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How To Conduct An Effective Account Review

In a time of global competition, rightsizing, and demands for predictable quarterly performance, executive teams cannot afford to waste critical resources, investments, or time. It is imperative to "manage up" the accurate and timely information needed to make the best decisions. An account review is an ideal vehicle for this communication, and a critical part of effective sales management execution. Account reviews help you identify both opportunities and sales gaps, assign critical resources, and create investment needs for the sales organization. It can also be an effective communication tool for sales leaders to share best practices with their teams, and develop their sales bench through mentoring and coaching. Why Do Account Reviews? How are you going to achieve your sales plan? Or more important, can you achieve your plan with the resources you have, directed to the customers you know, with the products and services you have? If the answer is no, the account r

5 Tips On How To Prospect Wisely

Most organizations want to prospect Fortune 1000 companies. While tempting, it can be a bit like boiling the ocean. After all, there are 1000 companies on the list and the big question is always how to prioritize. While many companies listed on the Fortune list are desirable prospects, some may not be and its really important to understand that, otherwise your sales people will end up dialing for dollars, which is time consuming and costly. Here are some insights that might help you and your team prospect more effectively. 1) Understand who you want to target A consultative sales approach starts with understanding who your target audience is and it might turn out that your ideal client is not necessarily on the Fortune list. For example, if you develop a niche offering your prospect could be small business owners or mid-size companies in a specific region or industry. 2) Develop a message that resonates with your audience Once you identified your ideal client profile, you nee

The Top Three Reasons Prospecting Efforts Fail

We are getting close to starting the second half of the year. Sales managers are conducting sales pipeline reviews only to discover: there isnt enough in the pipeline to achieve the numbers necessary for third and fourth quarter results. The pipeline is either half-full or full of unqualified opportunities. So what makes filling the sales pipeline so hard? If any of you are my age, you probably prospected by calling names in the yellow pages or marketing lists that gave you little or no background on the company. It should be much easier today. Salespeople have access to websites, LinkedIn, and the ability to follow tweets and chirps. They can google potential clients and gain important information that helps them craft compelling messaging. Its easier than ever to prospect. So whats the reason for these empty sales pipelines? The reasons for ineffective and inconsistent prospecting hasnt changed in 20 years. It isnt about the sales tools, its about the sal

10 Mistakes That Kill Sales Calls

Original Author: Scott Gruher Sales Leaders miss or make the number one sales call at a time. Yet they typically dont pay enough attention to each call. They look at each reps performance to quota. They review the pipeline. These are difficult to control. Sales leaders can control the quality of sales calls every day. Great single sales call execution will lead to great results. Your team is wasting at bats. Every week sales reps attend sales calls unprepared. You have a Sales Process. You have a team of experienced sales people, so what is the problem? In this post we will explore common sales call mistakes. Then we will review four simple steps sales leaders can implement to prevent them. The sales call coaching tool will help sales leaders ensure their reps are prepared.Sales, Social Media all You

More and more sales people are using social media to help them prospect and develop new business. Its certainly an avenue that I use for my client development. Used wisely and effectively its a great tool to enhance your business development efforts. Below is an article that was featured in Forbes on how sales people outsell their peers by using social media channels. http://www.forbes.com/sites/markfidelman/2013/05/19/study-78-of-salespeople-using-social-media-outsell-their-peers/ This is a quote from the article: "But as hes(Jim Keenan) shown, those who have been using it(social media) are quickly gaining a competitive advantage." The issue that I see in the long run is that once everybody adopts that technique (and everybody can and should), we are back to square one where sales people need to find ways to stand out from their peers. Standing Out From the Crowd? Last week we had a meeting with a logistics firm in Seattle and our prospect confirmed that sentiment. He men