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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
“We’re So Vain, We Probably Think It About Us….”
One of my favorite songs, as a kid, was Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain….” It was not only a great song, but provoked decades of discussion about who she was singing about. Fast forwarding to current times, based on how we engage our customers, we demonstrate a similar vanity. We think our customer care about us–they obsess about our companies, our products, and how great we are. I can imagine an updated version of the song, “We’re so vain, we probably think the customers care about us…” At least, we conduct our engagement strategies based on our belief that customers […]
“Pursuing Better, Differently……”
I was excited to see the CMO of one of my clients speaking about a pillar their culture, “Pursuing Better, Differently….” It’s such a critical concept, particularly if we want to stand out to our customers and differentiate our companies. It’s so important, if we want to continue to grow, outperforming others. It’s, also, so obvious–or should be. But how many organizations actually do this? Somehow, it seems too many believe, we pursue better by being the same. (head scratching moment…..) We believe we get better by doing more of what we’ve always done. My question is, “Then how do […]
Knowing The Answers Or Knowing What They Mean?
In today’s world, it’s pretty easy to “know the answers.” At least with respect to our products, we have endless content, training, years of experience. We can answer any question customers are likely to have about our products and solutions. We can compare them, factually, with the alternatives, showing how our approach might be superior. We know about, or should know, the problems our solutions address. We should be able to address all the questions a customer might have. We have tools, like ChatGPT, to help us find more answers. We know that CMOs of certain types of businesses are […]
Performance Plans And Performance Planning
Perhaps I’ve not been paying attention. Recently, in conversations with clients and other groups, I’ve been stunned at how few have performance plans in place for their people. Having been raised in organizations that valued performance planning, I had assumed these were common place. Starting my selling career in IBM, we all had them. Much later, when IBM was a customer, in calling on people, I would always ask, “Open your lower right hand drawer and pull out the first folder. I’d like to look at your performance plan….” (We all seemed to keep them in the same place.) Knowing […]
“Short Cuts” Seldom Proove To Be Short!
I suspect it’s human nature to constantly be in search of short cuts. We want to get a desired outcome without doing all the work one would normally have to do to achieve that outcome. I continue to imagine, “Wouldn’t it be great if I could achieve my desired level of fitness, without having to go to the gym for an hour every day! Imagine how I could waste that time doing something else….” Or, I tend to be an impatient driver. I always “know” the fastest rout to an unknown destination, consequently I ignore my Nav System. I appreciate […]
Is The “Buyer Journey” Even A Thing Anymore?
Ever since I started selling–you know back in the old days when phones were still attached to cords–I’ve been taught, “Buyers have a structured buying process.” I’d see all sorts of block diagrams, showing how the buying process always, coincidentally, aligned with the customer buying process. On the selling side we would have perfectly structured steps like Qualification, Needs Identification, Solution Presentation, Closing. These would, through some magic, always align with the customers’ very structured process, Problem Definition, Needs Definition, Evaluate Alternatives, Select/Buy A Solution. The idea that sellers and buyers could be in perfect synchronization throughout the process, marching […]