I’ve been in Florida for 5 days. It’s a chance to rejuvenate and write. the ‘plan’ was morning walks on the beach, writing, maybe a swim in the pool in the afternoon, and more writing. A good plan, right?

Well, the weather changed that plan – it rained for 4 days – serious rain, high winds and gloom. 

Today is my day of departure, and of course, the skies are clear and the sun is shining. I made time for a walk on the ocean’s edge before the airport!

As I was walking, I looked for shells. Each trip I find one or two special sea shells to take back to Wisconsin. We put them in the rocks around our pool to connect the two spaces we loves.

The beach was full of people hunting for shells this morning after the storms. There were thousands of shells – or rather parts of shells.  As I walked the shoreline like everyone else, I didn’t see any special shells, they were probably picked up already. So I waded into the ocean a bit to see what else I could find. Some, but still mostly broken. Then I waded out knee deep – figuring its a better workout anyway – and THERE were beautiful shells aplenty!  I filled my pockets within ten minutes.

Isn’t this how it is with sales? We need to look for prospects and opportunity. Yet often its easy to stay where it is safe on the shore and wait for the perfect opportunity to find that perfect prospect to surface.

We then find that many of the prospects may not be qualified – like the broken shells. So we need to exert more effort, wade in further and get ourselves really wet to find the perfect prospects – maybe they are even untouched by our competitors!

By taking the extra steps, we differentiate ourselves from most other sellers. They stay at the shoreline and fight for the easy picks.

By wading in, we can find a more bountiful opportunity.

As you think about this – are you playing it too safe by the shoreline? What waters should you wade deeper in to find your opportunities?

I challenge you this next week to take that step by:

• Identifying what is happening in your market that has washed ashore some opportunities?
• Where are your competitors focusing their efforts because of this?
• What is the next level for finding more opportunities? Is it calling someone you never have?Asking for referrals from your happy customers? Finding a plan for opening new relationships? Mining your CRM for stalled sales or former customers?

Identify at least ONE action  you can take – and then wade in to grab it!

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In many parts of the world – summer has arrived or is coming soon. (In Wisconsin, we are desparetly waiting still….)

Summer time often means a little more time to sit and enjoy life or maybe work in a little R&R on vacation! And that’s a great time to read…to let your mind fill with new possibilities or solve agonizing questions such as:

• Why did I ___________ ?
• How can I ___________ ?
• What on earth caused _________ ?

Well, I have put together a list of great sales books. I personally know many of these authors – and their insights, experiences and unique styles all provide something valuable to help YOU be more successful.

There are so many books we have made this a two-part post!  Look for Part 2 on May 30th.

And, to make it easy for you to reference the entire list, we’ll have a full listing of all 25+ books available for download on the 30th for you as well.

Enjoy!

42 Rules to Increase Sales Effectiveness, by Michael Griego. If you are a professional salesperson, sales manager or director, vice president of sales or marketing, CEO, or anyone supporting selling efforts, this book is for you. If you are a senior executive, consultant, venture capitalist, board member, entrepreneur or aspiring up-and-comer, you should know the updated tools, language and tactics of selling in today’s market.

Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by using What You Already Know About the Game of Baseball, by Dave Kurlan. Summer and Baseball!  Baseline Selling makes for a great summer read because unlike most sales books, it’s enjoyable to read, it’s easy to apply and the Baseline Selling sales process is both intuitive and easy to remember.

Business Expert Guide to Business Success, 21 Business Experts Guide You to Profit by Lee B. Salz and Jeb Blount. Build your business right the first time with practical, proven strategies that grow profitable business for the long haul. Be in control of that business rather than it controlling you! 

Bypassing NO in Business, New Body language and Influence Strategies to Eliminate or Reduce Resistance to Anything by Harlan Goerger. 31 quick ideas to get you to the beach more often with more green! Get more YES without pushing, lying or negative manipulation of your customers.

Go for No! Yes is the Destination, No is How You Get There by Richard Fenton & Andrea Waltz. A short, fun easy read about a guy who learns an entirely new way to view success and failure and the “NO’s” he encounters in his sales career. Written in fable style, you’ll get plenty of entertainment and sales lessons along with your tan!

Mastering the World of Selling – The Ultimate Resource From The Biggest Names in Sales, by Eric Taylor. No other resource gives you such depth AND breadth on so many sales-related topics, from so many experts – literally everything you need to know to become a Master of Selling and take your sales to a level you could only ever dream of before now.

Secrets of Successful Selling by Kelley Robertson. A good summer read, because each two-to-four page chapter offers a different piece of sales advice, technique or strategy. Categorized alphabetically, it is a great reference book and its short chapters make it easy to pick up and review in-between sales calls. You can read one or two chapters, go for swim, read another few chapters, enjoy a BBQ, etc.

