Today is my birthday…actually I’m not even supposed to be working – a long held practice from never having to be in school on my birthday since it was always during summer break!

But here I am posting this offer…cuz I’m so excited! What am I offering?  A FREE sales course to 2 deserving sales professionals!  This FREE $1295 8-week sales course will help you build your sales quickly – and I am giving 2 seats away this week!

Details, details….

• The sales training course is in the Milwaukee, WI area beginning September 22, 2010 at 8:30 a.m.
• The workshop is 1.5 days and then the course continues once a week for 8 weeks of reinforcing teleconferences!
• The sales approach is collaborative sales and will include success habit building activities and tools.
• All your materials – and success tools are included!
• You pick up your personal travel expenses.
• Contact me for a full course description.

What do you have to do?  Email me your name, company name and why you are ready to building your sales skills and results.  I’ll draw the winning names Monday morning!

Giving on my birthday makes me so happy!  I hope you’ll take me up on the gift!

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Filed Under: Collaborative Selling, Sales Productivity, Sales Tips, Success Tips
Tags: Collaborative Selling, learning, Sales, sales seminar, sales tools, Sales training

If you’re a Sales Manager or Trainer, a Company President or an HR Manager, then you know the importance of keeping your sales team performing at their highest level. 

You also know that in today’s economy, sales training is absolutely crucial. But do you know which training techniques are the most effective in today’s economy? Do you know which techniques have lasting power – and have worked time and time again?

I’m hosting a FREE webinar with Alice Kemper, my co-creators of Sharpenz. Together we’re sharing 37 years of experience and our work with thousands of sales professionals to bring effective, actionable tips to you.

“Get Your 2010 Back on Track – 3 Simple Steps to Double or Triple Your Sales“ is scheduled for Tuesday, June 15 at 10 a.m. Pacific / 1 p.m. Eastern.

We’ll present several must-know pieces of information – like how to get your salespeople to want to take action, how to occupy the attention and efforts of your sales team, how to give them the resources they need and how to help them find their motivation (and you’ll be surprised to hear what it isn’t!).

Here’s what we’ll cover during this powerful webinar:

• 2 Critical Needs to Get Your 2010 Back on Track – how to get your salespeople to want to take actions that lead to more sales, and when they do, how to turn what they do and what they offer into success.
• 3 Simple Steps to Succeed – by occupying the attention and efforts of your sales team, giving your team members the resources they need, and helping them find their motivation.
• Why MONEY isn’t the main motivator for the salespeople on your team – and what IS. 
• A 4-step process salespeople need to go through to build better selling habits.
• 5 skills critical to a sales professionals success in this economy.
• How to engage with the people on your team to keep them motivated and moving forward.
• And much more. . .

It’s easy to register here.  We hope you’ll join us!

Please note:This webinar is designed for those in a position to help their sales team – not for individual sales professionals.

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Filed Under: Sales Productivity, Sales Tips
Tags: Leadership, maximize sales productivity, Sales training

Every effective sales training course teaches sales professionals to ask open-ended questions.  These are the questions that start with who, what, why, when, how, etc.  Why are open ended questions so universally taught? Because:

• They solicit great information
• Get the person talking
• Allow you and them to find out if there is an opportunity
• Can show your expertise, IF you ask the right questions

All that sounds great, doesn’t it?  They really ARE effective.  But not 100% of the time.  Sometimes they can make a needs analysis seem like an interrogation.  Even though they are open they can be leading, forced, narrow, product focused and irrelevant.  Sales pros can come off like a robot reciting their list of questions so they can get to pitching their product! 

When we use the 3 ‘I’ approach, our open-ended questions include: 

1. Intent
2. Intelligence
3. Interest

Intent.  I’ve seen sales pros launch right into a list of questions that might seem irrelevant to the prospect.  The prospect thinks ‘What’s this have to do with anything?” Instead, we need to explain the intent of the line of questions so the prospect can put it in perspective and answer thoughtfully.

An example: Yesterday I received a call for someone who had something to offer.  They immediately asked me “So, what are you working on?”  My response?  “Wow, that’s broad, in what context?” They responded, “Whatever context you choose.”  Well, I was confused.  I knew what this person was selling and thought, should I answer my question based on that narrow interest or is he really trying to find out more?

So, I turned it back to him and said, ‘What are you working on?”  And then he responded. After 15 minutes I knew the flavor of his focus and we continued.

But why should I have had to work that hard?  If I knew where the discussion was going we could have both saved time.

