Categories: Sales Leadership
It's been another year full of unexpected challenges, big wins and learning opportunities. Now is a time to congratulate yourself on this year's journey and gear up for more growth. As we look forward to 2023, we're taking a look back on some of the most powerful lessons we've shared this year.
Here's some of the content that was most popular with our audience of sales leaders in 2022. Dig in for a refresher on what you've learned this year, or share with your team to keep these strategies top of mind as you head into the new year.
1. Simple Strategies to Increase Win Rates
Sometimes, simple is best. The continued popularity of this early 2022 blog post is a testament to the fact that when selling environments become more complex due to external economic factors, deftly and consistently executing the fundamentals is key to success. This timeless resource is a great reminder for leaders as we dive into 2023 to not overcomplicate your strategy: clearly communicate value, keep customers at the forefront of the sales process and create consistency using great methodology. The results will speak for themselves.
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2. How to Counteract the Fading Enthusiasm that Happens Right After Sales Training
This blog shared during the 2022 SKO season is an asset to any leader launching a sales initiative. With any training event, the learning must continue after the in-person session ends. The sales leader's challenge is ensuring adoption and, ultimately, return on investment for their initiative. With strategies for driving change, boosting morale and aligning your teams, this resource is a great one to dig into and share with enablement teams before we head into the 2023 SKO season.
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3. Selling to Decision Makers with Tony Parinello
Anthony Parinello, bestselling author of Selling to VITO, joined John McMahon and John Kaplan on the Revenue Builders Podcast for an episode that appealed to leaders of all stages. The topic of elevating sellers' value language and enabling them to sell to decision makers is one that resonated especially strongly in this year of economic uncertainty. This is a great episode to share with fellow sales leaders, sellers or to keep in your back pocket as a reminder of the power of sales messaging. Listen to the episode below for more of Tony's wisdom.
"You sell yourself first, then you sell your company. And guess why: VITOs don't really care who you work for until they understand what you can do for them." - Tony Parinello
4. Opportunity Coaching: Strategies for Managers
Very few factors impact your effective win rate as much as the ability of managers to coach. Whatever the initiative or strategy you hope to implement as a leader, the way your managers incorporate it into their day-to-day efforts can determine its success. Force Management Managing Director Brian Walsh shares in this video how opportunity check-ins can be used as tools to implement and train on critical concepts. Concise but impactful, this is the perfect resource to use as a launchpad for motivating and guiding managers to maximize their effectiveness in 2023.
5. Become a Next-Level Revenue Builder
Geared at leaders looking to level-up their revenue strategies, this resource combines advice from real, experienced sales leaders to offer a powerful guide on achieving elite performance. Including both strategies for personal leadership development and organizational alignment, it's no wonder this eBook was so popular with leaders this year. If you missed it, download it now to keep your team at peak organizational performance heading into the new year.
6. End of Quarter Sales Results: 3 Areas to Assess
Written by Force Management co-founder John Kaplan, this blog post in an instant classic. In it, John offers three strategies to make the most of quarterly results as a sales leader, using them to level up performance for your whole organization. If you're looking to achieve growth in the next year, this is a great way to ensure consistent improvement. Use it to assess your fourth quarter results and adjust for 2023, then keep it in your back pocket to ensure every quarter next year is better than the last.
7. The New Rules for Your SKO in a Changing Economic Landscape
We originally published this conversation with Managing Director Brian Walsh to help leaders plan for the 2023 SKO, but the strategies Brian shares remain as relevant as ever as we continue to face widespread economic shifts. This has proven to be a valuable resource for leaders who want to support their sales team in driving urgency and demand and accessing customers with changing priorities or budgets. We don't know what 2023 will hold, but these evergreen strategies will be a linchpin for any organization to remain consistently competitive in an unpredictable economic environment.
8. 3 Skills Sales Reps Need to Hit Revenue Targets in a Tightening Economy
The truth is that no matter your industry or reputation, every sales organization felt the effects of economic headwinds this year, even if the source was an abundance of caution from clients. How the most resilient organizations responded, though, is what sets them apart. That's probably why so many leaders were drawn to this resource on critical skills to reinforce with sellers during this season. With an effective and well-implemented value message, leaders can create sales success in any market environment. These three strategies are a great place to start refreshing your sales team and prepare them for the year ahead.
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9. Success Is a Marathon
One of our top-streamed podcasts this year was a conversation with Cedric Pech, CRO at MongoDB, about the most valuable lessons he's learned in his more than 20 years as a C-level sales leader. Our favorite Cedric quote from this episode: "Slow success builds character and fast success builds ego." This episode is the perfect example of all the self-improvement and leadership growth our Revenue Builders podcast brought to the sales community this year. Continuous learning is important to being a successful leader, so we're grateful to be able to learn from a new inspiring guest each week. Listen to Cedric's full episode below to see why this year's listeners loved it just as much as we did.
10. How to Prepare for Next Year
This episode of the Audible-Ready Sales Podcast, released last month, is the perfect tool for sales leaders to keep reps engaged throughout the holiday season. Brian Walsh discusses how sellers can best manage their customer relationships and reset their personal goals to ensure a strong start in the new year. Especially in our current economic environment, remaining close to customers throughout this busy period of holidays, planning and end of year wrap-ups will be crucial to maintain momentum. This quick episode is a great share to managers and sellers to help them maintain the mindset that will lead to success in 2023.
Drive Aggressive Growth Next Year: Determine Critical Needs
As we continue to face economic uncertainty and cautious buyers in the next year, efficiency and efficacy will be vital to continued sales success. To achieve sales resilience, leaders are focusing their resources in four key areas that most greatly impact the bottom line. Get strategies from sales veterans - download our guide to create and maintain sales momentum in 2023.