 SNAP Selling by Jill Konrath. If you’re frustrated dealing with today’s crazy busy prospects who never answer the phone, stay with a status quo they don’t like and take forever to make decisions, then check out this book. Tons of ideas and fresh strategies for dealing with frazzled prospects. #1 sales book on Amazon.

The Art of Social Selling – Free e-book from The Customer Collective, with contributions from Anneke Seley. Summer. It’s a time of relaxed deadlines, vacations, and the perfect time to let your mind explore new concepts and grapple with ideas your busy workaday mind doesn’t have time to explore.  This summer, consider the changing behavior of today’s customer that is prompting the contemporary sales organization to rethink how they sell. In this e-book, top corporate leadership and thought leaders who sell in a variety of industry sectors will share success stories and strategies for using social networks to generate leads and cultivate relationships.

The Selling Gap, Selling Strategies for the 21st Centuryby Harlan Goerger. Gain more beach time in less time with new ideas on how people buy in today’s market. It’s not about product, it’s about decisions and facilitating those decisions.

Negotiation Rules by Jeanette Nyden.  Big deal negotiators know the rules to winning great deals without sacrificing their bottom-line. This book is packed with dozens of relevant and practical skills that will help you successfully negotiate your next big deal.

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In less than a week – YOUR success is the focus of 35 sales and marketing experts from around the world. We’ve joined together, under the planning and organization of Jonathan Farrington at Top Sales World – to deliver an impactful series of sales and marketing webinars.  The best thing? The proceeds of the $5 donations will go to the Red Cross efforts for the Japan disaster relief.

The donation is one fantastic reason to begin to consider this…but that won’t be why you participate.  Look at the topics and presenters!  No matter where you are in your sales career or in your success level – there is SOME thing during this week that will benefit you immediately.  Or maybe there are MANY topics for you – and your sales team.

Click here for the full listing.  35 different topics – 7 each afternoon.  And they are ONLY 30 minutes long. We’ve been challenged to put our ‘best’ into a targeted 30 minutes so you gain the most in the least amount of time.

My presentation on Tuesday, May 10th is geared to those in a position of influencing a sales team. Maybe you are a business owner, or maybe  you lead a sales team personally - I will share with you how to  Build the Success of Your Sales Team with 3 Simple Steps to Improve Skill and Will. You won’t want to miss it.

If you are really ready for more success – select at least 3-5 of the topics during the week – make it one a day – or all 5 in one day. It will be hard to choose when you look at what is available.

I wish you the best of success today (and everyday)! 

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Japan’s disaster may seem long ago to many of you. For those in the US, the hundreds of tornados and deaths in the last week have replaced the news of Japan.

But sales and marketing experts around the world are giving back to japan!  The give back begins the week of Monday, May 9 through Friday, the 13th.  During those five days you’ll have the opportunity to attend up to 35 incredible webinar sessions—7 every single day—presented by 35 of the top sales minds in the world. You pick your topics – for just a $5 donation for each topic – which is a donation to the RedCross!

Each session will be a quick, but highly targeted, 30 minutes of tips and information.

Who are some of these presenters?  Well, there’s Dave Kurlan, Jill Konrath , Kelley Robertson, Colleen Francis, Linda Richardson, Paul McCord, myself, and manyothers.  Topics covered will range from Sales 101 Isn’t Enough: Advanced Selling Capabilities For Outselling Your Competition to 7 Habits of Highly Effective (Social) Salespeople to Successfully Profiting from the New Buying Cycle to my session on Build a Successful Business on Referrals by Knowing Who Your Client Knows and, of course, many, many more.

You can see the whole list of sessions HERE

And here’s even better news—when you attend any given session you’ll be helping the Red Cross in their mission in Japan.

Jonathan Farrington, the host of the conference says,

Just four weeks after the Magnitude 9.0 Tohoku earthquake and a tsunami which delivered 46ft waves, we learn that the death toll is likely to top 25.000, and recovery is going to take not years, but possibly decades, maybe even a generation, at a cost of at least $250 billion.

This is our opportunity to show that the sales community – so often derided for being shallow and materialistic, amongst other things – actually has a very big heart.

We plan to charge just $5 registration fee per presentation, and we are limited to 1000 guests per session, so places will be allocated on a “first come – first served” basis.

Can I count on your support? Together we can make a worthwhile *contribution to the people of Japan.

That’s right, it only costs $5 to attend any one session and all proceeds will be donated to the Red Cross specifically for Japan.  At the end of each session you’ll be given an opportunity to donate an additional $1, $5, or $10 if you so wish.

Here is a tremendous opportunity to contribute to the efforts in Japan and get great training at the same time. 

What a great deal!!!

