sales performance

  • Sales Success is Like Making Great Tasting Soup

    • November 3, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Sales success is no more about any one competency than great-tasting soup is about one ingredient.  If you omit one ingredient, like salt, the soup will taste bland.  If you omit one competency, like Qualifying, your sales effectiveness will suffer.  While you can’t leave one ingredient out of the soup, it’s also not possible to make soup by focusing on and including only one ingredient.  Likewise, with sales, you can’t expect to succeed, dominate your market, and celebrate your results if you focus on and include only one of the competencies on my list.  

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  • Are Salespeople Also Joggers?

    • September 26, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    As I drove to work today, I passed 4 joggers, all with different styles, paces and appearances.  As usual, I saw the similarities between what I observed and the sales profession.

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  • Starting with the Sales Management Team – Is it a Bad Decision?

    • August 21, 2014
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Companies typically have 5 reasons for starting with the sales managers:

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  • Top 5 Mistakes Salespeople Make When Under Pressure

    • August 11, 2014
    • Posted by: Kurlan & Associates, Inc.
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Before I unveil the top 5 mistakes, you might be interested to know that last week, Top Sales World Magazine went from monthly to weekly. I was featured on the cover, but I’m most hopeful that everyone will read Jonathan Farrington’s interview with me. He got me to be very outspoken about what’s taking place right now in our industry and I believe that everyone will benefit from reading it.

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  • Sales Lessons from Baseball’s 2013 World Series

    • October 29, 2013
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Instead of bad or wrong calls and decisions, I believe that it’s critical to frame decisions that don’t go our way as tough decisions rather than bad or wrong decisions.  “Bad” is a judgment and leads to debate, while “tough” forces us to move on to lessons learned and action steps.  It is far more productive.

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  • Top 5 Insights From Latest Sales Organization Studies

    • February 7, 2013
    • Posted by: Kurlan & Associates, Inc.
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    The folks over at IKO Systems were nice enough to send me a collection of infographics which they call 66 Crazy Sales Figures. I finally had a chance to read through it and found 5 sales figures which, after I combined them, are quite interesting:

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  • Dan Pink Hits and Then Misses the New Key to Sales Performance

    • February 6, 2013
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Why do brilliant people, like Dan Pink, look at research and then reach faulty conclusions?   

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  • 10 Keys to Solving the Sales Performance Issue

    • October 22, 2012
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Your kids won’t eat their vegetables, your parents won’t listen to you, your suppliers won’t provide customer service excellence, the President (as of 10-22-2012) of the United States can’t get the economy going, your football team isn’t winning enough games and the majority of your salespeople are underperforming.  You have no control over the football team or the economy, you may have given up on your kids and parents, you can switch suppliers, but what can you do about your salespeople?

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  • Targeting Sales Opportunities – The Hidden Truth

    • September 10, 2012
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    We frequently discuss reasons why salespeople fail, the differences between successful and unsuccessful salespeople, and scenarios where salespeople make good versus bad choices.  Those aren’t the only topics which separate good selling from bad.  Salespeople make other decisions which impact the likelihood for success and today’s article takes a look at one of those.

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  • What Leads to Salespeople Underperforming?

    • July 16, 2012
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Doesn’t it drive you mad when terrific, yet underperforming salespeople, take time off for their car to be serviced, to bring their pets to the vet, to spend time with visiting family members, to work out of the house, when they feel under the weather, to meet a with a contractor, for the dentist, for their annual physical, etc?  Take a vacation – no problem – but if you’re not on vacation, then work for crying out loud!  

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