Articles for Sales Management Professionals

Most sales reps only think and plan one move ahead with their accounts. Your goal as their coach is to help them extend their thinking into multiple-stepped plans to help improve their effectiveness and account control.

At Special Olympics there is a culture and belief exemplified through their athlete’s oath of “Let me win. But if I cannot win, let me be brave in the attempt.” Are you as gracious with your strongest competitors?

Are your customers really aware of everything you sell? How often are your salespeople hearing “I didn’t know you did that!” from your prospects or customers?

Service has evolved over the last 15 years. Are your current service levels really helping increase your competitive advantage?

What steps are you teaching your team? There are five steps of a sales call...

When a customer complains, are your team members asking “What did we do?” (A “Single Enterprise” approach) or “What did they do?” (A “Siloed” approach)?

Most reps can talk about how they save a buyer money. But collapse when asked to prove on paper why paying more with you will save them money. 

Product knowledge is the first level of competitive awareness. Knowing their features and benefits compared to what you sell. 90% of all reps have strong product competitive awareness.

As a sales consultant, I evaluate a lot of sales territories and selling efforts. I’ve found the average rep has over half their territory exposed due to only having one contact.