Sales Blog for Sales and Sales Management

Guaranteed?  Only if you execute what is outlined below.  I'm sure you've been asked by a prospect if you can guarantee a product or service that you offer.  In the world of sales, that can be one of the toughest questions to answer.  When I am asked that question, I tell them "yes, if": if they can guarantee that they (the company or sales person) can guarantee that they will do everything that we teach them.  No one makes that guarantee. Here are my steps to guaranteed sales success for next year.  You do these things and you will succeed.

 

 

1. Take time to establish personal (not business sales goals) goals that you have to accomplish (non-negotiable). Set time lines for, and share these goals with people that will make sure you are doing everything possible to succeed.
2. Build a success formula (link to our resources) so that you can translate your personal goals and the associated income required into an action plan that, when executed, will allow you to reach your goals. (The key here is that you must know your business to arrive at the various critial converstion ratios from one sales step to the next.)
3. Report your sales activity results weekly (huddles)to someone that cares enough to congratulate you on success or coach you when you are failing.
4. Undertand that missing an activity target by just 1% is still failing.
5. Review your actual sales activity results monthly against your success formula assumptions and make adjustments if your are falling short in effort or execution requirements. 
6. Once you identify gaps in your performance, reach out and get professional coaching help from someone that can help you, not just coddle you.
7. Take responsibility.  Don't blame the economy, the competition or your company for failure.  You are in control of your own outcomes, good or bad.
8. Manage yourself to success.  Do not let yourself get sideways with tasks and activities that make you feel good at the expense of the hard stuff like prospecting.  Prospecting is the job. It is what separates you from account managers.
9. Reward yourself for success and establish consequences for failure.

Now is the time to start this process.  In most B to B sales environments, there is a sales cycle that takes more than 30 days.  Guess what?  What you do right now, today, determines your success in the next 30 days.  Start NOW!

 

Old Dogs - I may or may not be talking directly to you if you don't consider yourself an 'old dog'.  I am talking to you if you've adopted the perspective of 'I've been doing this a long time' and you no longer feel the need to learn new 'sales tricks'.

Sales Tricks - this really isn't about sales tricks.  It is about learning why what you do works or it is about remembering why what you do works.

Case in point - do this exercise - connect the nine dots using four lines.  Rules - you can't back track on a line, the lines must be straight and you cannot lift your writing implement off of the paper to start a new line.  (Will provide answer below)

Second case in point hits close to home.  My long time friend and once mentor has written a book with one of his heros, Art Linkletter.  It's called How to Make the Rest of Your Life the Best of Your Life.  I just started reading so I'm not sure what to get out of the book yet, but I did read the introductions by Art and Mark. Mark reminded me why I got into this business 16 years ago and why I need to pull my head out of my butt and stop worrying about getting old and tired.  I'm sure that, if you've been in your business long enough, you know what I'm talking about.  If  you've been in business ten years or less, then your day is coming.  

The most important concept in the introduction is this:  Growing older is not the same as getting old.  Simply put:  Make sure you continue to grow as you age. This one concept caused me to pull my head out, kick myself in the butt and ask myself, 'what the hell have you been thinking?'  My last thought when I finished the introduction was, 'Once again thanks, Mark, for having such a great impact on my life.'

You see, I met Mark several years ago in Cincinnati, and for a time of 3 to 4 years, we stayed in touch and I considered him a mentor.  I was with him driving from Louisville to Cincinnati when he discussed the idea of 'Chicken Soup for the Soul'.  He couldn't get Campbell's Soup to play so he did it on his own, and well, you know the rest of the story.

The rest of my story today is this. Take time to learn new stuff or relearn the old stuff.  Bottom line is to keep yearning, learning and you'll keep earning.

Here is the solution to the puzzle that I'm sure you have seen before but have forgotten.

 

 

 

I've just finished reading two blog post by two very reputable authors:

Dave Kurlan from Objective Management Group and Michael Webb from Six Sigma Selling.  Here are the discussion topics as I read them. Michael is talking about the importance of having an effective sales process that meets the needs of your objectives in the current economic environment.  And Dave talks about the importance of being able to execute as a crucial element to success.  Which is more important?

My vote is for "the ability to execute."  Not because Dave is a friend of mine, but because strategy (i.e. process) is not important unless you can execute.  George Patton said that he would rather execute on a poor plan today rather than wait to execute a perfect plan (paraphrasing). Even if you had a perfect strategy- say, like hitting the ball down the fairway with a right to left draw- if you fail to execute, the strategy itself is useless.  You have to have the ability to execute. What does that take?

• Personal goals that are non-negotiable
• Desire - passion to succeed
• Commitment - willingness to do everything possible to succeed
• Accountability - inspection of what you expect
• Skill - ability

If you have these 5 key ingredients, then even your average strategy or plan will get you results.

I've made them, and if you are honest, you've made excuses when not making sales calls and not hitting sales targets.  Now when I talk about sales targets, I'm talking about the ones that you've set for your own personal satisfaction.  And if your goals for you are bigger than the company's goals for you, well, that is the first problem, but I'll address that another time. (goal setting)

As sales people, we can be very creative in identifying why we fail to execute and today we have a built-in reason: that is the headline news story in every media.

The economy!

I just attended a conference where Al Torrisi took the group through an exercise to help shed light on the reality of the current state of the economy as it relates to generating sales revenue.

• 1. Identify your geographic area.
• 2. What is the normal sales revenue is generated in your geographic area?
• 3. What are the factors negatively impacting sales?
• 4. How much should you discount normal revenue based on these economic factors?
• 5. What is the gap between the normal sales revenue and the discounted revenue?
• 6. Do you own 100% of the market that is left?

If not, then that is the business you need to go after.  It is out there; you just have to work a little harder because the market has indeed shrunk, but it didn't go away.  This can be your best year ever if you decide to participate in this time of economic opportunity.