|
|
| Sales Management Information |
|
|
The Sales Carpenter
I remember moving my family to Argentina as Vice President of Sales for Latin America. I was in charge of managing five regional offices, Argentina of course being one of them. In the company's ten year history of selling into Latin America it had never exceeded $14 million (M) in annual sales. The Argentina office itself had never produced more than $400 thousand (K) in sales. My task was to increase the sales locally in Argentina, but more importantly throughout Latin America. I remember sitting in my office one day, looking out the window and wondering, "How the heck am I going to grow this business with problems in Mexico, Brazil, Puerto Rico and other hot spots? "How can I grow this business beyond $14M when no one in the past has been able to do so?" Forget the movie Sleepless in Seattle, I was "Sleepless in Argentina," trying to map out a strategy. How would I make "sales" happen?! " A confession to you the reader: I was scared! Please don't tell anyone! One day while on the phone with a customer, I heard loud noises from across my office building. After getting off the phone, I opened the window and looked at the shorter building next door. On the rooftop, I saw several men using a scrapping machine to rip apart the flat roof the size of two tennis courts. This noise went on for days. Then one day I noticed the silence. I looked outside and discovered that the men had finishing stripping the rooftop and were now laying small ceramic tiles. Given the size of the roof I remember thinking, "That's going to take them a very long time." A few days later to my surprise and amazement I looked outside and saw that they were three-quarters of the way complete. "Amazing! How were they able to lay so many small tiles so quickly?" Satori,? a moment of enlightenment. At that very moment, a new mindset was born for building sales. Instead of focusing in on the enormous task of increasing sales for the entire region (the whole roof), I would focus on building the company's sales slowly (one ceramic tile or sales office at a time). It was this paradigm shift, this Latin American version of eating an elephant one-bite-at-a-time that helped me maintain the patience and sanity needed to grow the business. I considered each country in Latin America a "tile." I set out to make sure that each tile I laid was positioned correctly in the marketplace. The result? First year, we hit $14.3M. Second year $45M. By the end of the third year, the region's annual sales had grown to $98M. The Argentina office itself went from $400K in sales to $5M. Success, in sales and in life, starts when you break things up into smaller pieces; you begin to feel a sense of control. And as I began to take action, I began to feel a sense of momentum. Control and momentum became my engine for success. And every time I felt overwhelmed or anxious, I thought to myself, "Victor, let's just lay one tile at a time." Confucius said, "It is not a matter of how fast or slow, but simply a matter of you moving." I learned that progress or success never happens overnight, but over time?one tile at time. I learned how to become a sales 'carpintero' (carpenter who builds things). Victor Gonzalez, top Hispanic motivational speaker and author of "The LOGIC of Success". For more info go to: www.thelogicofsuccess.com or by email victor@thelogicofsuccess.com
Google News |
|
|
|
Careers and Employment 6 Common Mistakes in the Sales Hiring Process Is lack of sales results, more sales training costs, months of unearned salary and damage to your company's image or reputation your company's method of NOT finding good salespeople? For most companies it is! How Many Salespeople Should I Hire? One of the most asked questions I get is how many sales people does it take to get the revenue numbers needed. Personally, I believe in large sales forces because in highly competitive situations the largest army wins. That doesn't mean, however, that you can go out and hire 100 sales people if all you can possibly sell this year is a million dollars if everything goes right. So how do you decide how large a staff you need? 100% Commission Equals Zero Percent Control The temptation to use straight (100%) commission plans never goes away: "Let's put our salespeople on 100 percent commission. Then, if they don't perform, we're not out any money." For small, start-up organizations, the lure is irresistible, especially when money is tight and the company or the products they sell have no track record in the market. Increasing Business Through Distributors You're a small company with a good product. You are confident that the product can sell, but you don't have the financial resources to hire a team of fifty salespeople to market and sell the product for you. You also don't have the staff resources to support those that purchase the product. How do you make your good idea and good product create success for you? Profitable Relationships: Is It Amateur Hour or King of the Hill? "We're in the relationship business...airplanes are what we