If you want to make more sales, you should be following up fewer people. Wait! Hang on!  I keep hearing that sales is a numbers game. Let me share a story with you that may have you seeing the truth in the above. One of my first sales roles was selling software over the phone. I started out a bit wobbly, it took me a full month to close my first sale. (The rule in Read More

What is one of the least effective questions a sales manager can ask when trying to measure sales performance?  ‘What sales do you have coming in?’ If you just heard yourself ask that question in the last week.  Stop it now! That is like asking a professional sports team what score they will have at the end of the game.  They know what they are going for, but it totally depends on how well they play the Read More

A big mistake that companies make in sales is not bothering to take the time to think about the best way to position what they are selling, creating a sales script for it and practicing their pitch. Sounds obvious right? Business owners and salespeople constantly surprise me by not taking the time to: Develop a succinct way of explaining what they do and who they help, Practice what questions they will ask in a sales Read More

What happens when there is uncertainty about the next step in the sales process? Nothing – slow to no sales, no control of the sale, elongated sales cycles and management unable to ask anything more intelligent than “What sales have you got coming in?” I was once asked to help a company raise their sales through sales training. They wanted to make more sales. Simple, right? So, the first thing I did was interview all Read More

Yep, that’s what I was told. Let me tell you the story. I was speaking with a potential client recently and they told me with a great deal of emotion that salespeople are a waste of f&*#king money. Of course, I was intrigued and asked what he meant and he went on to tell me that they have employed a few in the past, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars for no result. My next Read More

Most us know that recruiting the wrong salespeople can have a devastatingly negative impact on your business. Carrying the costs involved with hiring the individuals – advertising, recruiting and induction – can be problematic. Especially if you have to provide for these costs again if the new hire does not work out. An employee that’s the wrong fit may also come with hidden costs. Think about the hours of wasted time and loss of productivity Read More

In this story, I will take you through how a client of mine was able to follow up a client for 10 months and eventually win the business without being a pain in the arse. Oh, and the last 6 of those months he received no response to emails or phone calls. So, if you want to learn exactly how you can win more business stay tuned. Last year, my client got the opportunity to Read More

Are you frustrated that your sales team are under performing or your business is not growing as quickly as you would like? I want to tell you the story of how David (not his real name) seemed to hit a ceiling relating to the number of effective salespeople he could have in his business, causing sales to flatten and frustration to take over. David was frustrated that he was not able to continue to grow Read More

I had an ex-employee phone me recently to ask for some advice about a business idea that she had and was considering investing a considerable amount of time and money into. I’m happy to help my friends so we talked it through for about 20 minutes. The conversation was along the lines of understanding what the first steps are to turn it from an idea to a product that the market might actually want. I Read More

I will let you in on a secret: I am not a confident person; I get awkward and embarrassed very easily and I care about others opinions way more than I should. How does a person who is racked with self-doubt become a salesperson? The realisation that I can be better and then doing something about it. There are 4 stages of mastery: 1. Unconscious Incompetence – I don’t know what I don’t know 2. Read More