As many of you know, LinkedIn has a follow button for companies which allows users to follow a company on the network, and receive real-time alerts from its profile in their news and activity stream. LinkedIn has taken this functionality a step further with the debut of an embeddable button that companies can now add [...]
Visualize Blog
Don’t let the critics get you down
President Theodore Roosevelt’s “Citizenship in the Republic” speech resonates with me on many levels: “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, [...]
Understanding your prospects’ needs to effectively close business
Like most sales professionals, you are highly knowledgeable of the capabilities of the products and services you represent. However, being a “solution expert” alone is not enough; ultimately you may end up trying to push products and services without really knowing whether or not your prospects actually have a need for them. When that happens, [...]
Hone your communications skills to build lasting customer relationships
Next time you pore over that PowerPoint presentation to choose the right words, consider this: Less than 10 percent of communication comes from what we actually say. The vast majority of the message comes through the tone and volume of our voice and the facial expressions and body language we exhibit. The same principle holds [...]
Conversations that move the sale forward
The best sales people go beyond knowing the ins and outs of their products and services. The best figure out how to get into the minds of their prospects. So what does it take to do this? No matter what level sales professional you are, it bears repeating: Walk in their shoes. To go from [...]
Prospecting in a shrinking territory
Recently a sales executive who was struggling with prospecting contacted us at Visualize. He had been struggling with prospecting ever since finding out that his geographic territory had been cut in half from the previous year. At the same time, his quota remained the same! To meet his goals, he needed to get aggressive with [...]
A refresher on managing the conversation
After years of experience, you know these concepts inherently. But now is always a good time to be reminded of the basic concepts to manage your conversations. Stay curious. Any relationship can get old and stale if you assume there’s nothing new to discover. No matter how long you have known your customers, keep asking [...]
The ABC’s of selling
In sales, there’s an acronym, ABC – Always Be Closing. What makes this acronym so relevant? Research shows that sales reps who close more, win more. For world-class sales professionals, getting to the close is easy. The hard work happens as you facilitate, guide and educate your prospect through a decision process. Here’s how you [...]
Creating a mutual plan
One of the key components of the ValueSelling process is creating a mutual plan. The plan is written confirmation that summarizes the conversations that have taken place. It helps to make sure you and your client are on the same page. That both of you agree on the activities, timeline and outcome. While it seems [...]
Close business this quarter
At the end of any quarter (or year), closing the opportunities in your pipeline becomes very important. Use simple, repeatable steps to increase your closing rate. As many sales professionals know, a successful sale is the logical result of a well-executed ValueSelling Framework® process that follows the following four key components: Differentiating. Establish credibility by [...]
