Read this article to discover the five essential skills sales managers must master to make 2025 the best year ever. In July 2024, a corporate client with over $75 billion in annual sales had 20 of their company’s sales managers complete my online sales management training program. Three months later, these program participants were surveyed ... Read full article The post 5 Essential Skills for Sales Managers in 2025 appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

For years, I’ve been asking sales managers whether they have one or more chronic underperformers on their team. Hundreds and hundreds of managers have told me “yes.” Then I ask two more questions: First, “How long have you known about this?” The answers range from months to years! And now the most difficult question: “Why ... Read full article The post What to Say to Your Underperforming Sales Rep appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

Building a better sales team is the most important responsibility of every sales manager. But too often, managers get distracted by the daily chaos of their lives. Here are five steps you can take over the next six weeks that will improve the overall success of your sales team quickly. Week 1: Start interviewing You ... Read full article The post 6 Weeks to a More Successful Sales Team appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

Building a better sales team is the most important responsibility of every sales manager. But too often, managers get distracted by the daily chaos of their lives. Here are five steps you can take over the next six weeks that will improve the overall success of your sales team quickly. Week 1: Start interviewing You ... Read full article The post Six Weeks to a More Successful Sales Team appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

Most sales managers come up through the ranks, bringing with them the long-engrained habits of a salesperson. The best sales managers, however, realize that the skills needed to succeed in sales management are different from those needed to succeed in sales. Here are some of the instinctive selling skills that inhibit leadership effectiveness and five ... Read full article The post 5 Habits of Great Sales Managers appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

I recently asked a group of salespeople to tell me about their #1 sales challenge. One common theme in their answers was the timing of pricing discussions. A customer keeps pressing the salesperson for a price early on during the discussions and won’t budge until they hear an answer from the salesperson. This situation is ... Read full article The post Why and How to Delay Price Discussions appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

Whenever I talk about “accountability” with salespeople, I see a lot of eye rolls. Not surprising, given that accountability is a word that gets tossed around when sales managers want to blame someone for something that has gone wrong. Over time, if accountability means blame it can destroy morale and undermine sales results. Instead, sales ... Read full article The post How to Create an Accountable Sales Team appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

The questions sales managers ask their salespeople have an effect on the questions salespeople ask their customers. If you want your salespeople to ask better questions of customers – you the sales manager need to ask better questions of your salespeople! Here are my five favorite questions to ask of a B2B salesperson. By asking ... Read full article The post 5 Best Sales Coaching Questions appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

Here are four of the biggest differences I see in sales managers that consistently get the best results from their sales teams. 1. The best sales managers rigorously control their time by continually asking themselves, “What can do right now to have a meaningful impact on the development of my team?” Sales managers always tell ... Read full article The post 4 Things the Best Sales Managers Do Differently appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more

In my online sales management programs, I tell sales managers that they should spend at least 20% of their time—8 hours a week—coaching their salespeople. The predictable reactions are a mix of incredulity (“Where am I going to find that kind of time?”) and skepticism (“My salespeople get a lot of training. How is that ... Read full article The post Why Sales Managers Thrive in a Sales Coaching Culture appeared first on TopLine Leadership ..read more