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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
Being “Tactegic”
Earlier this week, I participated in a series of reviews with a sales team. Each sales person was presenting their key deals and what they were doing to win. I was uncomfortable in much of the meeting, but had trouble putting my finger on what was causing my discomfort. Somehow, as I listened, I felt many of the folks were being too short sighted in their strategies. As they presented, they focused on what had just happened in the last calls and how they would respond next. I couldn’t see where they were going in the process, and what they […]
Know Thy Audience!
The other day, I wrote about how even the best of us are seduced into pitching–perhaps when something else might be more appropriate. At the same time, the pitch–or presentation of your solution is important. Too often, however, we don’t have the impact we should in our presentations. It’s odd–this should be where we shine, after all we get to talk about what we want to talk about, what we know, what we have been waiting so long to tell our customers and prospects. No, this isn’t an article about effective presentation techniques. I’m not the one to be talking […]
Even The Best Of Us Can’t Resist The Urge To Pitch!
Recently, I participated in a “discussion,” with a group of people I deeply respect. All of them were heavy hitters and well respected in their disciplines, I was almost embarrassed to be part of such a distinguished group. The topic was a discussion about a particular aspect of sales performance management that I am really interested in, I was looking forward to learning some new ideas and approaches in the discussion. I went to the meeting, the leader started the discussion, and the pitch began. It turned out, the leader was trying to enlist partners in selling something and acquiring […]
Generations
Mother’s Day seems appropriate for a very off topic post. Blogging gives me great joy. It’s therapeutic, I get to pontificate about all sorts of things. When I’m on, I get to learn from my readers, whose comments often provide much more insight than my posts. However recently, unbeknownst to me, I learned that my parents were great fans of my blog, reading it regularly. I know they knew I blogged, but I had never told them the URL, or anything about how to find it. Somehow, they navigated Google, found the blog, navigated the complexities of RSS feeds, discovered […]
Getting Personal About Metrics
Sales managers spend a lot of time talking about metrics. They measure everything–some good, some over measured, but some micromanaged. There’s a lot of focus in the Sales 2.0 world about metrics, but again, most of the discussion is how to help sales managers. It’s time to shift the discussion to sales professionals–individual contributors. Yes, we’re all used to being measured, that’s part of what makes us sales people. At any point in time, we know (or pretend to know), where we are in our quota attainment. We always focus on “The Number.” Making the number is the end game, […]
Is Sales Getting Soft?
Many regular readers may be a little surprised about this post. I’ve been very vocal about sales being consultative, customer focused, and creating value for the customer in their buying process. I’ve been (and continue) to be very much against the old line “hard sell” tactics. Having said all that, over the past few months, there has been too much discussion that leads me to believe that we may be getting so oblique in the way we describe what we do. First, there’s the name sensitivity. It’s hard to find anyone with the title “Sales Person” on their business card. […]