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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
The Flip Side Of AI/Machine Learning
Everyone in sales and marketing is jumping on the AI/Machine Learning bandwagon. Mistakenly, too many think of these technologies as the silver bullet that will enable us magically to increase engagement, increase our ability to connect with customers, and fill the ever widening gaps in quota and revenue attainment. Everyday, I see dozens, if not more articles on the power of AI/Machine Learning in sales and marketing. What is ironic, even comical, is most of the thinking is only about sales and marketing. I get the feeling these tools are the secret discovery of sales and marketing, that give us […]
The Future Of Sales
I have been invited to participate in a discussion on the “Future of Sales,” with a small group of wickedly smart practitioners. I can’t express how much I’m looking forward to the discussion and learning. In many cases, predicting the future can sometimes be done with an artful projection of the past. Not with sales/marketing–at least not in these transformative times. For my part, I see a number of critical issues at the organizational and individual level. At the individual level, I see a huge shift in required competencies. The traditional skills/competencies we look for in sales professionals will be […]
“All Generalizations Are Wrong…..” Be Aware Of Expert Advice
1000’s of blogs from real and self-proclaimed experts appear every day. Each asserts they have “the answers.” Often, these answers are based on deep experience from the writer. We can learn a lot in reading those. We are hungry for answers. Each of us faces challenges that are real and very difficult. We are anxious to find answers, often leaping to “magic solutions” based on the experience of some pundit. But there are no silver bullets. These solutions are based on specific experiences these experts have had, but have been generalized to address and attract interest from a broad audience. […]
Sales Effectiveness: Focus On The Individual Or The Organizational Performance?
The other day, Matt Dixon and I were having a discussion, trying to solve all the problems of sales. As is often, the case in these discussions, we started reflecting on a lot of broad and, possibly, esoteric issues. We started talking about what ultimately may be a Chicken/Egg issue. We were considering, “Where is the next big rock to turn over in driving sales effectiveness? Do we focus on driving individual performance or do we look at overall organizational excellence?” To jump ahead, the answer is, “We have to do both!” Further, the answer to where do we start […]
AI/Machine Language Will Manager 85% Of Customer Interactions
“According to Harvard Business Review, by 2020, customers will manage 85% of their interactions with an organization without interacting with a human.” If it’s in HBR, it must be right. Through other data, we know customers are self educating on the web, depending on who you read, it’s up to 90% of customers are letting their fingers walk through Google. The implication that many try to make with this data is usually something around the death of sales. Usually the authors try to use this information as a causal effect around the declining need for sales people. Certainly, there is […]
When Will We Stop Thinking Our Customers Are Stupid?
I’m beginning to think far too many sales and marketing people think customers are stupid. What else could it be? As an example, recently I participated in a discussion on LinkedIn. The author proudly declared victory for social selling with the statement: “LinkedIn empirically proves that 51% + of revenue is now influenced by social across some key industries.” Accompanying the statement was a chart displaying research data looking at the % of revenue influenced by social selling across various industry/marketing groups. But when I looked at the research, all sorts of questions started popping up. For example, the companies […]