Virtual selling is any form of selling that occurs without the buyer and the seller physically present with each other in the same room. Telephone, text, email, Zoom — it’s all virtual selling. Since virtual selling, in that sense, is longstanding, there’s no reason to think negatively about it.

The first key to successful virtual selling is to accept the fact that selling fundamentals don’t change just because you’re using a communication tool that is new to either you or the prospective client. The medium used to communicate with your target audience is just that — a medium. Your product … Read the rest

Have you ever received a text message like this?

Hi Jeff! I’m Calvin with XYZ. We offer tailored consulting-focused medical insurance plans with competitive rates and nationwide coverage during open enrollment. Would you like a quick quote?

Or how about this?

Hello Jeff. This is Elijah from ABC Bookkeeping. We’re an online bookkeeping service starting as low as $109 per month. Can I call you to explain the details?

Or even one like this?

Greetings Jeff. I know that technology integration is a concern for your industry. Our latest product addresses this directly, providing tools and platforms for sales trainers. … Read the rest

I do it like everyone else. I open up my email and battle with the 50 or more messages I don’t need to or want to see. If I open up a browser, I am confronted with the same thing. I am now getting texts with all this junk. No matter how much I try to dodge them, these irritating nuisance messages appear before my eyes forcing me to delete, click away, move to junk or try to block the sender. You probably face the same thing.

Those who research these kinds of things will tell you that we make … Read the rest

I am going to go off course a bit and delve into something that used to freak me out because I am a bit old school when it comes to the digital world. However, I know it is powerful and can transform business — especially sales — when used in conjunction with interpersonal real people skills. So, let’s dive into a topic that is hot in the digital world: AI.

The world of sales is evolving at an unprecedented pace, with businesses constantly seeking innovative ways to engage customers, boost revenue and streamline operations. In this digital age, one of … Read the rest

Feel like AI is taking over everything?

The rules keep changing on this, but what I want you to remember is this: ChatGPT is nothing more than a very hyperactive search engine. Don’t run from it! ChatGPT is a tool to leverage. Embrace it!

ChatGPT can give you a tremendous amount of information, but don’t think for a moment it’s going to replace you as a salesperson. Rather, keep one thing in mind: Not only are you using it to help you sell, but your customers are using it to help them make buying decisions. Let’s break this down.

Customers … Read the rest

Organic social media marketing can be a flashy/shiny object to companies. Brands start tossing time/money/resources into it, almost hoping that something positive will happen from all that effort.

We call that the “post and pray” method.

Or they barrel into organic social media, thinking it should be approached like any other direct response channel.

We call that generally a bad idea.

Examples of things I’ve heard company decision makers say (any of these sound familiar?):

• We’ve got to be on TikTok; it’s exploding right now!
• Social media feels like a marketing tax we have to pay — it doesn’t do

LinkedIn is a resource hub. It’s a place where people post updates, share company news, professionals seek jobs, pitch potential customers, and members chat and connect. Learn how to improve the effectiveness of your company’s LinkedIn page with these eight tips.

1. Improve the design of the company page

On social media, visuals are everything. If you don’t grab viewers’ attention right away, they won’t bother reading the content. Short and engaging videos are powerful, while strong and unique images can reinforce the message you are trying to communicate. Be sure to select photos on target with your business and … Read the rest

Emailing Customers

In the construction industry, it seems more and more communications are by email, whether conversations are interoffice, between companies, or by sales teams with customers. Using primarily email communication may seem to make us more efficient, but that assumption may not hold water.

Our inboxes are swamped. One study indicated that the average person across all industries receives an average of 115 emails per day. The study indicated that 57 percent of people do not even read all their emails! Many are simply trashed. How efficient is that?

The use of primarily email communication is led by millennials, … Read the rest

When I started my sales training business, I used to speak to some sales groups for free. Two days before one of those speeches I got an email from the sales manager saying that the salespeople wanted to spend the time in their next sales meeting learning how to use a new software program vs. listening to a speaker. She said the new software program promised to double, triple, or even quadruple their current sales. I had a similar experience while cold calling when a sales manager told me that he was holding off on sales training because they had … Read the rest

Even if you are thoughtful and deliberate when setting your goals, if you’re like most sales professionals, you don’t accomplish all of them. There are a number of reasons why you might fall short, but one of the most common ones I see is a lack of goal tracking.

Tracking is the magic ingredient that makes goal setting so powerful.

If you write your sales goals and put them in a binder that sits on the top shelf of a little-used cabinet, you are wasting a golden opportunity. Check your sales goals at least once a quarter, preferably once a … Read the rest

I spent my first six years in sales successfully selling over the phone, making between 200 and 300 hundred calls a day. For me, the phone was an effective way to sell to strangers all over the country. If you use the phone at all, whether it’s initial calls or follow-up calls, here are some tips that will be helpful.