To share intent can sound like this.  “We are going to talk about your human resource needs. What we have learned is that understanding  how this fits into the overall company’s goals and objectives helps us narrow down the approach and we will be able to give you a more accurate picture of how we might help.  The first questions are focused on that broader picture. Then we’ll get more specific.”  Then we go into our list of questions.

Intelligence.  Your questions reveal a LOT about you. Here’s how to raise your ‘perceived’ intelligence level:

• Explain the intent  of your line of questions and ask questions that broaden the dialogue to a bigger more strategic discussion. 
• Focus on the solution or value desired versus just the product.
• Wait to LISTEN once you have asked  a question. When you ask more intelligent questions, the person may need to think before responding (this is usually a good thing).  How long? According to research, they might need 15-25 seconds to think and respond.  That’s a long time to wait, but it can payoff.

Interest.  The questions should be ‘of interest’ to the person. How?  Make the questions relevant to the situation and person. When it’s about THEM, it’s interesting TO them. Every aspect of the sales process should be wiift focused – What’s in it for THEM? – and this includes your questions!

There you have the 3 necessary “I”s for making your needs analysis informative and not an interrogation. 

Of course I have learned many of these things the hard way.  With confused looks from prospects as I took a direction that surprised them. What have you learned about open ended questions?

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Filed Under: Uncategorized
Tags: Open ended questions, Sales training, skills

Free Sales Training Outline for Your Sales Meeting!  Looking for ideas to easily and quickly strengthen the skill and results for your sales team?  We’ve got ‘em!

We whittled our comprehensive sales training expertise into specific 30-minute boosts of power!  These proven (all tested) outlines focus on a specific sales topic (skill, attitude, tool, practice).  There’s more than 25 to pick from today and more in development.  We have tested each booster in the 30 minute format to make sure you do get a big BOOST in a little time.

Whether you are a sales manager or a member of ANY service/sales team that would like to work with your colleagues to boost each other’s skills in selling, prospecting, marketing, or personal development, there may be a Sharpenz booster for you!  (From goal setting to working through objections to team building.) 

To build excitement in our 2nd week of launching Sharpenz, we have two special offers:  

1.  A FREE Sharpenz booster for you – you can select one of two titles:

        Better Questions which focuses on helping you identify and practice better questions you can ask in your needs analysis and problem solving.  Or

       Now to Wow provides a very interactive format for your team to look at all your customer “touch points” and determine how to escalate these touches to a WOW! experience.

2.  All orders through November 15th are discounted 50%!

I’ve even put together a video for you to listen into (less than 2.5 minutes!)

Sometimes its good to hear other’s perspectives, the following blogs mention Sharpenz: 

• Jonathan Farrington’s Blog – Sharpen Your Greatest Sales Tool
• Salesopedia Blog – Sharpenz Your Sales Meeting
• Scott “Social Media” Allen – Sharpenz: Better Sales Meetings = More Sales

Give it a try today with your free Sharpenz sales booster.  You’ll find it to be the BEST 30 minutes of your sales meeting!

P.S. Sales Pro Insider, Inc. is alive and well.  In fact, we are working right now with two Fortune 100 companies to build sales and service skills  and helping another sales organization hire a KEY sales exec!

Let me know what you think of Sharpenz!  Do you think you can sharpen skills and results in just 30 minutes?

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Filed Under: Sales Productivity
Tags: Sales Productivity, Sales Tips, Sales training

Yes a free webinar!  If you don’t know Jonathan Farrington, you should.  He is very knowledgeable about sales -and is very witty with his delivery. It’s always a delight to be in his company!  (Okay, his British speak must be wearing off on me.)   He has great information to help you move to the top 5% players in sales!  And he is throwing in a few freebies when you sign up for his complimentary webinar on October 20th!

All the  informaiton you need is below:

So You Want To Be A Top 5% Player In The Game Of Sales? 

Recent exhaustive surveys suggest that only 5% of professional salespeople reach and remain at the highest level, which we call Level 3.  A further 15% attain Level 2 status, but the majority, i.e. a massive 80% remain at Level 1 in terms of potential achievement.

•  Level One salespeople sell products and depend on having the right technical solution for the customer’s specification. This is probably you.
• Level Two salespeople sell solutions, which changes their image from sales rep to business consultant and positions them as a potential strategic resource. Most salesmen and women manage to advance from Level 1 to Level 2 fairly easily but unfortunately; many find breaking through that final glass ceiling extremely difficult i.e. moving from competitive sales professionals to collaborative sales consultants. Or is this you?
•  Level Three salespeople are able to first identify and then capitalise upon the political component within the buying process. They develop and sustain strong commercial relationships at all levels within their accounts and these relationships endure because they are based on mutual respect and trust. Their clients feel secure, so secure, that they would be fearful of changing supplier.
  Level Three salespeople rarely, if ever, lose an order that they really want because they are always in control of the sales cycle. They have identified that in marketplaces where product uniqueness and technical expertise are no longer enough, it is they themselves, that make the difference i.e. their superior skills.
  This could be you!

