I came across Sir Ken Robinson recently while I was doing some research on creativity.
Watch the video - he could almost make it as a comedian!
and then read the book.
I have used a number of his principles of creative education in my sales training and strongly agree that 21st Century Education must reflect the way that people live today. Traditional learning methods stiffle creativity.
I was in the middle of doing some research in creative thinking for use in future blog posts when I decided it was time to take a break and watch Dragons Den.
The star prize for creativity went to Guy Portelli who managed to face the dragons and walk away with more money than he was asking for.
The dragons seemed a bit surprised that this proven sculptist would be asking for £70,000 for an almost guaranteed return of £250,000
It became clear, however, that Guy had his own plans. He had put his creative side to work and had thought about how he could launch his collection at the least cost to him and with the most control. Typically, art dealers would ask for 50% commission for the artist to use their premises, experience and marketing to gain access to people willing to pay around £20,000 per sculpture. They remained in control.
Guy had other ideas. His creativity led him to offering the dragons a deal that seemed to be too good to be true. However, he knew what he was doing: Read the rest of this entry »
Recently I wrote a blog post saying that I had been asked to write a review of a new book called Topgrading for Sales by Bradford.D.Smart and Greg Alexander.
A few weeks back I had the pleasure of watching one of my all time favorite authors Dan Kennedy on stage in London.
Dan is a no nonsense, tell it like it is American who has been responsible for some of the most profitable sales and marketing campaigns the world has ever seen.
I consider Dan Kennedy to be up there with Jay Abraham as the two most gifted sales and marketing geniuses alive.
He is credited with taking the Guthy Renker Corporation from next to nothing to a multi billion dollar conglomerate.
His sales letter writing book is a fantastic introduction to how to write sales letters that sell. I use many of the principles I learned in my sales letter writing workshops .
If you are aware of Dan then you will see his influence in many of my sales training workshops and if you have any interest in sales and would like to know about Dans approach to sales and marketing then give me a call on +44 845 6434165.
We became the proud parents of a new puppy a few weeks ago when we became responsible and bought Pemba, our black Labrador puppy. He is a great big ball of energy that only knows fun and has quickly become part of the family — with all the emotional attachment that goes with it.
Apart from teaching me a few things about communications skills the search and purchase of Pemba has been an introduction to some superb business practices - most noticeable by my vet.
See if you can spot their skill from our tale of acquiring a suitable pet doctor!
We were looking for a vet and asked around the local community and some family and friends. One name kept popping up and as my wife had used them for her cats when she was growing up we decided to give them a try.
I recently received a comment on one of my blog posts from a uk sales trainer which was basically a rant about the difference between Push and Pull selling and the death of ‘80,90 - BS!’.
To be honest I wasn’t sure of the point of the rant and what he was taking offence to. The post was this one on persuasion .
The post was a quick quote from Dale Carnegie about human nature. The rant took offense to the terms ‘Influence, persuasion and convincing’ and essentially (I guess) tried to make the point that no one like to be sold to - they like to buy.
I would like to open this up to debate, especially to the sales training, sales consultancy and sales coaching industry.
From personal recent experience I would say the Post Office can urgently do with some uk sales training .
The papers and TV news have been filled recently with the subject of post office closures and how this will kill off many local communities. I can understand this and can only sympathise with people who rely on the post office for essential services.
What I can’t help is my feeling that largely the post office have brought this upon themselves with untrained and quite frankly appalling customer service / sales staff . I know that many of the post office counters operate as mini franchises but they should insist on some element of sales training or sales management training .
