
Don’t Send Your Prospects Into Fight-or-Flight Mode
Pay attention and adapt your style to that of your prospect and customer. I work with great salespeople and the most successful know how to connect with a variety of buyers. Salespeople are taught
Welcome to the Sales Gravy blog, where salespeople and sales leaders get better every week. We publish new sales training articles and podcast episodes three times a week, covering prospecting, cold calling, objections, negotiation, and leadership, written by Jeb Blount and the Sales Gravy trainer team.

Pay attention and adapt your style to that of your prospect and customer. I work with great salespeople and the most successful know how to connect with a variety of buyers. Salespeople are taught

When you’re in combat or arguing with a client, you are automatically pushing them away, regardless if you’re right. When you’re in conversation, the buyer is staying engaged with you. Are your client and prospect conversations often

Characteristics of a resilient, sustainable business include leadership that understands the difference between working “for” and working “with” their employees. Consider these glum facts: Only one in eight workers worldwide are engaged at work,

Making the choice to build a spiral pipeline for your sales starts with engaging three core activities in your organization. And continuing these three core activities every day. Don’t Settle for Living in a

Stop thinking your job is done when the contract is signed. Stay on the ground. Remain active even after the deal is closed. Redefine Closing the Sale It’s time to reframe how we think

Make sure your testimonials are “impact” testimonials. Distrust in sales and marketing messages has skyrocketed over recent years. Not surprising when you see some of the ridiculous unsubstantiated claims made in e-mails. Buyers may

Salespeople and sales managers are caught up in their own version of Ground Hog Day. They keep using the same approach, having the same conversations, which are leading to the same outcomes. Sales Ground

In order to strike a balance between no theme and full-on theme park, it’s important to understand how to choose a theme that’s right for your presentation and your audience. A group of flight

Some of us aren’t even aware that we talk negatively to ourselves. Take some time today to think about what you say to yourself. If you find yourself doing this, it is time to

To create true sales predictability (and avoid Sales Whiplash), it’s critical to consider both independently, and to have your pipeline numbers influence your forecast output. Drastically Refine Your Sales Pipeline This Year Understanding that

As you work to make sales, it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking you know what your clients want and need. However, it’s likely that you have overlooked some of your clients’

The Warm and Fuzzy Value Proposition People love the term value proposition, so user friendly, none threatening, cute, warm, and safe You are no longer relying on Palm Pilot, going to Blockbuster for your

Objections are not deal killers. Sometimes, they are deal enablers, helping the salesperson to understand the buyer’s real needs and requirements. Zig Ziglar was the best-known sales trainer in the world. The man from

Steal this trial close technique and exact scripts to motivate buyers to make decisions and act without making big price concessions.
Salespeople fail at cold calling for five common reasons. Fix them and the phone starts producing appointments again.
Most salespeople are looking for the secret edge that will move them to the top of the sales ranking report. The truth though is that there isn’t just one thing that separates top performing
Short Answer How honest should you be in sales? Completely. The moment a customer catches you in even a small lie, like fudging how long a meeting will run, they have every reason to
The best pitch I’ve ever heard about didn’t have a single slide. It had an ax, an elevator, and a crowd that had no idea what was about to happen. The sales storytelling techniques
Sales complacency is the silent performance killer that sets in after winning — and the only defense is returning to the fundamentals that built your success in the first place. Key Takeaways When Success

Quick Summary Reading buyer signals means recognizing the behavioral and psychological cues prospects send before they ghost you, and using that information to keep deals moving toward a real decision. Key Takeaways Listen to
When results drop and motivation fades, the fix is to increase your prospecting activity above your normal baseline, not wait until you feel ready. More calls create more conversations, more conversations create more opportunities,
No matter your industry or deal size, mastering how to negotiate in sales comes down to seven rules that protect your leverage and win more profitable deals.

For new sales leaders, there are three fundamental keys to building trust with your sales team and getting off to a great start in your new role: Competence, Consistency, and Concern. If you are

Not all times of day are equal: how to structure your team’s day for optimal focus and flow. If you’re a sales leader, then you spend a lot of time thinking about your team’s

Leading companies are building stronger, more reliable, and recession-proof pipelines. When times get crazy. When there is uncertainty in business. When the markets take us on a roller coaster ride. When the world seems

During unplanned timeouts in business, the very best companies and ultra-high performers embrace that gift of time and leverage it as much as possible. There are some excellent anecdotes concerning the value of leveraging

To vet your sales reps and their progress fully, ask them specifically about the progress they’ve made during the time since your last meeting. This allows you to keep a finger on the pulse

In a hyper-competitive industry filled with giants, we need Millennials with superior sales acumen. But as wise leaders, we also have a responsibility towards the well-being of our up-and-coming sales leaders. My husband, Gordon,

Millennials are loyal to the bigger picture. They will help you get what you want if you help them get what they want. But first, you need to know more about what motivates them.

What mountains are your sales teams facing? How might you inspire them to be more engaged in their own success, as well as yours? What can you do together to reach the top of

When considering a merger or acquisition, investigate the sales management processes in place. Over the years of being in business, I’ve discovered a common strategy among consistently successful sales teams. These sales teams thrive