Best Practices

Change your language to change people's attitudes
Instruct reps to make "new" calls to prospects -- not "cold" calls -- and to "confirm" sales with clients -- not "close" them. Giving sales language a warmer feel will lessen your team's feelings of anxiety and resistance and yield better results. Selling Power (free registration) (5/16)

Avoid big presentations in sales meetings
Pitching your offering as the ultimate solution to your prospect's problem won't work with customers who don't even think they have a problem. Use client meetings to diagnose a customer's needs, discussing ways to improve on their business and weaving in how your offering can add value. Inc.com (5/1)

Management

Healthy companies require healthy entrepreneurs
Companies today are more likely to encourage employees to stay healthy by providing free gym memberships, a variety of nutritious snacks or a series of healthy and morale-boosting trips. These companies have figured out increased productivity and decreased stress can be achieved through encouraging employee wellness. Entrepreneur (5/2007)

Customer Relations

Increase trust with customers to build bond
Customer trust is at the foundation of a successful business, so companies should make an effort to gauge and measure the trust level with clients or risk becoming overconfident and missing opportunities for improvement. Forbes (5/25)

Training and Presentation

Manage, train off-site employees
Businesses that offer work-at-home positions can take off-site management and training cues from large companies that specialize in remote outsourcing. Allowing employees to work away from the office can save money, attract valuable recruits and build self-reliance. Meeting as a whole at least once a year and creating a functional, accessible virtual workspace are great ways maintain a sense of structure and unity. FastCompany.com (5/23)

Closing the Deal

Use SEO to get your Web site noticed
"With so much information available on the Internet, it is increasingly important that your site stand out amidst the clutter," said Incplace.com Chief Blogger Andy Leff in BusinessWeek. "Search-engine optimization (SEO) is critical for getting your Web site listed among the top-ranking spots on major search engines."

NAW Insider

Boost sales power with More to the Bottom Line

Are some of your customers more trouble that they're worth? What should you do about it? The NAW Institute for Distribution Excellence book More to the Bottom Line: Customer Profitability Tools for Wholesaler-Distributors answers those questions and lays the foundation for a powerful new sales strategy.

Should you become an acquisitive distributor?

This NAW Institute for Distribution Excellence book The Acquisitive Distributor pinpoints steps to success when one wholesale distribution firm sets out to acquire another. It can help you grow your business by showing you how the best acquisitive distributors operate.

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