TalkShoe Events | A Sales Guy

Sales Smack: Are Sales People on Autopilot?

Our next Sales Smack is this Tuesday, February 9th at 7:00. We’re going to be talking about Sales people and engagement. Are sales people on autopilot? Have we gotten lazy?

I’m excited about this one because it’s not black or white. I am expecting some differing opinions. I definitely think sales has changed, and this change is causing sales people and sales organizations to struggle with the changes, but I’m not sure it has put sales people on autopilot. I think this is going to be a great discussion.

Sales Smack has been a great event so far. I’m really enjoying it. The discussions have been lively. The content has been provocative and the participants have been first class. I think this last piece is what is making Sales Smack so good. The people who are participating are killer. They’ve included David Brock, S. Anthony Iannarino, Jill Konrath, Skip Anderson, Paul Dunay, Tibor Shanto and more. Smart people are asking challenging questions, pushing the limits, creating debate AND adding different perspectives and knowledge. Like most things social, it’s the participation that makes the difference. It’s been fun to watch and I’ve learned a lot in the last two events.

I suspect Sales Smack is going to continue to grow. It’s a great forum for discussion, live discussion and live discussion is hard to come by these days.

Come by Tuesday night and check it out. It’s a lot of fun and for me I’ve learned a lot.

Also check out our LinkedIn Sales Smack Group: it’s where the ideas and conversations start.

Sales Smack, Talk Shoe, and Other Topics (thecustomercollective.com)

February 5, 2010 | Filed under: TalkShoe Events | View Comments |

Where’s the Innovation?

Innovation in sales was the topic during this weeks Sales Smack event. The question was; “Does sales need innovation?” It was suggested that we have been doing the same old things for the past 50+ years and little has changed.

I look at sales in 3 stages; access, influence and delivery. I think there has been a fair amount of innovation in the first and last stages. With the advent of tools, like social media, CRM, and the productivity gains from the internet, computing etc., there has been tremendous innovation in gaining access to prospects and decision makers as well as improving our delivery capabilities. Where I struggled with innovation in sales was in the meat of sales; the influence.

Influence is where sales happens. The influence stage is where we “influence” the buyers decision. Those who are best at influencing the buyer win.

I didn’t see any innovation in this area. To me, the methods hadn’t changed in a long time. Influence had always been, build the relationship, solve problems, understand the issues etc. To me, it’s always been an information, problem solving game. That is until Sales Smack.

During Sales Smack Jill Konrath and S. Anthony Iannarino threw out a few things that got my attention. Jill said, sales has lacked a culture of “thinking” and organizations who provide training around thinking are seeing results. Anthony suggested it’s no longer OK to “pitch” (which I have always agreed with) but sales people have to be diverse in their expertise. Beyond being sales people they have to be engineers, CEO’s, finance people, marketers etc. To be a great sales person your skills have to be far more expansive than just being a magnanimous, articulate, jovial personality.

I think they are on to something. Sales Smack has altered my opinion a little. Innovation in the influence stage of selling needs to target the behaviors of the sales people. Innovation in the influence stage is going to come from the psychology of buying habits and decision making coupled with training to instill new selling behaviors in sales people.

Critical thinking skills and broad skill enhancements are for sure two ways sales is innovating. Organizations that leverage these innovative approaches in their organization through training will have a competitive advantage.

I struggled to see where sales has been innovating, especially in the influence stage. Sales Smack gave me a smack and it’s a little more clear. Now, I’d like to see more.

Do you see more innovation in sales?

Check out the entire discussion, folks were throwing down some good stuff:

January 29, 2010 | Filed under: Sales Leadership,Sales Process,TalkShoe Events,What I Think! | View Comments |

Is Sales “STUCK?”

Consultative selling, Spin selling, Selling 2.0, Provocative selling, we’ve heard them all. But, are they innovative? Are they bringing anything new to the table. David Brock at Partners in Excellence Blog has been asking this question a lot. Innovation in Sales; An Oxymoron?

