Salespodder (Page 351)

More issues

Change For The Better

I just saw an interview with a former CEO of BP, John Browne, as part of his autobiography [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/7189896/Beyond-Business-by-Lord-Browne-a-review.html] PR. He was pressed in typically rolling-news-knock-everything fashion that going into business was surely solely about the pursuit of making

Most Simple Deals Work

On a slightly tangential note for us solution sellers, I came across an interview with a Swiss chap that founded a hotel chain [http://www.timeslive.co.za/business/article283722.ece]. A quarter of a century later, the firm has 50 hotels throughout S Africa. Always interested in company founders,

Prepare A Closing Vigil

Your deadline is Friday. It’s the end of the month, quarter, year. Everything is in place. You’ve been promised the deal, signatures, purchase order, deposit. Zero hour looms and Bang. One small thing is amiss. The person who can fix it is back in on Monday. What’s

Picture Your Prospects

I got a terrific wine rack, made from the staves of a Steenberg Merlot barrel by a Cape Town oak artisan [http://www.thatoak.co.za]. He spends most weekends in various shopping centres standing with a display of his craft. As I saw with my own eyes, his wares

TMI Over-rides Helpfulness

I was in an informal first-meet the other day. It lasted around half-an-hour in a coffee shop that offered that wonderful Zumex-enabled fresh orange juice I’m so fond of. The chap the ‘other side’ of the table was interested in one specific project, for which we had a neat

Reference Visit & Corporate Hospitality

I was judging presentations as part of a sales training exercise for a client when the first team up ended with a close routine suggesting the prospect be flown around the world to visit as a reference an undeniably aspirational location. The three following teams picked up on this and

Malcolm Gladwell - Blink

A main conclusion of this book should spark any solution seller into action: First impressions (and its sibling “rapid cognition”) are so powerful and so open to subconscious prejudice, that you must do all you can to control them in your favour. Apparently many of us are expert in a

Champion Losing It

Serena Williams is still on top of her game, yet looked down and out in her Aussie Open Quarter when four-love adrift to Victoria Azarenka in the second set, having also lost the opener. But somehow she turned it around to triumph 4-6, 7-6 (7/4), 6-2. As she walked

Standing Out For Good

A BBC News Hard Talk interview with Graham Poll turned up an interesting gem. He’s a former football ref who officiated at two World Cups. The questioner asked whether he shared the lay-man’s commonly held belief that a good referee is an invisible one. Poll replied that this

Mapping The Process

Whenever you first move into the seemingly murky world of solution selling, someone usually takes you to one side and suggests that the fog of war can be lifted by “mapping the process”. With specific regard to sign-off procedures, I had a reminder of this when recently helping out on