Author: Steffan Hudson

Are you doing the sales basics before looking for silver bullets?

We spend a lot of time talking about how to improve sales. Better strategy, better systems, better CRMs, better marketing, AI automation, and training are all regular and useful topics to discuss.

But I get to look inside a lot of businesses and their sales pipelines, and I’m constantly reminded that quite often it’s the simple stuff that makes the biggest difference. It’s not particularly clever, it’s just good habits, done consistently.

Make time

Everybody gets busy, but we’re also very good at making ourselves busy doing the things we like doing (or at least feel comfortable doing).

If you’re responsible for looking after existing customers as well as finding new ones, you’ll naturally gravitate towards the existing customers. They know you, they need things and there are always emails to answer, quotes to do and problems to solve. Then Friday rolls around, you’ve had a busy week, but you haven’t actually done any prospecting.

The answer is pretty simple. Put it in the calendar. Block out the same time, on the same days, every week for prospecting, networking, reconnecting with old customers or whatever it is you need to do to create new opportunities. Tell the people around you that you’ve done it too, because a bit of accountability helps.

Be real about your follow-up

Most salespeople think they’re pretty good at following up. From what I see, most aren’t.

I get to look through business’ CRMs and I see rotting deals and missed opportunities left, right and centre. Quotes that haven’t been followed up, customers who were meant to get a call two weeks ago, deals with no next activity and opportunities that looked really promising and then just stopped.

Following up can feel uncomfortable. Nobody wants to be a pain in the backside or make the call where the customer might say no. But we still have to do it.

You’re far better off getting a no today and moving on, rather than leaving a deal sitting there for six months because you’re scared to ask the question. And don’t forget to use your CRM. Put the next action in there, give it a date and then actually do it.

Get in front of people

Nothing beats face time. Email, LinkedIn, Teams and Zoom all have their place, but spend more actual time with customers and prospects and see what it does to trust and loyalty.

Go and see them, have a coffee, visit their site and learn more about their business. Just don’t waste their time. Nobody wants another salesperson turning up to “touch base” for the sake of ticking off a sales call (or worse a boring, product pitch).

Every interaction should be useful. Bring an idea, share something you’ve learned, ask good questions or help them think about something differently. Don’t make sales calls for the sake of making sales calls, find reasons to have helpful conversations with people instead.

Always have a next step

We hear this one all the time: “The meeting went really well.”

Cool. What happens next?

A good conversation isn’t necessarily a sales opportunity, particularly if nobody has agreed on what happens afterwards. Before you finish, establish the next step. It might be, “I’ll send that through and call you Thursday,” or “You talk to the team and I’ll check back in on the 15th.”

Otherwise everyone goes back to being busy, nobody quite knows whose job it is to do something next and the opportunity slowly disappears.

Ask for the business

This is another ridiculously obvious one, but actually ask.

It can be as simple as “are you ready to go ahead”, or “what do we need to sort to move forward?”

If they’re not ready, find out why. Maybe it’s price, maybe they have questions or doubts maybe you’ve missed something or maybe the timing simply isn’t right. Whatever it is, you’re better off knowing than guessing – that way you can take the next reasonable step!

You don’t need some cheesy closing technique. Sometimes you just need to ask the question and give the customer an opportunity to tell you what’s actually stopping them from moving forward.

Do what you said you’d do

If you said you’d call Tuesday, call Tuesday. If you promised the quote by Friday, get it there by Friday. If you said you’d find something out, find it out. And if something changes and you can’t do what you promised, tell them before they have to chase you.

It’s hardly revolutionary sales advice, but being reliable builds trust and trust sells. Every time you do what you said you’d do, you give the customer another reason to believe that dealing with you is going to be easy.

None of this is particularly clever, and that’s really the point.

There are plenty of things we can do to make sales teams smarter and plenty of tools that can make them more effective. But sometimes we need to stop looking for the clever answer and get better at doing the boring, slightly uncomfortable stuff we already know works.

Make the time, follow up, get in front of people, agree on the next step, ask for the business and do what you said you’d do.

Do those simple things consistently and they can make a bloody big difference.

The 7 habits of highly effective Sales Managers

When sales performance starts to fluctuate, many organisations look first at the sales team itself.

Do we have the right people? Do they need more training? Are they motivated enough? Are they doing what they are meant to?

While individual capability certainly matters, the reality is that the performance of most sales teams is heavily influenced by the quality of sales management.

A strong sales manager does far more than set targets and ask for updates. They create the structure, rhythm, and accountability that allows the entire team to perform consistently.

Over time, we’ve observed that the most effective sales managers tend to share several common habits.

