The Death of a Salesman

Salespeople, your time is now.

In this episode, I am joined by Andrew Hough, CEO of the Association of Professional Sales, known as the APS.

The APS is professionalising the sales sector. By providing qualifications, professional membership, lettered accreditations and upholding standards of ethical selling, sales people can for the first-time progress along a structured career path, with the same level of skill, trust and career prospects as other established professions.

For sales lead companies this means a significant step change in sales effectiveness, calibre of sales employee, engagement in skills & behaviour improvement and reduced cost of sale.

For the sales professional this means a clear long, qualification led career path that rewards them in more ways than just this year’s bonus.

Andy, is a seasoned sales professional, with 20 plus years experience. He is a seller, he has led and managed sales teams as well as living through the changes that the industry is facing.

He and the team at the APS are on a mission to professionalise the role of sales, in the same way, that Accounting, Engineering, Lawyers and Marketing are. 

He shares his vision of what this looks like, how sellers can go about do this. 

We discuss how the team at the APS has successfully lobbied the UK government for this to be recognised under the Apprenticeship Levy, and more importantly how businesses can access this funding from UK Govt.

We also discuss where he believes the role of sales will be in the next 10 years.

You can connect with Andy on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewhough/

Find out more about the APS here - https://associationofprofessionalsales.site-ym.com/

The Apprenticeship Levy here - https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/apprenticeship-levy-how-it-will-work/apprenticeship-levy-how-it-will-work

 

Intelligent Virtual Assistants, is this end of sales people as we know it?

I am joined by Matt from Conversica on this podcast.

Conversica is a leading provider of Intelligent Virtual Assistants for business, helping organizations attract, grow and retain customers. The flagship Conversica® Sales AI Assistant helps companies find and secure customers more quickly and efficiently by autonomously contacting, engaging, qualifying and following up with leads via natural, two-way conversations.

Matt dispels the myths of what AI can and can't do. He corrects me that this is not conversational AI. He shares examples of how this works in a sales & marketing context, some stats on where their customer base has seen real term uplift in lead gen and sales revenue by using their technology.

A fascinating insight into where the world of "augmented sales reps" is going, and this is just the start. And Robo-Dogs.

Connect with Matt :

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewjohnlewis/

Twitter - https://twitter.com/thebowseat (for all you rowers out there)

Or of course to Conversica and see for yourself how this works in reality - https://www.conversica.com/

What is emotional intelligence? Why is it important in the Corporate World?

In this podcast I listen to the wonderful Helen Gazzi from iDiscover 360 share her insight on what emotional intelligence means, alongside emotional availability and emotional adaptability.

She tackles some big subjects

Why do you go to work every day?

How do you use a challenge as a catalyst for growth?

How do you act upon what you discover about yourself?

Links to the resource she refers to

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Emotional-Intelligence-Matter-More-Than/dp/0747528306 -

Emotional Intelligence: Why it Can Matter More Than IQ -

Daniel Goleman 

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=daring+greatly&adgrpid=54731098033&gclid=CjwKCAiAgqDxBRBTEiwA59eEN9To_mFVbCFNbF-GqgvO7g2spSdJEcsQlcK7I3JFCbuFfLBXtHs4JxoCVBAQAvD_BwE&hvadid=259038080363&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9045997&hvnetw=g&hvpos=1t1&hvqmt=e&hvrand=14394394018102858368&hvtargid=aud-857382801822%3Akwd-298952491860&hydadcr=10540_1753771&tag=googhydr-21&ref=pd_sl_7iw8qrab9_e 

 

Daring Greatly - Brene Brown 

 

Mel Robbins - https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=mel+robbin&adgrpid=58999975890&gclid=CjwKCAiAgqDxBRBTEiwA59eENxK01JWKHNkuvPDabOCO1Ji5vFVWve4guGYiqVqKern1Xs__RmS6phoC040QAvD_BwE&hvadid=318498014059&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9045997&hvnetw=g&hvpos=1t1&hvqmt=e&hvrand=13833815967631388354&hvtargid=aud-857382801822%3Akwd-448973376237&hydadcr=11856_1766746&tag=googhydr-21&ref=pd_sl_8cabminzxj_e

 

Follow Helen on Linkedin and Instagram

 

Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/helen-gazzi-20583896/

 

Instagram - @helengazzicoaching

Photo by Tengy Art on Unsplash

iDiscover360 - https://idiscover360.com/

Social Media has changed the World. So can you.

In this episode, discuss what do we mean by this? How can we earn trust in the digital age? What is your purpose and the purpose of your organisation? What is the impact if you get this right.

What is Social HR? Is it even a thing?

In this episode, I cover off how we, at DLA ignite, believe social technology and mindset within an HR function can be a true catalyst for change. In short, we see it as a for HR to connect talent and technology to get the best out of people.

This can be broken down into 5 key areas of focus :

Social HR Professional

Social Talent

Social Learning

Employee Experience

Employer Branding

Employee Advocacy, what is it and what are the pitfalls?

Employee Advocacy is nothing new, it has been around for a while, yet we are seeing a resurgence in this, as well as tools to support it. Research show that you can increase your organic reach by as much 500% if you are able to activate the voice of your employees. If being the operative word here, and that is a big if.

In this episode I cover off where things go wrong, why and what you can do about it.

Stop trying to be an influencer

In this episode, I share my views on what being an influencer in business to business really means, how you need to consider where your sphere of influence is, what data points you need to consider to ascertain if its working and finally, I touch on the mystery of the LinkedIn algorithm and how this may be impacting your reach.

I hope the volume is ok on this, I ran many tests before and all seemed to be ok!

knowledge is power, only when shared

based on an article in Venture Beat on how distributed teams can help startups scale, how can large organisations benefit from this approach? Link to original article https://venturebeat.com/2019/07/06/distributed-teams-are-helping-startups-scale-faster/

Competing in the Digital Age

I recently delivered a keynote on this topic, so thought i would share some of the themes i discussed here, with a final piece by Gerd Leonhard from his book Technology vs Humanity.

No one has ever sold through social

in this episode I tackle the debate of selling through social - you don’t sell and close on social