Dave Brock
Dave Brock
Dave has spent his career developing high performance organizations. He worked in sales, marketing, and executive management capacities with IBM, Tektronix and Keithley Instruments. His consulting clients include companies in the semiconductor, aerospace, electronics, consumer products, computer, telecommunications, retailing, internet, software, professional and financial services industries.
Applying My Lessons In Martial Arts To Professional Selling
About 6 months ago, I started taking lessons in a couple of martial arts, Tai Chi and Kung Fu. It’s been a tremendously interesting...
How Do We Find The Time To Coach Our Sales People?
Everyone recognizes the importance of coaching sales people, but it just doesn’t get done. In a survey of several hundred sales managers, we found...
Are You Committed To Upsetting The Status Quo?
Sales is about change–if we are successful with our customers, we get them to change, buying our products and services. But if sales is...
Location-Based Prospecting? Are Ad-Hoc Sales Calls Valuable?
I’ve been intrigued about much of the publicity around Hoover’s Near Here offering. Apparently it’s an Iphone based application for a sales person to...
High Performance Sales Driven By High Performance Sales Managers
Much is written about getting sales people to perform at the highest levels. There are countless sales training programs, books, blogs and webinars that...
Will Your Sales Defy Gravity?
Note: This post originally appeared as a guest post in Rebel Brown’s Rebelations Blog. Rebel’s book, Defy Gravity, will be published soon. It’s an...
Did You Hear The One About 4 Blind Men And The Elephant?
There’s the old story about 4 Blind Men, one on each side of an elephant, each is asked to feel the elephant in front...
The Coming Extinction Of The Lone Wolf!
We all know the concept of the “Lone Sales Wolf.” That’s the person sales person that works by themselves managing the territory. Typically, we...
What Should Salespeople Be Doing With Social Media
Social media is changing the way our customers buy and the way in which we engage our customers. Before customers even see us for...
Being “Tactegic”
Earlier this week, I participated in a series of reviews with a sales team. Each sales person was presenting their key deals and what...
Know Thy Audience!
The other day, I wrote about how even the best of us are seduced into pitching–perhaps when something else might be more appropriate. At...
Even The Best Of Us Can’t Resist The Urge To Pitch!
Recently, I participated in a “discussion,” with a group of people I deeply respect. All of them were heavy hitters and well respected in...
Getting Personal About Metrics
Sales managers spend a lot of time talking about metrics. They measure everything–some good, some over measured, but some micromanaged. There’s a lot of...
Is Sales Getting Soft?
Many regular readers may be a little surprised about this post. I’ve been very vocal about sales being consultative, customer focused, and creating value...
It’s So Simple, I Don’t Know What To Buy!
Disaster struck this morning, went to the office and the network was down. Technical guy that I am, I went through my diagnostics, called...
Waiting It Out Is Not A Strategy For Success!
I have to admit to being a little bit more than impatient–my wife says I have to be more tolerant. But there are conversations...
Knowing About Your Customer Is Not Enough
Everyone in sales knows that it’s important to know your customer. Sales people keep all sorts of information, both on individuals and the enterprises. We...
Penny Wise, Dollar Foolish
My friend Skip Anderson wrote an outstanding post, “The Race To Sale Competence, A Case For Sales Training.” He raises a critical issue: As sales...
Execution Is The Hard Part!
The phone rings, it’s a concerned executive. After pleasantries, we get down to the issues. Usually it goes something like this: “Dave, I’m worried about...
Persuasion
Persuasion—it’s important to sales. It’s important to business. When we want to change something, we can’t do it without persuasion. Persuasion is a simple word,...