If you are a leader – who needs to engage and equip your sales team this year (and beyond) I encourage you to seriously consider attending my session Tuesday, May 10 at 12:45 Eastern time as I’ll sharing 3 Tips to Build the Skill and Will of Your Sales Team.  Here is the direct registration page for my session.

Don’t miss this fantastic opportunity to help yourself improve your sales while helping those who are in desperate need of help.

View the entire list of topics and presenters – seriously, you will find MANY that will be ‘just’ what YOU need.

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Kendra Lee, an incredibly talented sales author and top IT seller, put to words what I have observed about email prospecting…

More from Kendra’s  recent newsletter:

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Email prospecting is hot.

It feels much less threatening than cold calling. No one will hang up on you. You have time to think about exactly what to write. And, if prospects like your message, they’ll respond.

But just as easily, prospects can delete your email – and never read a word.

Within three seconds of noticing it, they make a decision to read or delete. I call this the Glimpse Factor. You need to be able to break past it before they’ll ever read the great content you’ve toiled over.

Here’s how the Glimpse Factor works. When prospects first glimpse your email they have three questions top of mind:

• Do I have time for whatever it is now?
• Can I delete it and do nothing at all?
• Do I need to hold on to it to do something later?

Because they’re busy people, they’re secretly hoping that they can delete it with no further action. But your objective is to craft emails that make contacts feel like they have to read and respond immediately. Before you can accomplish that, you have to break past the Glimpse Factor.

To make their delete decision, the first place your prospects look is at the email address. They’re checking to see who the email is from, If they don’t recognize your name and note an email extension from a generic provider such as gmail or yahoo, odds are they’ll hit delete.

Approach prospects using your company email address. While they may not know your company, it reinforces your credibility and they’ll jump to read the subject line.

In the split-second that they read the subject line they’ll ask and answer, “Is this for me personally? Is it junk that I can ignore?”

They’re looking for any excuse to quickly hit delete. Use subject lines that require prospects to read your email. 

•  Can we talk Tuesday at 10:30?
• A quick question
• A thought about IT spending

If your subject line doesn’t feel relevant to your contact, it’s gone.

Next they hop to the opening salutation looking to see if it begins with their name. Including your prospect’s name alerts them that the email was sent for them specifically. Without it, discard.

While you’ve made it into the body of the email, your contacts don’t yet begin to read. Instead, their eyes drop to your signature at the bottom to check out your authenticity.

If they didn’t recognize your email address or company, prospects want to find out who you are. They’re scanning for marketing hype at the bottom. It’s okay to have links to your social networks and website, even a tag line about your company or a link to a free resource. But a blatant advertisement is their signal that this email isn’t one they need to address.

Prospects’ final test is to determine how difficult your email appears. They’re assessing to see how much effort it’ll take to address.

Simply by glimpsing the format of your content, they’ll make their decision!

To break through, keep emails brief. Use short paragraphs so they appear quick to address. You may be tempted to use bulleted lists to accomplish this, but resist. In prospecting emails bulleted text implies marketing content or action items, both of which have negative connotations to busy people who don’t know you.

If you make it past all these check points, they’ll finally begin to read the compelling message you’ve written just for them.

In just three seconds, your prospects make a choice: read or delete. Remember the Glimpse Factor as you compose your messages, and you’ll see both your response rates and your new sales pick up steam in no time.

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Well said Kendra!   Kendra Lee is a top IT Seller, Prospect Attraction Expert and author of the award winning book “Selling Against the Goal” and president of KLA Group. Specializing in the IT industry, KLA Group works with companies to break in and exceed revenue objectives in the Small and Midmarket Business (SMB) segment. Ms. Lee is a frequent speaker at national sales meetings and association events. To find out more about the author, read her latest articles, or to subscribe to her newsletter visit www.klagroup.com or call +1 303.741.6636. 

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Sometimes new tools become available that remind me that some of our sales activities could be so much more simple!And who doesn’t want to make capturing and nurturing leads more simple?

At the Sales SheBang event in August, a company,  ActiveConversion recently . Nancy Nardin, President at Smart Selling Tools recommended that we have ActiveConversion as one of our sponsors.

And I’m so glad she did – they have one of  THE best lead management tools out there for SMBs!  Their tools identifies who is visiting your website, scores  the activity during that visit, and then begins to automatically nurture those leads through email!  It allows small to medium sized companies to gain competitive advantages they hadn’t had access to before. 

It’s not only affordable but very user-friendly.  In fact, they even offer a free trial and satisfaction guarantee! Here is what I learned about ActiveConversion and why you should check out that free trial!

