10 Ways To Find More Prospects (Part 1/10)

Conferences, Exhibitions & Trade Shows (Part 1/10). Conventional thinking in prospecting says use all the traditional approaches such as Newspapers, Magazines, Journals, Periodicals, Reviews, Newsletters, etc. My experience has shown me that conventional approaches produce very conventional results, which are usually inadequate to transform your success in sales today. Here is one very simple technique that I use and have found very successful. It is easy to do, inexpensive and it works. Try it and see how many qualified prospects you can identify for an investment of 3 hours of your time.
Conferences, Exhibitions & Trade Shows. Participate in as many of these events as you can. Industry Events that are for your target customers or related to your target customers business are a prospector’s gold mine. Simply spend time there talking to people. Talk to everyone that you can. From conference attendees, to people that you meet during coffee breaks, to Conference Speakers and Panelists. At Exhibitions and Trade Shows talk to exhibitors, sales people on exhibitor booths and people you meet on the exhibition floor. Sales people are dying to tell you about what they do, their company and their products. Let them sell to you. Learn from them about their industry, the key Industry Players, their sales arguments, their positioning and whenever possible find out their PAIN points. You will go home with a rolodex of business cards. The Exhibitor Catalogue is a prospector's bible. Good luck and remember, Always Be Prospecting.
Part 1/10 in French

10 Ways To Find More Prospects - Introduction

Read about what I have to say in '10 Ways To Find More Prospects. How to Achieve Sustainable Performance in Sales' in today’s Metro Newspaper. This is the first in a series of 10 articles which was published today in a new column entitled Special Coaching Commercial, in the Careers and Employment section of Monday’s edition of Metro. For additional information go to Metro’s Website to see the article in English and French.
Metro Article Intro in French

Metro Article Intro in English

Exceptional Selling

Exceptional Selling, the name of this book says it all. In today's increasingly competitive world the business invariably goes to the better sales person. Better in moving the customer through the sales process and better in terms of personal selling skills.

Exceptional Selling. How The Best Connect And Win in High Stakes Sales was written by Jeff Thull, who also authored, "The Prime Solution" and "Mastering The Complex Sale". If you want to move your personal selling skills up a notch or two, or more, then this book is a must read and an excellent investment in your better future.

Exceptional Selling was released on September 12th and is available from amazon.com.

Flipping The Funnel

At Lunch@Circle today many of you expressed interest in a recent article entitled "Flipping the Funnel. Give Your Fans the Power to Speak Up." by Seth Godin. This article builds on many of the great 'new paradigm' ideas that Emmanuel Vivier from Culture-Buzz described at lunch. The key idea of Flipping the Funnel being to inverse the conventional status quo and get your clients and customers to promote your goods and services, or virtual Word of Mouth. The key Take Away for me today was: Influence = Sharing. In the online world what you bring to others is your measure of value, credibility and influence.

To download the article go to: Download Now

Go-To-Market Strategy Mapping

Go-To-Market Strategy Mapping is the visual representation of the linkages necessary to construct routes to market through complex business eco-systems. In B2B sales, constructing a simple a clear Business Partner channel to market can be difficult and time consuming. Using GTM Strategy Mapping you can see the Partner profiles and interconnections necessary to reach your final customer and this will help you build detailed and specific Partner Value Propositions. Ultimately you must ensure that each business in the the end-to-end value chain has a valid and viable role to play and that ultimately these interactions translate into meaningful value for your final customer.