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FAQ Answers

What does the name SalesPOP! mean?

Though the phrase started out as an acronym for our Sales Performance Optimization Program, almost as soon as it was coined, we knew it would work for our company name too. We believe it speaks to our ability to make your revenues spike. Also, unlike some corporate initiatives, it goes down easy, like pop (or soda for the non-northern people). Finally, it is celebratory, like a firecracker or a bottle of champagne, popped to usher in a new beginning or to commemorate a significant victory – like those you’ll see more often after working with us.

Why was SalesPOP! formed?

After 40+ years of combined experiences, Craig Pyne and Rick Wnuk realized that they shared a common belief and passion that they could improve the lives of sales and marketing staff by showing them a path to personal and professional development. It was based on this shared belief that SalesPOP! started. Though the partners have since separated while pursuing different markets, they still occasionally collaborate based on the needs of the engagement.

What do you mean by a closed-loop sales and marketing process?

For too many years, the sales approach has been an open-loop or one-way process. An open-loop process is one where there is no direct connection between the input and the output. For example, in early automobile cruise control systems there was an input (engine throttle) and an output (vehicle speed). Cruise control was designed to maintain your car at a constant speed on the highway, so the cruise would set the throttle and forget it, whether your car was going uphill or downhill. There was no information being passed from the output to the input. As a result, the system was highly ineffective – it only worked well in one condition: perfectly flat land. Today’s cruise control systems use a closed-loop process where feedback is provided, not only on vehicle speed, but also road conditions, incline, and how close you are to a car in front of you. This feedback makes for a much more efficient system.

The same is true in sales. In the past, both the individual sale and the overall sales organization operated in an open-loop manner. The salesperson presented every feature, without the benefit of feedback from the client. And the sales team never captured the things it was doing right so that others on the team could use those things too. The feedback was getting lost.

That feedback is the new intellectual property (IP) of the sales process. For a long time, the IP of salespeople had been their contact list. With the advent of the mighty CRM system, that information is now captured, catalogued and cleaned. But there is so much other IP that walks out the door every time you lose a salesperson: how you handle competitive objections; the success your solution has enabled a client to achieve; the pain and political landscape of a client; and on and on. This essential feedback must be captured as a part of your sales process and fed back into the marketing engine in a closed-loop manner that allows you to always put forth the very best sales effort possible.

At SalesPOP! we believe there are four tiers of sales performance. The first tier approaches sales in an ad hoc manner, with every salesperson a lone wolf, operating in their own way. The second tier uses sales training to impart a common technique among the team. The third tier integrates that sales training into every facet of what they do, optimizing the sales process so that it is the most efficient it can become. The final tier is a culture of best practices, where the organization is learning from every sales encounter and the team is highly scalable, with success easily repeatable. That is a closed-loop system of continuous improvement.

How do I convince my Board or Executive team that I need SalesPOP!?

We deliver results! We have a fundamental belief that we are successful only when our clients are very successful. To minimize any perceived risks, we propose a fee structure that is primarily a performance-based model. This approach is driven by our confidence that we will work with you to successfully execute strategies and approaches that optimize or correct critical sales issues.

What makes SalesPOP! different from sales training companies?

Don’t misunderstand us—we think sales training companies are great! We should know, we’ve been through enough of them. The problem is with what happens in the days and weeks following training. Without a process to reinforce it, the training is soon forgotten. An additional problem is that even if the management wanted to reinforce it, they don’t know it well enough yet. Or they’re too busy to figure out how to ingrain the sales techniques from the training class in every aspect of their sales culture.

That’s what we do.

Not only can we reinforce your training, but we figure out how to execute that sales strategy within your organization. We make sure that you are using a common language. We participate in sales calls and coaching sessions. We examine your pipeline and your qualification process to make sure they follow the same approach as your training. We make sure your team is focused and building good habits based on whatever sales methodology they were trained on. At the end of our engagement with your company, your team will have a blueprint for building a perfect sale, using the techniques they were trained on, but reinforced by real world information that is being collected and analyzed live as it happens. There is no stronger method for bringing focus to your team.

So SalesPOP! doesn’t do sales training, you just follow up on training that was done?

No, we’ll work either way. Our preference is to do the training ourselves, because we can tailor it to your sales process easier that way. But if you’ve already got an investment in a particular training approach, we can build off of that investment.

How does SalesPOP! view its relationship with its clients?

We strive to earn trusted advisor status with our clients. We believe that our Client Principles guide us to achieve mutually rewarding relationships. They are:

We build relationships that have longevity.
We build a foundation of trust and collaboration.
We create a platform for open communication and feedback.
We ensure equity for both organizations.
We commit to achieving high standards of performance and responsiveness.
We commit to resolving issues quickly and with your best interests in mind.
We commit to maintaining professional integrity at all times.
We encourage you to celebrate our joint successes publicly.

What is the duration of a typical engagement?

There is no such thing as a typical engagement. The variables that go into a time estimate range from complexity of sale to size of sales force. We think that at the short end, three months is average. For more complex engagements, it may take twelve to eighteen months.

Do you focus on a specific industry?

SalesPOP! is made up of former bag-carrying salespeople and executives who bring a diverse set of experiences. Although we focus on technology sales, we believe that our wide range of experience drives value to clients in many different industries. Historically, the SalesPOP! partners have developed expertise in the following industries:

Enterprise Software
Life Sciences & Healthcare
Telecommunications
Financial Services
Professional Services
Consumer Goods
Direct Marketing

We also work with clients outside of these industry segments that share a strategic need to increase sales performance, optimize sales and foster a culture of continuous improvement.

We already use Spin Selling (Solution Selling/Sandler/etc), why should we use you?

First, it is important to understand the difference between a technique and a process. Many sales systems teach techniques to make salespeople more effective, but they don’t tell them how to use that technique to navigate the sale. It is similar to being given a toolbox to put a bike together, but not being given a set of instructions to tell you what to do first.

What we do at SalesPOP! is help you integrate sales technique with your sales process and match it to your customer’s buying cycle. There are some awesome sales techniques out there, and we don’t reinvent the wheel. We take the best from all of them and figure out how to use those best practices in a way that allows you to sell the way your customers want to buy. Our expertise is in implementing and executing on sales and marketing strategy.

How do you measure results from a Performance Optimization Program?

We believe that at the most fundamental level, performance must be measured. At the onset of our engagement we collaborate with our clients to create a performance map with key performance indicators that measure productivity and effectiveness gains. These measurements vary depending on the engagement, but may include pipeline turnover, employee satisfaction, customer retention, close rate, forecasting accuracy, among others. This provides a baseline where upon which we jointly monitor and measure the results of the Performance Optimization Program.

Can you talk to my sales team / organization?

The partners of SalesPOP! regularly participate in industry, corporate and community speaking engagements. Simply use the link to the contact form in the sidebar of this page to discuss your speaking engagement.

What is the background of the founders?

The founders come from different backgrounds. Their experience includes start-up organizations that have grown from nothing to huge international organizations. They have taken companies public, they have sold companies, they have worked with VC boards and Wall Street analysts. They have large corporate experience, mid-size experience, and small business experience. They have worked in industries as varied as telecommunications, direct marketing, enterprise software, pharmaceutical, and consumer-oriented. They have call center experience, sales experience, marketing experience, management experience, executive leadership experience, and international experience. Further, both founders have a background in training and years of practice mentoring and coaching sales and marketing personnel to success.

What is the level of investment I can expect to make?

The price of a performance optimization program depends on several factors, including duration, stages involved, size of salesforce and complexity of sale. We can work using an hourly approach, a day rate, or a retainer-based approach. We prefer that there is a performance-based component because it reinforces our core concepts of aligning pay and performance, not only with your sales team, but with your entire organization.

This optimization stuff sounds like corporate speak, is this overkill for my four person sales department?

We work with almost as many companies that have no sales department as those that have large, international forces. Many companies hire us to help them set up a sales strategy and hiring plan before they even have staff. This is a great way to make certain you are prepared to scale your organization and to make your sales team successful as soon as they are hired.

Will you refrain from working for our competitors?

Yes, we put wording in all our contracts that give you the right of refusal for any clients we take on that may be seen as competitive. We work with you during the project definition phase to coordinate and document this list.