Dave Kurlan is a top-rated speaker, best-selling author, sales thought leader and highly regarded sales development expert.
Sometimes, I'll write an article and think it's one of the best 4-5 paragraphs I've ever written on the subject of sales excellence - and nobody will care. Other times I'll write an article and think nobody will care - and I'll get more feedback than I can believe.
Such was the case yesterday when I wrote this article for Baseline Selling Tips. The title was How to Use Fear to Maintain Your Edge but the real basis for the article was that you shouldn't let fear prevent you from doing what you must do; you should use fear as a way to be more prepared to achieve the best possible outcome.
Well this article caused more people to write and express their thanks than any article I've ever written and between this Blog and Baseline Selling Tips, I've published more than 400 articles on Sales and Sales Management Excellence.
Read the article first. Now rate each of your salespeople relative to how fear impacts them. Be brutally honest in your appraisals:
A. Fearless
B. Use Fear to Excel
C. They Sell in Fear
D. Fear Prevents Them from Being Effective
E. Fear Causes Paralysis
Now score your results.
A: 4 points x # of salespeople.
B: 5 points x # of salespeople.
C: 2 points x # of salespeople.
D: 1 points x # of salespeople.
E: 0 point x # of salespeople.
Now take the total score and divide by the number of salespeople. The resulting number is your Sales Force Fear Factor.
5 - awesome!
4 - excellent
3 - good
2 - you don't have a sales force
1 - set the date for closing your business
0 - why are you still reading this?
(c) Copyright 2008 Dave Kurlan
