I have a special file on my computer where I store passing thoughts that should or could be additions to this blog.  Way back in January of this year, I had an idle hour or so in a cavernous international airport.  It was late afternoon and being an intemperate sort of guy, I could have easily justified a conversation with Jim Beam or Jack Daniels in one of the terminal bars.  The truth is, I was headed that way when I saw a nearly empty little conference area and instead decided to invest my time in thought.   Over the past 10 weeks of our coronavirus-based crisis, I have repeatedly visited my notes on inside sales.  Believing recessions and other economic storms serve to accelerate change, I feel many of the things on the inside sales “wish list” will soon move from “nice to have” to mandatory practices.  With this in mind, let’s review some points tied to inside sales. Customers judge our service on inside sales behavior. Long ago a customer commen...

Let’s start out with the premise you are actively engaged in selling.   Your card may carry a slightly different title.   It seems like nobody has a card with the title “Sales Professional.”   Instead, you could be listed as any one of the following: Sales Engineer Field Engineer Account Manager Account Executive Product Specialist Customer Service Resource Branch Manager Inside Sales Channel Manager Customer Omnibus Person Business Development But somewhere in the details of your job description, you are measured on your ability to grow the number of purchases made by customers under your direction.  This makes you a Sales Professional. As a professional, you have the intrinsic responsibility to perform better than someone who is a selling amateur. With this fact in mind, we must ask the question: “What are you doing to improve your professional skills?" We ask this question often and the answers are s...