Rnordman

The business world is filled with proclamations. Usually these proclamations have to do with how businesses describe themselves. The word “leading” is often used. You have seen many of them. Companies often describe themselves as the “leading provider” of something. Do buyers see them in the same way?

Going To Market

Going to market today is a harder than ever before. Plenty of time, resources, and energy are spent to devise strategies, game plans, and tactics to win in the marketplace. If we were to do a reflective look back on why some succeeded or failed in their efforts, buyer perceptions would be a part of the findings. Oftentimes, research found companies went to market based on what they thought, not what buyers were thinking.

Overall marketing and sales effectiveness can hinge on buyer perceptions. If the starting point is an incorrect and assumptive perception, all the time, resources, and energy will not matter. Efforts can be doomed from the start. Here is a case in point:

A technology company I consulted with believed wholesale changes were needed in their sales force. Since products and services were becoming more sophisticated, they believed sales engineers could supply the level of expertise needed while they would hire more “hunters” versus “farmers” to accelerate growth. This backfired. In a two-year period, sales plummeted. Why? Because buyers had a perception of the existing sales force as smart and being expert advisors. Which, translated into their overall perception into why they chose to do business with this technology firm. The new moves created a perception of abandonment and a perception the company’s competitors cared more.

Hard Lessons

As you can see, the company committed to a shift in their go-to-market strategy and approach. Keep in mind, while content and inbound marketing has grown, there are still many technology industries highly reliant on face-to-face interaction. This situation being one of them. This organization learned valuable lessons the hard way. Here are three:

Invest in Knowing Your Buyer Perceptions

Knowing what your customers and prospect buyers think of your company is becoming not just critical but a lifeline to survival today. Companies will need to invest in using outside help and resources to learn what, how, and why their customers and prospects have developed certain perceptions. With buyer behavior changing rapidly, buyer perceptions are subject to major shifts within shorter time periods.

Understand Comparisons To Competitors

I have seen many go-to-market strategies based on the faulty assumption of superiority over competitors. Internal thinking about how products or services are superior over competitors may be true. However, it matters little if buyer perceptions are of the contrary. Insights about the perceptions buyers have of your company, compared to competitors, can be revealing about how you currently stack up. With technology being the great equalizer, competitors may be small but in the eyes of your competitors – they may be big.

Understand Brand Perceptions

On a personal level, we have all heard a description of someone we know. And, we usually respond by saying he or she is nowhere near like that! It happens in business too. Customers and prospect buyers can develop perceptions about the characteristics and attributes of brands, which bear little resemblance to reality. There are many reasons why it can happen. The important thing to know is if it did happen. Brand perception can shift overtime or almost instantaneously depending on external events. For example, brand perception is quite volatile in the financial and energy sectors right now. They cannot be ignored or swept under the rug.

To acquire understanding in these three areas of buyer perceptions, companies can do so with buyer insight research. Buyer insight research can provide the unbiased and objective means for acquiring the insights you need about buyer perceptions. Utilizing a technique associated with buyer mental modeling, which is the interpretation of insights on attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions. Revealing the crucial link to how buyers truly think.

Not knowing what your buyers think, how they think, and why they have formed the perceptions they have can put an organization at a significant disadvantage. Even worse, if left unheeded, inaccurate perceptions become so entrenched – they transform into entrenched reality. In which, a company can find itself battling to shift so it may survive.

(Schedule time with me and a conversation to help you understand how your buyers think. I am very interested in getting your thoughts and perspectives on how buyer perceptions may be shifting. Please share widely – your peers and colleagues are wondering what their buyers are thinking.)

 

Keeping up to date on the latest innovations and opinions in sales can be time-consuming, especially in the the digital space. Sales Sphere features relevant blog articles from PointClear's online B2B sales circles.

 

The Rise Of Inside Sales Is Shaking Up The Sales Pipeline

“The most successful organizations are realizing the vision of sales 2.0, by using the data, metrics and predictability that inside sales has always been known for,” says Anneke Seley, CEO of Reality Works Group. The role of inside sales continues to expand and rise in prominence. Learn how to tailor your inside sales conversation. Via DemandGen Report

Ninety-Nine Tips for Prospecting SMBs

In this free download from Radius, 24 sales industry experts weigh in on how to master prospecting. The focus of this ebook is to help salespeople create a healthy pipeline by organizing, identifying, and engaging with prospects. The insights shared can be applied to your sales organization today. Via Radius

Do You Know Your Millennial Customers

Today's digitally raised generation are quickly becoming the customers and sales reps we interact with every day. Lori Richardson asks the question, “Do you attract a younger demographic for employment, partnering, and as new customers?” If not, now is the time to take a good look at your business model and make the needed adjustments to adapt to the upcoming generation of consumers and employees. Via Score More Sales

9 Tactics Turn Referrals Into Rock Solid Relationships

A good referral contributes to sales and toward building lasting business relationships. A referral means you have respect and confidence in the person, service, or solution that is being offered. The 9 tips shared in this article can help you learn how to become the type of person that attracts referrals—the ultimate compliment in business. Via Small Business Trends

Do you have a resource from your sphere to share? Let us know in the comment section.

Andy Paul "The best sales pros know every detail of every sales opportunity off the top of their heads without looking at their CRM records."

Client retention is critical to a business’s success. Over the years, I have had a long, profitable relationship with several clients. It’s important for inside sales reps to not only believe in what they’re doing for themselves and for their company, but for their client’s best interest as well. Having a customer-oriented approach builds longer term relationships. But what does customer-oriented mean? How do you develop and maintain that relationship between clients? Below are a few tips I have found successful while engaging with clients:

1. Communicate openly, honestly and clearly with other inside sales reps, field reps and managers.

It’s important for inside sales reps to communicate each week, each few weeks, or as needed, with field reps and managers, detailing their experiences while prospecting. This means communicating with other reps on the team, Directors of Client Operations and managers, and clients in client meetings or phone calls. If the client has questions or concerns that need to be addressed immediately, inside sales reps should take initiative and bring them up promptly with the appropriate party before it becomes an issue. Here’s a breakdown of advice for communicating with these parties:

At client level: If there are roadblocks to being successful in a particular industry or with accounts you’re calling into, it’s important to be honest and direct about what you’re facing in the client call. The client may have insight on specific objection handling that we may not be aware of, or may have ideas on how to tweak what we’re working with to fit what is needed to be successful on the project.

At rep level: Some reps have been working in a particular area for many years. If a rep doesn’t know something specific about a product or solution, they should ask. Many reps are flattered to have someone tap into their expertise. It shows that the inside sales rep is interested in self-improvement and that he or she is truly engaged and thinking about conversations with potential customers. Reps may also be more prone to trust and to take an opportunity if they see and respect how much went into finding it.

At manager level: Having regular meetings with DCOs and MCOs outside of the client meeting can help prepare for bringing something new to a client. My DCO has an open-door policy. He expects me to come up with a potential solution before I come to him for advice and to focus on what can be done and what we can work with, not what can’t be changed. If something is needed, ask.

