BDU Blog

BDU’s CEO Lisa Peskin was honored to facilitate the Alliance of Women Entrepreneurs’ September Founder’s Roundtable. Current and prospective AWE founder members joined Lisa for a discussion on the topic, “How to Get in Front of Prospective Clients / Reaching Top Level People.” Getting in front of decision makers can be a challenge, so there are some key things to remember … Read More

The people you meet with on a regular basis typically fall into one of three different categories: your prospects, your clients, and your centers of influence (COIs). There are a variety of different outcomes you can aim to achieve depending on the type of contact you’re meeting with, as well as your initial agenda, so it’s important that you determine … Read More

There are three things that all salespeople need to do right now if they haven’t already to help maximize their performance and potential, as well as set themselves up for not only a strong second quarter but the rest of the year: 1. Stop, Start and Continue Take a moment to reflect on your activities and performance from the first … Read More

Are you doing all you can to really train, inspire and motivate your sales associates to be the very best that they can be? If you haven’t held one recently, it’s time to re-energize your direct reports and plan a Sales Kick Off! When is the last time you were able to get your entire sales force together for a … Read More

Whether you’re an individual contributor or a leader, sales success ultimately comes down to just three types of key activities and three types of key results. Over the years, Lisa and our coaches have worked with hundreds of companies to help them maximize their sales performance and potential. We’ve noticed that every organization has their own set of metrics or … Read More

As salespeople in a competitive selling environment, we always need to make sure that we can differentiate ourselves from our competition. Often buyers will indicate that they’ll be basing their decision solely on pricing, but we may not always have the least expensive option to offer. It’s important to remember that there is one thing that no other company or … Read More

One of the most important keys to being successful in sales is to fill the sales pipeline with qualified prospects on a consistent basis. However, sales professionals often mistake suspects for prospects. By doing so, they get a false sense of the true value of their prospective business and end up ultimately forecasting business that is not yet properly qualified. … Read More

We work with a variety of clients, both selling and non-selling professionals, but the one common challenge we hear more than anything is that they all have difficulty with prospecting and getting net new appointments. How do we help? We take a look at two key things: What is their game plan? Do they have a methodical approach outlined, including … Read More

As we’re into the fourth quarter of the year, it’s time to kick our sales efforts into high gear. Here are six AUTUMN-inspired tips you can apply right now to help you not only meet but exceed your year-end goals and set yourself up for success in the new year ahead! A = ASSESS Now more than ever, it’s important … Read More

As salespeople, we need to keep in mind that no one likes to be sold anything but everyone loves to be helped. Therefore, it’s important to understand your prospect’s ROI and how to use that when positioning your product or service in the form of a solution that can help them solve a problem or address a challenge. One of … Read More

As a salesperson, it’s always interesting when you’re on the opposite side and are being “sold” a product or service. Sometimes, it’s hard not to notice the sales “red flags” as they are raised. Recently, Lisa was looking for some help and scheduled a time to meet with someone who has been pursuing her business for quite a while. When … Read More

If you’re a sales leader, you’ve likely heard us say that your job description is just one line: to help your direct reports be as successful as possible. As we’re well into the summer and have officially started the second half of the year, it’s the perfect time to re-energize your sales team and reassess the ways in which you’ll … Read More

Not achieving the level of sales success that you desire? We know it’s easy to feel discouraged if you’re not hitting your numbers or performing at your best, but don’t worry! The good news is… Small changes make a big difference. There’s not a huge difference between being good and being great, or between being great and being a sales … Read More

You know that no one likes to be sold anything and that you should look for ways to help and not sell, but how do you build credibility so that you’re known as a reliable consultant that people can trust? Look for speaking engagements, where you can actively demonstrate your knowledge and expertise! Speaking engagements: Give you an opportunity to … Read More

The BDU team ranked this BDU blog post as #1, plus a few other top blog posts we don’t want you to miss We recently asked our BDU team members to select one post from our blog that they felt was important for people to see and read. More than half of the group selected Are You Truly Listening? and … Read More

By Janet Nankin, Managing Director, Southeast Region If you watch Food Network, you may have seen a show called “Worst Cooks in America.” I love the Food Network, but I generally watch it for several reasons: to learn new cooking techniques, because I’m hungry or because I am just bored. I certainly don’t watch it to see people who can’t … Read More

In honor of April Fools’ Day this year, we’ve decided to take a look at some of the ridiculous business tips we’ve heard. You know they’re out there, those “words of wisdom” that some business people and sales folks alike swear by but that we’ve come to realize just don’t work. Here’s what some of our BDU team members said … Read More

As we’ve said time and time again, sales really is a numbers game. It’s critical that you understand how your business metrics break down and where your revenue is coming from so you can figure out the best way to not only get more business from existing clients but also find new clients to help boost your numbers. Figuring Out … Read More

As Stephen Covey so accurately expressed, “The biggest communication problem is we do not listen to understand. We listen to reply.” Do you find yourself listening to reply instead of to really understand what the other person is saying? Now more than ever, our ability to truly listen to and hear one another is critical to our personal and professional … Read More

As we’ve said time and time again, half of sales success can be attributed to your attitude and motivation. Therefore, it’s imperative that you start each new year off on the right foot. It is so much easier psychologically to get off to a great start and keep that momentum going than to start slow and play catch up all … Read More

As a sales leader, you know that you have a one-line job description: to help your direct reports be as successful as possible. With the end of 2020 fast approaching, here’s a handy year-end checklist you can download and use to help your team finish out the year strong and set yourselves up to hit the ground running in 2021!

Lisa’s Takeaways for Sales Leaders from the Extreme Sales Summit 2020 Lisa was thrilled to be a part of the Extreme Sales Summit last month, where she presented to sales leaders on how to run effective meetings with their teams. She was greatly honored to be included in this three-day event alongside incredible long-time sales superstars who had a major … Read More

Sales is truly the best career out there but like anything there are ups and downs. Being in sales is basically like running your own little business, with the upside that often you have the benefit of not having to pay for your own supplies, expenses or operation costs. However, the downside is that in this little business of yours, … Read More

As we’re well into the month of September now, with Labor Day behind us and the unofficial end of summer here, it’s time to ramp up your efforts and focus on what you can accomplish for the remainder of the calendar year. Not sure where to start? Here are five things you can do right now to not only finish … Read More