You may know I’m a Brit. At the time of this post, the UK government is going through it’s 27th vote on Brexit. (Actually I don’t know how many votes there have been. It’s unlikely anyone could agree on the definition of “vote”.)

I’m involved in helping companies sell more effectively. There is an issue in sales that is a lot like Brexit. It’s super-contentious and you can find people to argue for and against it, and probably have 27 discussions. That issue is cold calling.

When it comes to cold calling I am a “leaver”.

My best rationale for why is based on data. Data on this subject is hard to come by so whenever I see some that seems credible I save it. Here’s what I’ve got so far.

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When I started selling technology I was told to get to the office at 8AM so I could cold call CIOs and catch them before their assistants came in.

When I did succeed in catching a CIO on the phone (one in say 50 dials) they nearly all dismissed me as a time waster. In fact, looking back on my efforts, I agree with them. I was a time waster.

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Getting in the door is the #1 problem for most small companies I know.

When I first got involved in sales I was a sales engineer. I supported a technology sales force on their sales calls with semiconductor engineers. I always thought I was pretty amazing. When I got to these meetings I had many engaging conversations with these buyers that our sales team did not seem able to handle.

Their knowledge seemed so “thin” compared to my in depth tech mastery. I wondered “what do these sales guys actually do? Many of them earn more money than me and when I go to these meetings I do all the work.”

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When I first started writing about sales in 2007 my main angle was that we should “bring science to selling”. As an engineer, I could not understand how we had applied virtually no science to how we sold. Everything seemed to be left up to the individual sales person.

Today, we’ve had a lot of improvement. Some great thought leaders have written and spoken about this so much, that some actual change has occurred in real sales organizations.

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There’s still plenty to do.

Back in 2006 I coined the term “Sales 2.0” (see the logo on this website). My concept of Sales 2.0 was, and is, “taking the sales profession to the next level”.

In my opinion we’ve come a long way since 2006 but we still have a long way to go. The posts on this blog are going to continue to be about how sales people can sell more, and sell more easily, by using techniques and tools they may not be using today.

If you want to sell more, please drop by here from time-to-time for free resources.

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