Chalk Talk

Everywhere you turn there is an article on leadership. Not a day goes by that you can’t find a blog or white paper on effective management strategies. A cluttered space to say the least. At the risk of adding to this already-cluttered-space here’s a hard look at the difference between people that just have the job […]

Negotiation. One of the worst occupational hazards of the sales profession. It’s not fun. Nobody ever looks forward to it. We want it to end up a win-win for both sides (but does it ever really turn out that way?). It’s inevitable. Hear me out. If a sale is qualified properly (all items in the qualifying […]

We facilitated a role play session with a client last week. Were the participants dying to do it? Nope. Was it awkward? Yep. Were they nervous? Oh, hell yes! Did it help them? Absolutely. It’s not uncommon for salespeople to really dread a role play session. After all, as Jerry Seinfeld says in his stand-up […]

How many times have you said to yourself, “I need more time”, “There’s just not enough time in the day”, “I don’t have time to hunt for new business.” How many times has your manager or director come down on you because you were late on delivering a project, report or anything else she asked for? Admit […]

Does your business lend itself to customers consistently placing “orders”? Are you lucky enough to enjoy easy & automatic renewal of business? If so, stop reading. Most salespeople have to endure a daunting balancing act — a balance between two activities: 1) the management of current accounts (farming) & 2) going out & finding new […]

Hate voice mail? Everybody does. Get over it. It’s not going anywhere. As companies continue to downsize & right-size, voice mail is the Administrative Assistant of old & has been for a long while. The Gate Keeper. And your prospects use it beautifully. You probably use voice mail too, so relax & think about what you […]

A life-long study of sales, selling, salespeople & anything related to the wonderful world of helping people make decisions has been a blast! As you might expect, we have run into quite a few sales organizations. A few things are constant among most of these organizations. There are some common characteristics that sales leaders look […]

If someone told you your job was to call or email people who you don’t know… that didn’t want to talk to you … about something, they didn’t want to buy … how quickly would you sign up? Nobody would be dumb enough to sign up for that. It’s ridiculous. I’d rather poke my eyes […]

We’re ten days into 2017. You’ve had enough time to settle in. And you didn’t win the Powerball. Tough question: What’s going to be different this year? More specifically: What will you do this year to take your sales to the next level? If you’re satisfied, coasting, or as a friend of ours used to […]

Salespeople have lots to do. Some of the things we do directly “pay us” while other things do not. Sales studs & studdettes have a tight grasp on the activities that they should spend time on during “Pay Time hours” and do those activities first. Since we don’t punch a clock in sales, the activities […]