I’m just come back from a week in Las Vegas working for a client at Autodesk University, one of the largest events dedicated to CAD in the world. Nice work when you can get it and the weather was good!

Things haven’t run as smoothly in a number of strategic accounts as maybe they should have. However, selling complex software doesn’t come without its challenges. Things don’t sell themselves and they need to be carefully nurtured and managed to get to the “tipping point”. To arrive at the tipping point you need to have identified the key influencers around the business.

  Continue reading →

I’m constantly asked by clients how can we make sure that we win every sale.

The simple answer is you can’t and anybody who tells you otherwise hasn’t been in sales.  There are practical things you can do to minimise the number of sales you lose.  You might be surprised to hear that it’s not all to do with selling!

In my experience when reviewing a clients sales performance the reason that their performance is less that optimum is due to not clearly understanding the market dynamics of the market they operate in, have the right sales people with the right training and understand the importance of account planning.   I agree completely that selling is a numbers game but they have to be the right numbers in your sale funnel and you have to be targeted the right customers!

Continue reading →

That got your attention and No I haven’t lost my mind

You need to be proactive with your accounts culling clients against a structure account performance audit to establish which clients you would be more profitable without.

Characteristics for this category of customer:

• Continue reading →

We all know international brands that seem to look, feel and sound the same wherever you find them on your travels across the globe.

The reality is very different each of these well-known brands has spent considerable resources making sure that each of the product is market relevant.  Why? Because they know that whilst superficially that consumers and / customers might seem the same they are in fact very diverse in how they react to your brand messaging, the packaging, the language used, how and where they buy, what they perceive is the right price and product specification and even down to the colour, texture, smell and taste.

• Coke doesn’t taste the same in ever country and neither does a Kit Kat.
• Car manufacturers have different feature packages customised for each market
• Breweries brew different beers to suit regional neither mind country taste differences

Continue reading →