What is Webucation?

It is the online avenue for learning that will take hold of the 21st century. According to Forbes magazine, about 10% of GDP comes from traditional schools, but a majority of the growth will come from online learning from continued adult education.

Online training is the future of ongoing learning for professionals seeking to continually develop their skills, broaden their perspective, and develop new techniques outside of their core competencies. Today the Internet provides training on topics ranging from typical college courses to self development to niche topics that are unique desires to a select group of individuals.

Knowledge is the key resources, especially in the United States where over 40% of today's work force are classified as knowledge workers (compared to 20% being labor workers). Today's word force is very different then it was for previous generations. As young people enter the work force today, they will most likely not spend their entire career at one company or industry. The opportunities to change occupations is more accepting. Employers place a higher emphasis on the ability to adapt and use best practices developed outside their company, so it is company practice today to look for talent outside of one's organization. However, in order to compete and succeed in this current environment, developing new schools is critical for personal and professional success.

Traditional learning will no longer work. It is too expensive and not easily accessible. Online training creates a flexible and targeted method of learning. It allows specific skills to be acquired for fractions of the price and time. It also creates a new form on interactivity with video, chat rooms, blogs, instant messaging, and teleconferencing just to name a few.

Traditional education will not be replaced but the future of education will be based on online training and development. It is the learning trend of the 21st century.

Source - http://www.forbes.com//forbes/2000/0515/6511084a.html

Loving Leadership

Leaders are fond of their craft. To them, Loving leadership is essential to their success. It is part of their drive. It is part of who they are in their personal and professional lives. True leaders are not looking for power or control. They are looking for a way to help make people people. They want to bring out the best in others. They want people to see themselves as they see that person.

Leadership comes from a person's focus to combine their knowledge, experiences, and values in the spirit of serving others. Leaders have the desire to make an impact and make the world a better place. We see this often with political leaders, business executives, spiritual leaders, and even our parents (often the best leaders).

To those looking to develop their leadership skills, you need to start with a thorough evaluation of your skills, ethics, and personal desires. You need to know yourself. What are your values? What are your motivations? What gets you excited every morning when you wake up? From there, you need to see how you best want to serve others. What are you good at? What do you like to do? Answering these questions will guide you to where you go and how you will get there.

From there, you need to learn how to lead. Leadership information is available in many different formats and places in the 21^st century. You can go to traditional schools or leadership courses. The Internet is constantly becoming more of a resource for content and "webucation". Find the avenue that works best for you learn and develop your skills. Do not fall victim that "knowledge is power". That is not the case. The correct phrase is "APPLIED knowledge is power".

Loving leadership requires skills and discipline to leadership skill training. Increase your ability to lead a team, corporation, community, or family. Leadership is one of the most difficult skills to learn, but also tends to be the most rewarding.

Gung Ho Friends!

Developing your Sales Numbers

I always find it funny when I meet a salesperson that wants to make a ton of money without learning, practicing, and developing their sales skills. They know that sales is a "numbers game", but they do not know what their sales numbers are or how it can earn them success. They do not make the time or devote the energy to learn the skills and strategies to maximize the sales numbers game and achieve their ultimate success.

The first step is to admit it is a learned skill. You might be a "natural salesman" but you still need to hone your skills. Just like professional athletes, you need to master the basics:

· Know the value of your products and how they add value to your customer

· Know your customers...their business needs and challenges

· Be open, honest, and ethical. People buy from people they trust so your integrity, follow through, and sincerity are worth your weight in gold.

So where do you learn to sell? Here are some of my favorite places to learn Sales techniques:

* Sales Books/seminars

* Mentors and coaches

* Great Sales people

* For some of us, our parents (this is how I think sales people can be born)

The second step is to know the numbers:

People will say often that sales is a #s game. But so few people know what they are. They say what the numbers are and what to do with them. I have been fortunate enough to build my professional career around the creation and development of those sales numbers.