Tip #1: Have a Mirror With the Word “Smile” on It

As you are speaking on the phone you want to look into your own eyes in the mirror as if you are looking into the eyes of the person … Read the rest

“Telephone prospecting is a waste of time, because all I ever do is leave voicemails. Nobody ever answers the phone!”

I hear frustrating words like these from sales reps quite often.

Few topics in the sales world generate more opinions than telephone prospecting in general, and voicemails in particular. Sales reps typically don’t enjoy telephone prospecting, and many get tired of never reaching a real, living decision maker.

Make no mistake; those of us who sell for a living spend a lot of time leaving voicemails.

According to Ringlead.com, the typical sales rep leaves an average of 70 voicemails per … Read the rest

I should qualify that title. As you can imagine, there are plenty of inappropriate behaviors that people could display on Zoom or Teams. Some are obvious: taking phone calls, talking to coworkers in the background, forgetting to wear pants (yikes)! In terms of virtual rudeness, I’m referring to the most common etiquette sin many people commit in the first five seconds, without being aware of it.

I’m referring to logging in “late,” and by late I mean arriving at exactly the appointed meeting time. I learned the lesson decades ago as a university student at a business class where they’d … Read the rest

We are living in a dangerous time right now — a dangerous time for sales professionals, their personal brands and their continued employment.

The world in which we live has become politically and socially polarized. For many reasons, some nefarious and others unintentional, people are being sucked toward the outlying extremities of the opinion spectrum.

It’s unfortunate, and I don’t see it getting any better in the short run. As socio-political vitriol reaches new pitch levels, some people are finding social media to be too unnerving.

Like you, I have social media connections who regularly pontificate on their immoderate points … Read the rest

Most CEOs would nod that the digital revolution is underway, but plenty haven’t fully understood what this means for their sales efforts. Here are five guidelines to ensure that your business is the “disruptor,” not the “disrupted.”

Recent studies from Gartner and Forrester show that Covid is accelerating the transition online, even for B2B enterprises, which means that CEOs need to ensure their sales teams have the digital skills and the tools of engagement to win buyers, without straying from the timeless principles that still apply.

It’s been a while since anyone argued that “dialing for dollars” is still the … Read the rest

“I see your signs everywhere!”

For 20 years, I worked in commercial real estate, and if had a dollar for every time someone said that to me about our company, I’d have a ton of money.

They’re talking about the “For Sale” signs that real estate brokers plant in front of their listed properties.

Of course, even the busiest company doesn’t really have signs everywhere, but sometimes it feels like they do.

Why is that?

It’s called the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon also known as “frequency illusion.” Psychologists tell us that the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon is a cognitive bias. After noticing something for … Read the rest

The Pew Research Center released the results of a survey on social media use in the United States, and the results are salient for anyone who uses social media for prospecting purposes. Here are some of the findings:

• Approximately 81 percent of adults use YouTube, an 8 percent increase from the previous year.
• Gender matters! — 46 percent of women use Pinterest, but only 16 percent of men are on it.
• Age matters! — 50 percent of Americans over the age of 65 are on Facebook. Meanwhile, Snapchat, Instagram and TikTok are most heavily used by the 18-to-29 demographic.
• Education

Do you remember April 1, 2020? The entire world was in lockdown, and at Objective Management Group (OMG) we had just 10 days to figure out how to convert our annual four-day international conference for sales experts to a three-day virtual event over Zoom. The 200 in attendance loved it!

By late last summer, we knew full well that our 2021 conference would also be virtual. The difference was that we would have seven months to prepare, and we wanted to optimize the conference specifically for a virtual event. How was it different from what we accomplished a year earlier? … Read the rest

Without the opportunity to maintain in-person relationships with clients or prospects, businesses have realized that it is now more vital than ever to have a strong online presence. An online presence can help to build credibility, and in turn, generate leads.

People are willing to engage with brands and companies they know on social media if they are getting meaningful social interaction and a sense of community out of it.

To help you and your business use social media to build a community around your brand or product, we’ve compiled a list of “do’s and don’ts” to guide you when … Read the rest

How customer relationship management solutions transform sales organizations.

Technology is an integral and mission-critical part of every business process today and a strong technology foundation is essential, no matter the industry. This is especially true in the area of sales. Successful sales executives are constantly looking for ways to sell more, sell better, and sell faster. A key solution to achieve these goals is Customer Relationship Management (CRM).

