Sales Management Matters

We recently featured Splunk sales effectiveness leaders Bart Fanelli and Kym Wood in “Case Study: Sales Enablement at Splunk.” Splunk (NASDAQ:SPLK) has taken the “big data” space by storm; the firm IPO’d in April. Their webcast is noteworthy on several fronts: it offers great practitioner-focused perspective on effective sales enablement;...Read more

Mercer’s Shawn Rossi discussed sales strategy development in a recent webcast, Sales Planning and Strategy: Optimizing Resources, Tactics, and Outcomes. Sales strategy, says Rossi, answers three questions: What, How and Where What What is your growth target? Many factors impact this – including budget resources, past achievement, and demand projections. Rossi...Read more

Richardson’s Mike Kunkle and Dario Priolo recently presented Six Emerging Trends in Sales Force Effectiveness; among the trends they spotlight: a resurgent focus on new account acquisition. Their excellent webcast is archived here. Most markets, they point out, are thawing after the recession’s long winter. But with the relief of...Read more

The “SMART” goal setting methodology is well known (“SMART” goals are “Specific, Measurable, Assignable, Realistic and Time-related”). In a recent webcast Iconixx Software’s Bruce Jackson and Carolyn Jenkins described how SMART goal setting should apply to KPI (“Key Performance Indicator”) development. KPIs are often used as a kind of short-hand...Read more

Remember that crummy conference bag you didn’t get at last year’s Sales Force Productivity conference? You’re not getting one at this year’s conference either. Do you need another crummy conference bag? One you schlepp around for three days, full of stuff you aren’t even sure you want? An ugly, logo-slathered...Read more

Step inside the sales organization (most any large sales organization). You’ll see things that overwhelm the senses, confound reason, boggle the mind. Buyers will violate long-established natural laws governing customer behavior. Salespeople will perform activities that serve no purpose, and be paid for outcomes that they do not influence. Investments...Read more

ZS Associates’ Andy Zoltners is fond of posing the following question: If you had to decide between having a team of excellent salespeople with an average manager, or having a team of average salespeople with an excellent manager, which would you choose It’s a question he asked the general session...Read more

Sales organizations are smart to invest in “onboarding” – systematic programs that assist new salespeople up the learning curve. Yet plenty of companies miss the boat when it comes to onboarding sales leadership. In fact, most firms are caught flat-footed when a sales manager leaves the firm. Without a ready...Read more