I was talking to references for one of our clients last night and the reference kept telling me the candidate was excellent at solution selling. To sum up what he was telling me – the candidate is excellent at speaking the customer’s language instead of using company jargon or convoluted questions. The candidate ran a selling process to find out what business problems the company was facing and then articulated his company’s value proposition in regards to resolving their issue. Interestingly enough, I then caught up to an article in my RSS reader titled 5 Quick Tips for Creating Conversations Salespeople Will Use from ManageSmarter.com. The tips can help your… Read More
Continue ReadingPhone Screens – See The Candidate In Action
Selling Power offers a quick article titled Successful Phone Interviews (the headline writer must have had the day off). I’m not aligned with all of the suggestions, but I cannot stress this one item enough: She also says to pay close attention to candidates’ phone manners €“ especially if they’re going to be using the phone on the job. How does their voice and tone sound? Do they project energy and enthusiasm or do they ramble on, putting you to sleep? How do they answer the phone? The key here is to talk less than the candidate. If you are talking, you are not qualifying. Paying attention to the candidate’s… Read More
Continue ReadingHow To Make Employee Orientations More Effective
In a recent article on SHRM’s weekly Newsletter (membership required), a survey of 597 organizations found that 86% of organizations have an orientation program (14% don’t?), but most said they lacked real impact. Here are some other findings of the survey: 81% of the organizations turn to HR to administer new employee orientation, 23% involve multiple departments and 21% include the department in which the new employee will report. Orientation usually takes a day or less for about half of the employers and 26% take two to three days. Nearly half use employee surveys to measure the effectiveness of their orientation program, 22% don€™t track it at all, 20% measure… Read More
Continue ReadingA State Of The Industry Speech – Mobile Devices
CareerJournal.com pens an article titled Mobile Workers Tie In With Hand-Held Devices. I hope most of the information in the article is familiar to you since mobile PDA phones are more than a passing fancy. The article reads like a state of the industry address with a couple of notable points. First, the sheer size of this industry (my emphasis): There are an estimated 50 million “mobile” workers in the U.S., those who have no desk or spend more than 25% of their time outside the office, according to Frost & Sullivan, a business-research and consultancy firm. Catch that? No desk – totally mobile. This new format is more than… Read More
Continue ReadingFast And Loose
This is from a shady-looking sales employment ad: Now is the time to get into the fast paced sales industry. We are looking for mativated (sic) well spoken individuals with a loose tongue. I’m speechless.
Continue ReadingRetention In A Downsizing Industry
We don’t do much work in the pharmaceutical market but I do have a couple of friends who sell for the big players. SellingPower.com’s article Have You Heard Who€™s Hiring? discusses a downsizing trend in sales hiring that is occurring in that specific market. €œThe days of armies of sales reps in the field driving revenues are over,€ Davenport says in a recent Business Wire story. €œIt will no longer be about numbers and volume €“ now the focus will shift to productivity and performance of the remaining sales staff.€ This comment is spot on even though it seems counter-intuitive. My sales friends in this industry have mentioned that their… Read More
Continue ReadingOf Dads And CEOs
From CNNMoney.com comes a humorous article titled Do CEOs make lousy dads (and moms)? The Q&A format is a discussion of an entertaining new book from a former comedy programmer at HBO. The guy is now a CEO of an executive search firm in Los Angeles who almost lost his wife during an armed robbery. The article starts with some stats from a monster.com survey: …found that 58% think their employers should do more to accommodate the demands of fatherhood; 71% of those with a child under age 5 took a paternity leave when it was offered. The poll also found that, if money were no object, 68% of fathers… Read More
Continue ReadingAdvertised Vacancies Up 29% In Past Year
As I was searching the web this morning came across an interesting site for The Conference Board. The company is “the world’s preeminent business membership and research organization.” They have been around for 90 years and are best known for the Consumer Confidence Index and the Leading Economic Indicators that you see referenced so often. They provide an economic analysis based on a monthly basis is the total number of online job ads. The report and analysis they provide is amazing – a total of 17 pages of information for the month of May alone! Although the total online job ads were 4,374,400 in May, a 0.2 percent increase from… Read More
Continue ReadingReading The Resume Tea Leaves
We do not make sales sourcing decisions based on resumes as you may know from reading our blog. It’s an unreliable approach when looking for strong salespeople or sales leaders. Yet, we do receive resumes in response to our ads and that always leads to some interesting reads. Here are the bullet points listed in one resume describing a candidate’s recent managerial position: –Create and maintain dedicated sales programs and outside events to increase revenue and overall sales –Motivating staff on a daily basis to achieve sales goals and maximize retention –Daily sales analysis to coach representatives into meeting monthly quotas These are 3 good points but they are not… Read More
Continue ReadingSales Traits Series – Sense of Self
This trait is one to measure in all salespeople since it reveals much of how they approach prospects, how they handle rejection and how they hold up under stress. Sense of SelfThe ability of a salesperson to realize and appreciate their own unique self-worth. They base these feelings on internal factors as opposed to external ones. This internal feeling of value allows them to appreciate themselves based on who they know themselves to be on the inside. They do not judge themselves based solely on what they do, what role they occupy or what success they attain. This capacity could also be considered the level of €œself acceptance.€ A salesperson with strength… Read More
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