The way it works is to pick 4-5 measurable events that will move you through from the first time you engage a customer to when you solidify a deal. Ask yourself:

· What are the main pieces I need to accomplish to create a buying customer? · What thresholds or obstacles do I overcome that let's me know I am closer to sale (or just lost a sale)? · What are my common barriers to completing a sale?

By answering these types of questions, you will being to develop you sales formula. In a past life, I developed simple numbers that was used a basis for a 500 salesperson environment that drove $400 Million a year in revenue. The basic numbers were simple, it was also the sales numbers that was the basis for the entire organization.

50 Cold Calls = 10 Contacts = 5 Quotes = 1 Sale

It might sound simple; the truth is that with a little practice and persistence, it is! Give it a try with your current sales environment.

The third step is to know how to manage the numbers and to work the formula

Once you have the formula that will drive your success, you need to do the hard part and learn to work the formula.

For a Sales rep:

· What is your formula?

· How do you track results?

· What could you be doing to better increase your results?

· How do you compare against the best in your company/industry?

· Who do you go to for coaching?

For a Sales Manager/Executive:

Once you know what you are going to measure, you need to create a baseline with

· Where you are now

· Where you want/need it to be

· How much revenue you can make per employee (tends to scale up as tenure increases)

· How scalable do you want this to be? Many organizations used a formula that works for 10 people, then 100, then 1000 people.

If you can build a model that drives revenue then you can:

· Plan for employee growth by determining how long it take for a new hire to be break even and profitable

· Plan for revenue growth (headcount and average revenue by tenured rep)

· Focus on how to coach the process

· If someone is not hitting the formula, find the point of pain that is keeping them from moving forward.

· For those that are achieving (or exceeding) find the best practices that you can replicate across your organization.

The keys to understanding the sales numbers are available to all that want to BECOME THEIR VERY BEST. Take the time, devote the energy, and focus on the areas that will maximize your sales success...

To learn more, please go to http://www.becomeyourverybest.com

Glengarry Glen Ross - Is It The Lead, The Salesperson, Or Both?

Sales leads are everywhere. Often sales people look for the infamous Glengarry Glen Ross leads. They think that management has the sales lead center that has the best sales lead lists from the best sales lead generation company. The fact is that new business sales leads are only as good as you work them.

The hard part is not getting the sales lead list, but what to do with that new business sales lead once you have it. Let's review how these 2 pieces are critical to maximizing sales success.

Starting with the sales lead center:

1. Know who to target. Spend the time or money to make sure you reach the customer(s) that will yield you the most profitable (short or long term) return. Use referrals, the web, or industries where you have a high amount of interest or knowledge when generating sales leads.

2. Know how to target them. Provide specific value to these customers. Have a compelling offer or positioning statement so they respond to your mailer, phone call, in person solicitation, sales magazine advertising, etc.

Continuing with the sales person:

1. Speak the person's language. Know what motivates them (make assumption until you can ask). Have that opening scripts ready so when you contact that sales lead list, you know what to say and who you will say it to.

2. Know the top 3-5 objections you will hear a vast majority of the time and learn how to overcome those objections with value statements

3. Move to profiling the customer to keep them talking about their needs. Always ask questions and let the customer speak about their business needs or challenges as often as possible.

4. Get a definitive action item and when it needs to be competed by. Rate your success with what needs to happen and when it needs to happen by to move the sales process forward. Remember that the only way to move forward is to continually provide value.

This process works from a home based sales business to business to business sales leads. You need to work the process day in and day out to BECOME YOUR VERY BEST.

For more information, please go to http://www.BecomeYourVeryBest.com

GOLD Selling Model

The GOLD selling model was created to make the selling process simple, very simple. It is a flow that makes sure the sales person knows where they are in the process of a sales meeting and how to move forward. This process works on cold calls with no previous relationship or all calls where you have had a customer for many years.

