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It was a couple of days before the end of the quarter. I was a VP back at Salesforce when one of my reps came to me with a request. “Hey David, I’ve been working with this customer for a while now and I think we can get the deal done by our deadline. We have all the terms ironed out. The only thing is, they’re asking if they can pay quarterly instead of annually.
Here’s a startling fact you may not know: Salespeople who uncover budgets are 172% more likely to close business than those who do not. This stat drives home the point that you must have a sales process that includes money discussions early in the conversation and you must help salespeople sell value by being more comfortable having those conversations.
Oxford defines a crutch as a prop, a support. While there is nothing wrong with needing a little support, the crutches salespeople rely on harm their results, often without their knowing why. Here we will look at a number of crutches, what salespeople believe they do, and why they prevent sales.
Many people prefer purchasing things online nowadays. In fact, three-quarters of surveyed buyers prefer virtual sales over traditional sales. If virtual selling is already part of your business strategy, you might want to ramp your efforts up. Here are 5 proven tips to help you increase virtual sales.
Speaker: Matt Sunshine, CEO at The Center for Sales Strategy
AI isn’t replacing salespeople—it’s empowering them. The most forward-thinking sales organizations are using AI to enhance human performance rather than eliminate it. From coaching and messaging to prospecting and pipeline accountability, artificial intelligence is giving managers and SDRs the new tools they need to work smarter, sell better, and close more.
Even though businesses moving to remote sales have been increasing in the past few years, others have been reaping the benefits of remote sales for years. They have long adopted and understood the power of remote sales, which has helped them establish a strong market compared to their competitors. Remote selling has allowed businesses to overcome time constraints and geographical locations in a bid to engage with a larger number of customers over a shorter period.
Couple questions here – are your sales stagnating? If yes, then you’re probably looking for new ways to improve your sales performance. Perhaps the answer could be in your sales pipeline. Research shows that top performing companies and sales teams do extremely well when it comes to managing their pipeline. However, over 60% of sales teams say their companies are doing a bad job of managing the sales pipeline.
Users can access Spotify’s extensive music library for free, yet their Premium subscriptions grew 15% in 2022. Meanwhile, ecommerce marketing software Privy is generating 10% higher average order value for Shopify users with their related product recommendations add-on. These tactics are upselling and cross-selling (respectively). While both effectively drive revenue and enhance the customer experience, upselling is ideal for companies with a single product or freemium model.
Users can access Spotify’s extensive music library for free, yet their Premium subscriptions grew 15% in 2022. Meanwhile, ecommerce marketing software Privy is generating 10% higher average order value for Shopify users with their related product recommendations add-on. These tactics are upselling and cross-selling (respectively). While both effectively drive revenue and enhance the customer experience, upselling is ideal for companies with a single product or freemium model.
Product-led growth (PLG) is driving some of the fastest growing B2B companies. While these solutions can propel organizations forward, this approach requires business leaders to make strategic decisions around what’s needed to scale that success.
One way to describe our current environment is AC/DC, an acronym for the A ccelerating, C onstant, D isruptive C hange we have been experiencing in the 21st century. In the late 1990s, there were people who suggested the world would end with the millennium. Even though the Earth is still spinning its way around the sun, the people predicting the end of the world were right, even if their predictions were too literal.
Doing research and preparing for a prospect meeting so that you know what questions to ask is important. However, it is even more important to have a healthy level of skepticism and not assume anything about what they may or may not need.
We are creating a new category in the sales technology industry: the Sales Suite. Wrong Approach to Complexity. Today sales—and, really, commerce as a whole—has hit an all-time high of complexity. The technology industry has dealt with this complexity with an ever-increasing number of apps, a separate app developed to deal with every single factor in this complexity.
Speaker: Brendan Sweeney, VP of Global Sales and David Phelan, Account Manager
In a world where buyers are more informed and objections are more nuanced, confidence isn't optional—it’s a competitive advantage. In high-stakes conversations, knowing how to handle pushback can make or break the deal. Join industry experts Brendan Sweeney and David Phelan for a behind-the-scenes look at how teams are transforming sales coaching with real-time feedback, objection-handling role plays, and pre-call preparation that actually sticks.
Before the pandemic, Salesforce found that most customers were demanding a team selling approach to satisfying their needs. Fast forward to today’s post-pandemic business world, and our research shows that sales teams are starting to put the customer experience first—and team (or collaborative) selling is an integral part of that sales plan. What better way to satisfy the rising standards of customers than by inviting more trusted advisors from other departments into the sales process , such as
Consistency is the cornerstone of good marketing. You only have to look at top brands to see this in action: Apple’s sleekness, Coca-Cola’s playfulness, Disney’s magic. Consistency is equally critical for startups. Stacked Marketer turned a free newsletter into a six-figure revenue generator by staying actionable, convenient, and entertaining. Being consistent earns trust and cements brand status—qualities that add 10–20% to your overall growth, according to LucidPress research.
While the delineation between marketing and sales can vary from one organization to the next, establishing a close working relationship between both areas remains critical. The most successful companies are the ones with leaders who can mitigate any silos and ensure the entire customer-facing organization is aligned with what’s most important to their buyer.
A decision maker is defined by their title. A person who is charged with making a decision, especially one with the potential of negative consequences, has an obligation to make the best possible decision for their company and the better future results they need. Throughout human history, leaders charged with making decisions have relied on advisors who could provide a perspective that would inform their decisions, increasing their ability to better understand the decision and the potential outc
Speaker: Jady West, VP of Hospitality & Chris Bennett, Head of Sales & Engineering
The modern hotel room is no longer just a place to stay—it’s an experience to remember. Today’s guests expect seamless 5G connectivity, personalized comfort, and high-tech convenience. From AI-powered smart room controls to in-room entertainment and app-based services, technology is redefining hospitality from the inside out. In this new session featuring industry pros Jady West and Chris Bennett, we’ll explore how high-speed, high-bandwidth connectivity powers the innovations that are enabling
In the profession of selling there is a response or an answer we are often confronted with that causes great distress, delays in decision-making, or loss of opportunities. That response is: “I need to think it over”. There are three major areas that "think it over" typically appear- the initial phone call, the first appointment, and the presentation.
