Stephen Kirk's Blog

JAWS Sales Training – A Really Useful Update

stephenakirk — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 23:17:29 +0000

Last year, we put all our sales team and most of managers through the JAWS Sales Training. JAWS stands for “Just Another Way Of Selling” and I recommend it thoroughly. It is practically focussed and provides a system to help you listen more than you talk in a sales situation.

We have just run a refresher session run by Derek Leathem and it reinforced how important it is to take the time to understand what your customer really needs… also, how easy it is to skip back into bad habits!

I suspect that knowing how to listen (or seek information) is even more important for people who are technically expert… as they are often keen to help the customer by providing information, but can easily miss the underlying point!

I know that sales training is a very subjective thing and would appreciate other people ideas and comments.

Using LinkedIn For Recruitment

stephenakirk — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 13:00:04 +0000

We’ve just started using LinkedIn for recruitment (we are looking for an additional sales Account Manager for the UK) and I’ve been very impressed by the calibre of the candidates we have seen so far. Hopefully this is not just “beginners luck”!

I would be interested in any feedback from other people who’ve used LinkedIn or similar sites for recruitment.

You can see the advert at www.linkedin.com/jobs

Security Evaluation Of Payments Products

stephenakirk — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 16:57:44 +0000

Interested to see some more articles in the press today about the security of Payments systems. Looks like this is an area which has caught the attention of the general public.

So I’m plesased that we (RFI) have been able to increase our security evaluation capabilities to include the APCA requirements for Australia. Please see the news item RFI Becomes APCA Accredited For Security Evaluation Of Smart Card Products on the RFI web site for more information.

Is The UK Economy Improving?

stephenakirk — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 23:23:30 +0000

Nearly the end of August and it looks like the UK economy may finally be coming out of recession. Certainly we are seeing a lot more enquiries from customers with interesting new products…. sufficient for us to decide to strengthen our sales team!