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About this newsletter
This month's newsletter contains the
third article in a series of four dealing with sales through direct and
indirect channel models. In June and July 2005, we featured articles
dealing with "Building a Sales Pipeline" and "Developing a
SOLUTION with your Prospect". This month the main article deals with
Forecasting. I hope you will find it interesting.
This week, Culpepper Sales Study
revealed a compelling list of reasons why your company and your sales
force deserve to evaluate our services:
- Fact: 94% of all sales veterans have had less than 5 days
of any formal sales training
- Fact: 87% of all sales managers have had less then 8 days
of any formal sales training
- Fact: 98% of all salespeople don't follow a consistent
sales methodology
- Fact: 93% of all sellers volunteer a price decrease without
being asked
- Fact: 87% of prospected inquiries are never followed up by
a sales contract
- Fact: 81% of all sales take five calls or more
- Fact: 80% of all salespeople are willing to accept a 90%
rejection rate
- Fact: 40% of all sales veterans experience bouts of call
reluctance severe enough to threaten their contribution in sales
- Fact: 93% of all sales veterans have had no training on how
to generate their own leads
With Q4 upon us and 2006 right around
the corner, isn't it time for your company to evaluate and then implement
a sales methodology that will bring discipline and consistency to your
selling behaviors? Wouldn't you want your sales people's to generate the
revenue and forecast accuracy you deserve?
Aside from promoting our services, our
intent with this newsletter is to offer industry news, success stories
you may relate to, new books we have found interesting reads, and other
information that relates to organizational sales enablement and
improvement of sales performance.
We always welcome your thoughts, comments,
and suggestions. Email us at info@keyroad.com.
Good reading.
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new
books to read...
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Three great books to consider this
month. For your convenience, click on the Amazon logo to the left
should you want to order these and see the other books on our
recommended list:
The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman
The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell
Don't Think of an Elephant by George Lakoff
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success
story... L-3 Communications Infrared Products
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L-3
Communications Infrared Products is the manufacturer of the Thermal-Eye and
NIGHTDRIVER technology. The company produces high quality, uncooled
infrared camera cores and finished products. These thermal imaging
cameras and the core technology are used in firefighting, security
applications, industrial machine vision and preventative maintenance
applications, public safety/law enforcement, and automotive
applications.
Results achieved: (i) Improved 30 day
forecast accuracy from 50 percent to 95 percent; (ii) Improved 60 day
forecast accuracy from non- existent to 82 percent; (iii) Increased
sales performance of the total channel to 140 percent of YTD quota by
mid-year; (iv) Increased number of resellers who exceeded their YTD
sales quotas from seven at the end of the first quarter to 15 by the
end of the second quarter.
Read more details about this
situation and see other success stories...
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newest
white paper...
Forecasting: Why Bad Things Happen to Good People...
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Check out our newest white paper
titled:
Forecasting:
Why Bad Things Happen to Good People
Picture this. It’s the last week
of the month. Each sales rep provides his manager his forecast with his
best guess as to what will close this month. Taking this information,
the sales manager prepares her forecast and submits it to her VP sales Americas.
He turns around and prepares his forecast to his VP worldwide sales.
When the forecast gets to the CFO, CEO, and the Board, the forecast has
been touched by many with their own guesses, biases, and wishful
projection to attain Nirvana this month. (This story applies to
quarterly forecasts too, as many sales people know).
The month comes to a close and
suddenly the sunshine, smiles, and optimism disappear as time comes to
justify what transpired. Revenue was missed by 20% to 40%, less than
50% of the sales reps met their quotas, and the expenses and inventory
increased significantly based on the original forecast. Does this sound
familiar? If you have been in such a situation, and if you were the VP
sales (worldwide, Americas,
or regional), how did that make you feel?
Click here to read more and
access the entire article...
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CustomerCentric
Selling® book...
CCS® Public Workshop Schedule...
CCS® Newsletter...
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Heard of the latest buzz about
"loading the lips of sales people" to enable them to diagnose
a prospect's situation before they prescribe a solution? Get an insight
into Sales Ready Messaging® by reading this best seller:
CustomerCentric Selling®, written by Michael Bosworth and John Holland.
To determine if the CCS® methodology
is right for your organization, experience it by participating in a
CCS® Public Workshop. Click
here to see the CCS® schedule of public workshops. When
registering, please indicate "KeyRoad" as the referring
party.
To minimize the number of emails you
are receiving from us and our related affiliations, you can now access
the CCS® newsletters directly from here. There is no need for you to
subscribe to the CCS® newsletter. We will make sure to keep you up-to-
date every month.
CCS® Newsletters
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MarketingSherpa
2005 Lead Generation Summits
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We all know how important lead
generation is to our sales results. To that effect, KeyRoad invites you
to save $100 off the admission to MarketingSherpa’s 2005
Business-to-Business Lead Generation Summit
on October 24-25 in the Boston area and
November 17-18 in San
Francisco. Reserve your ticket by September
30th to save: http://SalesLeadSummit.MarketingSherpa.com
Attend these advanced training
sessions:
- 6 advanced training seminars on lead generation via
search marketing (PPC & SEO), public relations (online &
off) and web site revamps
- 4 advanced training seminars on nurturing leads to
shorten the sales cycle and measuring your results (includes email
& client evangelism tactics)
- 4 Case Studies presented by marketers at Sybase, Red Hat,
B&K Precision Instruments, Miller Heiman, and XOSoft
Plus, non-stop
networking with your peer at breakfasts, lunches, and evening
reception. Please reserve your ticket by September 30th and save $100
off the admission at: To
register, click here:
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in
summary...
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We are open for business. We welcome
the opportunity to learn more about your operations to determine if any
of our services can help you achieve your sales goals. Let us know if you
want to learn more about:
- How to better use the telephone for success
- Pipeline grading system development aligned with your
prospect's buying cycle
- Sales tools development for each stage of the sales cycle
using the Sales Ready Messaging® process to help sales people be
more effective and successful
- Organizational sales training
- Sales advisory and coaching services
We welcome your feedback and comments.
Please send them to info@keyroad.com. We look forward to hearing from
you.
Good selling,
Philippe Lavie
KeyRoad Enterprises™, a CustomerCentric Selling® Affiliate
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Philippe started his career with the
Portland Trail Blazers and after three years in the world of sports,
co-founded an $8 million business in the online event and entertainment
ticketing space.
Since then, Philippe Lavie has had 20
years of direct and channel sales, sales management, business
development, and marketing experience in the information technology
industry, both domestically and internationally with companies like
Daisy Systems, Sun Microsystems, Onlink Technologies, MindCrossing, and
OnDemand Inc. In 2002 he created a unique sales-performance improvement
company, KeyRoad Enterprises.
Philippe holds an MBA from one of the
leading French business schools, is fluent in English and French, and
lives in San Francisco
with his wife, Carol, a learning specialist, and their twins.
KeyRoad Enterprises
312 Douglass St.
San Francisco CA 94114
phone: (415) 229-9226
fax: (415) 934-1469
cell: (650) 996-0445
For more information or to arrange for
an onsite Executive Overview, contact Philippe Lavie via email
at: plavie@keyroad.com
To learn more about KeyRoad Enterprises, click
here.
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