I started laughing out loud when I read this title for an article in Sales Vault’s weekly newsletter. I just got off the phone with a persistent telemarketer who did it to me. So what is this “Barf Factor?” The author, Kelly Roberston, describes it as:

Too many sales people mistakenly believe that they should open their conversation with a background and history of their company. Or, a complete description of their products, services, or solutions. It’s seems like they can’t control what comes out of their mouth once they open it. They puke. They barf. They spew all over themselves.

Exactly what the telemarketer had just done to me. I am not a prospect for the product he was pitching but it didn’t matter. He wasted 2-3 minutes going through a canned speech only to hear me say no thanks, I just purchased a competitor’s item.

But enough about the telemarketer – what tips can you provide your salespeople so they don’t “barf” on their prospects and customers? Here is the criteria Kelly suggests you use along with an example script:

• It focuses on the other person.
• It conveys how you help your clients & customers.
• It is easy to understand.
• It does not contain an excess of adverbs or adjectives.
• It intrigues the other person.
• It must be delivered in a conversational tone.

Mr. Adams, I’m Pat from Geeks R Us. We specialize in helping small businesses like yours fix computer problems. The reason I’m calling is to see if you have ever experienced computer problems, and if so, how have they affected your business?

The example is not perfectly constructed, but it is better than what I just experienced. Too bad I didn’t have the telemarketer’s email address to send him this article – it could have saved him the 3 minutes he spewed on me.

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Seriously. From abcnews.com’s Basic Training For Business Types:

The most domineering boss has a way of melting in the presence of the drill instructor’s flush cheeks. And the royal waistline loses some of its cache when draped in mesh gym shorts

“Yeah, we break down their egos real quick,” said Senior Drill Instructor Matt Terlop.

Terlop is a former U.S. Border Patrol agent, and the lead drill instructor at CEO Boot Camp.

This is almost surreal. I enjoy the concept and was hooked into reading the entire article when I read this line:

“We want this to be an excuse-free environment,” Terlop warns.

Amen to that. All sales departments should have a big sign that reads This Is An Excuse-Free Environment.

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We are asked from time to time about the best way to conduct an employee compensation review. I have to relay a story to you regarding a friend’s annual review. Here’s how it played out.

She sat down with her manager and recieved a very positive review. She was told she was one of their better employees – recieving 3′s and 4′s out of 5 in all performance areas. In fact, my friend is the top person in her territory and the territory is ranked 2nd out of 8 in a large corporation.

Everything was going well and she received a lot of verbal praise about her performance. Then the manager told her that she would be receiving a 1.5% increase in salary and it would be this amount. My friend interrupted her manager and told him, “That is my current salary.”

The manager asked, “Are you sure?”

He then looked it up on his computer. After about 5 minutes he said, “You’re right, but you are really going to like this then. You are actually going to be getting a 2% raise this year.”

This raise was less than $600 a year. Her manager told her that she really needed to bust her butt because he wanted to win a corporate contest and was not going to settle for second place. My friend is motivated by money so his statement was launched at the wrong time. He never told her what was in it for her: extra cash, a trip, recognition, nothing. The only thing that mattered to the manager was that he would not settle for coming in second place.

Suffice to say my friend was completely de-motivated.

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We are coffee house aficionados as I have mentioned in previous posts. One of my goals is to be a barista some day. Now a Pioneer Press article describes a coffee university – Enrollment grows at Espresso U. I now have a new motivator! In case you doubted the appeal of coffee:

Nationally, the number of coffee houses has nearly doubled in the past six years. According to the Specialty Coffee Association of America, there are almost 24,000 coffee houses in the U.S., up from 13,800 in 2001.

The addition of wireless internet has made them a business hot spot. Yesterday the Rock Star and myself were working at Panera in the early morning before meeting with a client and we observed at least 10 business people working on laptops, 3 different business/sales meetings and 1 company (?) meeting of 8 people at one table. None of this is news, just an observation.

But be careful – this is pure coffee heresy:

To fuel its expansion, Starbucks in recent years has dropped manual espresso machines from many stores, replacing them with automated models that are faster and more efficient.

That is just plain wrong.

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Seems like I am encountering many articles and posts regarding under-performing salespeople. Now SalesforceXP.com offers Move Bad Salespeople Up Or Out. The author offers 5 strong steps to get the mediocre salesperson performing. His first step is one we fully endorse:

Never lose sight of the ABR principle: Always Be Recruiting.
If you have five strong candidates in the pipeline, you don’t have to endure a low performer. But if you have no bench, you may opt to keep a warm body around €“ even if that body hasn’t sold anything in weeks.

That is an area in which we can be of assistance. There is much truth in this approach. If you know you have a strong bench, you tend to be more direct in your assessment of your low performers.

And the article closes with the crux of the issue for sales managers:

Realize that you need to get comfortable with confronting people on poor performance. You can’t be a sales coach and a conflict avoider. When someone is failing at selling, you’re not doing him a favor by letting him coast along.

