Is Your Sales Team Undertrained? Ten Ways to Know

If you are an business owner or a sales manager who is responsible for the success of your sales team, you know that it is necessary to constantly evaluate the team's performance. Your ongoing business success is determined by continuous training so that the team has the best tools and strategies available. When you evaluate your team's statistics, it's also a good idea to apply this simple ten question test to measure whether your team is undertrained and perhaps requires a little extra help.

The Dirty Little Secrets Of The Failure To Leverage The Inside Sales – Customer Service Potential

How can the distributor take advantage of existing relationships between Inside Sales/Customer Service personnel and customers? This age-old question has caused managers to implement a variety of approaches in the attempt to tap perceived potential, but many fail and the question persists. Why? Most firms do not have adequate measures installed to determine who does what within an Inside Sales/Customer Service group. For lack of measures, it is not possible for management to define department productivity or level of activity much less individual productivity.

The Myth of the Working Sales Manager

Sales managers are often promoted and then expected to continue to handle their most lucrative accounts. This decision is often made by management for the fear of losing major accounts. The new sales manager hardly ever protests as it is an affirmation as to his worthiness and ownership of those accounts. These decisions leave little time for coaching their sales teams or strategizing about future sales initiatives. Field sales people may end up with the perception that their personal growth potential may be limited.

The First Step In Sales

Most if not all sales processes consists of three steps. The first one is a very simple one. It is such a basic step that many tend to forget to use it. Even in a normal communication process this activity is also required, but often source of confusion when the complete step has been skipped or ignored. But whether it is the internal sales process, communicating the goals and activities to pursue or the external sales process, it starts with...

Leadership Lesson in the Face of Virginia Tech Tragedy

In the aftermath of the massacre at Virginia Tech, the spirit of the campus was changed by a few short, yet powerful words. Read the leadership lesson this has for all business professionals.

Sales Forecasting Is The Achilles Heel Of Business Planning

The challenge for modern day business is to create an accurate, consistent sales forecast based on qualified and useful information. Unfortunately, for many companies, this is an area of business that too often falls short of this challenge.

Opening a Dollar Store - A Merchandise Handling No-No

One of the biggest mistakes that many who are opening a dollar store make is in failing to realize that merchandise must be readily available and on the sales floor to sell. They forget that just because an item was ordered and then it arrived, there is still no chance for a sale if the customers cannot see it because it is awaiting someone to actually price and take it to the sales floor. They don't realize that every minute an item is not on the sales floor represents lost potential income.

The Second Step in Sales

The second step in sales is quite simple. It is about the immortal on-liner...

When To Hire A Salesperson

One of the questions I am asked is, when should I hire a salesperson and what should I look for? I have always felt that hiring a salesperson should be like any business decision. The business should consider the investment as a capital expense that will deliver profitable, measurable results. A budget should be allocated for the expense and a return on the investment should be calculated.

How Soon Can We Get Underway?

If we could absolutely know right away who was destined to buy from us, and distinguish these folks from non-buyers, selling would be a lot easier; don't you agree? Of course, we can't be certain. There are always surprises, like prospects that seem to return from the dead and suddenly buy without any fuss, and become profitable customers. QUALIFYING prospects is the process of determining whether people have the means, the motivation, and the clout to buy. Unfortunately, when qualifying is done, it usually sounds brusque. There is a better way, according to this top speaker, radio and TV expert commentator, and best-selling author of 12 books and the popular Nightigale-Conant audio program, THE LAW OF LARGE NUMBERS: HOW TO MAKE SUCCESS INEVITABLE.

What Kind Of Sales Manager Are You?

Most managers don't consciously decide to behave in any particular way with their sales team, that is why most tend to steer towards the opposite ends of the management behavioural spectrum either leaning towards friendly and approachable or strict and enforceable. Both management styles have certain drawbacks however...

A Better Way to Get Quick Sales Results

JAMIS International - will lead, plan and implement the strategies and processes that deliver Sales Optimization to your sales force to leverage sales productivity and revenue results.

Essential Elements For Sales Training, Knowledge!

Training your sales staff to be the authority on what they are selling is the key to making your targeted sales figures.

Sales Force Automation Tools Designed for Reps and Agencies Are Coming

Web based selling tools such as CRM systems and quote to order management software are starting to be hosted by software developers and barriers to entry to these kinds of systems for independent sales reps are starting to fall down. Reps will be able to find all the functionality they need at a price they can afford.