More activity will not fix a bad list
Welcome to the Finding Business podcast. Five minutes that will help you learn something new about attracting ideal clients and accounts. I’m your host, Scott Channell. For more about this show, episodes, and services offered, go to Scott Channell — with two t’s, two n’s, and two l’s — dot com. Now, on to the […]
Discovery calls, sales visitors & sales catalysts
Most advice about discovery calls comes down to one instruction: read the room and adapt. That advice is not wrong. It is just incomplete. Adapting is a skill, but adapting requires a destination, and most first meetings do not have one. Welcome to the Finding Business podcast. Five minutes that will help you learn something […]
Disqualify ruthlessly: the rule vs. preference problem in sales
Every sales rep says they have standards. Then a slow month hits, a decent-but-not-quite-right prospect seems interested, and that standard quietly gets set aside. Just this once. In this episode of Finding Business, I break down why a rule that bends under pressure was never a rule to begin with, and what it actually takes […]
Sales systems beat a superskill
Most reps think one great skill is enough — a tight close, a strong opener, relentless prospecting. It isn’t. In this episode of Finding Business, Scott breaks down why a single superskill can’t outrun a rep running a full system, and points to the five components of what he calls the Sales Decision Machine — […]
Sell the Meeting, Not Your Service
Why Focusing on the Meeting Books More Discovery Calls The most important B2B appointment setting truth in sales prospecting and B2B lead generation is simple. Your first objective is not to sell your service. Your first objective is to sell the meeting. Because without a discovery call or first sales meeting, nothing else can happen. […]
Credibility before curiosity: where most sales outreach fails
Salespeople are often taught to start sales outreach with curiosity. “Quick question…”“Are you struggling with…”“Would you be open to…” The assumption is that curiosity will pull the prospect into the message. But experienced decision-makers don’t process sales messaging that way. Before curiosity ever appears, the buyer makes a faster and far more decisive judgment: “Is […]
Lead qualification is what protects your sales pipeline
If your sales forecasting feels unreliable, look upstream.Late-stage slippage.Conversion volatility.Discount creep.Planning anxiety. When these show up, teams often push for more activity or stronger closing inside the sales pipeline. But the issue rarely lives at the bottom of the funnel. It begins when weak opportunities are allowed into the pipeline. That is a lead qualification […]
Your sales pipeline velocity is limited by your ideal customer profile
Your sales pipeline velocity is not primarily determined by effort.It is not determined by how many calls are made.It is not determined by how many emails are sent.It is not determined by how aggressive your follow-up is.It is largely determined before the first conversation ever happens. In multi-step multi-decision-maker B2B selling, velocity is engineered upstream. […]
Why your sales pipeline feels fragile — and the bottleneck causing it
Your sales pipeline looks healthy.Meetings are on the calendar.Activity is high.The dashboard says you’re fine. But something feels fragile. Table of Contents In multi-step, multi-decision-maker B2B selling, fragile sales pipeline management is rarely a volume issue. It is usually a structural constraint inside pipeline generation. Until that constraint is relieved, everything else is incremental. In […]
Stop fixing symptoms in B2B appointment setting: identify the real constraint
In complex B2B appointment setting environments, leaders often respond to weak results by increasing activity. More dials.More scripts. More follow-up. The intention is sound: strengthen the B2B sales pipeline and drive sales performance improvement. But in multi-step, multi-decision-maker environments, most underperformance is not an effort issue. It is a structural issue inside the sales prospecting […]