Topic

grapevine

A collection of 649 issues

Slow Economy Sales Boosts

Shame on me. My web 2.0 engagement is lamentably low. I clicked on an auto-LinkedIn mail the other day as dozens of people have apparently invited me to be ‘connections’. It’s been literally years since I ‘connected’ myself. I was delighted to find their Answers action still had

Leadership Myth Debunked

There’s an annual British Science Festival on at the moment. It slyly never fails to generate endless hours of material for afternoon radio phone-ins. One of this year’s headlines [http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/british-science-festival-2010] though happily had some decent meat to it from a sales perspective.

Tony Hsieh Service Excellence

One of the two biggest wastes of a new business salesperson’s time is post-signature firefighting. Similarly Account Managers hate having to be the frontman for delivery problem apologies. Zappos are an American-only billion dollar shoe etailer. Founded in 99 they are, according to the Bloomberg Venture show I saw

Psycho-Shopping TV Pitch

Mix the science of why people buy with the evangelic vigour of television reps and you get the optimum behavioural economic infomercial pitch. I know this via the FT’s deliciously irreverent Undercover Economist’s suggestion [http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/71796594-a9a4-11df-a6f2-00144feabdc0.html] of a perfect pitch based

Sales Chief Exec Memories

As you’ll gather from my blogsite straps, a wish I hold dear is for more sales people to become chief execs. Flicking through an old back-up drive from 2003, I discovered a document from a thoroughly engaging chap I knew back then called Paul Morris. In 2004/5 I

Most Revealing Sales Stats

Here’s the meat on a mailshot promoting a September seminar sponsored by a mindmap software house. The figures are credited to a CSO Insights survey on 2009 performance. > The percentage of salespeople making quota dropped from 58.8% to 51.5% last year. Despite this drop, 85% of

Nudge Choice Reminder

I’ve blogged about choice architecture and the joys of nudging before (in 2008 [http://salespodder.com/are-you-a-true-choice-architect/] & 2009 [http://salespodder.com/selling-and-the-prevention-paradox/]). For 2010’s reflection I’ve just come across four delicious further examples from a Brand Republic blogger [http://community.brandrepublic.com/blogs/dtb/archive/2010/

Continuous Partial Attention

I’ve long been contemptuous of people that break-off mid-conversation to answer a random mobile call. Similarly, anyone replying to an email the instant it lands for no other logic than it has just flashed on their screen I hold in equal disregard. The latest Economist Technology Quarterly highlights [http:

Top Sales Outfit Secrets

Here’s a steer from a recent Selling Power article. The writer contends that the following five traits [http://www.sellingpower.com/content/article.php?nr=1&a=3] identify a world class selling operation. How do you fare on these? > Buyer Enablement – your focus is client goals

Mangled Ericspeak

How not to pitch. I watched an American called Eric Daniels [http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/eric-daniels] on newsbites yesterday. He had reason to be cheerful. The banking giant he currently runs was bailed out by the UK Government to the tune of £20bn. A welcome change in fortune