In this article I will highlight the many benefits and advantages of CRM and how it transformed Harvey Gerstman Associates (HGA), the New York-based manufacturers’ representative agency I manage, from a very … Read the rest

Just as with so many of his fellow reps, the COVID-19 pandemic has to a large extent taken long-time MANA member Sid Ragona out of the field; but Ragona has hardly disappeared. Instead, while still tending to his rep duties, today he also can be found in a series of YouTube videos covering a number of topics impacting what reps do on a daily basis.

A simple YouTube search on the name “Sid Ragona” will reward interested parties with discussions of:

• Mastering Zoom.
• Elevate Your Zoom Meeting to New Heights.
• Ten Tips to Becoming a Manufacturers’ Rep.
• Home Office Basics.

Did you ever have a potential customer who should have been excited about doing business with you but seemed reserved? It happened in a weird way for me. The senior managers seated around the boardroom table were excited about their new technology that would disrupt their market and separate them from every competitor.

They had brought me in to help craft their sales message and to eventually train their reps on how to introduce it to their customers. Along with their excitement though, I sensed some tension. So as the vice president of marketing introduces me, my first remark to … Read the rest

At the end of summer we moved our son into his dorm to begin his freshman year of college. The college president’s opening remarks were virtual, so we joined the Zoom stream from our hotel room and listened in. He had some really useful things to share with the new freshmen and while his thoughts were targeted to the students, they apply quite equally to salespeople.

Among the points he made, these seemed to be just as applicable to salespeople:

• Show up.
• Do the work.
• Try approaches that you haven’t previously attempted.
• You will be uncomfortable but do it anyway.

“Jeff, I’d like to meet with you, get to know you and pick your brain. Do you have time for lunch next week?”

I periodically get calls that sound just like that. As I’m listening to the caller, I’m Googling that person. I want to know who I’m dealing with and what he or she is all about. This may not be fair, but if nothing or very little pops up after I Google someone, I’m unimpressed. My assumption is that they don’t have much going on; they’re not involved in their profession or community.

It’s safe to assume people … Read the rest

The coronavirus has definitely impacted the way we do business today.

Those firms who are up and running on a CRM platform are positioned to capitalize on their database that they have built over the years. CRM databases containing contact information, MRO, OEM and contractor profiles, quote history, old and dead lead information, even some with SIC or NAICS codes. With business slow, this is the ideal opportunity to make the move to a CRM system, train your people the right way to use it, and then begin capitalizing from it in ways you probably would not have thought about … Read the rest

The term “New Normal” is one that is being popularly bandied about as we either wind down from the COVID‑19 pandemic or face the prospect of a second wave coming our way this fall. Focusing on that term for a moment, author, speaker, consultant, Terry Brock, observes that a look back at history shows a number of “New Normal” examples — and we’ve survived and thrived with each.

“Look back at everything from the American Revolution, The Civil War and even the move from the horse and buggy to cars. Think about the latter for a moment. If we felt … Read the rest

“I’m taking a break from Facebook.”
“I don’t even check Twitter anymore.”

I’ve been hearing statements like these with increasing regularity.

As political vitriol reaches new pitch levels, some people are finding social media to be too unnerving. While Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter remain important parts of my life, I can understand why a person would want to avoid all the unpleasantries. It’s almost as if you have to psych yourself up these days before opening your Facebook feed.

Like you, I have social media friends/connections who constantly spout fervent opinions on a host of socio-political issues. I strongly agree … Read the rest

Creating a culture of WOW makes a powerful impact on all employees — including the growing number of people who work away from the office.

In 2020 remote work is “normal.” There’s a good chance at least some of your employees work from home, a co-working space, or some other distant location. And while the arrangement has benefits for all parties, the trade-off is that remote workers get far less (if any) face time with leaders and coworkers. This may lead you to wonder: Can you truly engage remote employees? Is it possible to shape a positive company culture that … Read the rest

We had a request for some data from one of our longtime partners.

My knee-jerk reaction to her request was that it would be a big nothing burger. She asked for data that would show the difference between salespeople who are goal oriented and those who are not. I did not expect much of a difference except in the area of motivation but I was wrong. Very wrong! Check out some of the profound differences this data mining uncovered!

Objective Management Group (OMG) measures 21 sales-specific core competencies. We have data from our evaluations and assessments of 1,942,180 salespeople. Can … Read the rest

Managing remote teams is a whole different ballgame. Yet in the age of flex work, satellite offices, and telecommuting, mastering this skill set is no longer optional. David Deacon shares some best practices that help self-determined managers connect with employees at a distance.

Managing remotely has quickly become the norm in today’s work world. And yet, it’s not easy. With more employees working remotely or on flex schedules, it can be tough to create the kind of connection you need to help people do their best work. You can’t pick up on non-verbal cues. You can’t tell if they’re having … Read the rest