2. Ensure that the client sees your process and effort if there are no immediate results.

Sharing minor successes and good conversations you’ve had with a rep, or patterns you’ve come across while prospecting with the client, is a good way to show your client that you’re still working hard, even if opportunities aren’t immediately present. It allows the client to see what potential opportunities may be available later, and can give visibility into if you’re hitting the right areas.

3. Be consistent in the quality of your work. 

Passing a ton of leads is great. Consistently finding opportunities that move along to next steps, eventually close and meet your client’s strategic vision is better. I would never pass a potential opportunity to my reps that I wasn’t proud of. I’ve found that discussing the opportunity briefly via phone instead of just sending a lead write-up adds a personal touch and allows for deeper communication. The rep always knows what they’re going into before the call, and knows I’ll be asking for feedback after.

4. Be flexibile, willing to stick with what works and avoid what doesn’t.

I’ve been fortunate enough to work in a territory where as long as I’m hitting certain parameters I can call into any account that may be a good fit. It also allows me to strike while the iron is hot if someone has an active initiative. I can see whether or not my client is already engaged with a potential customer through an extensive do-not-call list. The ability to self-manage where applicable allows inside sales reps to be much more involved while prospecting, and may produce opportunities a client had not thought of before.

As you can see, it’s all about maintaining the relationship between you and the client. How do you recommend retaining clients? How have your best inside sales reps maintained accounts? Please share in the comments below! 

 

Prospecting can be difficult, especially without a large budget to put towards fancy tools with bells and whistles your small company doesn’t need.

Which is what makes free tools so beneficial.

Next Wednesday, OpenView labs is hosting a webinar outlining the top six free prospecting tools you need to use. On September 4th, at 12 PM ET, this interactive webinar will walk through six free tools that you can use to get ahead in today’s marketplace. Over 45 minutes, you’ll be shown:

• Where and how to access these six great tools
• The power of using web data to boost your team’s performance
• Best practices for how to successfully implement and integrate these tools into your current prospecting process

So who will be there?

The webinar is hosted by Devon McDonald and Cece Bazar of OpenView Labs, as well as SalesLoft’s own Kyle Porter.

Devon McDonald

Devon is Director of Sales and Marketing Support at OpenView Partners, and works directly with key stakeholders to provide repeatable and scalable marketing and sales processes.

CeCe Bazar

A sales and marketing consultant at OpenView Partners, Cece works with the teams portfolio companies to provide value through add-ons and operating expertise.

Kyle Porter

CEO of SalesLoft, Kyle aims to provide sales tools that generate higher response rates from customers & build effective lists of leads.

–

Sign up below to learn about these free and efficient prospecting tools.

In my last article about shortening your sales cycle, I revealed the first five tips for getting to the close faster. I covered:

I. Thou Shalt Present a Crisp, Clear Value Proposition

II. Thou Shalt Talk to the Right Person

III. Thou Shalt Uncover the Prospect’s Aspirations and Afflictions

IV. Thou Shalt Engender Trust and Confidence in Your Company

V. Thou Shalt Deal With Objections Early On

In this article, I’ll finish the list of commandments with the next five ways to shorten your sales cycle...

Co-founder of nonprofit Practice Makes Perfect dishes on what he wished he would have known before joining an accelerator.

Technology buying decisions made by small businesses are influenced more by attitudes and beliefs than by demographic factors such as industry, revenue, and years in business, according to a recent report from Infusionsoft. Read the full article at MarketingProfs

Sharon Drew Morgen Buyers already have work-arounds to manage what your solution does. They will only buy if they avoid disruption. http://ht.ly/ol2sh

Here are a few truths and myths that the best sales teams understand better than the rest:

Myth 1: The Best Sales People Can Sell Anything

While the best sales people can apply their skills from one industry to the next, it’s ridiculous to expect a sales professional to sell something they know nothing about. Furthermore, even the most successful sales people have met a deal they weren’t able to close and lock down. Different situations call for different approaches. That’s the key piece of the puzzle that the best sales teams recognize and understand.

Myth 2: Great interviews make great sales people

Sales people are usually great at selling themselves, even when they won’t be as great at selling your product. I personally believe that interviews should be a small part of hiring members of a sales team. Reference checks as well as the candidate’s validated history and relationships are a better predictor of success than anything that you’re told in an interview.

Myth 3: Technology Can Replace Sales Professionals

The best sales teams aren’t afraid of technology. Instead, they embrace technology as they can see the value it plays in making them more effective and more efficient. The best sales teams look for sales software and technologies that will help them do their job better as a unit. It’s this passion to becoming better and striving for greatness that truly differentiates those who thrive and those who merely survive.

Myth 4: The Best Sales People Excelled in School

Education is important but a great sales team isn’t focused on their talents GPA in University. Instead, they spend time focusing on their output and what they’ve done lately. The best teams are about getting the job done, being open minded, and pushing the envelope with a serious passion for self-education.

Truth 1: Sales Professionals Are Storytellers

The best sales teams share the story of their organization with every member of their team. Instead of simply sending their sales team off into the wild, they spend time educating their team on the story they’re trying to tell along with their vision. Additionally, the best sales teams know what stories are most likely to resonate with their target audience and use trial and error to get their story right.

Truth 2: The Best Sales Teams Have Passion

The best sales teams are passionate and competitive. While they work as a team, they also work as a team of mentors, motivators and supporters. The best sales team isn’t filled with individuals who are solely passionate about their individual gains but also are passionate about their client’s successes and winning as a team in comparison to the competition.

Truth 3: Relationships Rule Everything

Great sales professionals know that they are only as good as their network. In some ways, the best sales teams and businesses understand that their net worth is related to their network. Whether we’re talking about clients, employers or colleagues – each of these relationships matter as they could lead to an opportunity in the future. Great sales people embrace their relationships and put in the work as they subscribe to a philosophy that is based on quality over quantity.

Truth 4: The Best Sales Teams Get Support

It’s easy to get caught up with a combination of pride and ego this day and age. Instead of allowing your ego to get in the way of your sales teams success, the best teams recognize the importance of inter-office communication. The best teams have a manager who is frequently in touch with the folks in marketing and product to ensure that everything is aligned from a strategic perspective. Additionally, they ensure that their team has the tools and sales kits required to do their job. It’s about teamwork and open collaboration.

What other truths and myths do you think need to be brought to the surface as it relates to the sales industry?

Mobile and social technologies have radically changed the way people buy. Buyers are increasingly savvy and willing to shop around, and salespeople have to recognize how the landscape has changed and how the interaction with potential customers continues to evolve.

Companies must take the lead and make sure their sales people are familiar with the new paradigm, says my latest guest on PowerViews, Nick Stein, senior director of marketing and communications at Salesforce.com, the enterprise cloud software heavyweight.

