Sales Hacker

NOVEMBER 1, 2019

The problem in sales is that we tend to be “givers.” They end up having little respect for us towards the end, which is why they either keep asking for things (discounts) or they just flat out disappear on us and don’t even give us the courtesy of a callback. Keep track as you go through the sales process.

Negotiation 103

Negotiation Discount How To Buying Cycle 103

Partners in Excellence

DECEMBER 2, 2014

I was just doing some deal reviews with a very frustrated sales person. As sales people, we are very focused on our goals, objectives, and numbers. Getting more frustrated, pushing harder, or worse, going back and offering a deeper discount if they move faster won’t help. Bear with me on my word play in the title.

Discount 118

Discount Face-to-face Buying Cycle Call-back 118

MTD Sales Training

JULY 26, 2016

It may sound something like this: “Tom, many businesses in the construction industry have been able to save over 15% in their long-term buying cycles by using our preferred supplier status discounts. It creates a closer link between your products and their overall needs and speeds up the whole buying process too.

Examples 120

Examples Prospecting Decision Maker Buying Cycle 120

Allego

JANUARY 16, 2025

Managing a sales team is no small feat. From setting clear goals to inspiring sellers to deliver peak performance, knowing how to manage a sales team can make or break a sales manager’s success. Heres a look at the key responsibilities every sales manager must know how to do. But the effort is worth it.

Sales Qualified Lead 62

Sales Qualified Lead Lead Rank Lead Scoring Strategy 62

Pipeliner

JANUARY 28, 2021

Deal Winning Value Identified & Validated by Buying Cycle Stage. Sales conversations should guide prospects to quantify (usually financially) the value of the outcomes of doing business with you. DWV is also a leading indicator driving and predicting forecast accuracy because value is why customers buy.

Lead Rank 98

Lead Rank Lead Scoring Customer Discount 98

Zoominfo

SEPTEMBER 3, 2020

As a B2B marketer or sales professional you have a number of things battling for your attention at any given moment. Compared to B2C marketing strategies, B2B marketers and sales professionals rely on educating their audiences to gain more leads and conversions. How Do You Set Up Email Automation?

Prospecting 130

Prospecting Scale Lead Nurturing Campaigns 130

Miller Heiman Group

DECEMBER 21, 2020

COVID has greatly affected the buying and selling process. A recent Korn Ferry survey of global sales organizations revealed that virtual selling is here to stay, with fewer than 2% expecting the changes to be temporary. Changes include the addition of more, and likely new, stakeholders entering the buying and selling process.

Face-to-face 122

Face-to-face Sales Cycle Report Survey 122

Mindtickle

MAY 21, 2021

It might not come as a surprise that 57% of sales reps are expected to miss their quotas in 2021. Sellers often can’t explain why deals don’t work out, leaving your sales managers in the dark. Conversation intelligence solutions offer invaluable support to sales managers. Pre-qualification call. Discovery call.

Coaching 104

Coaching Conversion Sales Coaching Lead Rank 104

The ROI Guy

JANUARY 3, 2012

I n 2011 you worked hard to produce new value-focused tools, empowering your sales team to meet the growing challenges of today’s more empowered, skeptical and frugal buyer. And you are not alone, as SiriusDecisions reports that the average company now spends a whopping $43K on marketing content and sales tools per salesperson per year.

Sales Tools 80

Sales Tools Tools Incentives Incentive 80

Partners in Excellence

NOVEMBER 2, 2020

“All sales problems are pipeline problems, and all pipeline problems are prospecting problems…… ” I was having a conversation with a really smart person. But I’m uncomfortable with this, I wish diagnosing sales performance issues could be that easy. We carefully looked at our sales cycles.

Pipeline 90

Pipeline Ideal Customer Profile Top of Funnel Hiring 90

Partners in Excellence

APRIL 10, 2018

Too often, we get to the end of a buying cycle and pricing becomes the issue. The “D” word–discount–dominates the discussion. What If You Couldn’t Discount? The deal stalls, the customer may discuss a competitor’s lower price, they are looking for concessions.

Buying Cycle 62

Buying Cycle Discount Objections Revenue 62

Customer Centric Selling

JUNE 19, 2018

A common ploy buyers use toward the end of buying cycles is having someone (often a non-Key Player) request a “best and final” pricing. In my experience, vendors selling non-commodity offerings can seldom discount their way into becoming Column A. By John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling®.

