As we start our tale, we find ourselves in the 130 year old cottage which serves as the office of River Heights Consulting.   Frank Hurtte, the organization’s founder, seems totally absorbed in his work.   Glancing around the office, we see several mementos of Hurtte’s long association with Kris Kringle and the Santa Organization.   There’s a picture of Kringle carrying his legendary bag.   The likeness of Kris keeling in front of an ancient manger is prominently displayed near a time worn photo of a much younger Frank seated on Kris’ lap.   The phone rings; the answer is a seasonal combination of Christmas Cheer and morning routine.  But in a flash, we see Hurtte spew some of his coffee and snap to attention.  The conversation goes like this: FH:   River Heights Consulting, Frank Hurtte speaking. Elf:   Frank, this is Elf Alabaster Snowball.  You don’t know me, but I know all about you, including that pouting incident back ...

Kris called a meeting with his top elves. These were the folks, assuming elves count as folks, who have had centuries of experience filling Santa Enterprises’ magic bags to the brim for all the nice girls and boys. And, as Kris thought back, this team had never missed a single Christmas. Through massive snow storms, candy cane shortages and even the great reindeer food shortage of 1954, they always came through; never, ever missing a single good little boy or girl. Even though he was madder than a wet reindeer, Kris sent a politely worded invitation to the new elfin expert down in procurement, a certain Elf Pricedrop. Please be aware Santa Enterprises hadn’t held a meeting in December for eons. Kris believed in Santa. Under his magically jolly leadership style, the top elf in every workshop was empowered to make their own decisions. These elves believed in Santa too. This is the busiest of seasons, so no one was taking this gathering of top elves lightly. The meeting was...

'Tis the season. When my daughter was young, I loved telling her stories. After a while, I got tired of the classic princes kisses frog and lives happily ever after kind of tale. If I had to make them up, why not make the sales guy the hero. For the next several years, my daughter heard a collection of tales where bad guys in business suits were fed to hungry dragons and purchasing types turned into frogs. This year we are determined to spin such a tale. Trust me, there will be a happy ending. Talk about seasonal surges, Santa’s North Pole Enterprises experiences the largest single seasonal surge in any venture, anywhere. It calls for dedication, it demands expertise and it demands for some really fancy footwork during the last days of December. As President and CEO, Kris Kringle has seen some changes. Quoting him directly: “Back in the old days, most of the goodies we delivered to the good boys and girls were made of wood. We simply chopped down a few trees, brought ...

Okay, so I’m not the kind of person who generally talks a lot about the soft and mushy side of life.  But, I assure you a couple of micros below this battle-hardened exterior of kryptonite lays a mushy guy who is touched by the tearjerker movies on the Hallmark Channel. And even though we celebrated Thanksgiving last week, we continue to be in a season of giving thanks.  We’re supposed to stop our daily chores and thank our Creator for all that is good in our world.  I have an endless list of blessings; health, home, family, friends, and so much more.  But I wanted to give you just a quick list of four things we distributors should also be thankful for today: Only a Knowledge-based Distributor can provide proactive recommendations to our customers. Not Amazon.  Not the internet. Only a Knowledge-based Distributor can gather information from multiple sources within the customer and develop conclusion that extend in to the future. Only a Knowledge-base...

Partners, Allies, Friends and Money No man is an island, it takes a village; heck even the Lone Ranger had Tonto, Bevis has Butt-head and, stretching things to the limit of reason, Ren, the insanely psychotic Chihuahua plays off a dimwitted cat sidekick named “Stimpy” (Stimpson J. Cat). There is power in teams. We’ve discovered in today’s selling environment most salespeople work as part of a team. While the structure of the team varies based on the industry, organization and technologies sold, the basic framework is almost always the same. The salesperson acts as the leader orchestrating longer term strategy and individual tactical moves. When it works, the beauty of the concept brings a tear to my eyes. On the flip side, a dysfunctional team is a train wreck looking for a place to happen. We are going to break this subject into two sections: • Other employees from within your own organization • Supply-partners and various vendors While each category is part of the...

Follow the Money In an earlier edition, we talked about understanding the opportunity presented by an account. Let’s push this thought further. Way back in the late 70s, there was a movie called All the President’s Men that popularized the catch-phrase, “follow the money.” And while the movie put a negative stench on the phrase, for sales types, it comes with a great connotation; almost like a new car smell. So with this thought, hop in and join me as we… follow the money. The truth is most sales people follow technology, applications, customer needs and pursue friendly contacts. Salespeople rarely follow the funds. I can’t help but wonder if a lot of guys actually feel like their work is cheapened by the exchanging of money. Just think back about how many times you have heard a salesperson lament: “The proposal was perfect. The product was everything the customer wanted. We were the best supplier on the planet. But, the customer didn’t have any funding.” Think about ...

How to Think About Opportunities At the mere mention of the word opportunity, most sales guys’ nostrils flare, blood pressures spike and pupils dilate. Perhaps left over from some prehistoric caveman fight or flight gene, they seem to check their cognitive skills at the door and wildly rush ahead. Make no mistake, I like aggressive sellers. But, it’s important to take just a moment to fully understand the full story at an account before investing time, effort and company resources. The full story comes at the crossroads of three very important variables: 1. Real dollars/gross margin potential 2. Estimated time to achieve business success 3. Level of effort involved with getting the business Dollar/Gross Margin Potentia l Many experienced salespeople miss the dollar/gross margin potential of their accounts for number of good reasons. Often, it’s hard to get accurate estimates of the potential in the early stages. This is one of the reasons why we believe that a certain a...

Sometimes, it’s not just what you know, but who you know ...and how you treat them. I’m sure you’ve heard the saying, “Sometimes, it’s not what you know, but who you know that counts.” Perhaps you’ve been on the wrong end of this old axiom. You did your homework, researched the products, built a killer presentation and followed up with amazing vigor; only to lose an opportunity to someone who already had a relationship with the customer’s top guy. These things happen and sometimes there is really nothing you can do about it. As salespeople, we can either shrug our shoulders and go on about our day, or do something about the situation. Most salespeople focus on the technical users of their products. For automation sellers, it’s the engineering department. Industrial supply salespeople hit on maintenance. Janitorial and paper product distributor sales folks go to the head of facilities. I could elaborate on the list to nauseating length, but the point is, most frontline se...

What value do you bring to the customer? Several months ago, I had the opportunity to “ride along” with what my client described as “one of our promising new sales guys.”  Because I wanted to just get a snapshot of the quality and quantity of this guy’s work, I didn’t do much to brief him on our objectives for the day.  Instead, I emailed him, "I just want to ride along and observe your work."  A few days later he texted coordinates of a greasy spoon where we would slosh down a cup of coffee and brace ourselves for the day. After a handshake and a few social niceties, we dove into the day ahead.  I was pleased.  He had real live appointments at three accounts and plans to drop by another couple if time allowed.  Demos and literature were well thought out and carefully stored in the back seat of his meticulously clean company car.  He had invested in timely topics to explore with the various people scheduled to see us.  I could easily see ...