Question Tradition: The Sales Scoreboard Reset It's that time of year again...when we embark on the unquestioned tradition of resetting the scoreboard for all of our revenue-responsible team members. Well, I’m here to question it…in another case of something sales...

Building Personal Values - Ten Mottos To Be Your Best You As we usher in the new year, advice abounds about how to make this year the best one yet. Instead of recreating the wheel on these ideas, let’s turn the clock back 87 years. In 1937, Paul W. Ivey released a...

Sales History: The Wage Stabilization Board and Sales Compensation Can you imagine living in a time when the government was involved in determining sales compensation and seeking ways to limit it? It happened...and people seemed, for the most part, ok with it. An...

Why does sales exist the way it does? Despite knowing I could ask Todd Caponi for a sales history lesson, I keep asking myself this question. Why? This morning, Justin Clifford posted this question above on LinkedIn and I love it. My answer? Well, I started writing an...

Sales Prospecting Fundamentals - From Sales History How often have you heard how many touches it takes to reach a new prospect? How often have you heard that cold calling is interruptive? How often have you heard that surface-level objections hide the true underlying...

Sales Leadership: Why Celebrating Losses Wins! “Celebrate the losses!” A few months back, I was keynoting a revenue leadership summit for one of the largest technology companies on the planet. I said those three words...celebrate-the-losses. One leader immediately...

Pioneering Women in Sales: Barbara Pletcher In my nerdery, I’ve found some incredible pioneers who built the sales profession. Specifically, one you’ve probably seen me highlight a few times is Lucinda W. Prince Prince set up sales schools for women in 1905, brought...

The Challenge of a Dishonest Competitor “Todd, I appreciate and embrace the idea of being transparent - but here’s the problem: We’re transparent. Our competitors aren’t. And, the customer doesn’t find out until it’s too late - they’ve already gone with our competitor...

Sales Negotiations - The Irony of the Simple Concession “My budget is tight - and for me to be able to buy this gallon of mayonnaise here at Costco today, I need 10% off?” “I know this ‘bowl two games, get a third one free’ coupon expires on Saturday, but I’m afraid...