The traditional B2B sales process is broken. Buyers want to spend less time with sales reps than ever. And yet, sales tenure, experience levels and engagement rates are all in freefall. Years ago, Revenue.io founder & CEO Howard Brown knew that simply giving sales teams more tools with which they could crank out hundreds of […]

Are you making the false choice between learning and doing? Many sellers do exactly that. I was once asked if the reason that more salespeople don’t invest in their own development was that it was difficult for them to make the connection between investing their time to learn and their professional successes. In other words, […]

“In all affairs, it’s a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.” That’s from the famed philosopher, Bertrand Russell. This especially applies to sales. We’re stuck on paradigms of how we sell, how we train and develop sellers and how we manage and […]

In sports, coaches help develop the athlete’s and the team’s strengths, identify weaknesses, put together plans to improve performance, and drive them to perform at their best. All elite athletes at the top of their game have coaching. In fact, all professional musicians also have coaches. And all movie stars have coaching. Virtually everyone at […]

I read so much nonsense about relationships in sales. You’ve probably noticed that I’ve been writing about this more recently. (I admit; I get triggered by it…) The problem many writers and commentators have is that they can’t get past a single definition of a “relationship” as an “emotional bond between people.” (AKA a friendship.) […]

It’s a cardinal sin to be boring in sales. It’s not your value proposition that’s initially interesting to your buyer. It’s you. Creating a working connection with a buyer, or a human, demands that you demonstrate a sincere interest in them as a person. It also demands that you be interesting to them in return. […]

Objections. They’re a pretty hot topic (did that sentence make you feel like you had on a Nirvana shirt?). The other day, I heard an ad on the radio from some guy who claimed to be “the world’s best sales trainer.” He was selling his sales program, and said he could teach you how to […]

Sellers have to invest the time and effort to think about their future and anticipate what it will hold for them. How will your markets, buyers, companies and careers be disrupted and transformed by rapidly changing technologies and evolving buying behaviors? What will you have to learn today to be ready for tomorrow? I’ve spent […]

Your victories and failures do not define you. Unless you let them. In sales, we experience victory and failure in roughly equal measures. It’s the nature of the beast. All of our victories, and failures, are transitory. The joy and pain equally fleeting. If you hit quota one month, on the first day of the […]

It seems like hardly a day goes by without reading some nonsense online about why relationships aren’t important in sales. Anyone who says relationships are unimportant in selling is wrong. It seems clear that they don’t understand what a relationship is. Let’s keep it really simple. A relationship is defined as the way two or […]

What’s your buyer’s ROI on the time and attention they invest in you? B2B buyers want to make purchase decisions faster. Up to 40% faster according to one study. What’s holding them back? Empty, valueless sales touches that don’t help the buyer make progress toward making a purchase decision. Take a second here and estimate […]

I was thinking about my friend Don this morning. Years ago Don and I swam in the same Masters swimming program. We often swam in the same lane; though he was faster than I was and I usually spent the entire workout chasing his feet. Don is a successful entrepreneur and a very positive thinker. […]