Nick is a results-driven marketer, has been a writer for Fortune magazine, an adjunct professor at New York University, and an award-winning investigative journalist for CBC television.

Here are some highlights from our discussion, which can be viewed in its entirety below.

Consumers are Better Equipped

Click to start video at this point—When a consumer initially picks up the phone to talk to a vendor, they’re already 60 percent of the way through a buying decision, Nick said. Because of the proliferation of mobile and social technologies, consumers can heavily educate themselves on potential purchases. I also shared statistics from the Corporate Executive Board that 71 percent of buyers still want sales involved early in the buying process. Buyers are more sophisticated, but they still prefer a human touch.

Turnover of Account Executives Can Cripple Companies

Click to start video at this point—The sales business is going through one of its most interesting and turbulent times, Nick said. Less than half of account executives are not meeting their quotas, which in turn is leading to tremendous turnover. This is extremely detrimental to companies that have to hire and train new account executives, which typically takes six to 12 months. Businesses are struggling to figure out how to adapt.

Youth Meets Experience in Sales Force

Click to start video at this point—The young people entering the sales force are changing the dynamic between managers and their reps. Young people have grown up in an era of instantaneous, real time feedback, Nick said, so they expect to get answers immediately. They especially want to know about their job performance. Not so long ago, managers and their sales team were in one centralized location. But with the rapid growth in technology, a manager’s sales team can be spread out. That has pros and cons, Nick said. Among the negatives: the on-the-spot feedback that was vital to the relationship between a manager and his reps is now less common.

What About Gamification?

Click to start video at this point—“Gamification” is a commonly heard buzzword these days, but what exactly does it mean? Nick points out that using leaderboards or employee of the month recognitions are longstanding games in the sales business. Obviously you want to be thoughtful about the behaviors you’re trying to promote in your sales force and ultimately drive revenue.

You can connect with Nick and learn more about his work at Salesforce.com via the following resources:

Website: www.work.com

Twitter: @stein_nick

The next PowerViews will be with Chris Snell of Care.com. Stay Tuned.

By Dan McDade

Like any other business owner, you’re probably constantly juggling multiple tasks and priorities, so finding time to pay attention to all of the details of your marketing regularly may be difficult. No wonder leaks in your marketing can sneak up on you –  problems you may not even realize you have could be keeping your hard-won prospects from becoming paying customers.

So, what can you do to fix these leaks (or better yet, prevent them in the first place)? Take a few minutes to discover where you may have leaks in your marketing – so you can solve them and make sure you’re getting the most out of your investment.

Not sure where to start? This infographic illustrates 10 common places where leaks can happen in your marketing and sales process, along with some handy tips you can use to address them.

These are just a few of the top leaks businesses face in their marketing. To learn more about additional leaks in the buying journey, download our ebook “Don’t Leak Leads: How To Identify Leaks & Get More Customers” today.

 

Every sales process includes what would be considered the “tough questions”. You know them, the questions that make you sweat, shake in your shoes or simply make you uncomfortable to a point that you just don’t ask them.

Why? Because you are afraid you might offend the buyer. Or, perhaps you fear the buyer will not like you once you ask. Remember people buy from people and if you offend them or make them not like you, there is no chance of winning the sale.

What questions do this to you? Well here are a few I thought of:

• Do you have a budget?
• How much is your budget?
• Who makes the decision to buy products like ours in your company?
• Who can sign a contract?
• What is the process your company goes through to purchase something like our product?
• Can you draw me an organization chart?
• Will you introduce me to the president (or person who can sign our contract)

These questions and others like them are uncomfortable to ask during the sales process and they become more difficult to ask the longer you are engaged with the prospect. Which brings us to a major issue you face, if you don’t ask them up front during your initial discovery phase, you lose the opportunity ask them later. By the time you need to know the answers it may be too late to get them, without sounding amateurish, or begging.

So how do you overcome the fear of asking these or any question that is uncomfortable during the sales process?

First, you need to change your mindset from sales professional to person helping another person solve a problem they are experiencing. Remember, you are not selling this prospect, you are helping them with a big problem they have. You have the solution, and you need to better understand how to help your prospect resolve the issue.

Second, you need to realize you are not going to insult a buyer by asking these questions. In fact you might make it easier on them so they can explain to you how the buying process goes and who must be involved. They may also offer information on budgeting and the people in the organization with a budget.

Third, if you approach the discovery phase with a sales tool like an initial discovery document that you forward in an advance to the prospect so they are aware of the questions you want to cover before you meet with them, then you don’t have to “drop” these tough questions on them during the discussion. Using an initial discovery document and an organized series of questions, as opposed to a list on a yellow pad, you show you are professional, organized and educated as to how to gain a better understanding of the prospects issues, pains and goals. It just so happens that you also want to better understand the buying process and who the decision makers are.

Sometimes, we all have some challenges in asking the tough questions. I find that an Initial Discovery Questionnaire will help you get them answered. Be sending a list of questionnaires you would like to discuss with your prospect in advance, they are more apt to provide you with answers. Sometimes you don’t even have to ask, they just answer them from the questionnaire.

 

Michael Nick is the Author of 3 bestselling business books, including his Amazon top 10 The Key to the C-Suite. Michael is also the CEO and Founder of ROI4Sales, a company that specializes in the design, development and deployment of custom software sales tools, like ROI, TCO and custom Business Case tools. Michael is available for keynote addresses, workshops and seminars. Check out his website at www.roi4sales.com

In the same week as Sprint announced the availability of the BlackBerry Q10, so a report has been published stating consumers haven't shown any interest in the QWERTY-equipped BlackBerry 10 phone.

The post Report claims BlackBerry Q10 sales are a disaster, as company continues to struggle appeared first on Digital Trends.

Almost two years ago Republic Wireless launched with a crazy plan to offer phones that would use Wi-Fi as their default network, sending any requests outside of Wi-Fi over the Sprint 3G network. The program started with a $19 monthly plan and an older model Motorola smartphone using a custom version of Android.

Today almost 90 percent of wireless carrier Republic Wireless’ data traffic goes over Wi-Fi, leaving 11.5 percent traveling over Sprint’s 3G network. While Republic is a niche carrier for the budget conscious that don’t mind a limited selection of phones, it’s also at the forefront of a shift in telecommunications that will not only happen, but needs to happen. Eventually instead of thinking about which carrier you want to use, you’ll just think about Wi-Fi.

“Carriers and cellular will become the mortar while Wi-Fi will be the bricks,” said David Morken, CEO of Bandwidth.com. Bandwidth owns Republic, so Morken obviously has an agenda, but he’s far from alone in pushing Wi-Fi as the primary means of connecting to the web. Free, a French carrier, has built a mobile network using Wi-Fi hotspots provided by its wireline broadband subscribers, and has found success.

