Blog Entries for Selling

Breaking the chain of ignorance: How to up the pace of transformation

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 12 May 2013 22:41:09 +0100

In December 2012, we published the 12 Sales Trends Report for 2013 and released a brief summary of each trend. This month we are focusing on the sales trend "Breaking the chain of ignorance – upping the pace of transformation".

It is not enough to adapt to change, we need to keep ahead of the curve and continue to transfor [...]

Does your sales team or culture need a detox?

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 05 May 2013 23:08:46 +0100

It doesn't take much to sow the seeds of discontent in business today, and the potential for creating dysfunctional, "toxic" sales teams and culture is much easier than you think. There are so many things that can and do go wrong.

We at Barrett have met and worked with a great many sales teams across all sorts of industrie [...]

How many clients and sales are you losing out the back door?

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 23:00:21 +0100

Keeping clients onboard and engaged with your business is just as important as your sales team finding new business sales with new and existing clients. However, many businesses do not pay enough attention to the back end of their business leaving client retention to chance.

Have you ever mapped the whole value chain of your busine [...]

Delivering real value beyond product and price

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 00:00:50 +0100

In December 2012, we published the 12 Sales Trends Report for 2013 and released a brief summary of each trend. This month we are focusing on the sales trend, "Delivering real value beyond product and price".

For many years most of a product's value came from the production processes that converted raw material into useful [...]

Are your invisible sales managers losing you sales?

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 14 Apr 2013 23:01:32 +0100

The number one priority for any sales manager is to lead and drive the effective sales performance of their sales team. The only way a sales manager can achieve this is by being available and responsive to his/her sales team. What does this actually mean in real world terms?

This means getting out from behind your desk, ditching [...]

How much valuable selling time are you wasting?

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 07 Apr 2013 22:34:36 +0100

When it comes to sales productivity and sales performance, many companies are shortchanging themselves and unfairly blaming their salespeople for poor sales performance results.

How can that be? Well, too many businesses pay salespeople for business development and then lumber them with non-revenue, non-customer oriented activities such as [...]

Key accounts management, selling, sales,

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 23:34:12 +0100

Not every business needs a key accounts management function or team but many more are finding they do. Why?

In recent times we are witnessing a distinct shift to key accounts management with five major events fostering the development of key account management as a crucial business function.

Market maturity

Increasing cost of sale

Customer / client negotiating power

Pressure on margins

Increased local, regional and global competition

In particular, custo [...]

Leadership in uncertain times

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 21:22:57 +0100

In December 2012, like in the previous years, we published the 12 Sales Trends Report for 2013 and released a brief summary of each trend. Throughout the year we will look into each of them a little deeper. This month we are focusing on the sales trend "Leadership in uncertain times".

Extreme uncertainty is the new norm. Living in a constant state of fear and anxiety only leads to more fear and anxiety. Research shows that highly distracted or stressed people don't and can't innova [...]

If you're a salesperson, you should be a brand leader

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 10 Mar 2013 14:00:00 +0100

Barrett's head of sales strategy, Peter Finkelstein, contemplates the power of salespeople to be brand leaders:

In the last 40 years the concept of branding, as a means of differentiating one company or product from another, has become an important and powerful marketing tool. Enormous sums of money, and extensive executive time has been invested in developing and promoting brands, and making sure that more buyers were aware of the value that a brand had to offer.

Since the [...]

Why is sales forecasting such a pain?

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 14:00:00 +0100

I'll give you the two main reasons why most sales managers find sales forecasting such a pain in the backside.

1. To meet and exceed your sales budgets, manage your client portfolios and direct your sales activities you need to know what deals are in your pipeline, where you are at with each deal and what you need to do next. And without accurate information it is really hard to get accurate forecasts and predict sales revenue and margins.

2. Senior management make a really [...]

Enthusiasm in selling

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 21:34:33 +0100

There is a popular fallacy that salespeople are born, not made. Whilst there is some vestige of truth in the statement, it is not for the reasons made so popular – i.e. it's not that salespeople have the 'gift of the gab' but rather because these successful salespeople are genuinely enthusiastic about what they do in helping prospects find a solution. These salespeople have a purpose to what they do and enjoy the process of discovery, problem-solving and collaboration with others.

