Posts with Category "RAIN Selling"

On Relationships, Solutions, and Challengers

Having spent two decades in the sales training and consulting world, I get asked all the time what I think about this or that sales approach or book. When I do, it tends to make for productive discussion and learning. Importantly, it helps people decide what’s right for them when it comes to selling.

Until now, I’ve never been asked about the same approach and book on a regular basis. That approach and book is The Challenger Sale by Brent Adamson and Matthew Dixon. And now that we’ve published RAIN Group’s major research study, What Sales Winners Do Differently, we’re getting asked even more often.

Since we get asked often—and since it’s getting a bit old copying and pasting the same emails to clients and colleagues—we thought we’d open up the discussion to everyone...

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New Sales Research: What Sales Winners Do Differently

By Mike Schultz

After many months of significant effort, we launched What Sales Winners Do Differently this week. This report reveals data and insight from our in-depth sales research on what sellers do to win sales opportunities.

The results are both surprising and fascinating.

Where selling was just a few years ago, where it is today, and where it’s going: these are pretty hot, and hotly debated, topics.

Quite a few people, most notably the authors of The Challenger Sale, have declared the death of solution selling. You know an idea has gained mainstream credence when the Harvard Business Review publishes an article that takes a firm position on it. In this case, the article in the July-August 2012 issue was titled “The End of Solution Sales.”

No hedging in that title. Story over. The end.

We agree that sales is changing, but the question is how.

When we started this research, our goal was to find out what’s currently working in sales. Is solution selling really dead? If so, what should replace it? If not, since we know selling is changing, what do sellers need to do differently in order to find themselves in the winner’s circle more often?

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21 Powerful, Open-Ended Sales Questions

By Mike Schultz & John Doerr

Broad, open ended-sales questions are great for helping us to find out what’s going on in our prospects’ and clients’ worlds. They help us connect with buyers personally, understand their needs, understand what’s important to them, and help them create better futures for themselves.

Following are 21 open-ended sales questions you can ask that will help you round out the picture of your clients' needs. These questions are broken down into four groupings within the RAIN Selling^SM Framework:

Rapport
Aspirations and Afflictions
Impact
New Reality

One thing to note about open-ended sales questions: they don’t need to be complex. Often the basics are all you need.

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Vote for the 2011 Top Sales Awards

By Erica Stritch

It's that time of year again when all of the "Best of 2011" blog posts, newsletters, and magazine articles are coming out – from the best new business books to the best restaurants in every city.

This year we are thrilled that RAIN Group and our online publication RainToday.com have been nominated for an unprecedented total of 7 Top Sales and Marketing Awards.

But the voting ends tomorrow!

With stiff competition in each category, we need all the voting help we can get. If you find that we're deserving and you would be willing to vote for us, we're up for:

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Complimentary Webinar: The 7 Principles of Successful Sales Training Programs

By John Doerr

If you’ve downloaded our Why Sales Training Fails report within the last few weeks, you’ve been getting my tips on how to make your sales training initiatives better.

This is a great start for you, but it is just a start.

My partner Mike Schultz and I have been getting so much great feedback on the report, and more questions than we can address by email and by phone.

So, we’ve gathered up a lot of the questions and put together a webinar all about how to run successful sales training initiatives that really lead to long-term results. And we’re offering this webinar free...

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