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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
When Deals Stall……
When deals stall it’s a sign that something has to change! All of us have experienced stalled deals. It’s frustrating, we’re anxious for the customer to move forward in their buying process. We’re anxious to close the deal! Deals can stall for all sorts of reasons. Customers may lose their sense of urgency. Their attention may have been diverted to other priorities. They may simply get lost in their buying process. I review hundreds of deals and pipelines every year. I see thousands of stalled deals. Too often, the deals are stalled because of sellers! Let’s dive into some of […]
Reflecting On “Founder Mode”
Since Paul Graham’s fascinating article on Founder Mode, I’ve been reading/rereading his article and listening to Brian Chesky talk about his re-wiring of AirBnB. I’ve also been wary of way too many pundits jumping on the bandwagon with their thoughts about Founder Mode as the miracle cure to our business woes. (Let me be clear, neither Paul, nor Brian talk about it in that way.) I have to confess, it took me some time to wrap my head around what they were talking about. Part of it was the jargon around “Founder” and “Manager” modes. Part of it was my […]
RevOps Can And Must Do Better!
It’s “strategic planning season” for many companies. I sit in countless discussions and reviews, led by RevOps teams. They are presenting the strategic goals and numbers for the coming year. In addition, there have been a lot of RevOps conferences, where these leaders talk about developing the function. While none of these discussions have been “wrong,” I worry that so much more can be accomplished. Too many discussions are about the numbers and doing the math. RevOps teams have access to data and analytics many of us never imagined possible. In discussing the strategic goals for the organization, most take […]
The “Things We Don’t Want To Do”
Regardless our role, there are certain aspects of our jobs we don’t like. They are the things we don’t like or want to do. They vary for each of us. For individual contributors, it may be prospecting, admin tasks, researching our customers, managing our pipelines, dealing with all the minutiae of moving deals forward, and on and on For managers, it may be hiring, coaching, dealing with poor performers, understanding performance data, and on and on. We may simply not do those things, even though they need to be done. Alternatively, we may seek others to do those things we […]
Who Is This Important To?
We are taught to “call high.” We want to reach the top executives in an organization, getting their support in buying our solutions. In our best days, we have articulated a business case about the impact of our solutions. “We can reduce costs by $10M. We can reduce swelling admin time by 20%, we can increase revenue by $100M…..” The numbers can appear big, particularly in context of the investment the customer may have to make in our solutions. But too often, when we are focusing on the approval of top executives, these results produce a MEH reaction. In the […]
Pushy Vs. Pushing, A Matter Of Context
Sellers are too Pushy! Customers always seem to move more slowly than sellers want. They wander, waste time that sellers don’t have. Sellers are anxious to move things forward! Get the meeting, get the demo, get the order! Sellers have always been known for being pushy, we as sellers recognize it, we high five each other on our clever techniques to get the customer to commit faster. Customers have always recognized it, that’s why they want nothing to do with sellers. Whether responding to spamming emails/texts/social outreach, avoiding meetings, trying to perfect their seller free buying journey! We all recognize […]