quirky

Feeling unusually half-empty after this weekend’s World Cup disgrace.  After all that, what a waster Sven’s been for England.  If we did on sales campaigns what he did (or more importantly did not) do, we’d have been long since sacked. Best individuals don’t make the best

Learning about the First World War at school captured my imagination.   At The Somme [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Somme_(1916)], senseless slaughter along 40ks of frontline.  Almost one million combatants cut down.  One of the turning points in warfare. Many sales texts historically feature hints from

I always maintain to newbie sales people that avoiding getting distracted by other reps performance is vital. They must remember in most sales teams different financial targets have evolved, often dependent on experience, markets and products, so someone pulling in a $10m deal cannot be compared to a starter dealing

Having managed to sell beyond the shores of my birthplace, I’ve long held the belief that if you can sell in Blighty, you can make it anywhere.  The reason for this, is that the people left behind on our tiny islands tend to be, unlike the winners that colonised

Do you sell something that can be broken down into a small amount?  The classic is leasing or rental type sales.  Something where you can say it only costs x per minute.  The photocopier crowd have been doing it for years; “you gotta go for this, as it’s only

I met a total tosspot yesterday.  Full of self-importance, a total absence of rapport establishment capability, and a complete disregard for what really makes a difference to his sales guys.  We shall refer to him as “Gav”.  And I reckon if I was one of the dozen or so guys

We were nattering away in the office, before I remembered to crack the whip and ensure the Greek galleon continued on it’s smooth course, about forgetting to do one vital thing on a sales campaign, and as a result going from hero to zero, with sales figures falling. It

I’m not referring to littering your speech with expletives, but painting pictures with your words.  Eloquence is often bashed out of sales people, with language often ‘dumbed down’, with the accepted wisdom being clever big long words alienate any audience. I was quite chuffed to be praised by one

I’m involved in 3 sales cycles at the moment that are all suffering from the same distraction.  Jam Tomorrow is a phrase, the origins of which eluded me during those dark, pre-internet days.  In sales circles it simply refers to a hollow promise of more business to come, if

I was reminded of the difference in the approaches of the sexes to selling, when running through an ideal first meeting template with one of my new winners.  When I entered sales over 15 years ago now, it was a rare occurrence indeed to find girls with order pads, and