Our Blog

The five-star general Dwight D. Eisenhower aptly noted that, “Morale is the single greatest factor in successful wars.” The same goes for the battlefield of selling. Much like a general leading troops to victory, high-performance sales managers earn the willing and earnest cooperation of the sales reps beneath them.

Time is a scarce resource that you dole out on a breath-by-breath basis. Leaving the existential debate aside, most can agree that it is wise to allocate time to worthy activity, and forget the rest. Highly effective sales reps know when to spend working hours completing a task, and when to say “no-” for today, this quarter, or forever.

If you’ve seen a video clip of the sun setting below a desert horizon where time passes on fast-forward, and each movement looks unusually pronounced, you’ve likely seen a creation of time-lapse photography. Perhaps you’ve seen a construction project captured by time-lapse photography, and watched a home appear in a 30-second clip that shows the building action, from the lay of the foundation to the finishing touches on paint. 

To create a time-lapse clip, photographers take hundreds of single photos of a sunset in action, for example. You’re viewing hundreds of single frames played together one after another, quickly. The method creates the illusion of a lengthy video played on fast-forward.

Ever been in a conversation with a prospect and found yourself unable to handle their objections?

Sales execs play a vital role in the success of the sales team. They are responsible for setting the tone and culture of a sales organization, and they have the ability to make or break a company’s fortunes. Building a high-performance sales team is no small feat, but when done right, it can be worth a great return to an organization.

But what is it about sales execs that get the best out of their teams? What differentiates them from managers that don’t achieve the same results? Although it may be difficult to define what makes a sales exec great, there are qualities that differentiate top performers from those that lag behind.

Just as any relationship with a promising future, the key to establishing a healthy business relationship is based on trust. Top performing companies know that prospects and customers buy only from sales reps that they feel they know and they can trust, and the only way to build these kinds of relationships is over time through customer engagement.    

High-performing marketing departments churn out quality content with the precision of artful scientists. When an interested prospect hits the sales team only to find a half-baked PowerPoint, they halt mid-pipeline.

According to a Demand Metric 2013 Benchmark Report on Sales and Marketing Alignment, 66% of organizations reporting complete alignment achieved their revenue goals compared to 41% who reported no alignment.

Whether making a sales pitch during a 60-second elevator ride, or engaging in a walk-up meeting, short sales call, or any unplanned selling encounter, the effective salesperson can use prepared content to turn a quick, surprise exchange into a high impact sales interaction using sales enablement tools. Here’s how.

The New Year has arrived and it’s time to round up the hottest trends in sales and marketing for 2015. This year, sales reps and marketers will gain the benefits of establishing deeper connections with customers through the following 4 trends:

1. Mobile Sales Enablement is going to change the way organizations do business

Sales Call remains to be the most traditional way of engaging with customers; this is why Mobile Sales Enablement adoption is growing at a rapid rate. Purchases made by tablets rose 48% year over year in the second quarter to $8 billion, which is three times faster than purchases made at a desktop computer, according to Business Insider. 2015 will see this number continue to rise as sales reps realize that Mobile Sales Enablement provides the best way to present solutions to customers. To stay on top of this trend, sales execs will have to adopt tablets if they want to increase sales team performance.