1. They focus on the pipeline, not just the result

Weak sales management tends to focus heavily on the number at the end of the month. Did we hit the target or not? Strong sales managers understand that results are simply the outcome of what happens inside the pipeline weeks or months earlier.

They spend more time reviewing pipeline health than reviewing past performance. They ask questions like:

• How many qualified opportunities are entering the pipeline?
• Are deals progressing through stages consistently?
• Where are opportunities stalling?

By focusing on the pipeline, they are able to influence future results rather than simply react to them.

2. They establish a clear sales process

In many businesses, each salesperson manages opportunities slightly differently. Some qualify thoroughly before progressing. Others rush to proposal. Some follow up consistently, while others allow opportunities to sit in the pipeline for long periods.

Effective sales managers remove this ambiguity by establishing a clear and shared sales process. Pipeline stages are defined. Qualification criteria are understood. Follow-up expectations are clear.

This doesn’t remove the individuality of salespeople, but it ensures everyone operates within the same framework.

3. They create a regular management rhythm

Sales management should never be reactive. High-performing teams operate within a consistent management cadence. This might include:

• Weekly pipeline reviews
• Regular one-on-one coaching
• Monthly performance analysis

Consistency in leadership behaviour creates consistency in team performance.

4. They coach, rather than just inspect

One of the biggest differences between average and exceptional sales managers is their approach to reviewing deals. Some managers simply ask for updates: “Where is that opportunity at?”

Effective sales managers go deeper. They help salespeople think through their opportunities:

• Have we properly qualified this opportunity?
• Who are the decision makers?
• What problem are we solving for the client?
• What is the next step?

This type of coaching improves both the quality of opportunities and the capability of the team.

5. They maintain visibility over the entire pipeline

Many sales managers only focus on the largest or most urgent deals. Strong managers maintain visibility over the entire pipeline. They understand:

• Which opportunities are early stage
• Which are close to decision
• Which have stalled

This visibility allows them to identify risks early and support the team where needed. It also leads to more reliable forecasting, which is invaluable for the wider business.

6. They reinforce accountability

High-performing sales teams operate in environments where expectations are clear and accountability is normal. Effective sales managers ensure that:

• Pipeline stages are updated accurately
• Follow-up commitments are honoured
• Sales activity remains consistent

This isn’t about micromanagement. It’s about ensuring the system operates as intended. When expectations are clear and consistently reinforced, team performance becomes far more stable.

7. They focus on building the system, not closing every deal

One of the most common traps for sales managers, particularly founders, is becoming personally involved in closing too many deals. While this can produce short-term results, it prevents the development of a scalable sales function.

Effective sales managers focus less on individual transactions and more on building the system that allows the team to succeed. They refine processes. They monitor metrics. They coach their people. They improve the structure around the team.

Most sales teams don’t have a strategy, they just have hope.

When I ask sales leaders to describe their sales strategy, most will confidently point to their pipeline, their CRM, or their revenue targets. But these things are not a strategy. They are tools, data, and outcomes.

A true sales strategy defines how opportunities are consistently created, managed, and converted. It provides structure, clarity, and predictability. Without it, sales performance becomes highly dependent on individual effort, personality, and circumstance rather than a repeatable system that can be measured and improved.

What most businesses actually have is not a sales strategy, but hope:

• Hope that opportunities will continue to flow.
• Hope that salespeople will follow up properly.
• Hope that enough deals will close to hit targets.
• And hope is not something you can manage.

The symptoms are easy to recognise

In businesses without a defined sales system, performance tends to fluctuate. Some months are strong, others are unexpectedly quiet. Forecasts are often unreliable. Opportunities sit in the pipeline for long periods without clear progression. Follow-up happens inconsistently, and when results fall short, it’s often unclear exactly why.

This creates frustration at every level of the business. Sales leaders lack visibility and confidence in future revenue. Business owners feel dependent on a small number of key performers. Salespeople themselves often operate without a clear framework, relying on their own instincts rather than a shared, structured approach.

Importantly, this isn’t usually a people problem. Most sales teams are made up of capable, motivated individuals. The issue is that they’re operating without a defined system that guides behaviour, establishes expectations, and allows performance to be measured objectively. The things they are doing well are not organised into systemised repeatable patterns.

What a real sales strategy actually looks like

A structured sales strategy defines the architecture that supports consistent performance. This includes clearly defined pipeline stages, so every opportunity progresses through a consistent journey from initial contact through to close.

It includes defined qualification criteria, ensuring sales teams focus their time and energy on the opportunities most likely to convert. It includes structured follow-up processes, so no opportunity is lost due to inaction or inconsistency. It also defines simple processes that can be automated so that sales teams can be focused on high-value conversion activities.

