Not a time to be fooled...

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

At the beginning of the Q on April Fool's Day, it's important to first congratulate yourself for the quarter no matter what the results!!!  Overall, a solid quarter for most everyone as we slowly crawl out of the pandemic. Clearly questions on the horizon with the impact of Putin's War, but still a relatively positive outlook for the balance of the year in which we've discovered workarounds for labor and supply shortages.  At the end of the day, we still need to successfully sell things that create value, no matter what the outside environment is. 

In the world of selling, there have been numbers of evolutions in "the practice" of sales, but nothing as rapid or as revolutionary as what is occurring today in "the science of sales".  In fact, that's now the official name of my "Science of Sales" course at Tufts, where it has just been defined as a core course requirement in order to receive a Minor in Entrepreneurship at the University.  

Those evolutions...

Relationship Sales

donuts and sales-2Been around for 100s of years.  This is the infamous JoeyBagaDonuts selling technique. 

Tickets to the Bruins, dinner at Davios, golf at the country club and the tiresome "I'm in the area and thought I would just drop by with some Dunkin." 

No one has any time for Joey anymore!

 

Solution Sales
Created by Mike Bosworth in his iconic 1995 book Solution Selling.  A superb sales professional with the first of the real process-focused methodologies to Sales.  Immensely successful for about a decade until it wasn't, when the process became so overused that buyers would respond with "could you please not try to solution sell me!"

Sales 2.0 (around 2005)
During this time, there began large numbers of alternative processes to Solution SellingThe Challenger Sale written in 2011 by Dixon and Adamson is certainly the best of this genre. Most of the rest were written by authors not salespeople.

Today's Value Selling
And here we are today in the world of "the science of sales" and "Value Selling" where a seismic shift has been made to "the other side of the table", where the very best sales professionals no longer attempt to sell "things" or "services" with marketing messaging focused on the newest and most shiny new feature. 

The very best and the most successful salespeople today focus on the specific value that their products will bring to both the specific buyer persona and to that person's department or the entire business.  If you want to read more, you can just click here to get to our site page on sales tools, or simply click here for our free 50-page book on "Writing the Winning Sales Plan in 2022".  Probably, a good idea for a quick refresh anyhow as you incorporate what you learned in Q1 for the quarter ahead

Don't be fooled 

Sales Stats 2022Just so you won't be fooled in the Q ahead, a few classic factoids to incorporate in your sales planning for the balance of the year.

Simple, factual and important basic facts to keep front of mind as you update your own sales processes, sign up for improved sales technologies and focus on the math and the science of hiring and training the very best sales talent!

 

Have a great day selling today...and enjoy what looks to be a great weekend!  No Vermont for me this weekend with yard work to do at the NH beach plus what would be $105 for gas for a round trip.  

IT'S TIME TO RE-FORECAST YOUR '22 SALES PLAN

Jack Derby, Tufts Professor & Sales Coach Your well-planned 2022 Sales Plan that you architected in November, revised and got approved in December and rolled out perfectly at your January sales kickoff now needs a tune-up. 

As that infamous philosopher, Mike Tyson, once noted "no plan survives the first punch!".  It's time this coming week to spend a day with the team and walk through the details of your entire tactical plan for Q2 and Q3.     

Here's our 2022 guide to help or why not just connect with me anytime!  There's no cost to a call or two, plus I love listening and talking about sales. 

www.derbymanagement.com  
Derby Entrepreneurship Center@Tufts. 

 

 

 

 

Tags: sales coaching, sales effectiveness, sales tools, how to close sales, sales boot camps, how to write a sales plan, 2022businessplansuccess