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84% of B2B Sales Start with a Referral — Not a Salesperson

Harvard Business

Outbound B2B sales are becoming less and less effective. In fact, a recent survey found that connecting with a prospect now takes 18 or more phone calls, callback rates are below 1%, and only 24% of outbound sales emails are ever opened. Why are more and more buyers avoiding salespeople during the buying process?

B2B 191
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The Basic Social Media Mistakes Companies Still Make

Harvard Business

Instagram has played an integral role in helping to lift sales for brands including Gatorade. Start by basing your social strategy on business objectives, then follow that by thinking about target market, social media platforms, tools, and metrics. Stories that evoke emotion tend to perform better than straight sales messages.

Media 135
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How to Increase the ROI of Sales Training

LSA Global

How to Increase the ROI of Sales Training Even though $20 billion is spent on business sales training per year, more than a third of sales leaders admit that they do not have a clear idea of what measurable return they are looking for on sales training. All those sales skills make sense.

ROI 64
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B2B Salespeople Need to Act More Like Travel Agents

Harvard Business

As we describe in our recent HBR article, “The New Sales Imperative,” the torrents of information, expanding array of options, and growing size and diversity of purchasing groups are leading to a kind of purchase paralysis: Customers are taking longer than ever to make purchases, and abandoning them more often.

B2B 120
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Good Sales Teams Know When to Stop Selling

Harvard Business

Think hard before blindly committing to another sales pitch. Looking at one metric for gauging customer advocacy, the Net Promoter Score, promoters are worth nearly three to seven times more in lifetime value than detractors, depending on the market. You have earned the right to ask them for another sale. Not so fast.

Sales 70
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Scaling Customer Service as Your Startup Grows

Harvard Business

Along the way, I’ve talked to hundreds of founders, sales and marketing leaders, customer success VPs, and front-line reps about how to build a customer-first SaaS organization. Don’t obsess over metrics like inquiry volume or time to close tickets. What not to do. Don’t optimize for efficiency. Your goal is success.

Metrics 131
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Deliver Better Sales Training: The Top 7 Steps

LSA Global

How to Deliver Better Sales Training We know from sales assessment data that far too many sales teams lack the proper business sales training , sales coaching, and sales support to consistently meet or exceed their sales targets. Most organizations need higher sales rep.