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Making A Difference – Thoughts, Observations and Opinions
This is Dave Brock’s Blog.
It offers my views on a variety of business, sales, marketing, and leadership topic. My goal is to make a difference for you, the reader, in both your professional and personal lives.
Latest Posts
On Disagreement
Disagreement is part of life and business. Disagreement is, probably, a fundamental to change and growth. After all, if we are always in agreement, we would never challenge ourselves and others to think differently, to consider something new. But we struggle with disagreement, too often we deal with it poorly. We may seek to avoid it, burying our heads in the sand, never considering a different point of view. Alternatively, we acquiesce, though we still disagree and are not aligned in what we are trying to achieve. Too often, we treat disagreement as if we are being attacked, seeking to […]
Problem-Market Fit…..
We, including me, have always focused much of our product development and GTM strategies around the concept of “Product-Market Fit.” Suddenly, I realized there is a much better way to look at this. The challenge with the concept of Product-Market fit is that it biases the way we look at things. As a result, it biases the solutions we create, the way we bring them and present them to market, and how we position ourselves in the markets. Ultimately, our focus is all about the product. As a result, we get into the old “If all we have is a […]
“Why I’m So Interested In Selling,” George Bronten
Preface: George Bronten and I have been friends for years. I first met him because I was intrigued by the capabilities of Membrain. It’s one of the most interesting technologies, I’ve seen. I think George and I recognized similar passions with technology, business and selling. Since that introductory meeting, we continue to have conversations about the state of our profession and its future. Two separate sentences lept out in George’s story: “There aren’t a lot of careers where you can do everything you can in sales.” This, I think is so powerful, when you look at the breadth of things […]
What Our Leaders “Owe” Us
As individual contributors, we are conditioned to think about what we owe our managers and leaders. Are we getting all our tasks done–making the calls, doing the outreach, meeting with customers, progressing deals, keeping our reporting updated. We are conditioned to think about hitting our goals and numbers, keeping our performance up, perhaps to keep our managers off our backs. As managers we are, likewise, conditioned to think, “What are my people doing for me?” We assess whether they are doing all the things cited above, perhaps thinking they could do more. At the same time, we think of our […]
Cold Calling Was Never “Alive!”
For years, the fashion has been to declare, “Cold calling is dead!” It always comes from people with a specific agenda. Those who believe inbound is the only thing that works. Or a newer fashion, espousing inbound generated outbound. Others promoting social engagement. Or any other engagement approach where “cold calling,” is the obvious foil. It seems to strengthen whatever position they want to take, and some are valid, the primary argument is to declare “Cold Calling Is Dead.” They go on to explain “cold calling.” Universality, cold calling is defined as untargeted, unfocused, massive outreach. The wider the reach, […]
The Recurring Revenue Mantra
Recurring revenue is critical to any business. But, I get confused in the discussions I get into with SaaS and other XaaS proponents. Somehow, they have the idea the SaaS recurring revenue model is both superior and has much greater predictability than other business models. I sit back, scratching my hear. My reaction is, “Huhhhhh, I’m not sure I get it….” People roll their eyes, “Yeah, Dave, we know back when you helped to invent fire, your currency in trade was apples…. Times have changed….” But then I ask, “Doesn’t every organization have a recurring revenue model?” The eyes continue […]