The super cool news is that these new social selling and corporate view features are getting paired with the best-in-class lead routing features that are the drivers of productivity for inside sales.  This makes for an unbeatable combination.  

This post may be bit self-serving, so I apologize in advance.  However, to make my desired point I need my own company, VanillaSoft, as an example.  We have all followed posts from talking heads like me that discuss the question, “Is cold calling dead?”  I say, along with our thousands of customers who cold-call, that it is alive and well.  Others say its time has come and gone.  I am sure, like most things, the truth is in the middle. Read the rest of this entry »

 Don’t get lost in the hype of slickness and cool features if you are seeking software to power your inside sales team. If you have folks making calls to generate leads or sales, then do the easy math.  It is about making better calls, the right calls, and making more of them. Read the rest of this entry »

I was recently asked about how I measured my Inside Sales people back in the day when I had over 200 of them.  I shared that we used lots of standard criteria, but that we also stack ranked each of our Inside Sales people.  The puzzled look told me I may need to go into greater detail, possibly for two reasons.  Read the rest of this entry »

All of the recent obituaries about the death of cold calling have been greatly over stated.  As a matter of fact, more companies than ever have increased their efforts with good old fashioned cold calling.  In part, the challenging economy has pushed companies to reduce their more costly outside sales efforts and replace them with- you guessed it- cold calling.  Sure, you hear a bundle about social media, social calling and Sales 2.0 and the hope that no one will ever have to cold call again.  But, the facts support a different story.  While companies scramble to understand the changing dynamics of selling through social media, they still have to butter the bread and move products or services into the market.  Many are turning to a reliable friend that has a history of predictable outcome: cold calling.  Read the rest of this entry »

Without question, Twitter is everywhere.  One would be hard pressed to visit the website of a company and not find their Twitter icon prominently displayed.  Today, businesses tweet, follow, track, list, recommend and work feverishly to build their followers.  I must admit – Twitter is cool, fun and a decent distraction from the daily grind.  But, is it a legitimate lead source that can justify the time invested for the output received?  Can it replace an existing source of inbound leads or is it just a complement to existing efforts? Read the rest of this entry »

As sales people we all love to hear ‘Yes.’  We call, we pitch, we charm and we educate; we overcome the objections and we sell.  Great sales people have it in their DNA; they love the ‘Yes’ and hate the ‘No.’  I contend that getting beyond the hatred of the ‘No’ can not only benefit us as sales people, we can actually use it as a hedge against failure. Read the rest of this entry »

Several years back I wrote a paper entitled, “Want to make more sales?  Make more sales calls.” The paper touted the old teaching that sales is a game of numbers, and doing more will get you more.  The paper did well and has been downloaded thousands of time.  Why?  Probably in part because the message and call to action are clear and something that all sales managers understand and embrace: talk to more people, sell more stuff. Read the rest of this entry »

So, it is everywhere.  You can’t read anything today about sales without reading about what you should be doing with social media, how you need to jump into the sales 2.0 world and, whatever you do, stop cold calling.  But, is this right for your business and sales efforts? Read the rest of this entry »