What we can say for certain, is that successful selling has become an exclusive club of highly skilled professionals where, for example, product knowledge, time management skills, objection handling and closing skills are the cost of membership, not leadership.

Attendees will not only receive a FREE copy of Jonathan’s most recent EBook “The Changing Face of Professional Selling” (Value $19.95) but also the chance to take a FREE ASP Profile (Value $175)

Jonathan Farrington is Chairman of The Sales Corporation, CEO of Top Sales Associates and Senior Partner at The JF Consultancy based in London and Paris.    He is also the Chairman of the Executive Board over at Top Sales Experts, and heads up the selection panel for AllBusiness’s latest initiative to find the very best sales professionals on the planet.

You can find out more about him and what they are saying about him here.  Then you can accept my invitation to claim your FREE place for this significant event and register here – http://bit.ly/4wW1fc

——————–

Participants from around the globe join the Top Sales Experts Masterclasses each week.  Hope you will too! 

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Filed Under: Uncategorized
Tags: Sales, sales seminar, Sales training

Today is a HUGE day for me.  I’ve pushed the launch button on a new venture, Sharpenz…half hour of power sales boosters. 

I’ve collaborated with Alice Kemper of Sales Training Consultants to bring a training tool to the world!  It’s been in the works for over a year! 

We whittled our comprehensive sales training expertise into specific 30-minute boosts of power!  Then we piloted, had focus groups, tested again, and then added even more value with reinforcement tips!  

We have over two dozen titles now available – with many more in development! 

Of course, to build excitement, we have two special offers:

1.  A FREE Sharpenz booster for you – you can select one of two titles:

        Better Questions which focuses on helping you idnetify and practice better questions you can ask in your needs analysis and problem solving.  Or

       Now to Wow provides a very interactive format for your team to look at all your customer “touch points” and determine how to escalate these touches to a WOW! experience.

2.  All orders through November 15th are discounted 50%!

If you want to hear me explain a little more about Sharpenz – I’ve even put together my first video!  (Really, this was one of  the most challenging pieces of this whole launch…I think there were 27 takes…and some of the “peppy and fun” Nancy was a little lost in the end….)   What makes the video even funnier to me is that when I was in NYC last week, I was selected to be one of the ‘volunteers’ for the NBC Studio Tour where I was the weather girl.  Now, without pressure THAT was a lot of fun (I even included a little weather dance.) 

I digress, back to Sharpenz.  We have tested each booster in the 30 minute format to make sure you do get a big BOOST in a little time. 

To honor the need for GREAT meetings, the rest of this week will focus on effective meetings. 

Today’s quick  tip for effective team meetings:

      Have a specific objective for your meeting.  Plan your agenda in advance to identify how much time you need for the topic at hand. 

P.S. Sales Pro Insider, Inc. is alive and well.  In fact, we are working right now with two Fortune 100 companies to build sales and service skills  and helping another sales organization hire a KEY sales exec!

Let me know what you think of Sharpenz!  Do you think you can sharpen skills and results in just 30 minutes?

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Filed Under: Uncategorized
Tags: Sales Meeting, Sales training

Yes, FREE Sales training!  We’re calling it our own Economic Stimulus plan for local companies (within 60 miles of Milwaukee, WI). 

As we get ready to announce our secret project, we are giving the unbelievable opportunity for FREE sales training to you!  Don’t reside in Wisconsin?  It won’t matter once you learn more about Sharpenz later next month. 

To learn more about our offer to deliver a high impact, compact and focused sales training workshop – You will find the information you need at Milwaukee Sales Training.

A few notes from participants who have experienced a Sharpenz session:  

• “They are short, to the point and contain good information. Great thought provoking session.” Sonya A., Primex Wireless, Inc.
• “This is a good format because a lot of concrete, useful information is shared in a short time.” D  Bennett, Kalmbach Publishing
• “An educated and fun way to deal with the sales process.” L. Jones  Woodward Radio

In the meantime, a quote for any of you who think we might be crazy for offering this:

Part of being sane, is being a little bit crazy.     Janet Long

Best to you today!

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Filed Under: Uncategorized
Tags: learning, Sales Tips, Sales training