Case Studies
Who:
General Electric
Client Description:
GE is one of the largest and most respected companies in the world. They are a global infrastructure, finance and media company.
Case Profile:
One of GE's finance divisions hired The Sales Advisory Board to provide sales organization advice and consultation for their national sales organization. Specifically, GE was looking at ways to enhance their sales organization and corporate culture in addition to looking at ways to change their sales compensation plan to increase employee loyalty and stability.
By utilizing our sales sounding board resource, GE was able to create sales territories to ensure there was sufficient geographical sales coverage throughout the United States where none existed previously. In addition, they changed their year end bonus structure to increase client satisfaction by ensuring the sales organization was focused on client retention more so than in the past. Moreover, they took another look at their commission structure for new business sold to further solidify the sales organization's focus on new business development activity. The Sales Advisory Board brought structure and new ideas to the table to help General Electric get to the next level.
Who:
HR Solutions
Client Description:
HR Solutions provides human resources outsourcing services to small and medium-sized businesses.
Case Profile:
HR Solutions is a start-up human resources outsourcing company. The parent company is a staffing company, and simply stated; they lacked the leadership, expertise and sales experience to build the HR Solutions company from the ground up. They also lacked the time, money, personnel, expertise and resources to facilitate its growth in an expedient manner. HR Solutions made a smart decision and outsourced the sales management function to The Sales Advisory Board for a fraction of what it would have cost them in time and money to hire a full-time Sales Manager. By outsourcing the sales management function to The Sales Advisory Board, they were able to minimize early problems during the start-up phase while maximizing sales and growth opportunities. In just six months, HR Solutions had three outside salespeople, one inside salesperson, several new clients and nearly $1,000,000 in working business on the table. HR Solutions understood their core competency was not sales and sales management, so they signed up for our sales management outsourcing solution for literally pennies on the dollar.
Who:
Mike Ricceri
Client Description:
Mike has nearly 15 years of sales experience primarily with technology companies selling enterprise software solutions, and he currently works as an independent salesperson representing several different companies throughout the United States.
Case Profile:
Mike was struggling with selling new business, and as is the case with many technology companies where they hire based more so on product knowledge and not necessarily on sales or sales management experience, his National Sales Director knew more about the technology side of the business and less about the sales and management side of the business. Mike felt he needed a fresh perspective, someone outside of his own company and network of business associates so he sought out The Sales Advisory Board and signed up for a one-hour telephone consultation. He partnered with us to discuss sales methodology, consultative selling and most importantly to Mike, his own sales process. In essence, Mike utilized The Sales Advisory Board as a sales sounding board to help him get back on track.
Although Mike was a successful salesperson in his own right and was earning in excess of $200k annually, he reached a point where he was having trouble selling new business. In just one hour with The Sales Advisory Board, Mike discovered that he was moving too quickly through the sales process by trying to sell new business without uncovering the definitive needs of the prospect first. Mike simply wasn’t spending enough time on the sales cycle itself in terms of focusing on the front-end of the sales process where it is imperative for sufficient needs to be uncovered first in order to substantiate the necessity of the sale taking place. The Sales Advisory Board reminded Mike…“Prescription without diagnosis equals malpractice” which is key to consultative selling. In addition, The Sales Advisory Board discovered Mike was missing a key objective in his selling process by not quantifying ROI to his potential new customers. We helped him to better position his sales proposition as an investment opportunity by demonstrating true “Return-On-Investment” for the services he was selling.
Mike understood completely, and after just one hour on the telephone with The Sales Advisory Board, he was back on his “A-Game” and well positioned to have a record sales year.
Who:
Bear Stearns
Client Description:
Bear Stearns is an investment banking and securities brokerage firm, publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange.
Case Profile:
Bear Stearns has utilized The Sales Advisory Board to support its own clientele in certain situations when a sales sounding board resource is needed to discuss specific industry trends, sales organization development and strategy. In the area of sales and sales management, Bear Stearns has utilized The Sales Advisory Board as a sales sounding board on several occasions. The Sales Advisory Board was able to provide requisite knowledge and information on a timely basis; thus ensuring Bear Stearns’ clientele were able to make prudent decisions about investment strategy.
Who:
Kelly Staff Leasing
Client Description:
Kelly Staff Leasing was formerly a division of Kelly Services, a publicly traded company on NASDAQ. Kelly Services invented the temporary staffing industry in 1946.
Case Profile:
Kelly Staff Leasing was in-between Sales Managers and having difficulty filling the position. They had admittedly made some poor hiring decisions in the past and did not want to repeat those same mistakes by hiring the wrong Sales Manager going forward. In fact, they actually hired two Sales Managers within one year. One Sales Manager left the company within six months, and the other Sales Manager turned out to be a bad hire; the result of panic-recruiting where the need to hire someone as quickly as possible outweighs the necessity to hire based on the quality of the candidate and the fit being correct.
The Sales Advisory Board was brought in as a temporary solution to “stop the bleeding” by acting as the interim Sales Manager on an outsourced basis until the best candidate could be found. The Sales Advisory Board became involved with the recruiting process, sales training and making joint-sales calls with the outside salespeople. Within one year, sales productivity increased 39% year-over-year. The Sales Advisory Board created a recruiting strategy, redesigned the compensation plan and implemented minimum performance standards. Kelly Staff Leasing finally hired a full-time Sales Manager with the help of The Sales Advisory Board, but for nearly 15 months, The Sales Advisory Board fulfilled the role as Sales Manager through its strategic sales management outsourcing solution.
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