Your Sales Management Guru

If you have received an email from me you most likely have noticed my signature line is “Looking Forward”.   That wording has multiple purposes: 1) looking forward is a positive statement, 2) Looking forward is also a reminder to stay focused on a goal and your plans.   As a sales leader you must be consistently looking forward or looking ahead to ensure all your plans and programs are well designed, ready to activate and your metrics/dashboard pipeline values are within acceptable levels.

The job of Sales management is to make sure they put their teams in position to exceed their quotas each month. Notice I said it is their quotas.  I have said multiple times it is the salesperson’s responsibility to achieve their numbers; it is the sales leader’s job to put the right people in place and put them in position to sell. Looking forward 60-90 days will help the sales leader be more organized and enough time to take corrective action if any is needed.  

That means as you close out February, effective sales management must begin to make sure their:

•  Marketing or lead generation programs are developed and ready to execute.
• Sales pipeline values and sales opportunities at stage 3 are significant at the first of March to achieve May quotas
• Sales training programs are in place and planned for May
• Sales contests defined for April & May have been thought through
• Hiring and interviewing plans are activated to ensure talent is on board

These are just a few of actions strategic sales managers must do to be looking forward and taking action to build predictable revenue.   From a philosophical approach I am encourage everyone to be Proactive vs Reactive, this attitude means effective planning and Looking Forward rather than simply looking at historical performance or worst, finding our March first that you are out of control, lacking in sales opportunities to achieve quota and it’s another month of scrambling.

 If you have not yet received our White Paper: “Top 40 Actions Sales Management Must Take for Building Predictable Revenue” send me an email and I will forward it to you. Ken@Acumenmgmt.com

Acumen Management Group Ltd. “operationalizes” sales management systems and processes that pull revenue out of the doldrums into the fresh zone. During the past 12 years, our consulting, advisory, and platform services have illuminated, motivated, and rejuvenated the sales efforts for partners throughout North America. Move up and move ahead!  www.AcumenManagement.com

Posted in Sales Compensation, Sales Leadership Training, Sales Management, Sales Management Consulting, Sales Management Planning, Sales Management Systems, Sales Management Training, Sales Training | Comments Off

During this past weekend, I attended the National Speakers Association conference in Nashville. But instead of speaking, I actually went to the breakout sessions, chatted in the hallways and listened to the keynotes. It was an amazing learning experience; in four days, I was exposed to concepts and methods to make my keynote more effective and more meaningful to attendees — including the two hours I spent with Max Dixon learning how to create and tell a story.

So where does this fit with you as a salesperson (or sales leader or executive)?

Selling and sales leadership are emotional jobs; selling must change buyers’ minds and hearts. But too many times, we hear sales teams selling only the facts.

As a sales manager responsible for salesforce training, what are you doing with your sales team’s training in terms of increasing their ability to tell your story — emotionally?

For our part, with many of our consulting clients, prior to going on-site to evaluate their organization, we review their brochures, Web site and standard proposal content. In most cases, the content is boring or stagnant. When we visit on-site and ask each salesperson,”Why do people buy from you?” or “What makes you unique?” the answers are boring or — worse –logical.

We hear comments along the lines of: “We have been in business since 19-so-and-so” or “Our company has extensive experience” or “Our company is committed to serving you” or “Our people are the best.” These are essentially statements of FACT. My question to the sales teams is: “So what?” What do these statements mean to your prospects? Nothing. It’s emotion that causes the buyer to take action. This is a fundamental truth in selling; sales managers must understand this and train their teams to create stories with emotion that make their points stand out.

As sales leaders, your sales training program must review your team’s content, messaging and verbal descriptions to find the “so what” statements. Create what we call “tribal stories” about when you company saved the day for a client or when your firm solution caused a client’s business to blossom. Write them down and make sure every salesperson can use them in a selling mode.

We recommend you videotape your sales team attempting to sell your firm; this will allow them to hear and see why and when their approach is ineffective. The next step is to create a training session that clearly crafts an actual benefit to each statement of fact. The last step is to “inspect what you expect.” 

Videotape your sales team again in three weeks to ensure the new message has been stuck. In short: Tell emotional stories and bring emotion into your selling.

If you’d like Acumen’s “Create a Selling Document” worksheet, send me an e-mail at Ken@Acumenmgmt.com.