The GOLD Selling method is:

Greeting - This is how are you going to start off the sales meeting? It is your intro, first impression, statement of meeting objectives. It needs to be clear, concise statement that sets the tone. For first time introductions, you have 15-20 seconds to get your name, company, and point across. Do it well, and the call moves forward. If done poorly, the buck stops here.

Overcome obstacles - These obstacles might be lack of interest, poor timing, or even a flat our rejection. If you customer has something that is standing in the way, you need to overcome that obstacle before you can move the process forward. In order to get past this stage, you must present value to the customer. Sound difficult, well it isn't. In most cases, you will have no more than 5 objectives that occur over 80% of time. Write down 2 replies to each, say them out load, and connect with the one that fits your sales style the best.

Lead the conversation - This involves asking the right questions to allow the customer to acknowledge they have a business need and that you have the solution that best fits that need. This stage involves a keen sense of active listening and engagement. You need to know what the most common business are and how you will want to provide value to those needs.

Definitive action item - Know what needs to happen and when. This defines the steps to move the process forward. Make them clear and agreed upon from the customer so you have buy in and support.

Since this is a brief overview of the GOLD selling model, please feel free to ask for a personal consulting session to review in more detail by going to http://www.BecomeYourVeryBest.com

For more information, please visit http://www.BecomeYourVeryBest.com

Sales Formula - How to Use the "Sales Numbers" to Maximize Success

Developing a sales formula is a fundamental process that separates a good sales person from a lucky sales person. Knowing what activities to do, when to do them in the sales cycle, and how to define success is critical.

This is needed for all sales people, from the beginner developing his business to the experienced professional looking to grow his business to the next level.

Example sales formulas in different environments:

• Telesales - 50 Cold Calls = 10 Contacts = 5 Quotes = 1 Sale
• Pharmaceuticals - 10 office visits = 4 doctor meetings = 2 samples
• Life insurance - 10 calls = 3 visits = 1 policy

The sales formula are the numbers needed to maximize success. Often these numbers are never completely understood or taken seriously enough to bring into action. It is like losing weight. You need to know what to eat, when to eat, what types of food to eat, etc. However, nutritionist will have you track these items to measure success. A personal trainer will give you their formula for exercise, and will also track your progress.

In any situation where you want to have sales success, You need to know where you are doing well and where you have a point of pain.

Putting the formula to work:

If you are a cold calling salesman with the above formula, you hit your 50 calls each, get 10 contacts, but only 2 quotes then you have an area for improvement. What could cause it?

• Maybe you have poor contacts and need to make sure you are talking to decision makers
• Maybe you do not know how to profile well to understand a customer's need
• Maybe you do not know your products or services well to provide enough value to a customer to want to move forward in the sales process

These examples illustrate different points of pain that will allow you to develop specifics skills to increase your sales formula to drive better results.

For more information, please visit http://www.BecomeYourVeryBest.com

Sales Development - make the money you want!

Part 3 of 3

The third step is to know how to manage the numbers…work the formula

Once you have the formula that will drive your success, you need to do the hard part…learn to work the formula.

Since I plan to have a consulting career someday, I cannot give away the entire bag of tricks, but at a high level here are the main things to consider:

For a Sales rep:

· What is your formula?

· How do you track results?

· What could you be doing to better increase your results?

· How do you compare against the best in your company/industry?

· Who do you go to for coaching?

For a Sales Manager/Executive:

Once you know what you are going to measure, you need to create a baseline with

o Where you are now

o Where you want/need it to be

o How much revenue you can make per employee (tends to scale up as tenure increases)

· How scalable do you want this to be? Many organizations (i.e. Dell) used a formula that works for 10 people, then 100, then 1000 people. If you can build a model that drives revenue then you can

o Plan for employee growth by determining how long it take for a new hire to be break even and profitable

o Plan for revenue growth (headcount and average revenue by tenured rep)

· Focus on how to coach the process

o If someone is not hitting the formula, find the “point of pain”

o For those that are achieving (or exceeding) find the “best practices”