And while Google taking over the Starbucks Wi-Fi networks and the continued expansion of the nationwide cable Wi-Fi network aren’t necessarily attempts to threaten cellular dominance, by providing a cheaper alternative in more places they are making business models that rely on Wi-Fi more viable. How viable? It’s tough to say, since Morken won’t share subscriber numbers. But he did say Republic’s growth is ahead of schedule and that it “has lower rates of churn than the carriers with two-year contracts.” He confirmed that his churn is less than 2 percent — far more impressive than what is usually seen on prepaid carriers.

Of course he also notes that people are using Republic Wireless as a landline replacement, which means that we aren’t exactly comparing apples to oranges. But that’s also part of the shift. Morken and Republic are trying to replace apples with oranges and are showing customers and other providers how to do it. “Cellular will be an edge case,” Morken says. He went on to predict that many connected gadgets like fitness trackers would turn to Wi-Fi.

I like his vision, but Wi-Fi is way too much of a battery hog to be a great solution for smaller connected devices. So even while I think that Google is doing the Starbucks deal to offer Glass users more places to get and stay online, I don’t know if there will be a huge adoption of Wi-Fi any time soon for wearables that don’t need Wi-Fi’s massive data rates.

But regardless, the writing on the wall seems clear. Most connected devices avoid cellular networks because consumers hate paying the expensive monthly fees. In many ways the adoption of the smartphone and the ability to download crazy YouTube videos helped drive the spread of Wi-Fi, especially in the early days when 4G networks and phones weren’t around. Now, carriers look at Wi-Fi as both a savior (punt that video traffic over to Wi-Fi please) and a threat (don’t use over-the-top apps that hurt our texting revenue).

If Morken’s future plays out, this will become increasingly clear to consumers as it becomes easier to find and join available Wi-Fi networks. I asked if Republic might make its version of Android that automatically allows dialing and texting over Wi-Fi available to the general public, and Morken said that wasn’t in the plan.

Republic’s vision will also get a boost as it gets more subscribers, and to do that it needs a better phone. The current model is the Motorola DEFY XT, which is pretty long in the tooth. I asked Morken if Republic is getting a new phone soon and he said an announcement is coming. When I asked if it is the new Moto X he said that the company has a good relationship with Motorola (owned by Google) but that he couldn’t comment further. When I asked for timing for the announcement of any new handset he also demurred.

Morken’s mission today was clearly to raise Wi-Fi’s profile as a viable alternative to cellular connectivity in a variety of devices. I’m with him on that front, although for Republic Wireless to change people’s minds it will need a better handset. It’s done work on the back end to make Wi-Fi more available to users and tweak its software, so maybe when it launches a new phone we can see if it will keep the carriers awake at night.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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• What to watch in mobile in 2013
• Mobile 2012 and beyond
• A look back at mobile in the third quarter

Rumors of a Nokia tablet has got the tech world buzzing, but Nokia’s plans to expand beyond the handset are much more ambitious than producing a mere slate. Nokia EVP of Location and Commerce Michael Halbherr told GigaOM that the Finnish handset maker is eyeballing the car as the next repository of its technology and applications and has plans to launch some form of connected car platform in the future.

Of course, Nokia is already a significant player in the automotive market. The company supplies maps for navigation systems through its Navteq group, which along with the rest of Nokia’s location services was recently renamed Here, the massive Nokia division Halbherr now heads up.

Nokia plans to use that deep-seeded mapping relationship with automakers as springboard into more sophisticated connected car and infotainment services, Halbherr said.

“Historically we’ve supplied content to the automotive industry – first maps and now traffic,” Halbherr said in a recent interview at Here’s Chicago HQ. “As more cars get connected we have the opportunity to move up the stack from a content player to a platform player to a services player.”

What kind of connected car services is Nokia planning beyond mapping? Halbherr wouldn’t talk specifics, saying the company would reveal more of its strategy soon. But he did say that Nokia is thinking far beyond the dashboard with plans to broach autonomous — or driverless — vehicle technologies and explore ways of integrating the car into larger transportation and “smart city” networks. This melding of the private vehicle into the public network is a topic Halbherr plans to discuss in detail at GigaOM’s Mobilize conference in October.

Halbherr said Nokia envisions cars that can not only direct you or drive you to your destination by the fastest possible route, but also cars that can send you on routes that minimize carbon emissions, that coordinate with the congestion and traffic management systems being developed in large cities and even work in tandem with public transit to more efficiently move people across a densely packed urban landscape. Halbherr said future connected cars can not only tell you the most optimal time to drive, they could also help you avoid driving altogether.

Connected car or connected cartography?

In our conversation, Halbherr consistently returned to the lowly map. The map may be Nokia’s automotive “in” and the primary ingredient in navigation systems, but Halbherr said it could be so much more.

“What is a map?” Halbherr asked. “Historically it’s a visual representation of reality, but we are building more than a map. We’re building a one-to-one representation – it’s about a digital recreation of reality.”

Halbherr argues that all of the connected car’s most promising applications lean heavily on location. The map provides a context against which a car can compare real-time sensor information and data from other networked vehicles to navigate the streets.

A car won’t just use a map to know its own location, but the location of the objects around it. Nokia is already overlaying that map with virtual information, which can not only be accessed by apps but can projected into the field of vision through augmented reality technologies like Nokia’s City Lens. In short, maps are going to make the connected car go, and there are few companies that can deliver the map that Nokia can, Halbherr

The unnamed company at the top of that list is, of course, Google. Last decade, Navteq and its Dutch competitor Tele Atlas (later acquired by TomTom) ruled the street mapping world, but Google has since established itself as the king of the interactive street map. Not only has it built what many would argue is the world’s most sophisticated navigation and location-based services operation with Google Maps and Streetview, but it is willing to acquire companies like crowdsourced traffic startup Waze that innovate in the space (though the Waze deal may be hitting some bumps with European regulators).

Still, Nokia has an enormous mapping operation. According to Halbherr it makes 2.7 million individual changes to its global maps everyday. It has created Nokia Here mapping and Drive turn-by-turn navigation apps, now standard on Windows phones and available on iOS and Android. It has traffic operations centers in North America and Europe that use roadside sensors, crowdsourced data from Here apps and even live traffic camera feeds to provide real-time congestion data to navigation companies and automakers all over the world.

Will the automakers buy into the Nokia car?

While maps are critical, there is a lot more that goes into a connected car. Nokia has years of experience integrating hardware, software and services – though Google recently gained similar expertise when it bought Motorola. Nokia also already comes with an OS known to the automakers, thanks to its tight-knit relationship with Microsoft.

Many automakers, including Ford already use embedded versions of the Windows OS to run their infotainment systems. Nokia can build on a platform they’re already comfortable with.

But the biggest factor in Nokia’s favor may be the fact it’s simply not Google, Apple or any other Silicon Valley interloper intruding on the automakers’ turf. Though some carmakers like Audi have already gotten in bed with Google Maps, and several more have signed on to work with Apple’s Siri Eyes Free voice interface, there’s a danger that by working with them carmakers will lose control of the connected car.

