New To Sales Management? - How To Quickly Establish Authority

Sometimes a new Sales Manager has to face awkward, contentious, embarrassing or tough issues. Difficult situations, you may have noticed, don’t tend to get easier if delayed or ignored. For the manager, dealing with such problems goes with the territory.

New To Sales Management? Assess Your Team Sooner Rather Than Later

The importance of assessing the skills-sets, experience, promotion potential andaspirations of your team as early as possible, cannot be over-estimated. Knowledge is power!

Cold-Calling (Selling Ice To Eskimos)

Cold-calling is still heavily used despite the fact it is an outdated sales strategy in today's information age.

What!? You Don't Know This Stuff?

The individuals that have been slowest to embrace technology and the Internet are the ones who have the option to use it, as opposed to those of us who are forced to in order to keep up.

Mindfulness - For Business People?

Business leaders are now examining the efficacy of Mindfulness and Meditation to reduce stress, improve concentration and increase overall performance at work. This article discusses what mindfulness is and explains how to begin to find out about mindfulness for yourself.

What Should An Effective And Professional Sales Team Appraisal Contain?

Every sales manager has to appraise subordinates and the mechanics of it vary from ticking little boxes, through marking on five-point scales, to writing an open ended report. The primary purpose of an appraisal is to help the subordinate, whilst at the same time ensuring that the company is receiving an appropriate return on it's considerable investment. Here I discuss just what precisely an effective sales specific appraisal document should contain.

No Pain No Gain No Profit

People will spend thousands of dollars and search for years on end to learn how to be successful. They could do it virtually free if they knew where to look and what to look for.

The Dirty Little Secrets Of The Failure To Leverage The Inside Sales – Customer Service Potential

How can the distributor take advantage of existing relationships between Inside Sales/Customer Service personnel and customers? This age-old question has caused managers to implement a variety of approaches in the attempt to tap perceived potential, but many fail and the question persists. Why? Most firms do not have adequate measures installed to determine who does what within an Inside Sales/Customer Service group. For lack of measures, it is not possible for management to define department productivity or level of activity much less individual productivity.

How to Create SIZZLING Value Propositions

You know those dramatic commercials on late night TV for slicers and dicers and steak knives and juicers and rotisseries, don’t you? What do all of them, the successful ones, those that stick around and actually tempt you to buy; what do they have in common? They’re crackerjacks at creating VALUE. Literally, theirs sizzle.

Opening A Dollar Store - Focus on Cost Reduction

Are you opening a dollar store? If so never lose sight of the importance of cost reduction. In fact cost reduction should take place from the day you start your planning. Once the store has opened, there are three areas that must remain a focus.

Sales Managers - Don't Just Manage Down, Manage Up!

As Sales Managers, much of our time is spent managing our sales staff. Training, forecasting, ride a longs. The list goes on and on. Our days are so busy, we are often taken by surprise when our VP or Senior Level Manager emails or calls us with an edict from on high. You know the call.

Selling & Marketing - The Secret to Developing a Thriving Business by Linking Strategy to Selling

A good marketing strategy will fail without crisp, consistent execution. A great sales plan will fail without a coherent, differentiated strategy. The secret to success is linking marketing strategy to selling execution.

Six Reasons I'd Rather Be Selling

If someone gave you a choice between selling, being in front of customers, talking to them on the phone, emailing them, or teaching sales skills, which would you select? I've been doing both for several years, but if I had to choose, I'd prefer to sell. Here are six reasons, according to a top speaker, international consultant, and best-selling author of 12 books and the popular Nightingale-Conant audio program, THE LAW OF LARGE NUMBERS: HOW TO MAKE SUCCESS INEVITABLE.