Monday, November 7, 2011

Top 10 Blog Posts for the Week of October 30, 2011

  1. Konrath, Jill. "Quit Being So Darn Nice!" In this article, Jill eloquently highlights the difference between being nice and being helpful. If you really care about your customers, you'll worry about helping them solve their problems rather than worrying about how pushy you come across to them.
  2. Morrow, Jonathan. "6 Ways to Sell Without Selling Your Soul." Great article on being a salesperson without acquiring the dread sales stereotype. We all sell, but none of us have to be manipulative jerks. We can sell with integrity and Jonathan shows us how.
  3. Weber, Joey. "How to Create Your Personal Brand in 6 Easy Steps." Interested in creating and/or enhancing your personal brand? Joey gives you some pointers on things you might want to do and then gives specific exercises to help you follow through. Great primer on building a better image for the world to see.
  4. Robertson, Kelley. "How to Tell if You are a Sales Zombie." My Halloween post of choice. Kelley draws great paraellels between zombies and sloppy, apathetic, poorly performing salespeople. Sometimes, we all get in to slumps and start to feel a little lifeless in our professions. Take a look at this post and see if you can relate.
  5. Keenan, Jim. "The 6 Biggest Changes in Today's Sales Environment You Nee to Know About." Tradition has no place in sales. You've got to adapt to your customers' buying behavior. Jim lays out 6 profound revolutions in complex sales and explains how salespeople need to embrace these new realities. If you've been selling the same way for decades, read this post and take notes!
  6. Cantrell-Kraig, Molly. "Do You Believe in Luck?" In this post, Molly turns the "good luck" and "bad luck" cliches on their heads. Believing in luck as the main cause of your success or failure makes you a slave to life's whims. I better way to live, a more enabling and empowering way, is take responsbility. Never say you are lucky or unlucky. Be accountable.
  7. Murphy, Shawn. "5 Beliefs That Undermine a Leader's Influence and Success." Leaders, like anyone, can fall victim to negative thinking. The problem is that, when leaders acquire poor beliefs, they inspire others to do so as well. Shawn gives us a solid list of dangerous beliefs a leader may hold in relation to her followers. See if any of these applies to you and then work on changing it right away!
  8. Iannarino, Anthony. "10 Ways to Be More Strategic and Less Transactional." The more transactional are in your selling style, the more commoditized you are in your pricing. If it's just about the single sale, the buyer will weigh you out against all the other "peddlers" out there. If you position yourself, however, as a strategic partner, the buyer will be buying a long-term relationship and that is much more difficult to cross-shop. Anthony provides us with a great list of ways to make that jump from transactional to strategic.
  9. Brock, Dave. "Unsolicited Email, Cold Calling, Prospecting, Nurturing..." Dave shares his thoughts on sending unsolicited emails and making cold calls. There is a violent revolt in sales today against any time of unsolicited prospecting. It's often construed as selfish and "pushy" behavior to cold call a prospect. Dave offers alternative thoughts about the importance of meeting new prospects and opening new relationships via cold calls. Definitely worth a read!
  10. Imbriano, Lou. "Always Give People More Than They Bargained For." Lou tells a great story about his grandfather's generousity in serving clients. Adapting his grandfather's example, Lou discusses the importance of giving more that your clients expect. Outgiving your competition is always the best business model. People respond to generousity.

3 comments:

  1. Doug, Great list with a nice variety of topics. I'm honored to be part of the list. Thank you for supporting our communities to actively!

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  2. Thanks so much for including me, Doug. Your group includes some wonderful bloggers. My best, M.

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  3. Thanks to the community for supporting me :-)

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