TSE 711: Common Mistakes Businesses Make When It Comes To Sales

Today’s guest is Chris Hallberg, author of the book The Business Sergeant’s Field Manual: Military Grade Business Execution Without the Yelling Push-Ups.

Chris has worked with hundreds of companies, advising them and giving them practical principles to help them scale and see tremendous success.

Here are the highlights of my conversation with Chris:

Common mistakes businesses make when they try to scale:

1. Taking your top sales rep and making them your sales manager

The skills you need to be a great sales manager are different than you need to be a great sales producer.

You have to have somebody leading the team that understands the process.

2. Conflating marketing and sales

Senior sales leaders these days don’t really understand marketing. It’s now an integrated approach.

If given the right tools, a salesperson can be involved in the marketing process. Each salesperson can have their own little sales company and their own little sales brand and generate additional interest just by participating in the process.

The Ideal Sales Leader:

• Somebody who has hit the numbers and always get the number you’re asking from your average salespeople
• Somebody who can do the job but also enjoys training other people
• Think of sales management as a third of it spent on recruiting and hiring the best available talent.
• They need to support the top sellers.
• The other third of the time is spent re-training people that can’t make it.
• Sales management involves managing that flow of human energy and talent on the way in, retaining it, trying to save or retraining, and off-loading.

Tools Chris Use on His Clients:

Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS)

The Accountability Charts

• Identify the teams you need to have. Then have a specialized training and the specialized accountabilities that go with that.

Important Principles Entrepreneurs Should Keep in Mind:

1. Go where your customers are.

You can’t expect clients to come to you. Go to where the customers are. Meet them where they are. Make it easy.

2. Have the right mindset.

Show your customers that what you do is going to make their life better.

Chris’ Major Takeaway:

Make sure you’re around people that get you, develop you, and take you to the next level. You have to have the right conditions for you to grow. Be careful where you put your time.

Episode Resources:

The Business Sergeant’s Field Manual: Military Grade Business Execution Without the Yelling Push-Ups by Chris Hallberg

The Business Sergeant

Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS)

Traction by Gino Wickman

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