Critically, it includes clear visibility and measurement, allowing sales leaders to understand pipeline health, identify bottlenecks, and forecast revenue with confidence. When these elements are in place, sales performance becomes far more predictable. Leaders gain clarity. Sales teams gain direction. The business gains control.

A good sales strategy means that any money spent on marketing efforts (lead generation) is fully maximised because once the lead is in the door it doesn’t leak from the bucket!

Why structure drives performance

One of the most important shifts that occurs when a structured sales system is installed is that success stops being accidental. Without structure, strong performance relies heavily on individual initiative. Some salespeople naturally follow up more diligently, qualify more thoroughly, or manage opportunities more effectively than others. This creates uneven results and makes performance difficult to scale.

Do you have a salesperson on your team that performs more consistently than others? What if you could bottle what they do and lift the performance of your entire team?

With structure, expectations become clear and consistent. Everyone operates within the same framework. Opportunities are managed systematically. Progress is visible. Weaknesses can be identified and addressed. This transforms sales from an art practiced by individuals into a process supported by the organisation.

Predictable growth is built on predictable systems

Businesses that achieve consistent sales growth rarely do so by chance. They do so because they have invested in designing and implementing systems that support performance. They understand how opportunities enter their pipeline. They understand how those opportunities progress. They understand where deals are won, where they are lost, and why.

This clarity allows them to continuously refine and improve their approach. Sales performance becomes something they can influence deliberately, rather than something they react to after the fact.

The question worth asking

If your sales performance feels inconsistent, unpredictable, or overly dependent on individuals, it may not be a reflection of your team’s capability. It may simply be a reflection of your system. Because in the absence of structure, hope fills the gap. And while hope can occasionally produce results, it is structure that produces them consistently.

If you want help understanding what your sales system should look like, then book a FREE Sales System Diagnostic with our system specialists. We’ll help you identify your sales blueprint and spot the weaknesses that are costing you sales.

Which CRM is best; the real question you should ask

Business owners often ask us which CRM system we think is the best. It’s a fair question and one our consultants hear regularly.

The truth? All of them and none of them. It’s a bit like asking; how long is a piece of string? Every CRM has its strengths and weaknesses, and the best one for you depends entirely on what you want to achieve.

The real question… which CRM can do what I need it to do?

Before you start comparing CRM platforms, ask yourself what you really need from it. Too many businesses jump straight to researching software without first defining their sales process and customer journey.

The number one mistake businesses make when choosing a CRM

The most common mistake is skipping the planning stage. Businesses often don’t take the time to map out their sales process and service blueprint.

A sales map and service blueprint help you:

• Identify every communication point with prospects and customers.
• Highlight reminders, follow-ups, and tasks that drive sales forward.
• Ensure nothing falls through the cracks in your customer journey.
• Keep customers happy by delivering consistent service at every step.

A good CRM should support these processes; not the other way around.

Don’t choose a CRM until you know what you need

Choosing a CRM without clarity is like buying a tool without knowing the job. Instead, build your sales map and service blueprint first. Once you have those, you’ll know exactly what features you need from a CRM.

If you’re not sure how to create these, our team can help. We love helping businesses design practical sales and service systems that work in the real world.

Happy selling!
Steffan

P.S. we work with many different CRMs

Our consultants have hands-on experience with platforms including Pipedrive, Salesforce, HubSpot, Cin7, Exsalerate, and more. If you’d like advice on choosing or setting up a CRM that your team will actually use contact us.

The one thing that customers want more than anything else from a salesperson is HELP!

If you want to be successful in sales, there is only really one lesson you must truly live by. You need to be prepared to help your customers get the absolute best outcome for them REGARDLESS of whether that means buying from you.

Yep, that’s right; if you want to increase sales you should forget about selling and focus on helping.

Why?

Because the one thing customers want from salespeople is HELP! The bigger or more important the decision, the more help we want. The more help we get, the more we trust. The more we trust, the better we feel about buying.

One of the biggest barriers to making major purchasing decisions is fear – fear that we’ll get it wrong and waste our money, or fear that a salesperson will take advantage of us.

Your job as a salesperson is to put those fears to rest.

Chances are you have plenty to offer in the help department. After all, you sell what you sell every day – which makes you an expert in your field, and you know what your customers should consider before buying.

In many cases, what your customer thinks are the key factors in decision-making are only surface issues. You can help by teaching them what questions to ask to ensure they get the best solution for them (more on that in a future article!).

In short, your customer needs to feel genuinely that you want to help them and that you can help them.