Google’s services are essentially free to consumers – it makes its money through advertising. Apple is trying to trying to substitute Siri for the dashboard interface, and the company that controls the user interface controls what apps and services the driver accesses. The auto industry has traditionally maintained a tight hold on what services make it into the car. It’s accustomed to charging drivers for services they could get free on a PC or smart phone and controlling what apps drivers can use. Carmakers don’t want their cars to be dumb vessels for some other company’s apps.

The automakers are a conservative bunch, but I believe they realize they have to become more open. They just don’t want to change as quickly as a company like Google wants. With Nokia, automakers have a comfortable relationship: Nokia sells them maps, and they in turn sell those maps to the driving public. If it can expand that model to other aspects of the connected car, then Nokia might be the exact partner the automakers are looking for.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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American labor costs have been so well contained of late that the proportion of nonfarm business revenue going toward wages, salaries, and benefits hit a record low 57.9% in the first quarter of 2012, the most recent period for which figures are available, says the Wall Street Journal. A decade earlier, the share was 62.7%. But when labor costs are low, companies are less willing to invest in labor-saving technology; the 10-year period ended in 2011, the latest on record, was the weakest for tech investment since World War II, the Journal says.

Facebook will nearly triple its share of global mobile advertising in 2013 compared to 2012, according to research firm eMarketer. They forecast that Facebook will have about 15.8 percent of the total global ad market, ahead of Pandora, Twitter and others. Google, however, is still the big kahuna with 53.17 percent of the overall market, up from 2012. The overall mobile ad market is forecast at $16.65 billion — up 89 percent from 2012.

Facebook, which has been focusing almost all its energies on mobile over the past year or so, has started to inject more and more advertising into its stream — a move not welcomed by consumers — and has started attracting big spending advertisers. Facebook’s success on mobile and aggressive injection of advertising has helped it become the company with the second largest ad-market share across all devices, behind Google of course.

The news shouldn’t come as a surprise — Facebook’s share of mobile users’ attention has been on an upswing. U.S. smartphone owners spend about 18 percent of their phone time on Facebook.  The company gets more usage on mobile devices than on the web, a fact that was reflected in the blockbuster financial results reported by Facebook for the three months ending June 30, 2013. During the quarter the company said that nearly 41 percent of its revenues come from mobile. Well, the news for Facebook fans keeps getting better. eMarketer has been impressed by Facebook’s advertising push and now expects that the company will make about $6.36 billion in 2013 (up from eMarketer’s earlier forecast of $5.89 billion).

Here are some other interesting tidbits from the new eMarketer report.

• Amazon is expected to see global ad revenues of around $840 million this year.
• Microsoft will bring in about $2.92 billion in ad revenues for 2013.
• Pandora and Twitter will bring in total revenues of $580 million each during 2013.
• In 2013, 18.8 percent of all digital ad spending in North America will go toward mobile internet ads.
• By 2017, nearly half of all digital ad spending in North America will be on the mobile internet.
• Western Europe and Asia-Pacific are nearly tied this year, with 12.6 percent and 12.3 percent of all digital spending occurring on mobile, respectively.
• In 2017, eMarketer estimates advertisers around the world will spend $616.3 billion on all paid media.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Facebook’s IPO filing: ideas and implications
• NewNet Q4: Platform mania and social commerce shakeout
• The future of mobile: a segment analysis by GigaOM Pro

Sales VPs are asking a similar question this time of year:

"What can we do with my reps to get a quick revenue lift? I am behind in my numbers for the year.  Can I make up the deficit and make my quota?"

Everyone wants to know the ‘silver bullets’ to generate revenue. There are certain trainings that can produce these results. 

Register now for our How to Make Your Number in 2014: A Sales Strategy You Execute.  By registering, you will get our Quarter 3 Pipeline Strategy Assessment.  It will help your team determine:

• What deals can close quickly in your pipeline
• Recognize the deals that are moving faster than the buyer moving
• Specific Seller actions that can get the buyer to take action

As a VP, you have various training options with your reps to generate sales.  The most impactful method is proper Pipeline Strategy. Yet most reps don’t understand it.  Training typically involves selling skills or negotiation methods.  Rarely do you train on how to strategize on a deal.  But this allows you to prioritize actions required in those deals to get movement.  This will get your deals to close quicker. 

The Best Practice Pipeline Strategy has Three Major Components:

1. Opportunity Assessment:  This is a simple list of questions assessing the current deal situation.  The answers reveal where the deal sits with the buyer.  You must assess the opportunity factually before deciding on next steps. That will help you decide how to get the deal quicker. Some sample questions your reps needs to answer:

1. Has the Buyer expressed their need to us?
2. Did the Buyer quantify how their problem affects their costs and/or revenues?
3. Have we identified the Buying Decision Team?
4. Has the Buyer established a decision timeframe for addressing their need?
5. Does the Buyer understand the consequences of inaction or remaining with the status quo?

2. Buyer Action Review:  This is identifying what actions the buyer has demonstrated. This helps to identify where the buyer is in their buying process.  This is also critical in determining next steps.  Too often we are not in sync with our buyer. This causes confusion which slows down the deal and frustrates the buyer.  To understand where the buyer is we must first document their typical actions.  The major actions are known as buyer stage exit criteria. This prevents a sales rep rushing the deal without the buyer preforms certain actions.  The key is to notice what the buyer has or hasn’t done.  Based on their typical actions we can determine where they are in their process.

3. Major Interaction Preparation:  Major interactions are those buyer meetings that are critical to advancing deals. Preparing for these critical interactions gets the deal sold faster. Major interactions are best prepared for with a call plan.  Simple call plans help prepare and keep the interaction focused on the objectives wanted.   There are many times we ‘forget’ to accomplish all objectives on a sales call.  We then need to ‘go back’ and find out the proper information.  This takes us another week or two extending the deal.  Call planning prevents this delay and helps us accomplish more on the same call.

Using Pipeline Strategy requires repeatable, rhythmic meetings.  Every week you and your sales managers need to have these strategy sessions.  During these sessions:

• Focus on the opportunity assessments that are in the late stage of the pipeline.  Look for the ‘no’ or ‘don’t know’ answers.  This is where you will shorten the sales cycle.
• Next make sure these late stage deals are in the proper sales stage.  Check the actions of the buyers.  This might need you to have the actual sales rep in the strategy session.  They often are the only ones who know the buyer actions.
• Finally, make sure the next customer interactions have completed call plans.  These are critical in identifying and accomplishing the chosen objectives. It allows you to accomplish more with less time.

Pipeline strategy will help get your deals closed quickly. Use the Quarter 3 Pipeline Assessment tool to quickly test the deals in your Pipeline.  Focus on your late stage deals and try these 3 steps.  Leave a comment on how they worked shortening your sales cycle.

Author: Dan Perry

Follow @DanPerrySBI

Follow @MakingTheNumber

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You Are Already An Expert At Writing a Value Proposition is a post from: The Sales Blog | S. Anthony Iannarino

You are already an expert at writing value propositions. Over the course of your lifetime you’ve written thousands of value propositions. Well, to be honest, you didn’t actually write these value propositions. But rest assured, you did create value proposition.

Let’s look at example. Remember when you upgraded your computer and bought that new MacBook Air? Did you really need the MacBook Air? We could have an interesting debate over whether you wanted it or needed it, but there is no debating that you came up with a compelling value proposition.

What did you tell yourself when you bought that computer? Maybe you told yourself that your old computer was too slow and that your work requires a faster computer. You might have told yourself that your new Macbook Air would boot in seconds, preventing you from having to wait to start working and saving you time. Perhaps you told yourself that the new computer would be light enough that you could carry it everywhere with you, allowing you to work from anywhere and making you even more efficient. If you were really convincing when you sold yourself, you explained to yourself how much money your time was worth and how much more you would make with a faster, lighter, sexier computer.

So the value proposition was that you would invest $1500 (plus or minus) and for that $1500 you would gain the ability to get to work faster, improve your efficiency, and make more money–regardless of where you happened to be in the world. And just like that, there is your value proposition.

Why then is there so much trouble converting this concept into a value proposition for your prospective clients?

You value proposition wasn’t about buying a computer. It was about buying what a computer would allow you to do. It was about the outcomes. Your clients don’t want to buy what you sell. They want to buy what it will allow them to do that they can’t do already. They want to buy outcomes, too.

Question

How do you craft a compelling, differentiated value proposition?

How do you convert features and a benefits into a concise, compelling statement?

What makes something difficult to convert into a compelling value proposition?

How do you make crafting a value proposition easy?

When you look at how selling has changed over the last 5, 6, or 10 years, there is not doubt that technology tools and a scientific approach to selling has become prevalent in the B2B sales world. But are you more productive now? Do you have better data that you actually apply?

In a world where CRM adoption is very low, and tons of information exist, but most of us are too busy to stop and take a look. I know people in selling are scrambling.

Recently I had a fun debate with Velocify CEO, Nick Hedges. On a webinar, Nick defended the science of selling while I focused on the importance of the art of selling – and since that time, Velocify has created an e-book with some of the takeaways.  You can read about it and download the new ebook

I am the first one to embrace technology – in fact most everyone I work with these days is involved in the technology industry or has new technological aspects to their businesses.

However, so much of what we do in selling involves the human art of communication – how you connect to a buyer, what you say and even what you don’t say. You must understand how to listen for nuances, and you need to make the effort to follow-up at the right times and with the right context to move a sales opportunity forward.

You can vote on whether Science rules selling or if Art does here – let’s take a stand!

Kudos to Colleen Stanley, author of Emotional Intelligence for Sales Success and to Ardath Albee of Marketing Interactions for some helpful input toward my part of the debate on art.

You need both sides – the art and the science of selling to be successful, but if I could choose which component to favor more heavily on I would definitely choose Art – because of two key areas:

Human Communication

There are nuances that technology have not been able to pick up on as of yet. When to follow-up, for example? Which person in the decision making team to talk with first? A CRM system might prompt you to set a next action, but it is human thinking that determines when that would be and with whom.

From an emotional intelligence standpoint, there is assertiveness, impulse control, self-awareness, interpersonal skills, empathy, and likability. Each of these has a communication aspect and must be considered when working as a seller.

The Psychology of Dealing with Humans

See above – basically there are so many ways a seller can sabotage a sales opportunity, and there are ways they can resurrect a very stalled opportunity to success – solely from the human aspect, not from any technology tool or process reminder.

So give a quick vote – Art or Science? We’d love to hear your thoughts.

Lori Richardson is recognized as one of the “Top 25 Sales Influencers for 2013″ and one of “20 Women to Watch in Sales Lead Management for 2013″. Lori speaks, writes, trains, and consults with inside and outbound sellers in technology and services companies. Subscribe to the award-winning blog and the “Sales Ideas In A Minute” newsletter for sales strategies, tactics, and tips in selling. Increase Opportunities. Expand Your Pipeline. Close More Deals.

The post Do Sales Grow More by Art or Science? appeared first on Score More Sales.

The decision of whether to apply to a company or accept an offer is incredibly complex. It's about pay, culture fit, and career goals. It's also about whether you believe the leaders of the company want to and are capable of doing something special. 

As part of its annual MBA survey, research firm Universum Global asks business school students to rank prominent employers on a variety of attributes, including how much they want to work for them, the strengths of their culture, and how inspiring their top management is.  

When it comes to inspiring management, Google's No. 1, which could speak to the company's famously innovative HR and management practices, and the incredibly lofty goals of the company and its CEO, Larry Page. 

At No. 2, design firm IDEO also does things a little differently. Everybody is encouraged to switch desks once a week. And in third place, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz is one of the most outspoken corporate leaders out there, as an evangelist for Starbucks' culture and weighing in on current events.

More than half of these companies are among MBA students' top targets after graduation, according to Universum.

Here's the full ranking:  

1. Google
2. IDEO
3. Starbucks
4. Walt Disney Company
5. Amazon
6. Southwest Airlines
7. Apple
8. Mayo Clinic
9. Intuit
10. McKinsey & Co. 

Join the conversation about this story »

What is it like to have an extremely high IQ?

Pretty much everyone responding to this question on a popular Quora thread agreed that it can be difficult, as geniuses and near-geniuses may have difficulty relating to other people and lack the motivation necessary to succeed.

One of the most interesting answers came from Christian Ritchie, an innovation analyst at PepsiCo, who explained how he struggled with having a high IQ before realizing he had to work hard.

His answer is published with permission below:

I have what most would consider a high IQ. I test in the top 1% in almost all testing I've done throughout most of my life. I would assume for those who have used and engaged it, it has been rewarding. It has been my best friend and my worst enemy at alternating times in my life. I have, for the most part, done very little with mine, which has been a source of frustration, depression, and, at some points, marital strife. 

Schooling
Academics were my first out, with a mediocre academic career that featured little work on my part, always perfect test scores, and an ongoing army of teachers who felt they were doing me a favor by passing me because I knew the material, rather than failing me for my work ethic. It helped that I attended a new school nearly every year due to my military upbringing, so teachers felt sorry for me rather than recognizing my self-destructive pattern of behavior.

Friendships
I will admit that my IQ isolated me quite a bit. I was too smart to fit with the "popular" kids, and my being the perpetual new kid didn't help. I was also the least accomplished and laziest of my intellectual peers, so didn't fit in that group either. Mostly, I ended up with the people who didn't care...the stoners one year, skateboarders another, emo kids another year, and always a small group of friends to play D&D with. I never had a set group identity. 

