I recently read a LinkedIn post, one of the statements was, “Sales are math.” For a moment I scratched my head, then I realized the author was absolutely correct. The noun form of the word, Sales, is about accounting for a transaction. When I was EVP of Sales, every day I would call my sales […]
Dave Brock
Buying Is Broken! What’s This Mean For Selling?
Report after report tell us that buyers are failing in their mission to solve a problem and buy a solution. We know 60% of committed buying efforts end in no decision made. For those remaining 40%, a huge percentage of them express regret. It doesn’t take much of a leap to recognize Buying Is Broken! […]
Top Performers Do More Of This
I love learning what top performers do and what drives high levels of performance. As a result, I’m drawn to articles titled, “Top performers do this…,” of “X% of sales people doing this outperform everyone else….(And X is a stunningly big number.)” The “this…” varies, usually it’s tied to what the author is trying to […]
Yearning To Be Unemployed
Dave Kurlan went on a fascinating rant on LinkedIn. You should watch it. But his rant provoked me into making a confession. For years, I’ve had a desire to be unemployed—that is to work myself out of my current job. Let me be clear, I love working, I can’t ever imagine not working. I’m fortunate to […]
54% Of Buying Journeys Fail
This data point has persisted for at least 10 years. Perhaps, if updated, it would be even worse. But 54% of committed customer buying efforts end in no decision made. It should cause all of us pause. It should force us to think differently. Reading the Numbers This data originally appeared in much of the […]
Leave the Heroic Sales Efforts to the Superheroes
We all have them, the “Must Win Deals,” where we pull out all the stops. We do everything we need to do to win the deal. Often, we are at our most creative moments when we do these deals. We thoughtfully overcome every hurdle, we get the customer to think differently, we mobilize all the […]
Give Your People The Chance To Do Their Jobs!
It’s funny, every once in a while I find myself in similar conversations with different executives. Each starts in a different place, but the underlying issues are all the same. A core issue has come up. It’s actually one that concerns me deeply. “Do we have enough confidence and trust in our people to let […]
Dear Outlook And Gmail Developers…
Dear Outlook, Gmail, and developers of all email systems. I have a feature request. Actually, it’s a feature removal request. I think it will improve the productivity of all email users, and how they value your tools. Please remove the “Reply All,” feature. I’m just about to join a meeting of more than 300 people. […]
Are You Confident Enough In Your Value Not To Discount?
Discounting has reached Pandemic levels. It used to be something we used as a last resort, and only under extreme duress. Today, responding to a prospecting call earns a discount. Proposals come with a price and then either an automatically applied discount, or hints at a discount. Something like, “Buy by the end of the […]
The Power Of Role Playing
You are probably shocked. “Dave doesn’t write about this stuff, he usually writes about much bigger issues.” Actually, conducting role plays has been a powerful tool that we use both in our consulting, training, and coaching. I don’t think we use them enough. Control the Stage Fright There are a lot of tools that offer […]
