Dave Kurlan
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Did Your Salespeople Choose to Be in Sales?
- January 5, 2011
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Even if you reviewed as many resumes as I do each week you might not notice this: Most sales candidates did not have a sales position as their first job after college. Most started as something else and then, out of the blue, they were in sales, sales management, marketing, or business development. I always get suspicious when somewhere back in time a candidate went from Purchasing to Sales Management and never sold along the way…
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Top 10 Steps to Initiate Salespeople to Their Roles
- January 4, 2011
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Categories: Best Top 10 Lists, Understanding the Sales Force
This is exactly how to initiate salespeople, whether they are new to your company, new to their role, or new to sales. Don’t vary at all from the steps above. More importantly, don’t assume that because they have sold for 10 years they’ll know what to do or be able to do it effectively. Follow the steps!
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Top 3 Sales Lessons from Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker”
- December 20, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
During a first sales call, suppose your salespeople hear one prospect say, “This has been a very interesting and productive conversation and we might have some interest in this.” And imagine another prospect at the same meeting says, “We’ll get back to you next month and let you know what kind of progress we’ve made.” And still a third might say, “In the meantime, please send us a proposal with references and timeline.”
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How Christmas Gift Giving Mirrors the Ideal Sales Process
- December 15, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Categories: Sales Process, Understanding the Sales Force
If you understand that, then why do so many executives and salespeople, from all industries, still insist that the first thing they must do with a new prospect is present? Even the word “present” suggests waiting for the perfect time.
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Top 10 Outcomes That Should Come from Sales Coaching
- December 14, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Categories: Best Top 10 Lists, Understanding the Sales Force
When you coach a salesperson, which words should you hear that would tell you the session was effective?
Not “Thanks” or “OK”.
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What The Salesperson Saw (or Didn’t) – A Question about Sales Calls
- December 10, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
It’s one thing to have eyes, but our salespeople need to use them too. Typically, their mouths are moving so fast and so often, and the sound of their own voice is so compelling (to them), that their eyes are neutralized. This is similar to what happens on a long drive when you suddenly realize you drove 10 miles past your exit and have no idea how you got that far without noticing.
What do your salespeople miss on their sales calls?
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When it Comes to Compensation Sales is Not Like Baseball
- December 9, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Categories: Sales Compensation, Understanding the Sales Force
The other day a client asked whether salespeople can make the jump from earning $85K to a position that could pay them $150K.
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How to Determine if Your Sales Process is Effective
- December 8, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Categories: Sales Process, Understanding the Sales Force
Can you reverse engineer your sales calls?
OTHER THAN THE PART OF YOUR SALES CALL THAT INVOLVES PRESENTING, could you break down and explain, each step, strategy, tactic, question, response and milestone met, in the order they occurred, why they were chosen, and the resulting reaction of each occurrence, AFTER you’ve completed an entire sales cycle?
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Top 5 Success Factors for a Sales Training Initiative
- December 7, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Categories: Best Top 10 Lists, Understanding the Sales Force
If your company is about to begin a sales development initiative, do you know the factors that will determine its eventual success or failure? There are many and ultimately, like most systems and processes, they are only as good as the weakest link.
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Sales – It’s More Like Miss Universe Than the Olympics
- December 6, 2010
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
Sometimes I get the feeling that salespeople think that they are in the Olympics, where coming in second is OK. I hear things like, “At least we made the short list”, or “That will make them think about us next time”, or “If anything goes wrong they’ll call us first”, or, “Well now they know who we are”. But it’s not OK. Selling is more like Miss Universe. If you don’t win, you’ve lost!