Sales Prospecting Perspectives

A few years ago I was faced with a tough decision. I was moving 20 miles north of Boston, which posed a problem because my job was 22 miles south of it. Driving through Boston during rush hour twice in one day quickly became overwhelming and was just too much. The last thing I wanted to do was leave the job I loved, and when my boss kept pushing me to work from home more, I was hesitant. I kept saying no because I thought it was crucial to be on site when managing an inside sales team. I had a lot of guilt on days that I couldn’t make it in. Slowly I started working from home more and more and I learned how to manage remotely. With all the technology available today along with some changes in my management style, I am now able to work from home most days and still manage reps – probably better now than ever.

The age-old question that every sales manager asks themselves is, “How can I better motivate my reps?” We often talk about rewarding our reps with things like money, extra PTO, company outings, and culture to keep them engaged. The reality is that while all those incentives are necessary, we sometimes forget about the intangible ways we can motivate and keep reps interested. In a meeting with my boss yesterday, he reminded us of something that is right at our fingertips that we sometimes forget about: Empowerment. It plays a very large role when it comes to motivating sales reps and it’s a great way to better your team as a whole.

Every night when I was growing up, my family sat down to a home-cooked meal by my mom (aside from Tuesdays: those days dad was in charge of making spaghetti). Anyway, every night my mom managed to make a delicious meal after a long day at work. She juggled a career, three kids, laundry, grocery shopping, and more. She did it all, and she did it well, and continues to do so today. Now that I recently became a working mom, I truly understand how much effort it takes and while I didn’t think it was possible, I value and appreciate my mom even more now.

AG Salesworks is pleased to bring you a guest post from Jeff Shore, an in-demand sales expert, author, speaker and executive coach. 

Learning to dance the East Coast Swing has long been on my bucket list. Because life is short and I’m not getting any younger, I’ve started chipping away at this goal. “Chipping away” is not the most elegant description, I realize, but given my diagnosable rhythmic impairment, it is accurate. Let’s just say that this is how I imagine I look when dancing:

There is nothing better than a sales manager who can speak from real experience when providing advice. It can be very difficult to relate to a boss who seems like they need to refer to a sales instruction manual.  It was always encouraging to know that my boss, at one point, had walked in my shoes and understood how to do the job. 

These last few weeks it seems the amount of people posting statuses about vacationing has skyrocketed. Good for them – I'm jealous. Throughout the year, we all look forward to our vacations because we want a break from the daily grind. Day in and day out we work hard Monday through Friday, and get burnt out from the repetitiveness and stressors of work.  Vacations allow us to change up our routines and result in us feeling refreshed and ready to get back to work when we return. 

The hardest transition I've found when moving into a manager role is the change in relationship between you and former colleagues that you've once worked with. This changeover generally tends to be the biggest challenge for most new inside sales managers, whether they're responsible for training the inside sales team or for managing the managers.

I would like to think of myself as approachable both as an employee and as a manager. Every boss would like to think they demonstrate that trait, but from what I've seen, that may not always be the case. Unfortunately, many managers want to believe they're approachable, but their outward demeanor shows something else. These are generally the bosses who never seem to have their finger on the pulse of their people. As a result when something unexpected happens, they're shocked. Because they feel out of touch, they lash out rather than getting to the core of the issue. 

Over the years I’ve seen some common themes from my most successful mentors. Every day, they realized they had to check their ego at the door. We’re in this together and getting things done is NOT a one-man job. It’s a collective effort each and every day.

Editor's Note: The following is an excerpt of a chapter from our recently published eBook, The Ultimate Inside Sales Prospecting and Management Success eBook. If you're interested in reading the 35-page handbook, click the link above.  

There are 5 important categories to measure from a reporting standpoint to ensure top performance from your inside sales team. The goal is to push your reps to excel in all 5 categories to guarantee their optimal success. The most important categories to pay close attention to are: