My friend and noted entrepreneur and teacher Steve Imke, posted an article titled, A recession is a great time to start a new business. I agree with this completely because I started my company, FusionMarketingPartners.com, in 2009, during the so-called “great recession”. Several business people I respected urged me not to do this but being […]
The beginning of a new year is always a great time to evaluate the results of the previous year and plan for more success in the coming year. All of us want to achieve our full potential, for both ourselves and our organizations. Yet, many of us don’t reach even a fraction of what we […]
There are many industry gurus out there proclaiming the death of the B2B sales profession. Forrester Research predicted that 1 million B2B sales jobs would be lost between 2017 and 2020 (something I haven’t seen). The basic premise is that today’s marketing automation and sales systems, content rich websites and e-commerce platforms, make the B2B […]
I have had more than a few people accuse me of being obsessed with marketing numbers (guilty as charged). One of my chief focuses has always been the production of high-quality B2B sales leads. Of course, there are many flavors of leads and one person’s definition of sales-ready is another’s definition of a substandard lead. […]
A big factor in the entire lead-to-revenue (L2R) process is making sure that you start with the right marketing and sales model. In our initial engagements with B2B clients, we are sure to ask them the types of questions that let us know whether their go-to-market model needs just a tune-up or a complete overhaul. […]
In a recent conversation, a B2B sales rep told me something to the effect: “I hate my job because no one wants to talk to me. They don’t answer the phone, they don’t return my voice messages, and they almost never respond to my emails.” He also mentioned the fact that his sales cycles were […]
The sales “closer” has an almost mythical reputation in the annals of business. Movies like Tin Men, Boiler Room, Door to Door and Wall Street show how the most successful at the craft of selling are also the most devious. A review of Elmer Gantry, produced in 1960, stated, “Elmer is a traveling Salesman, a […]
Those of us who have worked in B2B sales and marketing for some time agree that the rules have changed. But what exactly are the new rules and how do they differ from the traditional way of doing things? Rule 1: Selling is not just “Telling”. As a marketing professional, I always made it a […]
I just viewed a great online video that deserves its own blog post. The speaker is Barry Trailer, Chief Research Officer of CSO Insights (now a division of MHI Global) and the topic was the CSO 2016 Sales Best Practices Study Results. Barry and his colleague, Jim Dickie, have been following and reporting on the […]
My friend (and very smart marketer) Debbie Breemeersch recently shared a great article on LinkedIn: The Secret To Sales Success: Stop Selling! The author is Atchison Frazer, CMO of Xangati. Frazer talked about his last two years at Cisco, when the company implemented go-to-market strategies that essentially flipped the “good selling” moniker on its head: […]