So how do you do that – make your customers feel that you want to help them and that you can help them? Simple: first you tell them, then you show them how you will do it.

Introducing the Intention Statement

One of the best ways to set up a sales conversation is to introduce a simple agenda early in the process. Here’s a 4-step script for setting the scene with an intention statement:

1. Ask permission to set the scene

Do you mind if I take a quick moment to explain the best way that I can help you today?

2. Tell them your intention is to help them whether or not they buy

The most important thing we can achieve is to help you understand the best options for you regardless of whether that’s my product or service.

3. Tell them how you will go about helping

So, what I would like to do is ask a series of questions to understand what is important to you and what the ideal outcome looks like. Once I understand your needs, I can make some recommendations.

4. Remind them that you’ll only sell if it’s the right outcome

If we both agree that my recommendations make sense or are the right fit for you, then we can proceed. Of course, if I don’t have a solution for you, I will do my best to point you in the right direction.

Why Intention Statements work

They communicate your goal to help the customer regardless of whether they buy, reducing fear of being “sold to.”
They show the process you will follow to understand their needs, making customers more open to sharing information.
They allow you to guide the conversation and ensure customers consider the right factors.

Although it may feel uncomfortable at first, intention statements raise trust dramatically, which in turn increases your ability to sell. You don’t have to follow the script verbatim – the key is telling customers you want to help them and showing how you will deliver that help.

What would your intention statement sound like?

Why you should be measuring your marketing and sales usign a CRM

Do you know if your marketing is working?

Businesses are always saying to us, ‘we are doing all this marketing, but we’re not sure if it’s working,’ and when we start asking a few questions, one of the first things we find out, is that there are very few measurement strategies in place. As a business owner or a business manager, you need as much information as possible to be able to make sound decisions about where you should be focusing your time, energy and money. Strong measurement enhances your chances of doing marketing that brings strong results.

The goal is to understand exactly which of your marketing efforts are actually generating results, to measure every dollar you spend on marketing and be able to accurately predict what you can expect in return. The only real way to ascertain that is to test and measure the results. However, we all know that testing and measuring the marketing is only part of the equation, what you really want, and what you really need to do is measure your sales effort. Because it’s equally as important, if not more important, to know how effective you are at turning those enquiries into sales. You want to know how each salesperson is performing on an individual basis and use it as a sales management tool – for example, if you discover that one person is more effective than others, you can systemise their approach so everyone can enjoy better results.

How does a CRM help get you better results from your marketing and salespeople?

Using a CRM makes it much easier to track and record both your marketing results, your sales efforts and each salesperson’s individual results. A good CRM will actually track the lifecycle of a new enquiry right from initial contact all the way through to the sale.

When you break it down, most sales processes actually have a whole lot of micro conversion points, and when we know what they are and track our customer through each step, we can tell where people might be dropping off – crucial knowledge if you’re looking for ways to improve your sales process.

For example, here’s a look at all the micro conversion points you might see in a sales process…

1. A visitor to your website decides to enquire (micro conversion from visitor to enquiry).
2. A new customer phones and a conversation is had. At this point you qualify the customer to validate moving them to the next step, in this example, booking a sales appointment (micro conversion from enquiry to lead).
3. Contact made to confirm appointment – 24 hours before (micro conversion from lead to appointment booked).
4. Sales appointment occurs in person (micro conversion from appointment booked to sales call completed).
5. Customer emailed a quote (micro conversion from appointment completed to quote provided).
6. Quote followed up with a phone call.
7. More information provided; quote revised (won’t happen every time).
8. Details confirmed, quote accepted, order placed (micro conversion from quote provided to sale complete).

So, what your CRM does, is tracks your customer through each step, or each micro conversion. It’s one thing to know how many leads you’re generating and how many sales you’re making, but what is really powerful is knowing where your customers are likely to ‘fall off’ in the process. This helps us to identify what it is we’re doing well in our sales process and where there might be issues and room for improvement. This is sometimes different for each individual salesperson.

For most businesses, once we’ve implemented a CRM, we find really simple ways to change the sales process that don’t involve a whole lot of effort but massively improve conversion. It can be as simple as identifying that one of the areas where customers often drop off is after they’ve received the quote, and perhaps the reason is that there’s not enough follow up happening, which is really easy to change. Sometimes what a business really needs is better conversion, not more leads, and that can be much easier to influence.

What are the other benefits to having a good CRM and actually using it?

Having a CRM that monitors the sales process, and our effectiveness throughout the sales process helps us understand where to make positive changes, but there are more advantages to be gained from having a good CRM. A huge benefit of a CRM is the ability to collect and maintain a strong customer database. Maintaining a strong customer database using your CRM opens a world of opportunities for cost effective, simple and highly targeted marketing to your existing customer base.

