The Sales Leader Blog

Here are a three mistakes I see companies make in building their sales practice:

1. Not understanding just what it takes to build a pipeline and ignoring the prospecting side for the business
2. Not  understanding the business value of their product. As a result, what I see are a lot of companies hiring product specialists who  don’t understand the business case. Huge Mistake! Because people ultimately buy your product or service based on the business value it provides.
3. Hiring the wrong kinds of salespeople. If you are a startup, you need to hire salespeople who are great hunters, who love to build pipelines, and who have a proven background of building something from nothing. Founders often get a little bit excited about salespeople who have really great resumes in closing large deals or managing big, multi-million dollar opportunities. But they might not be the right personality or behavioral fit for a startup company that needs someone who can dig in the trenches — who can go after deals and hunt them.

Dedicated to increasing your sales!

While there’s no blueprint for start up sales success, there are certain consideration that every company should be aware of when building their teams.  Check out my podcast and the transcript at OpenView Labs.

Brendan Cournoyer is an excellent interviewer and regardless of your company’s maturity level you will learn something from this call about compensating sales reps , the key skill sets to target, the right time to hire a VP of Sales, and more.

Dedicated to increasing your sales!

Colleen

The secret behind the power of testimonials

Testimonials are a powerful component in your sales arsenal. But why are they so effective? The answers are in the lessons taught by legendary businessman W. Clement Stone—a skilled salesperson who built what would one day become a multi-billion dollar empire, selling fire-insurance policies door-to-door during the toughest years of the Great Depression.

There’s no denying that Clem’s people skills were big part of his success. He also had a little something extra—a binder overflowing with testimonials from his customers. Legend has it that that binder never left his side when he was knocking on all those doors. There was a good reason for that. It was chock full of stories—and not just happy accounts from people. It also told painful stories of those who had lost houses, farms and even loved ones to misfortune…and how relieved they were that, thanks to Clem, they had signed on the dotted line long ago, and were insured against loss.

Read any of the stories out of that binder, and it’s hard to imagine how anyone could ever say no to him!

That’s the amazing power of testimonials. They work because they humanize what is otherwise just another business transaction. They also reaffirm for others what you already know is true about the value of the product or service you are selling.

Dedicated to making this your best year yet

I always love to promote business with excellent sales practices. This time kudos goes to www.savvyselections.ca . This Ottawa based wine club gives you 3 options for participation and always offers an up sell (which I take!) on your package to take advnatge of a new, recently discovered or great deal wine for the region.

I love the fact I receive an email 2 days before delivery, delivery is always on time, and I receiving tasting notes for all the wine. Great work Debbie! It’s no wonder you are now the are the laregest wine club in Ontario! After all…What’s better than wine shipped directly to your office each month?

Sales lesson’s for you:

• How can you make buying from you easier?
• Are you inciting your buyers to an up sell or cross sell each time they place a order?
• Is your branding prominently labeled on each of your deliverables? (Documents, products, websites)
• Are you on time with your delivery?

August 18, 2011

For Immediate Release

Details:

Alan Weiss, PhD

401/884-2778

alan@summitconsulting.com

http://www.summitglobalnetwork.com

New Global Consulting Group Provides Dramatic and Diverse Capabilities

 A new network of outstanding global consulting practices, Summit Global Network™ (SGN), is providing outstanding results to hundreds of clients in dozens of countries. Founder Alan Weiss, PhD notes, “We’ve formed a coalition of longstanding, highly respected consulting practices with offices in over a dozen countries to bring the best practices of the entire body to bear on the individual client needs of any one member.”

Qualifications for membership include work with outstanding organizations willing to provide testimonials and endorsements; unique intellectual property and thought leadership; global applicability of approaches; and innovative, growth-oriented strategies. The average tenure of the 20 member firms is 18.5 years in business; over 90 books have been written by the principals and published; over 1,500 clients have been helped, including a range from Fortune 25 to small businesses governmental agencies, and nonprofits.

Members include:

The group’s capabilities include strategy, leadership, communications, change management, ethics, safety, cultural change, performance improvement, sales, marketing, organizational development, restructuring, mergers and acquisitions, training, finance, technology, psychology and counseling, coaching, accounting, and international business expansion, among other skills.

The network comprises scores of PhDs, MBAs, and university guest lecturers.

Awards include:

-      Consulting Magazine Top 25 Consultants in the World

-      Excellence Magazine Top 30 Leadership Development Firms Globally

-      Young President’s Organization “All Star” (highest honor)

-      Lifetime Achievement Award, American Press Association

-      National Speakers Association Hall of Fame

-      Fellow of the Institute of Management Consultants

-      Best Book Award winner.

-      Board of Governors, Grammy Awards.

-      Mentor Hall of Fame.

-      Web Marketing Association Web Award.

“We believe we’re the only global, growing network of its kind,” says Weiss, “representing the best of consulting expertise gathered from pragmatic work with some of the largest and best organizations in the world in all economies.”

Links to all members and their specialties can be found at http://www.summitglobalnetwork.com