Salespodder (Page 418)

More issues

Is Cold Calling Beneath You?

I’ve done a couple of meetings with a 3-rep business recently that’ll never buy from us, eventhough they’d really benefit from my services. They were the first entrant into the English search engine optimisation arena a decade ago. Last time out I met the MD, fresh from

Always Room For Another Diet

I spoke earlier today with a fella that seems courted by the likes of Microsoft and salesforce.com as an SaaS guru (that’s software-as-a-service, or web-accessed gear if you prefer). He made an interesting comment that people running sales teams are possibly the most put-upon, miserable people on the

Familiarity Breeds Success

Got stuck for a while in a reception this morning. Among the drivel of z-list celeb mags was a publication called Psychologies. When viewing the contents the horror of my perception was confirmed, as it looked like a long list of self-help rubbish for losers. My thumb-through uncovered one gem

Adversity Shows True Character

Simon Jordan is a familiar name to those that follow footie in England. Now Chairman of Crystal Palace, he made his money upon leaving mobile phone retail innovator The Carphone Warehouse to set up his own mobile phone shop chain, and being so early into the market, eventually sold out

Words To Avoid

Two valuable learning experiences I gained in the mid-90s alerted me to the over-formality of sales letter writing. The first involved a sales manager of mine commenting that I was too structured at the beginning of a letter. Saying things that didn’t need saying. As a result, I altered

Work hard for your money?

I’ve suffered the displacing emotion of buying a few things recently. For most categories of service/product I’m after, I can run a beauty parade. One such pagent led me to a young fella called ‘Kev’ on England’s south coast. I called him up first, he confirmed

Ditch Competitor Pricing Obsessions

A customer of mine’s just distributed one of their smaller, niche competitor’s price list around their sales team. The guy who obtained it got all excited and thought it’d help them beat up the young whipper-snappers more. I’ve never been able to see this. These people

Ever Seen A Baby Pigeon?

One of my friends in Cape Town hails from the mysterious luvvy infested world of advertising. A place filled with murkiness I cannot fathom, she told me of an event last week with a English speaker. He was a copy-writer from agency Young & Rubicon in London, who’d enjoyed

Proposal Presentation Approaches

I’ve recently got delegated a new role, that of Purchasing Manager 🙂 where I’m poacher turned gamekeeper and am actually out buying some stuff. All a bit new to me, it’s looking to get some creative and technical work done. What’s interesting is that I’ve had

Natalie's Winning Direction

Went along to a swish sports awards bash last night in Cape Town, where the guest speaker wasNatalie Du Toit [http://www.nataliedutoit.com/]. Now (somehow) I’d not heard of her before, and it turns out she’s a total hero. A potential Olympian swimmer already aged 16ish, a