Nearly 1 out of every 3 salespeople turnover each year, according to LinkedIn, Hubspot, Forbes & Harvard Business Review. In my own research and study, I found that the vast majority of that turnover is happening in the 1st year within a new company. Regardless of their professional experience, a well-structured onboarding program is critical to ensure your new B2B salesperson gains the competence and confidence they need to succeed at selling your unique offering. Here are the top 10 recommendations for a successful onboarding process.

In the fast-paced and competitive landscape of B2B technical and professional services, making strategic decisions about your sales team's leadership is critical. Unfortunately, the sales manager role is a hard one to get right and one that commonly experiences turnover. One common dilemma faced by organizations is whether to promote their top-performing salesperson into a sales manager role. As the saying goes…the best salespeople don’t always make the best sales managers. This decision can significantly impact your team's performance and overall success. In this blog post, I’ll explore the pros and cons of promoting your star salesperson to a sales manager position.

For nearly a decade now, Scott Peterson has helped executive leaders build high-performing sales teams of their own. We met with him to talk about leadership and the impact of human-centered design... Read the interview or listen to a podcast version through "Do tank Presents."

Nearly 1 out of every 3 salespeople turnover each year, according to LinkedIn, Hubspot, Forbes & Harvard Business Review. In comparison, the average turnover rate for all professions is about 13%. That means, the turnover rate in sales is 3x higher. The big question is WHY? I reached out to our community of business leaders who are actively building / growing their B2B sales teams and asked them a series of questions specifically around their Year 1 salespeople’s expectations, performance and compensation. Here are some of the results, insights and my five top 5 recommendations to help your organization improve at screening, selecting, onboarding and retaining top sales talent in Year 1.

Sales Managers play a pivotal role in driving growth and profitability within B2B professional & technical services firms. However, their job is filled with unique challenges that demand creative solutions and strategic thinking. In this article, I’ll dive into the top five challenges faced by sales managers in these industries.

In my experience, the key to growth is winning, retaining & growing the “right” clients. But unfortunately, all-too-often, sales & marketing teams don’t have a clear definition of what the “right” client is. Resulting in time, energy & money focused on misaligned prospects and clients. This is a one way ticket to nowhere. When I started my consulting practice in 2014, I needed a way to simplify business development for entrepreneurs and developed this 2x2 matrix. This simple framework has become the centerpoint of my work and has helped many organizations grow in a sustainable way.

The average turnover among U.S. salespeople is around 30%, according to LinkedIn, Hubspot, Forbes & Harvard Business Review. I'm confident saying the majority of this turnover is coming from “new hires” within their first 12 months of employment. It’s hard to attract, screen and select the right candidate if you don’t have clarity of “what success looks like” for a salesperson within your unique organization. So why do you have such a generic job description?

As we speak, your sales, marketing and customer success teams are abusing precious time by pursuing misaligned prospects (vs. aligned prospect) and unknowingly “prioritizing” your worst clients (instead your best).

Let’s be honest. Most cold outreach sucks. It’s painfully clear and obvious when you are the recipient of a generic, automated, wide net email blast.

You have a small number of clients that are generating the vast majority of your revenue and profitability. However, it’s astonishing that you don’t act like it.

If they are not willing to schedule time to review your proposal live with you…they’re just not that into you.

Buying has become more complex. Based on CEB’s “The Challenger Customer”, on average there are now more than 5.4 stakeholders involved in the decision making process.

These are prospects who often go through the entire sales process, only to end up doing nothing. That means your sales team has invested, or more accurately wasted, precious time, energy and resources on an opportunity that eventually fizzled out. Ghosted!

As a salesperson, time is your most precious resource. How and where you invest your time largely determines your performance and your paycheck. The last thing you want to do is dedicate time, energy and resources into a prospect and opportunity that doesn’t close. Unfortunately, we’ve all been there before. And it hurts.

The buying journey has become much more complicated. There are more stakeholders involved, considering more options and with an abundance of information readily available. Sales organizations are investing more time with prospects but closing fewer deals.

You are making important strategic decision based on your sales pipeline and the information is inaccurate. It’s likely you have old, stale opportunities that need to be “washed” from your funnel.

It’s been my experience that when you meet someone who is going to change your life, you almost never know it as it’s happening.

The education a good book provides can stimulate the mind with new concepts, personal challenges and providing new ideas for how to handle challenging situations. To encourage you and your team to pick up a book or two, we put together a list of some of our favorites that will inspire you to think, grow and learn.

When targeting your Power List, identifying those who have the potential to redefine your career is the first step. From there, information, strategy and a creative approach with make all of the difference in separating yourself from the pack. A targeted approach to each individual is essential, so always keep your eye on the prize to start turning those prospecting dreams into a reality.

5 Reasons to Leave a Voicemail Message When Cold Calling - You Build a Relationship. - It Demonstrates Calculated Persistence. - It’s an Opportunity to Provide Information. - Avoiding the Caller ID Effect. - When the Call Goes Through.