One of the things that limits a business’ success in marketing, is that we often spend a lot of money trying to talk to a small group of people through a mass communication methodology. When in actual fact, you are far more likely to get a result from marketing to the people who already know you, like you and trust you. So, if you can effectively market to your existing customer base, then your marketing is more likely to work, and you’re also likely to spend less money on it.

For example, it’s much cheaper to send an email to your existing customer base with a promotion than it is to pay for a month’s worth of radio advertising. But if you don’t have a strong customer database with up-to-date information, then you’re left with no choice but to use expensive marketing avenues like radio, or newspaper or Google Ads to reach people.

If you’re serious about sales and marketing, having a strong CRM is a crucial ingredient for your business because…

1. It helps you track the effectiveness of your marketing activities.
2. It helps you understand your effectiveness throughout the sales process and identify areas for improvement.
3. A strong healthy customer database gives you the opportunity to effectively market directly to the people who you already to talk to.
4. Having a good CRM in your business helps you plan your sales activity. For example, making sure your customers are on a regular call cycle, making sure that your salespeople are adequately following up quotes, making sure that you understand what’s in your pipeline of potential work in the future, and helping you take every possible step to maximise your conversion as a sales team.

From a sales management perspective and a business management perspective, a CRM gives you more visibility over potential sales, and therefore makes it easier to plan.

How to choose the right CRM for your business

When it comes to choosing a good CRM for your business, the first thing that you should ask yourself is “why do I want a CRM in the first place?” The second thing you should ask is, what do I want to be able to do with that CRM? If you’re not sure how to answer that, here are some ways a good CRM can help your business…

• Helps you forecast sales enquiry and results.
• Enables you to track the progress of your salespeople.
• Gives you clear visibility over sales activity.
• Enables you to communicate via your CRM to segmented groups of your customers.
• Helps you budget.
• Helps you plan sales and marketing activities.
• Tracks all client communication to one source.

Usually, people want their CRM to do all of the above. And if that’s the case, the good news is there’s some really awesome technology out there which is readily available.

We often get asked “what is the best CRM?”

The truth? All of them and none of them. It’s kind of like asking ‘how long is a piece of string?’ In other words, every CRM has pros and cons, and it really depends on what you want to achieve from having a good CRM in the first place.

The real question should be: “Which CRM can do what I need it to do?”

Pipe Drive, Hubspot or Zoho are a few of the more popular web-based CRMs. Or there’s a New Zealand based CRM called Exsalerate. Then you have your more detailed systems which require a greater degree of initial investment, like Salesforce.

The good thing about a web-based CRM is they can be accessed from anywhere in the world and you don’t need to have a remote server access, which means you can use them on the go. Many of them have apps you can use on your phone or tablet, which is great for salespeople out on the road. They often integrate with your emails and your calendar too, so you can file communications and plan meetings, all in the one place. They also tend to have awesome marketing and sales reporting functionality – some have other integrations with task management, mail marketing and accounting programmes too. Zoho CRM and Hubspot CRM both have native marketing tools.

The truth is that choosing a CRM is actually a highly individualised thing. It’s important that you understand why you want a CRM and what functionality you want, but you also need a CRM that is easy to use. A CRM will only ever be as good as the people who use it. So, what you really need is a CRM that your team are going to want to use, that is efficient, intuitive, and user-friendly. There’s no point having an awesome CRM that can do all the things you need it to that never gets used – we recommend that you place a great deal of importance on the user interface; if it is easy to use, it will have great uptake.

We often end up recommending systems such as Pipe Drive and Exsalerate, because they tend to be really user-friendly, they have a great interface which is quite intuitive (there’s lots of click and drag type functions), and they have smartphone apps attached to them.

How we can help you with CRMs

Our Marketing Consultants help businesses like yours decide what CRM systems are going to be the best fit for their organisation. They then help you to configure your CRM system so you get the best value out of it, providing your business with detailed information that helps you make smart decisions about marketing and sales, and ultimately your overall business strategy.

If you’ve already got a CRM, our consultants are really good at helping you understand how to extract more value from that tool. So, if you’re reading this article and you’re thinking, “we’ve got a CRM, but we don’t really use it” or “I’m not sure if I’m getting all the information I should be out of my CRM,” then we could be a good place to start. We deal with all kinds of CRM across all kinds of businesses, so we’ve got a really good idea of what works and what doesn’t. We can help you figure out which CRM is going to be the best for your business and then help you implement it and coach you and your team how to use it.