The CRAP Report

I read a great blog article today from Ardath Albee, B2B marketer and strategist.  The post, entitled What’s the Cost When Sales Tries to Do it All?, was found on the Customer Collective website, and in it, Ardath shared some of her thoughts on CSO Insights’ new 2010 Sales Effectiveness Study.  There were a few facts from the research study that Ardath had some issues with, and I think she makes some great points:

“Relationships are the name of the game. For marketing, for sales and for customer retention. How is it possible that so many companies still fail to “get” this? How is it possible that companies still haven’t woken up to the fact that selling is really all about BUYERS and providing whatever they need to make the purchase decision in your favor?”

You should check it out, too.  Seriously.  Go.  Go read it.

If you’re like me and my friends, you were pretty hyped up for last night’s season premiere of LOST.  I came to the game late on this one, having to watch three seasons on DVD (which by the way, is actually more fun because you can just keep watching episode after episode).  If you don’t know what LOST is, it’s a show about survivors of a plane crash and their adventures on the island that they crashed on.  To tell you anymore within the confines of this blog would break the space-time continuum.  I’d say it’s probably one of the most well developed shows in TV history; that’s just my limited opinion though.  As I was discussing last night’s two-hour opening with some of the BDR’s at work today, it got me thinking – how can you keep your teleprospectors from becoming “lost” on their sales prospecting calls? Read more… »

I read a blog today from the inside sales consulting firm The Bridge Group’s Patrice Murray.  Patrice highlighted a post from Dave Kurlan’s blog, where basically Dave shared a story of a time where he was giving a presentation on a Sales Hiring Webinar.  Dave was asked why, if his process worked so well, were more people not using it.  Dave’s answer was broken down into three points – ego, money, and fear.  Patrice did a great job breaking down the post, and you should read it here.

Additionally, my colleague, Craig Ferrara, hosted a webcast about best practices for hiring teleprospectors.  In it, Craig shares his thoughts on setting up a teleprospecting profile, implementing an interview process that focuses on the phone role play, and his evaluation process.  Check out the Perspectives on Teleprospecting – Best Practices for Hiring Teleprospectors webcast here.

*Photo courtesy of LisaDeeRN via Flickr

Now, I’m not really much of a racing fan, car, horse or otherwise.  What I do know about the sport of racing, however, is that whatever method you choose to use to race, you’d better make sure that it’s in top shape.  It always amazes me, whenever I do catch an auto racing event on TV, is how fast the pit crews are when a car comes in.  Even for a flat tire, they’re so fast at changing them!  They have to be though, right?  I mean, there’s a ton of money riding on those races.  You can see where this analogy is going, right?  Your sales machine is typically the money maker of your organization, and the “pit-crew” of your sales machine are the folks who are fully qualifying leads for them.  If you want to keep that crew at a level of high performance, how do you go about doing that? Read more… »

On Tuesday I shared with you a link to lead generation expert The Funnelholic’s The Marketing Hipster Dictionary, Part I.  Today, he posted part two with some help of folks like The Lord of The Leads Tom Scearce (on Twitter @TLOTL) and Chris Jablonski (on Twitter @cjablonski).  The Funnelholic certainly more than gets by with a little help from his friends, adding words like “Return on Contribution” and “Buyer Engagement.” 

My favorite: 

49.  Trapping the chicken in the courtyard:  A semi-obscure “Rocky II” reference/metaphor describing the relentless and often frustrating pursuit of repeatable marketing and sales success. “I feel like a Kentucky Fried idiot.” — Rocky Balboa (@TLOTL)

You can check out The Marketing Hipster Dictionary, Part II here.

Nice work guys!

Hey everybody!

Been real busy today, so unfortunately I have nothing original to share with you. 

Do not fret, though! 

Craig Rosenberg, marketing and lead generation expert also known as the Funnelholic, has come to the rescue!  Today, Craig posted a great blog article over at his site, where he is creating The Marketing Hipster Dictionary.  What a great idea!  Basically, what he’s doing over the course of a couple of different entries (today and next Thursday), is compiling a list of terms that are used not only on his site, but throughout the sales and marketing space.  From defining the term “Marketing Hipster” to “Maven Marketing,” Craig covers it all and offers up some great examples of folks to follow (on Twitter) in appropriate categories.  If you’re not, you can follow Craig on Twitter at @funnelholic.

You can check out The Marketing Hipster Dictionary here.  One thing is for sure:  someday, when I grow up, I want to make it on the list and be a Marketing Hipster myself.

Great job, Craig!

Last week I blogged about things that you need to think about before you decide to build your own in-house teleprospecting team,  where I tried to get folks thinking about some of the questions that they may not have considered, and hopefully offer some insight into the difficulty of creating their own teleprospecting team.  Today I was thinking – what if someone had all of those things covered?  What if someone decided to build their own team and had been an experienced, successful teleprospector?  What if they knew exactly what their ideal BDR looked like and what if they really knew how to measure their team’s success?  It certainly isn’t beyond the scope of possibilities that if you’ve decided to build your own team that you already know how to answer these questions.  As a follow up, then, I’d like to offer some additional questions that you should think about. Read more… »

Man, the summer of 1987 when I discovered Guns N’ Roses’ first release, Appetite for Destruction, was a good one.  I think I listened to their first album (cassette tape actually) so much that I probably needed to buy a second one.  My sister hated them, and would get mad at me every time I wanted to watch their videos on MTV (when they actually played videos).  In my opinion, there wasn’t a bad song on the whole album.  Do you have any like that in your music collection?  You know, one that you can just listen to over and over without feeling like you need to fast forward past a song.  I think I have a few, but the first one I ever encountered, where I liked EVERY song was Appetite for Destruction.  I thought I’d try and do something a little different today, so I’m going to relate some teleprospecting lessons through the titles of each of the songs on the Appetite for Destruction album. Read more… »

Think about your prospects for a minute.  You’ve probably got a list or a database chock full of folks that you really want to do business with.  Sure you want to do business with them because that means money for you and your organization, but I’m sure there are those that you want to do business because of the weight that their name carries in their respective industries.  Now take a minute and think about how you reach out to those folks, from a teleprospecting perspective.  Maybe you’re not doing that right now but you want to.  Do you prospect your prospects the way YOU want to or the way THEY want to be?  This question came to me today after reading a blog entry in the Marketing Mélange by Mike Frichol. Read more… »

Okay, if you’ve got a stick of gum, a paper clip, three pennies, a ball made of rubber bands, and an acorn who are you?  A lot of folks may say that you’re the contents of the front pocket of a seven year old boy, but they would be wrong.  Actually, the real answer is a flame thrower if you’re in the hands of one Angus MacGyver – yes, THE MacGyver.  You remember him, right?  They guy with a penchant for getting out of inescapable situations by creating some contraption out of things he’d find on the ground or in his or a partner’s pockets.  MacGyver was awesome (besides the mullet) and one of the cooler aspects of that show was actually trying to figure out how he was going to do what he needed to do, and with what.  Like I said, the guy could make a tank out of a broken baby-stroller and a coat rack.  More than anything, MacGyver was inventive, and without a doubt, one of the top 100 qualities of a great teleprospecting rep is being inventive. Read more… »