Oddly enough, be it friends or professional contacts, I have never found it too difficult to relate to other people strictly based on IQ. I'm much more likely to find issues with people who are married to specific ideologies. I have always ascribed to the Einstein quote: "Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it is stupid." My background in customer service (see below) helped, But I also realized that while I can, for instance, take apart your computer at a near circuit level, I can't work on an engine, fly a plane, design a building, or paint the Mona Lisa. Everyone has talents, and IQ is just one of many that people can possess. It is certainly one of the most advantageous in modern society, but its not the only one that is worthwhile. 

Work
After high school (I never went to college for more than half a semester until recently), I found I simply lacked motivation to excel. There was always a high-minded philosophical basis for my stagnation:  buddhist ideas against the accumulation of material possessions, a smug sense of escaping from the consumerist ideology that consumed American culture, etc. As long as my job paid for my hobbies, I was content to maintain a job that offered and expected very little from me. With my love for technology, I ended up at multiple help desk jobs of varying positions for over 10 years.  

At some point, before I began to understand my own culpability in the direction of my life, my intellect became poisonous. I started thinking about moving forward in my career, but never in terms of what *I* needed to do, but in the self-pitying belief that others simply failed to recognize my gifts and give me what I was DUE, either because they felt threatened or because they were unable to recognize and relate to my intelligence. Everyone always said the same thing, "You're so smart/talented, I'm surprised you're still doing this", and so was I, though I shouldn't have been. I believed my intelligence entitled me to opportunity, and it soured me on my professional relationships for a long time.

I'm not sure at what point I came to the realization that it is the outcome of the sum of your talents, and not the talents themselves, that define you as a person. Probably around the time I met my wife, and became a father. It wasn't just about SUPPORTING my children, or accumulating money, because there are plenty of starving artists raising amazing children. But I have no gift for art or music. My intellect is really all I have, so I knew that if I was going to teach my children self-worth, to make the most of the talents and opportunity they had, I would have to stop making excuses and do it myself. 

The last few years have paid off. My success has grown, in professional circles inside and outside my work. I've moved from doing things I *know* to doing things I *love*, paying my dues along the way, and not taking shortcuts. I hope that I'm showing my children that simply having a gift isn't enough.

That being said...

Family

I wish I could say I've "fixed" everything about me that my high IQ has "broken", but that isn't the case. I spend a lot of time, far more than I should, inside my own head, or working on problems that interest me, time that should be spent with family. I let my children spend too much time steering their own destiny, with little or no limitation, and they mostly choose to spend it glued to a computer playing video games. It is difficult for me still to find balance between everything that needs to done at home, and the things that I feel I need to do for myself. I'm not getting any younger, and I wasted a great deal of the opportunity of my youth. However, my constant NEED to better myself combined with the fact that I still struggle against poor habits, easy distraction, and severe disorganization cause my wife no end of frustration as I pursue whatever the "next thing" that consumes me might be. She is an angel for putting up with it, but her grace doesn't excuse me from my obligation to find a better balance.  At the same time, I have to work harder to make sure I don't miss the opportunity of my sons' youth as well. Children seldom care about your work ethic if you're not around the rest of the time. It's a work in progress, but never one you should give up on. 

SEE ALSO: 19 reasons it's horrible to grow up gifted

Join the conversation about this story »

Nice guys don’t necessarily get the sale.

If only I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard a sales manager say, “His prospects and customers love him, but he just can’t close,” or a salesperson says, “I’m feeling really good about winning this sale. The customer LOVES me.”

Niceness doesn’t pay your mortgage.

It’s often said that people buy from someone they like. If you believe that to be true, it would make sense that the nicer the person, the greater their chances of success in selling. So how come some of the most likeable people I’ve ever met have been complete and total failures as salespeople? The truth is, buyers can love you but still not buy from you. Unfortunately, in sales, love only matters when it’s accompanied by a check and an executed agreement.

Niceness isn’t a compartment of decision criteria.

You see, most buyers want to make the best decision possible for the money they have to spend. When examining alternatives, buyers have four compartments of information they evaluate. In simple terms, they are product, price, support, and the company. The idea is compare their current situation to competing alternatives, and determine whether or not one of these alternatives represents enough impact for them to spend money and make a change.

Notice the four compartments of evaluation don’t include niceness of the salesperson. Niceness only matters when there are no significant differences in the other four compartments. Hey, I get it. If all else is equal in terms of product, price, support, and company, who wouldn’t buy from a nicer person? What that really means, though, is no one could prove his or her solutions were any better.

Lots of salespeople are nice.

The problem is there are a bunch of nice people in the sales profession. That means a nice person almost always loses. If four nice people compete, three nice people lose. Do you really want to get into a battle of ‘niceness?’ Do you really want to try and prove you are nicer and/or more lovable than another sales person?

The truth is ‘niceness’ has little to do with sales success. Hey, I’m not submitting you can be a total jerk and reach your full potential in this profession, but I am saying that being ‘nice,’ in the traditional sense, only matters when you and others have failed to prove your solutions bring greater value in any other area. Even then, you may win the ‘niceness’ battle but lose the sale.

Be careful, you’ll get beaten by lots of people not nearly as nice as you.

Unfortunately, there are many who try to rely on nothing more than being friends with their buyers to build a relationship. Every day, people who aren’t nearly as likeable beat these well-meaning folk. They may make a friendship but lose a sale.

Customers aren’t buying a smiling face. They are buying impact on what they are trying to accomplish as a business. That means that a person who isn’t necessarily personable, is less friendly, even less likable that you, simply has to prove their solution does more for the buyer’s business than yours. Trust me, the moment that happens, nicer people are loved and thanked for their kindness, then quickly shown the door. The harsh reality is people are more likely to buy from someone they like less, but trust will get the job done.

Likeability comes from IMPACT, not just being nice.

Ok, so I believe in being nice. To me, it’s so much easier than being a jerk and, in general, makes the world a more pleasant and better place.

So after all I’ve written, what really makes someone more likeable to a buyer? Is it being nice? Good manners? Being polite? Having a sense of humor? Friendliness? It depends on the buyer. Some care about these things, some don’t. With these characteristics and traits, niceness and likeability are relative. So is it possible to remove relativity and consistently be viewed as more likeable to your buyers? Could ‘niceness’ and ‘likeability’ be redefined so they are important to every buyer?

You bet. I want to be liked, but for the right reasons.

If you, too, want to be loved AND win the sale, focus on the following:

1. Understand your buyer’s organization better than your competitors.
2.  Know their vision, goals, plans, strengths and weaknesses.
3. Find ways in which you have greater, measurable impact on what they are trying to accomplish as a business.
4. Focus on identifying gaps in their business performance and finding ways in which to close them.
5. Understand their buying criteria and help them identify and build criteria they may have missed.
6. Stop thinking about winning the sale and focus on helping the buyer make the best decision possible.
7. Identify the measurable, negative impact your buyers are experiencing and help them determine why it’s happening.
8. Demonstrate in meaningful, measurable terms why and how your solutions have a greater impact.

If you focus on these areas, I guarantee your customers will love you AND buy from you.