Low performers eat away at your coaching time and can infect everyone else’s attitude and mental capacity. They pollute the sales culture and can actually bring down overall performance.

One of the tasks many sales managers avoid is holding their salespeople accountable. But sales managers avoid this activity at their own peril. Salespeople need to have direction while also having clearly defined parameters and expectations. Sales manager who abdicate their authority in this area weaken their leadership…drastically.

We will address this topic with a new addition to our hiring process next week so please look for the announcement.

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In a recent article from Workforce Management on new employee retention, 7 months seems to be the magic number when it comes to retaining newly hired employees. Office Angels interviewed 1,400 new recruits on this subject. Here are some of their findings.

In the first seven months the workplace is viewed as a trial period for:

1. The boss – is he or she ‘lackluster?’
2. Are there mentoring opportunities available for them?
3. Does the new job accommodate their lifestyle?

Another important opportunity new employees look for is the camaraderie between the team.

77% of the respondents find it essential for the team to make a trip to the local pub.

No, I’m not suggesting you make an emergency field trip to the local pub as part of your orientation/training program (not an unappealing thought though). But how much time are you spending with your new recruit during the all-important first 7 months?

We’ll be adjusting our hiring process to address this need in the near future.

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This week we look at a trait that is beneficial to both salespeople and sales managers. The ability to stay balanced in forming decisions is integral to sales success. Salespeople who can look at the entire opportunity and properly weight the pieces before pursuing it are the most successful. Salespeople who can’t often chase the proverbial rabbit down the hole.

Balanced Decision Making
This trait involves the ability to be objective and fairly evaluate the different aspects (people and other) of a situation. This ability includes making an ethical decision that takes into account all aspects and components. It is the ability to maintain a balance between the needs of oneself, others and the company at the same time while providing equal importance to all three when making decisions.

A salesperson with strength in this trait does not suffer from an imbalance in the amount of focus they place on any one factor (internal or external). They will most likely make decisions which place equal emphasis on all involved parties or concerns – therefore making decisions which are more likely to satisfy all needs.

A weakness in this area indicates a salesperson who does not place equal importance on all aspects of a given situation. They may make decisions which satisfy some but not all of the factors or people involved.

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From Foxnews.com’s How to Deal With the Salary-Expectations Question:

Don Sutaria, president and founder of CareerQuest, a staffing and training firm, advises job seekers to avoid offering a solid figure. “Don’t answer the question. Say, ‘I’ll expect the fair market value. Make me an offer and we can discuss it.’ Or, ‘Maybe you can tell me what your range is?’”

Sutaria adds that the best approach is to arm yourself with information. “It’s very easy to find now, based on the job title and industry, what your range is.”

This is a pet peeve of mine. I don’t think candidates get anywhere by being coy about their salary expectations. Candidates should know what the going range is for the position and it is wise for the hiring company to include compensation range in their ad.

We deal with salespeople so we have a bit of a myopic view, but the salary question is really a qualifying question. We look for salespeople who can qualify money, i.e. compensation, effectively. I would expect a strong salesperson to have qualified the compensation before going this far into the hiring process.

As a hiring company, it is wise to put the information out there. Watch how the salesperson handles it. See if they attempt to secure more compensation (nothing wrong with that approach). You should not bring in candidates without having a basic outline of their compensation expectations.

Basically, don’t let the money topic turn into a cat-and-mouse game between the candidate and the hiring manager.

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CNNMoney.com offers a fairly innocuous story: Survey: CEOs bullish on better economy. That is always good news and I am bullish along with them.

Small and mid-sized companies are optimistic about the U.S. economy’s prospects in 2007 on the back of brisk first-quarter sales and increased revenue, according to a survey released Tuesday.

But catch this little throw-away line from later in the article:

Twenty-one percent of all executives surveyed report having conducted Internet searches via News Corporation-owned MySpace, Facebook or Google when researching job candidates, the survey showed.

I found that number staggering – almost 1 in 4 executives are using social networking sites or search engines to research candidates. It is the right approach. Unfortunately, I would prefer to know how many executives used Google vs. the other sites. My hunch – of those 21%, the vast majority only used Google to research the candidate.

We’ve posted on this topic before- every candidate should complete their own online research regarding themselves. You never know what digital dirt is floating around in cyberspace.

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Monster Pairs With Tech Company to Increase Newspaper Ties:

Under the deal, newspapers using Adicio’s service will have several options to increase their ties with Monster, including having their own employment ads co-listed in Monster’s database and giving online advertisers an easy way to buy print ads in the paper.

A good move by the fading newspapers for sure. The traditional newspaper help-wanted ad is just about toast, as it should be. Surprisingly, we still encounter companies that only advertise in the local newspaper (at confiscatory rates). The trend is clearly towards a handful of major online job boards and a myriad of niche online job boards serving specific industries or positions.

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