One of the worst things you can do for a sales call is go into it unprepared. Lack of preparation adds more stress to an already high-pressure task, but it also turns prospects off. They can tell when you’ve wandered into unknown territory. Just like they can tell when you’ve thoroughly researched who they are and what they need. The latter closes deals.
Now that field sales is making a comeback post-Covid, road warriors are clamoring for a better way to mobilize and visualize their Salesforce data. Making up for lost time and revenue is no easy task. So what’s the solution? Sales managers are looking to empower their field teams with MORE sales technology than ever before. In this year’s State of Field Sales Report , more than half of the solutions that are being deployed to sales reps are making Salesforce data MORE actionable on smartpho
How do you retain more accounts as you grow? Collecting and analyzing sales data indiscriminately is like endlessly tossing buckets of coins into a wishing well…and believing the act itself … Read More. The post Early Warning System: Retain More Accounts As You Grow first appeared on Colleen Francis - The Sales Leader.
Retailers know the clock is ticking–legacy SAP Commerce support ends in 2026. Legacy platforms are becoming a liability burdened by complexity, rigidity, and mounting operational costs. But modernization isn’t just about swapping out systems, it’s about preparing for a future shaped by real-time interactions, AI powered buying assistants, and flexible commerce architecture.
Your most important asset is your people. How can you own the talent management process to make your people your sales organization's biggest competitive advantage? In this era of mass resignations and global hiring, it's critical for sales leaders to take ownership of their talent management process. Recently, a Microsoft survey stated that 52% of young people polled say they are likely to consider changing employers this year.
I'm arguing with Jonathan Graham and Michael Price from the Inward Book Club. They have been kind enough to review a number of my books, and I like them very much. Our small bit of conflict is the result of being two people separated by language.
Most organizations and advisors have been working long term to be more customer-focused. The challenge is for advisors to be productive and assertive without coming across to customers as sales-driven. One of the key sales challenges is to stay focused on adding value and leading with relationship selling.
Being the salesperson companies desire is no easy task, especially with vast differences in the company culture. Never assume a sale; work for it instead is the motto, but for a moment, let’s assume you like your place of work and you want to be a likable salesperson. The ultimate goal of a business is to create a loyal fan base. Similarly, salespeople are to strive to earn a returning and referring clientele.
Documents are the backbone of enterprise operations, but they are also a common source of inefficiency. From buried insights to manual handoffs, document-based workflows can quietly stall decision-making and drain resources. For large, complex organizations, legacy systems and siloed processes create friction that AI is uniquely positioned to resolve.
It’s no secret that the global population is evolving and becoming more diverse. According to studies, there are plenty of benefits that come with building a workforce that reflects society. Diverse teams lead to sharper and more innovative teams that not only find work satisfaction, but improve sales productivity as well. So, how does diversity recruiting contribute to better overall performance?
David Gelles new book The Man Who Broke Capitalism is an account of how Jack Welch gutted the heartland and crushed the soul of corporate America - and how to undo his legacy. I learned a ton from this book, and it made me think a lot about the different ways that businesses can be run.
What do the most successful business leaders do to take themselves and their people to the next level? Tune into these episodes for insight on how to build and lead elite sales teams. Hear from dynamic revenue leaders on how they got to where they are now, and the trials and tribulations of their journeys. Take actionable advice, enjoy John McMahon and John Kaplan's banter (we hear it's a hit), and dig in.
The shift from being an individual contributor to leading a sales force isn't an easy transition. The character traits are different, and so are the required skills. While it's helpful to have experience in a sales role, by itself, it's not enough to ensure success. Few sales managers are provided the training and development that would enable them to lead their team and reach their goals.
B2B marketers face a number of challenges, including: continuously generating great leads converting leads to active sales prospects finding vendors that deliver real results Aggregage has proven content syndication, webinar, online advertising and intent signal marketing programs that deliver higher-quality leads. More than 700 companies have already benefited from our programs.
Knowing and understanding your prospect's buying motives allows you to make better decisions on whether to engage and pursue a potential sales opportunity.
In the past, there have been concerns that private email within CRM could be seen by other users who shouldn’t see it, because email in CRM has been accessible by any user. We have just released a new email permissions feature for Pipeliner CRM that will ease anyone’s mind about integrating email with CRM. With Pipeliner’s new Email Permissions feature, companies can now decide how they want email to be shared, within CRM, with others within the company.
A lot of folks are talking about how things were in ’08-’09 and even ’00-’01 these days. I don’t think today is anything like those times. The amount of folks buying SaaS software is a force like we’ve never seen before, and even with some stock market drama, many top SaaS companies still trade at $4B, $10B, $20B or more just a decade after being founded.
??????? Is there such thing as an ideal buyer? I recently have been interviewed on a number of podcasts because there’s great interest in my new book, Right on the … Read More. The post The Ideal Buyer in Today’s Marketplace | Sales Strategies first appeared on Colleen Francis - The Sales Leader.
When culture isn’t consistently lived out across the organization, engagement suffers—and it often starts with a disconnect at the top. In this session, Beth Sunshine, SVP of Up Your Culture at The Center for Sales Strategy, will reveal how HR and executive leaders can close the gap between vision and execution by equipping frontline and mid-level managers to become culture carriers.
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