verb”, according to Webster’s Dictionary. Customers are not just vetting the specs...Read More
If you’re a sales person and you’ve tried to sell me, I’m sorry . . . because not everyone wants to be put through an unsuspecting skill check whilst performing their job. Please don’t misunderstand, I’m not cruel or mean but I’m on a life long quest to understand, learn, grow and improve the Sales...Read More
Many many many stories have been written on the phenomenal, if not fanatical corporate culture CEO Tony Hsieh has created at Zappos, but here’s a new one on me: They offer a 4 week immersion to new hires but after a week or so, they give newbies “The Offer”—which is a bribe of $1,000 TO...Read More
Outside elements, personalities, bias, preferences, mistakes—these forces that impact business decisions cannot be compartmentalized and made without experiencing the application of external forces. So why do corporations still operate in departmental silos that stifle creativity, efficiency, productivity and profitability? As it turns out, no, no one ever asked me. However, I’ve turned every organization I’ve...Read More
The foundation of everything you build. EVERYTHING . . . rests on the kind of company you decide to keep. No, not who do you hang out with, but what vision, aesthetics, energy, influence, encouragement, relationships, structure—you keep in your business. Cactus grow in dry, sandy soil. Mushrooms grow in manure. Bromeliads grow on trees. Lotus...Read More
I met this delightful woman the other day at a Chamber Event. She was new, I was new . . . we bonded over the rather odd entrée selection at the buffet: FRIED catfish or GRILLED catfish. If you didn’t like catfish . . . um, you’re SOL, I guess. This is the South and all, but it was...Read More
I try very hard to take the esoteric jargon out of my blogs and posts and discussions with business owners because so much of it is rather nonsensical vocabulary created by sales directors and vp’s to turn into catchy training material. Harsh, perhaps. Accurate, definitely. So when putting on the finishing touches of a course I developed...Read More
