Caroline Robinson

Successful salespeople make it a point to deliver more than what is expected

1. If your 30-second commercial doesn't answer a prospect's "What's in it for me?" question, there will be nothing in it for you!

The Objective of a 30-second commercial is to capture a prospect's attention for the purpose of engaging him or her in a relevant and meaningful conversation. The conversation should include discussion of the prospect's needs, wants, challenges, problems, goals, objectives, and desired outcomes.

Brian is the Vice President of Sandler Enterprise Selling at Sandler Training, an international training and consulting organization. Prior to joining Sandler in 2012, Brian was in sales, sales management and P&L management positions with The Cap Gemini Group for thirty years and in sales positions with Xerox Corporation prior to his time with Cap Gemini. He also served as an adjunct professor for twelve years at Loyola University Maryland, where he received his BA in Business Administration and his MBA in Marketing.

Some of the worlds top female sales influencers answer "What is your one tip for women in sales ?"

Selling in a tough economy will separate those salespeople that ‘can’ and those that ‘can't’.

As a sales manager you need to know what to do when the economy starts to hit the brakes.

• How do you ensure your sales team achieves their sales targets when the market is flat?
• How do you as the sales leader plan to achieve your sales budget when there is so much indecision and fear in the market?
• Think about it, do you really know how each of your salespeople are going perform in these troubled times?

The trouble is that we start discussing things in January, finalise plans sometime around April, it then takes a couple of months to get people and budgets in place by which time we’re into the summer holidays. So it’s hardly surprising then that we really get going on our annual plan sometime around September, we haven’t a hope of delivering the income that our January discussions envisaged.

If you have ever watched or participated in dog training you may have realised that most of the training is actually focused on training the owner to behave in the right way, that then enables the dog to respond appropriately.

As part of our Enterprise Selling Programme we have a simple but really effective tool to help you take a strategic approach to account management – KARE.

With KARE, you analyse your accounts into one of four categories:

Keep: Those accounts that you want to retain but where there is no opportunity to grow that account further
Attain: Your wish list of clients you would like to work with
Recapture: Clients that you are no longer working with, that you would like reengage with
Expand: Existing clients that you want to Keep but where there is potential to increase the amount of business you do together

Most times you already know what objections you/your people are likely to face before you start a conversation.  As part of your pre-meeting planning take the time to figure those out and how you would handle them if they come up.

No doubt part of your growth plan for the business includes retaining and growing business from existing clients. Do you/your people have a consistent approach to these conversations to ensure they are meaningful and effective? If not, here is a simple 5 step process for how review meetings with existing clients, using the acronym RECON: