Sales manager is an incredibly important and difficult job. Unfortunately, it is often the most under-trained job in the entire organization. Instead of providing information on the best practices and processes of the job, most companies hope that their sales managers will have learned enough during their days as a field salesperson to provide some…
Every salesperson talks about “Closing the sale.” The best salespeople understand that before you can close the sale, you must open it. “Opening” means using well designed and delivered questions to thoroughly uncover as many aspects of the buying decision as possible. Too many sales people mistakenly concern themselves with only the technical aspects of…
“How do you create a perceived value to differentiate yourself from the competition when you are both selling a commodity?” That’s a question I’m often asked in my seminars. Here’s how you make a difference….
How much time should I spend entertaining my customers? Good question. The world of the field salesperson is changing rapidly these days, and everything is in question. The practice of entertaining customers is one of those issues that needs to be rethought. First, let’s consider whether or not you should entertain your customers.
That’s probably the question I’m asked more than any other. Frustrated CEOs and sales managers express that thought over and over, in one way or another. They harbor a feeling that some of their salespeople just aren’t doing what they want them to do, and they don’t know what to do about it. If that…
What’s gunk? Any practice that detracts from the salesperson spending time with customers. In other words, other things the outside salespeople do instead of meeting with customers. When we boil down the job of the typical outside salesperson to its essence, it is clear that the one thing we want of them, the one place…
How do I sell to an account that is firmly in the hands of a competitor? In one form or another, I hear that question at almost every sales seminar I teach. It’s a great question, reflecting one of the most perplexing and frustrating situations every sales person faces. If you haven’t yet been faced…
Relationship Selling is the differentiation of you and your agency from your competitors – without considering price. Sales can be made on the basis of price. But relationships cannot be created or maintained on price. The agencies that rely on price to sell accounts will lose those accounts on the same basis at renewal or…
What is GOOD customer retention? If you consider the fact that some customers move, sell their business or die every year, a 95% retention rate or better is considered strong. But having strong retention without knowing and controlling the reasons for the retention makes you “lucky” more than good.
Customer retention has been trending negatively for the last ten years. Customer retention in recent years has averaged 87% and, while a few percent retention loss doesn’t seem like much, consider the following: If you have 1000 clients, the difference between the 94% retention of the best agencies and the 85% retention of the typical…