Negotiation 55

Negotiation Buyer Vendor Discount 55

Customer Centric Selling

MARCH 5, 2014

Sales Training Article: Trouble Closing or Selling? By John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company Image courtesy of Pakorn at FreeDigitalPhotos.net Unlike other B2B selling skills, closing gets a disproportionate amount of attention. Need some help with your sales performance?

Closing 61

Closing Training Buying Cycle Incentives 61

Hubspot Sales

NOVEMBER 28, 2021

Maybe you have a sales development rep (SDR) who spends their days prospecting and qualifying leads before passing them along to an account executive (AE). Customers are assisted through automated communications during their buying cycle which limits the contact between employees and customers to streamline the experience.

CRM 140

CRM Strategy How To Loyalty 140

The ROI Guy

APRIL 12, 2013

You’ve worked hard to produce new value-focused tools, empowering your sales team to meet the growing challenges of today’s more empowered, skeptical and frugal buyer. And you are not alone, as SiriusDecisions reports that the average company now spends a whopping $43K on marketing content and sales tools per salesperson per year.

Sales Tools 68

Sales Tools Tools Incentives Incentive 68

Hubspot Sales

AUGUST 30, 2023

But what changes will it bring to the sales industry? Will it be the end of salespeople, or will it become the secret weapon to help sales reps work more efficiently? Furthermore, we’ve interviewed leading sales teams to collect 11 AI sales predictions that you should watch in 2023. Let’s jump to the nitty-gritty.

Lead Rank 98

Lead Rank Data Top of Funnel Cost per Lead 98

Pipeliner

JUNE 21, 2018

The lead time in each stage of the Sales Process was very high. Yet the sale didn’t happen. And went through the Sales Process and aligned it with the customer’s journey in the buying cycle. I did not discount my price to match or better the offer from the competition. I took a fresh look at it.

Guarantee 58

Guarantee Decision Maker Government Buying Cycle 58

Customer Centric Selling

MAY 22, 2013

Sales Training Article: Premature Closes. By John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company In creating and evolving CustomerCentric Selling®, a cornerstone of our methodology has been trying to provide superior buying experiences. Need some help with your sales performance?

Closing 45

Closing Training Buying Cycle Incentives 45

The ROI Guy

MARCH 15, 2011

Today’s buyer is more empowered, skeptical and frugal than ever before, providing a greater than ever challenge to sales professionals, and shaking the very foundations of traditional selling models. Commodity sales professionals are being disinter-mediated. Fight Frugalnomics with Outcome Selling?

Remedy 77

Remedy Lead Rank Vendor Lead Scoring 77

Partners in Excellence

JULY 20, 2022

They assemble a buying team, over the years, for complex sales the size of this team has grown. Alternatively, we try to increase their sense of urgency, “If you don’t order by… ” And then, there’s the king of all techniques, the discount. And for those decisions, buying cycles are getting longer!

Customer 71

Customer Buying Cycle Face-to-face Discount 71

Customer Centric Selling

APRIL 22, 2015

Sales Tips: "Always Be Closing". By John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company. Making a decision when buying sales training or process is difficult. Frequent closes in B2B sales can be offensive to buyers. Image courtesy of Glengarry Glen Ross, New Line Cinema.

Closing 40

Closing Decision Maker Buying Cycle Discount 40

LeadFuze

JUNE 17, 2021

These tactics can be applied in the form of limited-time offers or products with only a few remaining items left for sale. The scarcity tactic is important for your business for the following reasons: It will make prospects more likely to buy your products or services. Certain sales tactics are more powerful than others.

Examples 100

Examples B2B Ideal Customer Profile Webinar Metrics 100

PandaDoc

SEPTEMBER 2, 2020

Although 71% of companies say closing more deals is their top sales priority, further data from Forrester suggests that only 0.75% of leads generated become closed revenue. Compounding this issue is sales reps can spend up to 40% of their time looking for somebody to call, according to Insidesales. Adaptive Business Blog.

Top of Funnel 98

Top of Funnel Sales Management Hiring Lead Rank 98

Customer Centric Selling

OCTOBER 16, 2013

Sales Training Article: What NOT to Say. John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company Image courtesy of Imagery Majestic at FreeDigitalPhotos.net Most sellers, sales managers and executives of vendor organizations are rightfully concerned about what is said during buyer interactions.

Majestic 49

Majestic Training Negotiation Buying Cycle 49

The ROI Guy

JANUARY 5, 2011

As a result of Frugalnomics and other market drivers: 62% of B2B vendors indicated they needed more leads in order to generate the same amount of sales, 72% indicated an increase in buying cycle time over the past 6 month, The buying cycle timeframe has increased over 10% in the past 12 months.

