Colleen’s Blog

I've stopped more than one CEO in their tracks when I've heard them utter this phrase: "I need you to fix a sales problem I have." Doing the fixing is not what I do.

I was recently with a group of sales leaders and one of them admitted that he had sales reps who didn't use CRM. And this sales leader was from a top-performing company with around 40-50 reps who are consistently over their targets both from a volume and margin perspective. While it was commendable that he was willing to admit that his sales reps had CRM deficiencies, it's a shame that those salespeople were not using a tool that would make them much more effective.

I was recently talking to a sales rep who told me he had not taken a vacation in 5 years. I could tell by the tone of his voice that he saw it as a badge of honor and was bragging about it. I stopped him and told him that it's not a badge of honor to never take some time off. In fact, it's a sign that you are highly inefficient if you feel you can't go away for a few days—let alone a few weeks—and have everything fall out from underneath you. It's also a sign of a really unhealthy ego if you think that your business and your client will fall apart if you go away. You believe that you are the only thing that is holding the territory together. Stop it.

It's impossible to create a non-stop sales boom in your organization with a high turnover rate. Have you thought about how to reduce it on your sales team?

Far too many sales teams underperform because they have underperforming sales reps in the team. These sales reps need to be replaced. Additionally, another reason for a sales team's poor performance is that one of the top sales performers left, resulting in a drastic loss. Both of those are issues that sales leaders have to address on a proactive basis.

Most of my clients are in traditional businesses: commodities, manufacturing, aerospace, and finance. Businesses and business reps that have a long history in the market have been successful because of relationships. When you spend 30 years in your territory selling to the same customers and buyers, you have a good relationship with those customers. You see those businesses grow, thrive, and flourish as a result of your work. However, recently, we've been helping some of those clients of mine reposition the way they are thinking about relationships.

I recently talked to a CEO whose sales were down $16 million. That represented a 20% decrease from the prior year. Thus, they were concerned. I asked him, "What would your sales VP tell me if I asked why your sales were down." He replied, "Our biggest customer that represents the vast majority of that loss is in flux. They pivoted their business and, as a result, they're not buying from us right now. We think it's going to pick up, but we are not sure."

Summer is not an excuse to stop selling. You don't have to give in to the idea that there are no sales to be made in July and August.

You may have noticed this interesting trend... Lost deals tend to be the same ones that stagnate during the proposal phase.

I'm currently working on a large project where I work closely with several sales managers. Unfortunately, I have been disappointed with their managerial qualities. This is because they don't practice coaching and exhibit leadership—skills that all of these sales managers are more than capable of displaying. However, instead, they make excuses, hang on to existing customers, and get engaged in customer service or delivery work—work that isn't their primary responsibility. As a result, their sales team suffers.