use to provide a service." remarked Colleen Barrett, President and COO Southwest Airlines remarked, Sales Marketing: 12 Sneaky Tricks To Help You Outsell Your Competition Business can be like war sometimes. SEZ WHO? Tips About Recommendations, Sales Cycles, and Trade Shows Here's the scene. You're at the trade show, having a discrete "Sales Call" conversation with a visitor. Things are going well until he says something like... The Effective Executive What does it mean to be an "effective executive"? Well very simply it means achieving the goals you set out to achieve in an efficient, creative and effortless manner. Some of the benefits that ensue from this self efficacy are: feelings of self confidence, self esteem, self worth, a sense of personal empowerment, feeling invigorated and passionate about everything you choose to do, a sense of resilience, more energy, personal emotional and physical health and for some a great sense of purpose. How to Develop a Proactive, New-Business Sales Team! I don't know about your business but in my experience proactive, positive, consistent new business winners are the holy grail of any sales organisation. All of my clients have their own unique ways of motivating, managing and running their sales teams yet they all have problems from time keeping those teams on target and "up for it!" In this article I am going to cover the core fundamentals of How to Develop a Proactive, New-Business Sales Team. These are the same strategies and techniques that I have used to help many of my clients explode their personal and their team's sales. These strategies all combine an exciting and proven mix of attitudinal, skills and structural development that really works and what's more they're fun so your staff will want to use them! How To Build A Worldwide Distributor Network When your product is market ready and has a good bargain, it will be no value to you if you don't know who's going to buy it, or how you are going to tell the world about it. Your product will only sell if it has a good wide distribution network. The Hardest Job Of A Trade Show You've heard this before: There were four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody and Nobody. The Art of Sales (And Tips On How To Manage Your Sales Team) Selling. Cold calls, introductions, interviews, appointments, proposals, referrals, call cycles, building rapport, listening, asking for the order, overcoming objections, closing the sale, and rejection. There's a lot to know about the business of selling. No wonder many people are a bit overwhelmed when they are asked to do it. Ten Awesome Ways To Incease Your Sales In Holidays Everybody thinks that the businesses will slow down a bit in holiday seasons. Ofcourse everybody thinks that people don't want to start new ventures in holidays too. Book of Lists Marketing for Pressure Washing Companies The American Business Journals produces a Book of Lists each year in their many markets, it is wise for pressure washing companies to use this book of lists to find new clientele. The book of lists, lists the top companies in size in all industry sectors. Since pressure washing companies clean almost anything, it behooves them to use the book to selectively target the top companies to do business with. Are Your Sales Meetings Boring? Many sales meetings are boring and a waste of salespeople's time, say the majority of salespeople I interview. A review of what's going on in the market is good to know, but to be effective, sales meetings need to be a lot more than that venues for quick market updates. Free to Succeed: Effective Sales Leadership Using A Coach Approach About 2 years ago, I participated in a training program I'll never forget. The leader divided us into two teams. Each team's task was to fire a whack of darts into each number on a dartboard. The leader of Team A was given instructions that his team had to hit the numbers in a certain sequence. He then related the sequence, number by number, to his team. Sales Competence Isn't About Quota Performance! Compounding the problem are two myths regarding measures of competency in sales. Five Steps to Maximize Success in Targeting For Growth Targeting is the process of selecting high potential customer accounts to receive intense sales focus. Goal setting translates that high potential into achievable numeric objectives, i.e. revenue and margin growth. Seven Deadly Sales Mistakes That Cost Business Owners Big Money - And What To Do About Them 1. LOOKING for a "quick fix" to close more sales sales aren't closed, they're opened. Rotten to the Core: The Story of How the Best and Brightest can be Ruined The objective of an incentive is to incite action within an organization using a device or mechanism that that allows the rewarding or recognition of behaviors. This can be accomplished by offering preferential treatment, money, privileges, promotions, verbal praise, or complements. With that states, I suggest the answers to the questions above are:
|
| home|Sales Training|Telesales Training|Site map | 
|
© 2006 www.elearn-university.org |
