Tag Archives for " Sales Managers "

Planning is So Boring (said the broke salesperson)

By Kelly Riggs | Sales + Leadership

Until you have clarity on your daily and weekly activities, generated as a result of a defined sales plan, you’re just winging it. And, you’re wasting precious hours every week that could be used to prospect, build your funnel, and create more customer contact. If you think about it, that may be the biggest loss in failing to plan – the time you lose as a result of indecision or filling time while you wait for the next customer emergency. But not to worry. Your competitors are probably in the same boat. You hope.

Continue reading

The Nonsense That Passes for Sales Management

By Kelly Riggs | Sales + Leadership

When a company needs a sales manager, the first place they typically turn is to one of their top salespeople. That’s no big revelation. I mean, who would we turn to – one of the bottom-dwellers?? As a result of this very common practices, I’m you’ve heard (and probably experienced) that promoting your top seller to the ranks of management is usually a disaster just waiting to happen. You lose your best salesperson, and get (more often than not) a mediocre sales manager. But why is that? Why can’t top salespeople become excellent managers?

Continue reading

How to Kill a Sale (and Never Even Know Why You Failed)

By Kelly Riggs | Sales + Leadership

There are certain things that average salespeople do over and over that can kill a sale. I know because I’ve done most of them. For some, I’ve been guilty many times. [I’m not hopeless, but I am slow.] Turns out, however, it’s not just me; most every salesperson makes these same mistakes. Which is sad because every single one of the seven things listed below can be fixed immediately.

Continue reading

A 12-Step Program for the Recovering Sales-Hater

By Kelly Riggs | Sales + Leadership

There are quite a few professions that have a complete aversion to the idea of selling.

Accountants, bankers, engineers, doctors – they generally don’t want to sell. They certainly don’t want to be called salespeople. In fact, they don’t even want their names in the same sentence with the word “selling.”

Let’s just call them what they are: Sales-Haters.

Unfortunately, in the very next breath these same professionals want to know how they can increase business, survive the economy, defeat the competition, and win more projects.

Seriously?

Continue reading