Colleen Francis is the Sales Leader - providing businesses with sales assessments, sales strategy design, sales training, sales coaching and speaker that delivers immediate and lasting sales results. Again for 2013 Colleen has been named to the OpenviewTop 25 Sales Influencers.

Sales Webinar - When you become your customer's trusted advisor who they look to without concern to competition or price, you have achieved sales nirvana. You have to have a well thought out plan to systematically work through the decision makers and influencers to gain this coveted position with your client.

Measuring your sales pipeline as percentage complete, as opposed to probability of close, will give you a more accurate number for your sales forecast and a more complete picture of your future sales.

Traveling is great way to observe the best and the worst in sales and customer service. Here are a very highlights (and low lights) from May.

Here is a new interview with me and Lattice Engines on the power of referrals and cross selling.

In rethinking the sales process this way, every step of the process represents a set of tasks or activities that have to be complete in order to move the deal through the pipeline. It’s no longer the probability of close—a subjective opinion from the sales rep—but the percentage complete in the sales cycle—an objective statistic based on facts.

AND IT WORKED AWESOME!

In this week’s article at Engage we show you an easy adjustment you can make to ensure revenue predictability. After you read it test your knowledge with the Quiz. I’ll be curious to know. Did you get the answer right or wrong?

Here is what I discovered during my 42nd year:

Too often when looking at a sales team’s success, managers only look at the actual sales (the closing of the business). Of course, this is important—but the sale is a lagging indicator. If you have no sales closing today, it indicates that your team has not been performing well for months. By the time you’re at the point of no business, you’re already well into trouble. In fact, you are at the point of no return.

Sales people hear it all the time: “ABC. Always be closing.” But as a sales leader I’d recommend that you adopt a slightly different mantra for yourself: “ABR: Always be recruiting.”

During a museum tour I found myself in JP Morgan’s office and I couldn’t resist (with permission from the security guard of course) to take this picture at his desk. Can you imagine all the ideas that flowed across it? All the companies that were formed here? All the contracts that were signed?