[...]

Are you paying salespeople enough to sell well?

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Fri, 15 Feb 2013 04:48:43 +0100

Are you paying your salespeople enough to enable them to focus on selling and not worry about where their next paycheck is coming from? Because if salespeople are constantly worrying about when they are going to get paid, how can they sell well?

For many years, unlike most other salaried employees who can rely on a regular weekly/monthly pay cheque, salespeople have often been required to live hand-to-mouth – making sales and waiting for their commission or bonus to supplement thei [...]

Mastering the sales management essentials

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 21:35:07 +0100

What are the Sales Management Essentials and how do we master them? Well firstly, sales management and leadership is not about selling!

In fact, when one examines the role of the modern sales leader it quickly becomes evident that there just isn't time to sell.

Equipping sales leaders to perform the tasks for which they are responsible and sustaining the momentum of the sales force in its drive for incremental value and volume, at the same time as continuously improving the [...]

Ego is a dirty word in sales and sales management

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Mon, 04 Feb 2013 14:00:00 +0100

Having a big ego is often associated with the sales profession. For many years, the supercharged Alpha male, 600 lb sales gorilla has been the poster person for successful salespeople.

And then there is the larger than life sales manager who charges in to save the day by taking over the sales call, making the sale and demonstrating to everyone present just how much better he is than the salesperson. With stories like these swirling in the ether, it is often assumed that a big ego i [...]

What does empathy have to do with sales?

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 21:54:03 +0100

Late last year we published the 12 Sales Trends Report for 2013 and released a brief summary of each sales trend in December. Over the year we will delve a little deeper into each sales trend. To kick off the new year we will focus on the sales trend, Empathy.

This sales trend is seeing smart businesses making it a priority to redress the balance and develop our interpersonal sensitivities: our empathetic side to take into account the needs of others as well as our own. We will see [...]

Hey retailers – stop whinging and start caring!

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 21:22:39 +0100

Having immigrated to Australia last year, you may find interesting the sage observations of Barrett's head of sales strategy Peter Finkelstein about our retail industry.

Here's what Peter has to say about the current debate about the state of play in Australian retail:

Over the past few months there has been a plethora of editorial regarding the decline in retail sales. Amongst other things, an argument being put forward by traditional retailers for these poor sales numbe [...]

Learning how to ride the boom and bust economy

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 06 Jan 2013 21:52:46 +0100

These turbulent, challenging and sometimes volatile times we find ourselves living in are making many of us rethink how we do business, how we live our lives and how we engage with the world. Unless you are hiding under the doona, the rest of us are witnessing and experiencing a major transition from the Industrial Revolution to a brave new world of the New Tech paradigm.

This transition is exciting and frightening at the same time because the "new order" is not ordered at all. It [...]

The yin and yang of selling

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 23 Dec 2012 21:34:43 +0100

In the 20th century, the emphasis on B2B selling had a distinct aggressive ring to it. So much so, that you could walk down the halls of many businesses and think that you were involved in big game hunting. Many of these teams saw selling as an extreme sport, or more precisely, as big game fishing or hunting.

Customers were 'targets'.

Getting a sale was referred to as 'the kill'.

Customers were regarded as objects to be possessed or trophies to be placed in their ca [...]

Sales lessons out of the mouths of babes

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Mon, 17 Dec 2012 00:36:10 +0100

'Out of the mouths of babes' is one of those expressions you hear adults utter occasionally. Often amazed at the remarkable or insightful things children say, I think we do children an injustice by thinking this is an infrequent or rare occurrence.

The many children I have met over the years are very perceptive, smart and able to see through weak arguments and call people on them, even if the children, themselves, have not acquired the worldly experiences we accumulate as adults.

On your marks, get set, go!

sbarrett@smartcompany.com.au — Sun, 09 Dec 2012 21:42:14 +0100

A prosperous life after sport is critically important to elite athletes as many of them have dedicated the best part of their lives (some into their 30s) pursuing excellence in their chosen sport, often leaving education or business pursuits to the side.

These elite athletes know that achieving excellence in sport requires dedication, determination, discipline and sacrifice. So what do you do career-wise after a life in elite sport? Or what can you do business-wise while still pursu [...]