When companies inquire about our services, they sometimes ask if Connect 5000 gets compensated by the sales meeting or on a monthly retainer.
There’s a formidable competitor of mine out on the East Coast who charges by the appointment. I believe like $700 a meeting. There’s no upfront fees and they only get paid if it’s a “qualified” meeting. Read more
Happy 4th of July to you!
Can you believe how fast the 1st half of 2012 came and left?
I met with a VP of Sales of a large health benefits organization here in town this week.
She and I discussed whether the first sales meeting should be face to face or by phone. She wanted to target the state of Iowa which can be a 3 hour drive. She’s had success both ways and wanted my opinion. Read more
Last week I attended Jigsaw’s 3rd Annual Rainmaker’s Conference for 3 days in Las Vegas. I’m considered a “Rainmaker” because of my ratings and usage. Jigsaw is a community website wiki that was sold for $170M to Salesforce.com. They renamed it Data.com recently.
As you may or may not know, LinkedIn shows you companies, names, and titles of people nationwide and worldwide. Jigsaw provides more often than not direct phone numbers and email addresses of these executives that are pretty accurate. Is it Jigsaw 100% accurate? No, but they are pretty close. I know of many people’s LinkedIn profile that aren’t updated or accurate. Read more
Here’s a great post from insideview.com, a great resource for sales folks!
In sales, money is made when a salesperson goes beyond the initial cold call. In fact, about 80 percent of all sales are made after five to 12 contacts between the sales person and prospect. The sales person, when pinpointing a potential sale, must dig in. The rep must engage the prospect in a variety of ways, whether it’s through social media or customer referrals, and through several contacts and interactions.
They have to go beyond the age-old art (or archaic practice, depending on who you ask) of the ever-waning cold call. Because sales people have to be constantly chasing a prospect for a sale, they leave themselves room for error. They might get cranky after a prospect won’t bite initially, or they might chase a prospect not worth chasing. Worse, a sales rep might drop a prospect who would’ve bought if the sales rep were more persistent. Read more
A few weeks ago my wife and daughter spent some time her her mom and dad and it was just me for 6 days.
The first night they were gone, I attended a networking event for a non-profit here in Kansas City. They asked me to be serve on the board. It was pleasant and I had a good time. One of the guys there who I’ve met before asked me if I attended a lot of networking events like the Chamber of Commerce. I told him no because that CEO’s and VP of Sale’s of companies that I want to do business with typically don’t attend these events. Read more
We’ve entered the dog days of summer! Prospects are tough to reach as is. Now they’re going on vacation and even more challenging to reach.
It was a tough week for Connect 5000. We lost a large client on Monday. The VP of Sales called my cell phone. He usually doesn’t contact me unless he’s got really good or bad news. He typically doesn’t call just to chat.
To make a long story short, Autodesk, $2.22B software company, acquired Vela Systems, a provider of Field Management Software for construction firms nationwide last Friday. Read more
I would consider myself a control freak. Or more politically correct speaking, I’m very “particular” on how certain things should be.
BUT
There are 3 things I can’t control:
1. The weather.
2. The economy
3. Other peoples and companies decision making process Read more
My family didn’t own a television set until I was in the 5th grade. What madness! Kidding.
Since we didn’t own a tv, I read a bit. Quite a bit. I’ve always been a voracious reading. Read more
You can’t track what you don’t measure.
You can’t improve an area if you don’t know your numbers. Plain and simple.
If you want to improve your free throw percentage, shouldn’t you track the number of made free throws divided by total number of attempts?
Of course. Read more
Michael Jordan is arguably considered the best basketball player. Ever. 6 time NBA Champion. 5 time NBA MVP. 14 time NBA All-Star. I could go on and on about his accomplishments. But I won’t.
You may or may not know that Michael Jordan tried being a professional baseball player but was not successful at it.
Does that diminish Jordan’s basketball accomplishments? Absolutely not.
How does this apply to sales and prospecting? Read more
