2017 is now in the history books for sales organizations, and 2018 is upon us. And for the vast majority of companies, this year’s revenue expectations for sales teams are higher than last year. A question we should be asking ourselves is, “What can we...
Most sales organizations today struggle like never before. Their teams are not consistently hitting their numbers, they have a weak funnel and, when they do have a customer interested in buying, they have a hard time closing the deal.Here’s what I mean: According to data...
I enjoy going to baseball games from time to time, but I’ve never been a big fan of the sport. That is, until I recently had a chance to attend a National League Championship Series game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Chicago Cubs at...
Recently, as I was listening to Billy Joel through my headphones during a cross-country flight, I started thinking about how much time he must have spent practicing the piano throughout his lifetime in order to become “The Piano Man.” Real talent requires hard work, discipline...
Sometimes, you have to know when it’s time to cut bait and run.It’s a lesson fishing boat captains who make their living catching crab on the Bering Sea know all too well. In the most recent episode of the hit TV show Deadliest Catch, Sig...
Shift happens – or so they say. A significant shift occurred earlier this year when Tim Houlihan, a vice president at BI WORLDWIDE, a global engagement company, left that position to launch his own consulting business. Tim is a creative thinker and has been a...
As a 20-year-old college graduate (many years ago), my first job was as an account representative in the advertising industry. My father had a very successful career in sales that led to senior leadership positions, and he encouraged me to stay on the sales path,...
If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my 20-plus years in the sales profession it’s this: I don’t have all the answers. And I’ve learned how to be comfortable saying, “I don’t know.”When I finally learned this lesson, it was liberating. I learned to realize...
My journey into sales and, eventually into sales enablement, was really the road less traveled, to borrow a phrase from Robert Frost. Sales was always seemed a bit suspicious to me. My father had his own engineering firm but I never heard him talk about...
Sales enablement should always be a cross-functional discipline that encompasses more than sales and marketing. In fact, it should encompass your entire organization.What does that mean: Let’s say you’re bringing a product or solution to market. You’ve done the research, developed a unique solution that...