• The Wolf of Wall Street is one of the best-known sales movies of all time, and the “sell my this pen,” scene is one of the better-known scenes. But what is the lesson behind the “sell me this pen” question, and does Jordan Belfort (The “Wolf”) actually endorse the lesson himself? ScreenRant recently tackled this very question, and laid it all out in a nice quick read. You can check it out here.  
   
• After cutting 10% of their staff in January of this year, Salesforce is hiring 3,300 people across various departments, according to a recent report from Bloomberg. The new hires will be split among sales, engineering and those working on Salesforce's data cloud product, Chief Operating Officer Brian Millham told Bloomberg. It’s a good sign for those working in tech. You can read the report here.

• Sales cycle times have increased in the last year. 
• The percentage of opportunities lost to no decision has increased.
• The percentage of opportunities lost to competitors has decreased.
   

According to the report, sales leaders reported the top sales challenges today as:

• Recruiting and hiring (52 percent of sales leaders cited this issue)
• The uncertain economic climate (43 percent)
• Generating qualified leads, quantitatively and qualitatively (40 percent)
• Developing sales skills, e.g., winning sales opportunities, driving account growth, and consultative selling (33 percent)
• Training up sales managers (32 percent)
   

Managing virtual and hybrid teams was cited as a challenge as well, but much less so than the others listed, demonstrating that many sales leaders are excelling at adapting to these new work environments.

“The good news is that sales and enablement leaders can overcome the challenges and achieve their priorities, even in an uncertain economy,” Schultz told CRM Magazine. “If your sales organization can develop a strong sales enablement program focused on three strategies and track key metrics, you should achieve sales success.”

The three strategies Schultz refers to are:

1. Focus on productivity habits in the workforce. Rather than focusing on technology or process, the report explains, it is the development of specific productivity habits that bring the most success to sales teams; so much so that the report states organizations could increase their sales productivity by 46 percent without hiring additional staff.
    
2. Give sellers the skills to change seller behavior and habits. Too many organizations choose skills to develop in their sales force arbitrarily, the report states. 
    
3. Invest in excellent sales managers. Sales managers make or break teams with their ability to retain sellers and coach them to victory. RAIN reports that sellers are 63 percent more likely to perform at the top when they have a good sales manager in their corner who supports and mentors them consistently.
    

Everything old really is new again (baggy jeans are back!?). But now, at least some of us get to lose sales due to indecision, have difficulty retaining staff, and suffer through pointless skills seminars from the comfort of our homes! And that’s progress…. right?

• It automatically recommends prospects that are a good fit for your business
• It creates personalized outreach campaigns for both email and LinkedIn, which has proven to get a 33% response rate (5x better than just email alone). 
• It turns cold prospects into warm ones with personalized follow-ups

Awarded for its easy-to-use design (those Swedes!) they have a database of 600M+ prospects, and are GDPR compliant, because in Europe, you can’t blow your nose without a permit.

To sum it up, Zaplify will literally find the right prospects, will reach out to them for you, and will follow-up as many times as needed to get a response. 

Best of all… it’s free, forever. Seriously. FREE. As in… doesn’t cost a thing! You can claim your free account here.

p.s. If you need a good laugh, check out their hilarious Sales Squad shorts

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