Last week Mary Meeker unveiled her annual Internet Trends report for 2013. Not surprisingly, it showed strong growth in broadband and mobile users. The growth in mobile was staggering – there are now over 1.5 billion global smartphone subscribers, up from 1.1 billion a year ago. That’s about 30% growth in one year.

Chances are that you and your sales team are using smart mobile devices as well. But how does your personal experience on a smartphone or tablet compare to that of your business applications? Is your CRM truly mobile optimized or just a bit mobile friendly? Unusable, clunky, mobile-backward CRMs are a real problem.

It’s not like we only think about work when we happen to be sitting at the desk in the office. No. Today’s sales people are on top of their opportunities, always looking for the right time to close. This means there’s a need for constant access to customer information and sales data.

There’s no question about it – every modern sales team needs a mobile CRM. If you’re still not certain, take a look at our free ebook Instant Customer Gratification in a Mobile World to learn more about leveraging mobile to improve your customer relationships and sales.

If you buy in to the need for mobile CRM (you should), where do you start? What do you look for? It’s a question we get asked all the time so we created an ebook to answer it. You can download Choosing the Right CRM for your Mobile Team for free and use it as a guide for getting a mobile CRM for your team.

Remember – not all CRMs are created equal. Naturally, we hope that you choose Base for your mobile CRM needs.

Every day we have customers who switch to Base because of the poor user experience and resistance towards adopting their current CRM. It’s tough to get it right, especially on mobile, which is why when we develop Base, we build with the end user in mind. After all, if your sales team isn’t using it, the manager or VP isn’t going to get any good insights out of it, right?

Mobile is no longer a trend. It’s normal part of work life. The sooner you accept that your sales team needs a robust mobile CRM solution, the sooner you can get the productivity gains that come with mobile CRM.

Try Base CRM free for 14 days.

My wife and I had our first child recently – woohoo! It’s been a lot of fun, and a huge learning experience as well.

Since this is our first and we had no idea what to do, we hired a baby nurse for a few days, not to take care of the baby as much as to teach us how to take care of the baby ourselves.

The most obvious part of baby care is that you’re never pleading with or begging the baby to do anything. Instead, you create the ideal circumstances to get the baby to do what you want, or what’s best for the baby.

What’s most interesting is that unlike typical, sleep-deprived, frazzled new parents, we’re sleeping pretty well and are relaxed and life is going on mostly as normal. All this because of a little bit of knowledge!

This was also true when we got a dog. We have a Great Dane, and with a dog of that size, you can’t mess around with it being untrained. So we hired a military dog trainer to come to the house, but rather than train the dog directly, what she did was teach us how to train the dog. The results were pretty amazing, and people are continually amazed at how well-behaved she is.

Again, there was no begging or pleading or saying “please” to the dog. You create the ideal circumstances, and the dog does what you want it to do.

The bottom line with both dogs and babies? Begging doesn’t get them to do what you want.

So … WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING IT WITH YOUR SALES PROSPECTS?

If begging doesn’t work with dogs or babies, it most definitely won’t work with sales prospects. In fact, it actually turns them off and gives them all the reasons in the world not to BUY from you.

Like parents who go through life, or at least those first few months, frazzled and sleep-deprived, most salespeople go through their lives frazzled and stressed out. And frequently broke.

Why?

Because they’re not learning HOW to be successful. Worse, they sell in a way that comes across as BEGGING and PLEADING to prospects!

Begging & pleading with baby = fussy difficult baby.
Begging & pleading with dog = bad dog.
Begging & pleading with prospects (even if you don’t realize you’re doing it) = NO SALES.

So do yourself a favor, stop begging & pleading with prospects. Stop putting prospects up on a pedestal and supplicating to them and treating them like superiors. Instead, take charge and create the circumstances for them to buy right now.

“Circumstances? Hell, I make circumstances! ATTACK!”
-Napoleon Bonaparte

You need to have the same attitude in sales! Don’t beg & plead – ATTACK!

Smartphone penetration among mobile users in Mexico is greater than in Latin America. Reflecting that trend, mobile ad impressions served to advanced mobile devices are far more common in Mexico than in the rest of the region. The distribution of mobile impressions is closer to trends seen in North America.

Recently, I recorded a webinar explaining 5 tactics designed to increase your sales. In 39 short minutes, I covered such topics as:

• Transforming your average prospecting calls into client-creating conversations.
• Reducing the number of clients that you lose to 'no decision'.
• Streamlining prospects through your pipeline.
• Creating more time for activities that develop sales.
• Generating more business from the clients you already have.

The webinar, 5 Strategies to Jumpstart Your Sales, can be replayed for free by clicking here. Don't keep struggling with stagnant sales - listen to the webinar to learn how to keep the sales momentum.

I worked in publishing for almost 20 years. Starting in the mid-2000s, as advertising sales plummeted and readers headed elsewhere to get their news and information, a lot of publishers chased their tails rather than try to come up with innovative products and services of their own.

Some tried to make an online replica of their magazine or newspaper, allowing readers to flip through pages and save a few trees, while other publishers still flounder today at any attempt to create a successful online business.

Publishers also began scrambling to find ways to make up lost revenue. Some tried getting into ecommerce, but while their efforts may be valiant, being the Amazon, or even the Gilt, of publishing didn’t necessarily work out.

The next logical―or illogical―step was flash sales. After all, traditional publishers are usually never first, or second, or third doing much of anything, and flash sales have been an ecommerce winner for quite some time. I received an email (pictured here) last week from a business-to-business publisher (full disclosure, it’s a former employer) and immediately took notice.

While I have no idea if the flash sale for these books worked or not, here are three simple tactics missing from this effort that definitely would have helped make the publisher more money.

1) Add continuity between the offer in the email and then throughout the website. One or more pieces of creative would have reinforced the reason why the potential buyer responded to the offer and, in turn, helped increase conversions.

2) Once someone clicked through from the email, the publisher should have leveraged a referral link in the email to trigger the 20% discount and automatically apply it at checkout. This way, the buyer wouldn’t have needed to go back to the email to find the special code, potentially losing a sale in the process.

3) The countdown is on? What countdown? Going to the website provided no sense of urgency that the flash sale was ending in X number of hours and minutes. Use page real estate to show how much time is left before the sale is over (even if the discount still applies).

Rather than trying to turn analog dollars into digital dimes, publishers should focus on optimizing the website experience by treating every website visitor individually based on what they know about her or his interests and behaviors, including offers in an email.

For publishers that do this right, the end result will be the creation of new revenue that puts them not only ahead of their competition, but the envy of any business. Learn more in The Online Customer Experience Handbook for Publishers.

Mastering Big Data: Best Practices, Dos & Don’ts
Big data offers big opportunities for marketers, enabling them to deliver the most relevant website experiences possible to visitors. But there are hurdles to overcome. Find out how to avoid big data missteps and stay on the path to success. Download your free copy today.