1. Their solution identifies anonymous visitors and sends those leads to the right person at the right time. It helps manage and nurture those leads and better qualifies them to shorten the sales cycle.
2. You don’t have to be an expert in knowing what works best in lead conversion, ActiveConversion will do that for you.
3. Once you see which companies have visited your website, you will become addicted to the information and never want to lose that data.
4. ActiveConversion helps companies’ double lead generation and manage sales leads throughout the entire sales cycle, not just as lead generaton.

To learn more about ActiveConversion, I encourage you to do two things, go on to their website  and sign up for a free trial account. If you need more help then do not hesitate to give them a call on their toll free number 1 877 872 2764 and request for a demo.  They really are helpful!

It really is a cool tool!

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Technology and work overload have made it easy to lose  the personal touch. Even pushing messages out through social media can be very one way – unless you are in a dialogue. 

The good news is that with so many professionals only focused on technology ‘touches’ it is easier than ever to create a memorable WOW experience for your contacts!

Sometimes the small touches matter more!  Easy wows that take little time and money:

• Send a handwritten personal note. Attach a copy of something interesting you have ready lately that would be interesting to them.  Your note can be as simple as “I thought this would be of interest to you.”
• Share something inspirational. Find a quote and add it to your email signature. Change it often.
• Call someone without a sales reason – thank them for their business and let them know you value their relationship. Keep it short -though often they will want to chat longer if it is all about them!

When you Wow your contacts with the small touches – they will remember you when the BIG opporutnity arises.  The 5 minutes you spend on the small things do matter. It’s one of those ‘Just do its’ that we need to make time for.

I suggest you make time today to Wow one prospect or customer. Then do it again tomorrow!

What else do you do to wow your customers?

p.s. Today as I head to the women’s sales experts conference, Shebang, one of our preparation items is to share our “$1 idea” – a small thing we have done in the past year that has helped in some way.  I’ll share the ideas discussed with you next week!

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Today I facilitated a workshop with a group of 40+ realtors. Our topic? Referrals!  Instead of coming in and telling them what to do – collectively their years of experience FAR outweighed mine – I used a Sharpenz ready-to-go sales training kit instead. 

The format included each person identifying “I wish I knew” items on referrals as a rookie and as they look at what is needed the next six months.  I circled the room and listened to what they were sharing…solid reminders and principles of referrals.  Here’s a dozen tips for you to ponder and act upon.

1. Ask for referrals consistently.
2. Have a plan for asking.
3. Identify Howto ask in a way that is comfortable for you.  Some like humor, some asked in writing, others at certain points in the relationship. 
4. Have a process of follow-up to the referrer. Lots of discussion around whether you should reward the referrer in some way.
5. Tap into the need for many people to help. Ask for their help!
6. Assure the referrers of your intentions and what you will do with the contact information.
7. Be timely in contacting the referral.
8. Do not ask for their entire contact list. 
9. Be specificin what information you would like.
10. Use social media outlets when possible.
11. Be sincere and honest (someone suggested saying “I get referrals from every one of my clients.” and the group said if it wasn’t true, then you would break trust.)
12. Always be thankful – state your appreciation and then assure them how you will use the information they shared.

Taking action on these tips will increase your ABILITY to earn valuable referrals.

There’s so much more to referrals. What’s your best tip?

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Wouldn’t it be great if sales opportunities truly ‘dropped in your lap.’  Well, sometimes they can … if you are looking for the opportunity!

Some people call them ‘trigger events’ others call them ‘golden opportunities’ and still others say ‘I was in the right place at the right time.”  All great things when you are on the positive end of that luck!  But the very successful find their luck – they don’t wait for it!

In my hometown, we are recovering from strong storms and a tornado that hit Monday night. Much of the damage is literally 250 yards from my back door!  It was that close!  So yesterday as I watched dazed people try to take it all in and stand and ponder,,I also noticed people finding their luck in the situation!

Proactive contractors and ’handymen’ were on the scene, offering help and services.  Within hours chain saws were whining, dump trucks were hauling away debris, and roofs were being repaired. Tornados are NOT common in this area – did these people have this included in their annual ‘plan’ this year? Most likely not.  

How do you use this approach in your work?  Well, its time to start FINDING your luck and opportunities!  Some tips:

• Set up Google Alerts for terms, companies, names of individuals who you want in your sales pipeline.
• Read the blogs, magazines, publications that relate to the industry, type of business and geographic area that they operate in.
• Set up and then follow a system to regularly review what is going on and then…
• Act and make contact when you can.

A company I had a meeting with a while back was not ready to do anything – they definitely have a need for our sales and leadership training, but they had a Senior Executive who was not wiling to do anything.  Last month, there was a Google Alert for the company that said he had left the company!  I didn’t pounce right away…I gave it two weeks for the dust to settle and then called the next-in-command.  It was the perfect opportunity to open the door of opportunity again!

If you want to make the most of the rest of this year…make the time to find your luck today!

Catastrophe or Opportunity?

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