The Sales and Marketing Management Podcast

In this episode, we talk with Ken Lloyd, author of "Performance Appraisals & Phrases for Dummies." The book has been revised for a workforce that is vastly different than when it was first published in 2009. In most workplaces through the decades, annual performance reviews have been something that evokes more groans than grins. However, today's younger workers actually embrace...

For decades, corporate group travel for recognition purposes was almost exclusively for top-selling sales reps. The President's Club model had straightforward qualifying metrics and an easily measured ROI: "Did we bring in more revenue?" C-suite executives who make the decisions about incentive travel programs these days are broadening their campaigns' scope, with an understand...

Corporate gifts are a critical component of companies' employee engagement strategy and customer loyalty efforts. Some use corporate gifts to build stronger relationships with channel partners. It's a $300 billion industry in the U.S. alone. But Tom Romine, founder of Cultivate, a corporate gifting services provider, said many companies continue to make mistakes in gifting that have been...

Art Fromm started as an engineer and implementer of software applications before he became a sales professional and sales manager. Building on that experience, for the past 25 years he been in sales enablement roles, including starting his own company, Team Sales Development , in 2009, helping clients increase win rate, margins, revenues and client satisfaction. He helps presales and sales teams e...

What level of spending is required to get employees excited about a non-cash recognition offer? The Incentive Research Foundation conducted extensive surveys to find out. It turns out effective reward values are dependent on multiple factors, including employee role and salary. And reward value isn't the only determinant of success with a recognition program. We Used Google NotebookLM to have...

We used Google's AI-driven NotebookLM to create this conversation about the importance of recognition in the workplace and how it's only impactful if a company first establishes an environment in which employees feel they matter. Rewards beyond a paycheck or cash bonus are essential to increasing employee engagement. However, missteps in such an endeavor can be worse than doing nothing a...

Marc Matthews makes memories for a living. The founder and CEO of Pulse Experiential Travel creates incentive travel experiences for reward recipients - as few as one or as many as several hundred. There's almost no event Matthews can't gain entree to. Did you know you can reward your star performers by getting them into Elton John's Oscars viewing party? In this episode, Matthews s...

"Always remember," states James Chitwood in his book Leadership Is Not Enough , "the adage says when things go wrong, it's because of the leader, but when things go right, it's usually because of the team." In this podcast conversation, Chitwood explains why a true performance culture continues to do what it does whether or not the leader is there. Chitwood, a former...

Sabina Nawaz is a former Microsoft manager who advises C-level executives and leaders at Fortune 500 corporations, government agencies, nonprofits and academic institutions. Her new (and first) book is titled, "You're the Boss: Become the Manager You Want to Be (and Others Need)." It's an executive coach in book form. In this podcast episode, we discuss some of the key points f...

We used NotebookLM, an AI-powered collaboration tool that creates audio summaries, to cull the highlights of our Focus Report feature on the leadership style of Donald Trump . Don’t want to wade through the 3,300-word article? This 18-minute podcast-style conversation between two bots covers the most important points. 

Britt Yamamoto is a leadership consultant, entrepreneur and professor at the University of Washington's Department of Global Health. In this podcast conversation, he discusses some of the lessons he learned working on a sustainable farm in the Japan countryside that can be applied to leadership roles in business and in life. It's the subject of his book, "The Soil of Leadership: Cul...

Russ Hill was promoted to mid-management early in his radio broadcasting career. He floundered and was nearly fired without ever being told how to convey the company's priorities to his team. He has incorporated the lessons learned from that experience into the Lead In 30 leadership development program he offers through his company, Lone Rock Leadership. In this podcast, Hill explains three k...

There has been a lot of talk about sales enablement in the past several years. "Sales enablement specialist" is one of the fastest-growing job titles on LinkedIn. But what is it, exactly? The truth is it's different things for different people. In this episode, we talk with Deniz Olcay, vice president of marketing at Allego, about the emergence of sales enablement and how companies...

In 2025, data intelligence has moved from being a competitive advantage to an operational necessity. Amit Patel, senior vice president at IT consulting firm Consulting Solutions , says those companies that make the most of data intelligence will create customer experiences that win business, open the door to upselling, and create the type of true partnerships that drive customer loyalty.

Can you identify how you like to be shown appreciation in the workplace? Do you know your colleagues' preferences? In our continuing discussion with Paul White, we explore why it's important to understand your own primary and secondary language of appreciation. Also, in the interest of promoting peer-to-peer appreciation, it helps to spread the word on everyone's preferences for app...

In our continuing conversation with Paul White, author of "The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace," we discuss why praise is such a powerful motivator. Words of affirmation is the top language of appreciation for nearly half of all workers. White explains why praising colleagues is not as simple or intuitive as it may seem, and why words of affirmation can't just flow from...

You may have heard of, or even read, Gary Chapman's "The 5 Love Languages." Paul White, a psychologist whose work focuses on workplace engagement and building better work relationships, thought Chapman's five love languages could be adapted to the workplace to create healthier, more product work environments. In 2011, he and Chapman published "The 5 Languages of Appreciati...

We were putting together a Focus Report on rebounding from a slow sales period and Michael Hinkle held up his hand as someone who has been through it and who now helps other companies break sales slumps. Hinkle, like a lot of salespeople, didn't intend to go into sales. After 30-plus years of selling, he founded his California-based sales consulting and coaching business, JBI (Just Buy In) ....

B2B buyers have changed dramatically over the past few years, so why haven't B2B salespeople? Julie Thomas, President and CEO of ValueSelling Associates, says product-led sales no longer works in an era of self-educated buying teams. It's all about bringing value to prospects and making sure they understand your value. But they can't understand your value unless you - or your reps -...

Gartner Director Analyst Adnan Zijadic discusses his report "How Generative AI Will Revolutionize Sales Force Automated Platforms."  What does it mean for B2B sales leaders? What steps need to be taken to keep up with this headline-making technology?

In this podcast, we talk with Julie Thomas, president and CEO of ValueSelling Associates, which recently published an eBook on a study they completed called " The Behaviors and Skills Sales Leaders Care Most About - and How to Measure Them ."

Sales trainer Amy Franko shares highlights from a webinar she presented for SMM Connect on the most important metrics for sales managers to monitor. She talks about how she goes to market and how companies can be smarter buyers of sales training.

Stephanie Harris is a veteran of the non-cash incentive industry and, for the last three years, president of the Incentive Research Foundation. We spoke with her about emerging trends in group incentive travel, including designing events for today's multigenerational work force.

Doug Bushée, an analyst at Gartner Sales Practice, explains what we're talking about when we talk about digital sales transformation - and he reviews three common pitfalls to avoid, which he wrote about for Sales & Marketing Management.

Michael Bungay Stanier is an author, speaker and entrepreneur with a background in leadership development.  His latest book is "How to Work With (Almost) Anyone: Five Questions for Building the Best Possible Relationships." Collaboration is what workplaces are all about, yet work relationships are usually left to chance. Bungay Stanier offers insights on why it makes sense to have admitt...