I have a seven-year-old nephew who lives in the southwest of Ireland. Visitors to that part of the world are often surprised to see palm trees and bamboos growing – until a local explains how the gulf stream comes up from the south bringing warmth with it. In truth, the climate in Ireland – particularly…
Trust is the fulcrum upon which every customer relationship pivots. Trust is a valuable currency that must be earned, but never spent. Trust is built one step at a time, and unless protected, can be blown away in a moment. Account Planning is all about developing long-term relationships, and that is hard to do without…
One of the critical metrics that all sales organizations should measure is sales velocity. By sales velocity we mean the revenue that can be achieved in a given period, whether that is a day, month, quarter or year. No matter how complex your business, there are really only four levers that you can pull to…
The Big Data hype worries me. A lot. Particularly as it pertains to sales analytics. When it comes to understanding the inflection points that should be the determinants of behavior change to improve sales performance, we don’t suffer from an information deficit, we suffer from an insight deficit. Big data is perceived by some as…
There’s a Jackson Browne song called These Days which he wrote at the tender age of sixteen. One of the lines in the song goes, “Don’t confront me with my failures; I have not forgotten them.” A sixteen-year-old wise beyond his years. For those of you who are not old enough to remember Jackson Browne, he was a seminal…
There is frequently a contradiction between the importance that sales leaders profess they place on account planning and their actual behavior. While recognizing the tremendous value that can accrue from this important sales discipline, they habitually revert to type and look for the deal they can close quickly. The greatest evidence of this is the…
