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Making A Difference – Thoughts, Observations and Opinions
This is Dave Brock’s Blog.
It offers my views on a variety of business, sales, marketing, and leadership topic. My goal is to make a difference for you, the reader, in both your professional and personal lives.
Latest Posts
The Irony Of Change
The other day, I was speaking with a colleague about the state of sales/selling. We started talking about the irony of change, how our jobs are all about change–yet we, somehow, seem the most resistant to changing how we sell. Sales/selling has little to do with what we sell. It is strictly about change, helping our customers/prospects recognize the need to change, helping them in that change process. Whether it’s convincing our customers to change vendors or products, helping them address a new opportunity, helping them solve a problem, helping them grow and improve their performance—it’s all about change. Until […]
What Is Your Development Plan For Your People?
My friend, Tibor Shanto, and I were talking this morning. He asked me a fascinating question, “Why don’t managers have a development plan or roadmap for developing the capabilities and performance of their people?” The question caused me to pause and reflect. Very few managers sit down with their people and develop a plan to help them learn, grow, and contribute at higher levels. Mostly, if managers are coaching performance at all, it’s tactically oriented; how do we win this deal, how do we fill the pipeline, what are you doing in this next call…..? But we know, if we […]
“Selling Without Feeling ‘Salesy'”
I just had a few minutes free time and skimmed Clubhouse to see if there was a discussion I might listen to. I stumble on one entitled “Selling Without Feeling ‘Salesy’” I didn’t listen to it, but it struck a nerve. We hear that all the time, expressed both by sellers and buyers. (As a side note, we never hear buyers of being too “Buyersy.”) The salesy terminology conjures up the worst images, including the sleazy manipulative stereotypes portrayed in movies like the Wolf of Wall Street, Boiler Room, Glengarry Glenross, Wall Street, or Cadillac Man. We immediately think of […]
“Tell Us Your Top Business Challenge”
A very large telecom company sent me this marketing email. It was one of those, “Dear Occupant Or Current Resident” emails. The subject line was “Tell us your top business challenge.” The message continued, “Our experts want to help your business thrive.” There were links to resources about their products. Then the message went on, “It’s your turn to tell us what you want to know. [Our High Speed Networking Product]] can help you find the right solutions to your business challenges.” More links to product pitches. The rest of the note was on their expertise in solving business problems […]
Figuring Out Networking
“Networking” is critical for all of us. Both in developing new professional and business relationships, and socially, just getting to know more and different people. We can learn so much new by networking and developing relationships with others. Networking has always been a bit of a challenge to me, since I’m naturally a bit shy and introverted. Yeah, I know that may surprise a lot of you, but it’s an unnatural act for me to get out and proactively build relationships. Since it’s so important, I continue to push myself and learn more about how to become more comfortable in […]
Doing The Math,,,,,
Sales (and marketing) is a numbers game! Well, kind of, but…… Let me backtrack. Too many organizations are driven by the numbers and “math” of sales and marketing. They think the way we drive performance is manage to the numbers and math equations. Let me give a very simple example: (Number of dials) x (Answer rate) = (Number of prospecting conversations) This is a fundamental equation we all use in prospecting. Let’s imagine the following, we have an answer rate of 5% for our dials. (This is probably a very ambitious conversion rate, but let’s go for it!) Doing the […]