Technology has a long and storied history of over-promising and under-delivering. How paperless is your office today? Despite not yet achieving the paperless office, making ongoing process efficiency improvements is the real promise technology holds. If you think about it, paper is simply an output. Someone makes the decision to click print. The real process burden, and laborious time suck are the inputs. In the sales process for instance leads and prospects still have to find their way into the system.
Complicate for Profit, Simplify for Action.
“To earn a fortune in the diet and exercise industries, there is a dictum: complicate to profit. To grow, however, you need to simplify.” Tim Ferriss, “The 4-Hour Body” The same principle applies to Enterprise Software, the more complicated it is, the higher the consulting fee can be. Which is a win for shareholders but [...]
Continue reading...5 steps to effective messaging
The reality is that you have something to sell. Yet much to your chagrin not everyone is buying what you’re selling. Effective communication isn’t rocket science. But in many cases it’s entirely possible that your key messages are getting completely lost in translation. Too witty, too cute, too puffy, too shallow, no story, no value [...]
Continue reading...Going to a Trade Show? Leave the Gimmicks at Home and Get Down to Business
It’s pretty tough being in the sales business and not having to attend a trade show or two in the run of a year. It’s all about wheeling and dealing, schmoozing and boozing, and trying to outshine the competition.Trade shows exist on a spectrum from the Las Vegas extravaganza to the Springfield county fair. No [...]
Continue reading...Don’t let churn burn down your business.
You ring the bell, pop the cork, crack a cold one, or at least toss out a few high fives with every win. Celebrating the sales wins is easy because you’ve usually endured being on the losing end a disproportionate number of times. Once you’re over that fleeting sense of jubilation, consider how hard you [...]
Continue reading...What is the best way to track outside salespeople?
Someone on Quora recently asked this question, here are my thoughts on the subject: TL;DR: Track performance, not the location of your reps – you pay for their performance not their time. Two questions to ask yourself: Are my outside sales reps hitting their performance targets? Do I trust that they are acting in the best [...]
Continue reading...Communicating value always resonates…
Consumers, customers, clients, and prospects are more educated about making their purchasing decisions than ever before. Be it a big ticket item, such as a home, new car, appliances, or even a vacation, down to everyday purchases to fill the pantry, stock the liquor cabinet, download a new business productivity app or game for sheer [...]
Continue reading...7 questions to ask yourself – and your employees – before buying a CRM system
Full disclosure: We sell CRM or Customer Relationship Management Software @ www.voltageCRM.com. This post is about CRM, but the ideas here are applicable to anything you are buying or selling. One of the questions people always ask me is, “how are you different?“. It’s an important question and I can see why they think it’s important… [...]
Continue reading...One word on the path to success…
“do or do not, there is no try” -Yoda How often do you catch yourself saying “I’ll try”? One of these words is keeping you from achieving real success. The performance gap between saying “I’ll try” and saying “I will” is really the chasm of failure. “I’ll try” gives you an excuse to fall short [...]
Continue reading...Defining the Sales and Marketing Funnel: Prospects, Leads, Opportunities, & Clients
There always seems to be a good amount of confusion around the terminology used in the Sales and Marketing funnel and CRM systems. We’ve written this article to help clarify the terms used in the Sales and Marketing funnel by looking at the steps in each funnel as well as a potential customers buying process. [...]
Continue reading...Ask, and ye shall receive
It’s the rarest of occurrences that a sales professional finds themselves drinking from the perpetual fountain of leads. Seriously the phone is ringing off the hook, and the inbox is full of highly qualified leads is the stuff that sales fairy tales are made of. If anyone tells you sales are an easy gig, and [...]
Continue reading...Storytelling is the great sales differentiator…
You’re hitting the sales trail with a great product. It’s a winner, in terms of design; the look, feel, and overall aesthetic will dazzle. Most importantly it will solve a problem, and help clients grow the top line. The product development team hit a home run. The marketing team has done their part, the buzz [...]
Continue reading...Win the influencers, and win the business.
When buying decisions have wide impact on an organization, in most cases it’s not simply one person’s decision. You might know who the ultimate decision maker is, but do you know who they’ll be consulting with in the organization? How many stakeholders have the ear of Mr. “The Buck Stop Here”? Of course you want [...]
Continue reading...What is CRM anyway?
I’ve been thinking a lot about a post I wrote back in December titled 4 Key Sales Tools you Shouldn’t Live Without* and it really got me thinking about the core functionality of a “Really Good CRM” and how one would go about even evaluating one. First, let’s start with some definitions…
Continue reading...The first question you should ask a potential customer…
It can be music to the ears when a client or prospect says, “I think I’m ready to make a decision”. But how did we end up there? Let’s step back for a moment and look at the first conversation you should be having with every client…
Continue reading...