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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 Power Our Questions Offer Our Customers
Any sales person worth her salt knows how important questions are. They are critical to our success. Effective questioning gives us great insight into what the customer is trying to achieve, their attitudes, their problems and needs (though I know it is no longer “fashionable” to probe for need.). Effective questioning gives us the data we need to develop and position our solutions. Once we know what the customer is trying to achieve and what they want, we can prepare our strategies for presenting the solution and winning the business. But questions are much more important than just giving use the […]
“Content Free” Content
I haven’t whined in a while, so pardon me for this indulgence. We all know that content is critical in engaging prospect and customers. Let me rephrase this, “good content is critical…..” Clearly, organizations are getting the message about content, the problem is they are forgetting to provide the content. A couple of examples, in cleaning out my email this morning, I’ve actually encountered several offers that I’ve found interesting. I dutifully clicked the links to get the information the emails were enticing me with. In the first case, I get to a beautiful landing page. A nice picture, with nothing […]
Metrics, Awareness, And Goal Attainment
For those of you who have followed this blog for some time, you know my obsession with metrics. I measure everything I do, whether it’s work, professional, or personal. I’ve written about how I measure my performance on my bike rides in What We Miss About Sales Metrics. I’ve gone another step in my obsession. I’ve recently gotten a clever device called a Fitbit One (yes, I’m really a gadget freak). While the folks at Fitbit may be appalled with this description, it’s basically a pedometer on steroids. It tracks how many steps I’ve taken, how many sets of stairs I’ve climbed, how far […]
“We Aren’t In Kansas Anymore” Going Global
Finding and serving customers around the globe used to be the province of larger companies. It was difficult for small to mid-sized companies to move beyond their home regions. Often it required massive resources and investments. Today, it’s high on the “to-do” list of most entrepreneurs and start-ups. But going global is challenging. Whether a North American, European, Asian, African, South American company; success depends on building and executing a sound plan. In working with our clients, we’ve discovered a few things: Are you ready to expand out of your home country? I mean REALLY READY! Too often we see companies wanting to […]
“Protecting The Family Jewels” And Disruption
“Protecting The Family Jewels” is an implicit or explicit part of too many business strategies. Often the term reflects a focus on the core–whatever that might be–core products, core markets, core strategies. I first became acquainted with the term in terms of protecting base revenue. However, in protecting base revenue, we miss or lose new opportunities to grow. Sometime, protecting the family jewels focuses on protecting what made us great in the past, but causes us to miss important disruptions that can destroy that base we are protecting. Every segment, industry, market, even geography is filled with examples of “Protecting The Family Jewels.” Protecting […]
If You Don’t Value Your Time, You’ll Never Value The Customer’s
In commenting on my post, Given A Choice, Customers Generally Prefer Not To Have Their Time Wasted, my friend Gary Hart struck a chord, stimulating this post. Thanks Gary! There is not a lot that we as sales professionals control. Our companies set our quotas, define our territories, give us sales and marketing programs, and help define out priorities. We can’t control the products, product quality, our pricing, or much of the customer experience. The one thing that is in our control is how we use our time. Yet, too often, I see too many sales professionals wasting time. No […]