One Sock | Sales

Does Commission Only sales actually work?

By brendan at 3 March, 2010, 9:37 pm

Quite regularly I get offered commission only sales work. Rarely though its ever phrased that way. Normally its a discussion about how exciting and lucrative the opportunity is with a statement at the end like “we don’t pay retainers though”. Instead there is a discussion around “spotters fees”, “trailing revenues”, “your margin” or being “looked [...]

What great questions have you got?

By brendan at 22 February, 2010, 8:54 pm

My son, like many children, had his birthday around the cutoff date for entry into Primary school. So my wife and I had a choice “do we send him a little earlier, or a little late. My position on the matter was “Give me one good reason we should hold him back”. [...]

Time & Materials V’s Fixed Price billing

By brendan at 27 January, 2010, 12:11 pm

Just before Xmas I had one of my coffee/mentoring sessions with a vibrant young Victorian entrepreneur and an interesting question came up around how she should invoice her services. Although not an expert in the area of pricing models (I generally recommend Jon Manning of Sans Prix for some hard core consulting), I [...]

What would a Sales 101 course look like?

By brendan at 18 January, 2010, 6:14 pm

Something that drives me mad is that in my humble opinion, our Universities are undermining the success of Australian business. I say this because from my observation the number one skill required for success in business, regardless of profession, is the ability to sell. To sell your product, yourself as the right candidate [...]

A Process Approach to Effectively Managing Sales & Marketing

By brendan at 2 October, 2009, 10:53 am

After a long struggle, I now have real ‘cut-through’ in my sales and marketing processes. I’ll tell you the secret…[ Note I wrote this 18 months ago, but only just found it again]
When I looked at marketing texts, they tell me that marketing is about product, price, placement and promotion. Unfortunately, this hasn’t ever helped [...]

Networking Numbers

By brendan at 31 August, 2009, 2:17 pm

I was thinking the other day about two guys I knew that were really good at generating new business. Earlier in the day I had dismissed both of them with the comment – “they are only selling into their existing networks”. but at my afternoon coffee, I wondered whether I had thrown the “baby out [...]

Pitching for Government Agency IP

By brendan at 24 March, 2009, 1:56 pm

In 1999 a small web development business called Pyra Labs was founded by two people. They were trying to build an online Project Management system called Pyra. Times were tough and staff number fluctuated dramatically (at one stage, down to one person holding on to the vision). Eventually some interest was shown in a side [...]

Dark Clouds on the Horizon……

By brendan at 9 September, 2008, 12:37 pm

Last time we had a recession in Australia I was working as a branch manger with an electrical components wholesaler (and re-training to be an accountant). Our customers were generally electricians and small manufacturers of electrical components. Life was reasonably depressing and you were used to bandying about terms such as “Provision for doubtful debts”. [...]

7 Secrets of Great Dinners

By admin at 10 June, 2008, 1:28 pm

I went to an interesting lunch the other day – a discussion on narrative as a tool for coaching, which is a more complex way of saying how stories have impact on people in the workplace. Lots of anecdotes about things that have happened inside companies that have had impact (both good and bad) for [...]

Hard or soft serve?

By admin at 23 April, 2008, 12:32 pm

Last year I met with a British researcher who was out in Australia to talk about Innovation policy. From my point of view, the interesting thing about David Connell was that not only was he a researcher at Cambridge, but he was also, until recent years, the CEO of a Venture Capital fund specializing in [...]