Sales Enablement 40

Sales Enablement Buyer Buying Cycle Lead Rank 40

Sales Training Connection

FEBRUARY 27, 2015

In today’s B2B buying environment, negotiation is likely to be part of any sales cycle. It is also true that the buying process is no longer a simple linear step-by-step interaction between the customer and the seller; hence negotiation may occur at any time in the process and it can occur more than once.

Negotiation 50

Negotiation Face-to-face Decision Maker Buying Cycle 50

Julie Hanson

MAY 31, 2017

The underlying “why” for most prospects typically boils down to one of the following: Start with Why : Why should I buy this product or service? Why should I buy it from you? Why should I buy it now? Starting with the right “why” is critical for advancing the conversation and the sale.

Face-to-face 73

Face-to-face Hiring Competition Buying Cycle 73

OnePageCRM

MARCH 8, 2017

There’s an old joke in sales about selling products at a loss but making it up on volume. A common complaint from sales teams is: we can outcompete and make more sales simply by reducing prices. buy some search traffic to your offering (Google Adwords). TOTAL $19,547 from 322 sales. Fred Wilson. lower the price.

Discount 55

Discount Lead Rank Top of Funnel Enterprise 55

Customer Centric Selling

JUNE 29, 2016

Sales Tips: A Poor Way to Close. Many sales organizations place an extraordinarily high emphasis on closing. The best case is that concessions or discounting are necessary. When you think about it, issuing a proposal is a closing technique, as it should contain all the information needed to make buying decisions.

Proposal 45

Proposal Vendor Buying Cycle Discount 45

Cincom Smart Selling

APRIL 3, 2017

Automate sales quotes to keep your sales reps focused on closing business. Sales reps have a full plate. For most selling organizations and for individual sales folks, the key limiting factor in achieving their goals is time. Attending sales meetings? Preparing proposals and sales quotations? Waste of time.

Proposal 48

Proposal Vendor Discount Collateral 48

Allego

JUNE 28, 2022

Today’s sales managers face tremendous pressure to achieve ambitious targets. Now more than ever, you need to up your game to increase sales performance. But choosing which sales metrics to measure can be tough. 6 Sales Performance Metrics to Track. Sales Lead Quality. Sales Call Quality.

Ideal Customer Profile 62

Ideal Customer Profile Top of Funnel How To Lead Rank 62

The ROI Guy

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

The bad news for B2B sales cycles everywhere is that 84% of B2B buyers report that purchase decisions take longer than expected – twice as long for most. Even more troubling is the fact that 94% of today’s B2B decision makers have participated in a canceled buying cycle. It's a NO PITCH zone.

Decision Maker 45

Decision Maker Buying Cycle B2B Buyer 45

Customer Centric Selling

FEBRUARY 26, 2016

Sales Tips: 8 Signals That Your Buyer Is Ready to Close. I’ve had several sales executives and CEOs tell me "My salespeople can’t close." If all of these items have been covered, buying should be the logical last step of a sales cycle. In my mind, a buying cycle is much like a play.

Buyer 40

Buyer Closing Decision Maker Proposal 40

Customer Centric Selling

FEBRUARY 12, 2016

Sales Tips: Sales Doesn't Need More Product Experts. Having started my career with IBM, I've witnessed the shift from product to business focus in sales firsthand. But in the late '80’s clients started to more closely scrutinize IT expenditure, and technology buying decisions migrated to business executives.

Hiring 40

Hiring Buying Cycle Proposal Inbound 40

Mindtickle

MAY 2, 2018

Plus, according to CSO Insights 2016 Sales Enablement Optimization Study, only 49% of study participants had Sales Enablement Content Management solutions with adoption rates of 76% or better. What is sales content management? A broad variety of content is needed for salespeople throughout the sales cycle.

SalesForce 52

SalesForce Sales Cycle Study Sales Enablement 52

The ROI Guy

DECEMBER 23, 2010

These engagements eventually led to incremental sales / revenue opportunities, improved loyalty and retention, collaborative innovation, cost savings and more. Offering exclusive contests, discounts and deals are popular ways to connect with buyers who seek a “bargain” from every purchase.

Social Media 58

Social Media ROI Media Webinar Metrics 58

The ROI Guy

FEBRUARY 2, 2011

Over the past 18 months, the survey results indicate that CFOs have assumed significant additional responsibilities for several key groups, including: information technology (43%), human resources (39%), production (38%), customer service (37%), and even marketing / sales (33%).

Buying Cycle 45

Buying Cycle ROI Journal Case Study 45