The salutation from another email cover message: Dear All Hiring, Cover emails are difficult to write without starting it in this manner. I’m not a big fan of using “To Whom It May Concern,” but at least it doesn’t draw your attention in a negative way.
Continue ReadingA Question For Every Candidate
We never, ever phone screen a sales candidate without asking some form of this question: Why are you looking for a new opportunity? This question is revealing especially if you drill down a bit on their initial response. You will learn much about the candidate. We also ask it of previous positions – why did they decide to leave those positions. Listen closely to their response. Just in time comes this line from an email cover (emphasis mine): The company is closing their doors in Minnesota and abolishing all positions. Therefore that is why I am seeking new employment. Dramatic. This respondent certainly gets right to the point on the… Read More
Continue ReadingCoffee Culture Marketing
I graduated with a degree in psychology and I have a coffee addiction so abcnews.com’s article was irresistible: Starbuck’s Psychology. The article points to some specific, subtle marketing principles incorporated by the ever-expanding Starbuck’s chain: It has everything to do with the marketing strategy behind this designer coffee chain, which devised a clever way of creating its own community. It also pinpointed one key aspect of caffeine shoppers: They want their coffee immediately. “Designer coffee” for certain. Knowing this fact, they devised their strategy: Across the United States, there are 9,814 stores with a total of 13,728 worldwide. The Starbucks management has watched coffee drinks, and figured out exactly what… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Can vs. Can’t Approach
One client of ours told me a sales hiring story that led them to us. The sales manager followed the conventional hiring process – post an ad, sort the resumes, interview the candidates from the “yes” resume pile. He chose a salesperson with a glowing resume who absolutely won him over in the interview. He knew he had made a mistake a couple months into her employment. It turns out that this salesperson could not handle making calls in the presence of other people. What I mean is that her phone-intensive position was located in a cube farm with her peers all around her. She was incredibly uncomfortable talking to… Read More
Continue ReadingUbiquitous Communication
Yesterday I posted on communication blindness. Today, I stumbled upon CareerJournal.com’s Can a Business Be Run As a Corporate Democracy? A stunning thought that I have never considered. Yet, I suspect Gen Y has some ideals that favor this approach. Ternary runs itself as a democracy, and every decision must be unanimous. Any of Ternary’s 13 other employees could have challenged the incentive decision and forced it to be revisited. Running a company democratically sounds like a recipe for anarchy, and it can prompt bureaucratic whiplash: Ternary, a company with annual revenues of around $2 million, adjusted salaries for employees up and down several times last year. At first blush,… Read More
Continue ReadingSales Traits Series – Leading Others
This week’s trait focuses on an important sales manager trait. The aptitude to lead others works in concert with many other traits and motivations, but the natural ability to lead can be identified and measured through our assessments. Leading OthersThe ability to organize and motivate salespeople to get things accomplished where everyone feels a sense of order and direction. Effective leadership depends on a fine mixture of capacities that must match the environment in which the sales manager is asked to perform. Regardless of that mixture, every leader must be able to gain the trust of others and be able to solve problems among/for the group. A sales manager with strength… Read More
Continue ReadingAwful Interview Questions
I have a weakness for this topic so I was pleased to read today’s ERE.net article titled Results-Focused Interviews. Remember, these are all questions that people submitted to the website as their best questions to use in an interview. I am not making these up: “If a spaceship were to land outside this office and you were asked to get in, would you? Why?” (Is an acceptable answer, “Because they had a ray gun?”) “Am I a good interviewer? Why or why not?” (Well, if you have to ask me, maybe we ought to switch chairs.) “If you were a part of a car, which part would you be and… Read More
Continue ReadingCommunication Blindness
Anyone who has managed salespeople knows how difficult a task that can be. We see it often in companies where clouded communication occurs daily. I think most of you could name numerous situations throughout your career where management communication simply broke down or worse, did not even occur. SellingPower.com’s article – There€™s No Communication Around Here! – dives right into this topic. Clear communication covers many transgressions. We’ve posted about this topic numerous times since it is so important. In case you had doubts: The latest Watson Wyatt Communication ROI Study found that companies with effective communication practices have a 19 percent higher market premium and a 57 percent higher… Read More
Continue ReadingFocus On Your Selling System
SellingPower.com offers up an interesting article in their CRM newsletter – Is CRM Really Improving Sales Productivity? The short answer is no for a handful of reasons. One item resonated with me: Mike Bosworth, author of the bestseller CustomerCentric Selling (Wiley, 2005) argues that the sales process must be adapted to customer buying processes prior to being automated. But that€™s not what€™s happening. Instead, when sales managers see sales productivity dropping, they€™re likely to turn to CRM in an attempt to make their existing, traditional process more efficient. That€™s like stepping on the accelerator when you€™re heading for a cliff. He’s right – there is no reason to automate a… Read More
Continue ReadingA Year Of Sense
Today marks The Hire Sense’s first anniversary so without much pomp and circumstance, let’s get a proper perspective: Most modern calendars mar the sweet simplicity of our lives by reminding us that each day that passes is the anniversary of some perfectly uninteresting event. -Oscar Wilde We may have to use that quote every year on this date! Thanks to all of our readers and to the acquaintances we have made through this expanding channel.
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