Ken Thoreson, president of Acumen Management Group Ltd., “operationalizes” sales management systems and processes that pull revenue out of the doldrums into the fresh zone. During the past 12 years, our consulting, advisory and platform services have illuminated, motivated and rejuvenated the sales efforts for partners throughout North America. Move up and move ahead! Acumen Management provides keynotes, consulting services and products designed to improve business performance. 3f

Tags: keynote speaking, sales approach, sales leadership, tribal stories
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Amazing — we’re already two weeks into the second month of the year. As 2010 moves along, sales and executive management will become engrossed in managing the numbers and actions designed to ensure quotas are achieved. This is essential to building a prescriptive methodology for a business.

While I’ve written much about discipline, accountability and control and the importance of finding your own formula for success, today I’m looking for your ideas on something else.

In building a high-performance sales organization, sales leadership must focus on building pride in accomplishment and creating a feeling of teamwork and positive energy. My question is: What are you doing in your sales organization to create these important ingredients? Let me know by commenting below or sending me an e-mail at Ken@AcumenMgmt.com.

Here’s my own list:

1. Set up a “good news board” where all employees can share positive results.
2. During your company meeting, have each salesperson say something positive or thank a fellow employee for their work.
3. Set a goal to keep a positive attitude; your mood can swing the office.
4. Know what your salesperson’s personal goals or interests are and always ask about them.
5. Whenever an employee calls you or walks into your office, the first thing you should say is, “How can I help you?”
6. Are you running a fun, first-quarter sales contest? How are you reinforcing it?
7. Send out companywide e-mails recognizing positive news — orders, contest winners, customer stories, etc.

Keep building on to this list and executing brilliantly every day. In challenging economic times, sales leaders must keep focused on multiple actions, but building the right sales culture is a very important aspect to achieving your overall company goals.

Ken Thoreson, president of Acumen Management Group Ltd., “operationalizes” sales management systems and processes that pull revenue out of the doldrums into the fresh zone. During the past 12 years, our consulting, advisory and platform services have illuminated, motivated and rejuvenated the sales efforts for partners throughout North America. Move up and move ahead! Acumen Management provides keynotes, consulting services and products designed to improve business performance. 3f4qb8v9ge

Posted on February 09, 2010 at 3:14 PM0 comments

Posted in Sales Kick Off Meeting, sales leadership, Sales Leadership Training, Sales Management Planning, Sales Management Training, Sales Motivation, Uncategorized | Comments Off

This week, I’m giving a talk called “Economic Recovery: Growing Revenue and Share During a Recovering Yet Volatile Economy” to a group of NSI partners in Redmond, Wash. These tend to be the larger-sized Microsoft partners, but the message is applicable for any size partner organization.
About 18 months ago, while we were helping our clients create their 2009 budgets, we asked them to create their revenue and expense pro formas, reduce projected sales by 25 percent, and then redo their pro formas again. This exercise was designed to help the clients gain a perspective on what changes or cost reductions they might need to make if expectations weren’t met. This helped everyone manage their business well during the past year.

2010 will be a different year.

A recent USA Today headline got it right: “Key To This Earnings Season: Sales.” And the deck reads, “Investors want to see profit growth that’s not from cost cuts.”

This clearly states the objective for 2010: Be aggressive and focus on earning market share and building your customer base. Specifically, the message of my talk will be around creating a culture of success — what I call “brilliant execution” at all levels of the organization — and focusing on being aggressive in sales and marketing.

I’ll also talk about focusing on the little things: putting up signage on positive messages, celebrating wins and providing positive reinforcement every day. Why is this important? Sales teams are mentally tired, support and technical people are stressed out, and as the business climate improves, retention and development will be important. People might consider moving to other organizations where the internal climate seems more employee-friendly.

The other reason sales leaders must be more aggressive is that many of your competitors are still “sitting back,” waiting for the economy to bring them out of the sales slump and recession they’ve experienced. My recommendation? Be proactive, not reactive.

Final note: If you’re going to be in Charlotte, N.C. soon, join me Feb. 16 for the Sales Leadership Summit. Register by Feb. 5 and save! Sign up here.

Ken Thoreson, president of Acumen Management Group Ltd., “operationalizes” sales management systems and processes that pull revenue out of the doldrums into the fresh zone. During the past 12 years, our consulting, advisory and platform services have illuminated, motivated and rejuvenated the sales efforts for partners throughout North America. Move up and move ahead! Acumen Management provides keynotes, consulting services and products designed to improve business performance. 3f4q

b8v9ge

Posted on February 02, 2010 at 2:27 PM0 comments

Posted in Keynote Programs, Sales Kick Off Meeting, sales leadership, Sales Management, Sales Management Consulting, Sales Training | Comments Off