academy

Was in a customer near Shakespeare’s birthplace and met a decent chap called Richard now selling the best drinks dispense systems into the pub retail trade for the past seven months.  One of the sales teams aim is to talk business issues with senior execs rather than delivery ones

What a winner these are.  I got reminded of them today when a prospect left me a message on my voice mail.  Called Kevin, and MD of a £30m+ sales progressive lighting company, he mentioned he hoped to gain an “amber light” off his Chief Exec upon returning from America.

The best part of my day-job (after knowing someone’s buying from me to make their lot a happier one!) is that I get to speak to sales people about what they do and how they think.  Wednesday saw an introduction to a Welshman called Martin, seeking how his ten-strong

Heard this wonderful expression from a seller inside a customer of mine that’d been there for 20+ years.  The “shout down the corridor” is where you propose something, and you leave thinking the deal is as good as done.  Afterwards, your contact asks their boss whether the money can

Here’s a wonderful gem unearthed when I spoke Wedensday with a fella that’d been selling for his present (multinational blue-chip) employers since 1969.  Originally from Doncaster, he was dropped off in the middle of Edinburgh by his boss (from Leeds apparently) with a load of samples and told

Anyone remember “TQM”?  If you do, relax, Total Account Management in the terms I’ve recently discovered it has nothing to do with such early-90s Quality drives.  ‘Phew’ I can hear you sigh.  Steady on, though, as some TQM problem solving techniques are awesome and deserve a second-chance…..but I

Britain is in the grip of collective trauma after a three-year old toddler’s abduction from an Algarve holiday apartment.  The local police force face a barrage of complaint from The Fourth Estate, as the Portugese authorities don’t do communication.  At best bizarre, at worst inexcusable, this outdated behaviour

Over lunch I read an American article on presentation lessons for software demonstrators that could ‘have prospects buying without even asking the price’.  Trying hard to contain my drooling, I did note there was one good point among the seven steps proposed. Apparently, prospects get overwhelmed with more than two

The mention of IBS may send a teenager into fits of sniggers, but in the context of sales, I discovered the other day it can stand for Initial Benefit Statement. Hanging around in a conference room for a meeting to start, I couldn’t help but notice a few sheets