First get on the pitch

Its funny how the same theme will turn up twice in one week.

On Monday I was discussing with a US client the content of a training programme we're doing for him next week. The company has developed higher value services and he wanted his sales people to sell these as well as the standard stuff. He said, "Chris, the salespeople know that they must sell these new services if they are to make their revenue targets. All they need to do is get on the phones. I know that they're just talking about doing it but not getting on with it!"

Later in the week, at our London 'taster session' the sales director of a printing company, asked anxiously; "Does your programme get salespeople, who know that they must contact new propects in order to succeed, to actually get on and do it? I have a sales guy, who has for the last six months promised to drum up new business, but he hasn't yet picked up the telephone!"

I'm not going to bore you with my reply but suffice to say that both frustrations reminded me of that saying, which is so relevant to selling;

Eighty percent of success is showing up.

Woody Allen