David makes an interesting point:

. . . with all the talk going on, when you peel everything back, have things really changed? Customers still avoid wanting to speak with sales people. We hear too much about sales people pushing products, not understanding customer problems and creating value, and the list goes on. Often, it seems to me, we are having the same conversation repeatedly. Sometimes we change the word or methodology, sometimes we add technology or tools so we can do this stuff at the speed of light, sometimes we disguise it with new buzzwords, but somehow it seems that things aren’t changing.

I think David is on to something. I often wonder the same thing. Is sales changing? Is sales being innovative. Is the profession and how we practice it growing? Has there been any innovation in sales in the past 50 years?

This is the next topic on Sales Smack tomorrow night at 7:00 EST. Jump in with us as we try to break down what is happening in sales and what is really happening to the second oldest profession in the world.

Sales Smack is an open forum where everyone get’s a chance to share their opinion. A live, open, conference call on TalkShoe, where we break down sales topics in an open podcast forum.

See you there.

January 25, 2010 | Filed under: Sales Process,TalkShoe Events,The Chase | View Comments |

TalkShoe: Sales Smack

Tonight was the first Sales Smack even on Talk Shoe. I talked about it last week. You can listen to the replay here.

I thought the idea had potential, but like anything you try for the first time you’re never quite sure how it’s going to turn out. The topic was; Is Sales Responsible for a Companies Growth? We had good attendance. David Brock, Paul Dunay, Shane Gibson, Tibor Shanto, and Jerry Kennedy, where just some of the folks on the call.

The call exceeded expectations. It was a killer event. There was good discussion. It was lively, energetic, funny, and informative.

I came up with the idea, because I wanted to do a Podcast type event, but I didn’t want it to be a stiff, talking heads, static event. Tonight was far from that. There were a lot of good tweets and folks really enjoyed the interaction.

I learned a lot by engaging with this group and that was the icing on the cake. I went in with one opinion and walked out with a better one. My perspective grew from the call. In my opinion, that is what good social engagement does.

We’ll be doing Sales Smack every other Tuesday at 7:00 EST. The Next Event: Does Sales Need to Innovate? If so how do we do it?

Maybe we’ll see you next time. For more info just go here.

Sales Smack, Talk Shoe, and Other Topics (thecustomercollective.com)

January 13, 2010 | Filed under: Business Performance,TalkShoe Events,The Chase | View Comments |

Talkin’ Smack; What Do You Have to Say?

I love the discussion on this blog and the conversations that happen on other blogs I visit. I think that is one of the best things about the web and social media. To those of you who visit often, you know this about me.

I’ve always loved a good conversation and debate. I love dinner parties for this reason too. There is nothing better than having a table full of really smart people sitting around talking about a good, profound topic. Discussion is energizing. It brings people together. It expands ideas. It challenges perspectives. It expands perspectives. It creates camaraderie. It’s fun.

Knowing this, I’ve been looking for a way to create more dialog. I wanted something where people could be heard. I wanted it to be real time and open to everyone, not just a few “select” people and I found it in TalkShoe.

TalkShoe in TalkShoe’s words:

“TalkShoe is a service that enables anyone to easily create, join,
or listen to Live Interactive Discussions, Conversations, Podcasts
and Audioblogs.”

In other words, TalkShoe let’s a bunch of people get together and talk via the phone. Think about it like a public web conference or conference call.

I dig this idea and have started a series of events called, Sales Smack. Sales Smack will tackle sales, business, marketing and entrepreneurial topics. They will be controversial, challenging and unique topics; topics that traditionally have multiple opinions and camps.

Why Sales Smack?

I think it will be a great way to learn, grow relationships, and get new information. Because it’ll be frickin’ cool to rap with all of you! It’s our very own sales dinner party.

There will be a Sales Smack event every two weeks. The first event will be Tuesday at 7:00 p.m. EST. You can check out the event here.

The first topic; “Is Sales Responsible for a Companies Growth?” This has been a wildly debated topic on this blog, so I thought let’s keep the discussion going.

What do you think? Do you have something to say?