Demanding Views

By Scott Gillum, SVP of MarketBridge; Author of the B2B Sales & Marketing Knowledge Sharing blog

The pipeline took a beating last year and it doesn’t look like it’s going to get any better this year.  In fact, signs are pointing to an even more challenging year.  It’s rough, no doubt, but there is one area where you might find opportunity, and its right in front of you.  Try mining your existing accounts for opportunity and you might just find a goldmine in your own back yard.

 By Andrew Gaffney, Editor 

 The very first item that must be checked off before a prospect is considered “sales ready” is whether or not the company has a stated budget for the solution offered. If the prospect answers “no” or even unsure to that first Budget question, it typically doesn’t matter how they qualify on the Authority, Need and Timing components of a BANT scoring system.

By Larry Mosiman, Worldwide Product Marketing Manager, SAS’ Customer Intelligence Solutions

Almost every article you read today talks about, in one way or another, the down economy. You have to cut costs, layoff staff, renegotiate suppliers contracts – all kinds of dramatic things to survive this down economy. From my perspective, the sense of urgency has been intensified by the economy, but the reality is that this is the same economy as it was one, ten and twenty years ago in many respects. The current economy is a customer insight economy.