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- September–October 2023
- Article
Building Brand Engagement: Lessons from NFTs and Collectibles
By: Frank V. Cespedes and Ben Plomion
- August 2023
- Teaching Note
Aphro Beverages
Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 823-044.
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- July 2023
- Teaching Note
Belden and Digital Transformation: From Product Sales to Solutions Sales
Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 823-002. Belden manufactures devices such as switches, cables, adapters, and connectors. Faced with market changes, the firm initiated a new Enhanced Solutions Delivery (ESD) initiative. In November 2022 executives are evaluating the...
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- May 3, 2023
- Article
What Top-Performing Sales Managers Do Differently
By: Mike Schultz and Frank V. Cespedes
Sales managers hire reps, influence their training, provide (we hope) feedback and so reinforce good selling behaviors, and are key in the execution of growth and change initiatives. In a study of more than 1,000 sales managers and sellers across industries, we found...
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- May 2023
- Article
Where Sales Technology (Really) Helps
Interest in Sales Enablement (SE), the catch-all term for attempts to increase sales productivity with AI and other technologies, is driven by multiple factors. One is the declining costs of the tools. Also, selling is now data-hungry work and not just in tech sectors....
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- April 18, 2023
- Article
The Rebirth of Software as a Service
By: Frank V. Cespedes and Jacco van der Kooij
Traditional sales models focus on customer acquisition and the “funnel” or “pipeline” metrics that dominate talk about sales. But this approach falls short when applied to a recurring revenue business, where the customer life cycle looks more like a bowtie, not a...
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- March 9, 2023
- Article
Linking Growth and the Frontline
By: Frank V. Cespedes, Jay Galeota and Michael Wong
Most strategies are about growing the business. But about one quarter of companies do not grow at all and, even before the pandemic, only one in eight achieved more than 10% revenue growth annually, according to data from S&P Global regulatory filings. One reason is a...
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- March, 2023
- Article
Linking Value and Price
- March 13, 2023
- Article
Sales Teams Need to Stop Focusing on the Customer Funnel
Understanding where customers are, how they navigate streams in your market, and how to interact with them in a given stream is now central to crafting a good customer experience, and that has implications. Among other things, companies need to shift from thinking...
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- January 2023 (Revised January 2023)
- Case
Belden and Digital Transformation: From Product Sales to Solutions Sales
By: Frank V. Cespedes and Amy Klopfenstein
This case concerns the industrial automation division at Belden, a hardware manufacturer. While Belden historically sold products such as cables, wires, and other networking devices, EVP of Industrial Automation Ashish Chand recognized that IT vendors were entering the...
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- November 15, 2022
- Article
Using Simulations to Upskill Employees
By: Frank V. Cespedes, Trond Aas, Alex Hunt and Huw Newton-Hill
Reskilling employees tops the agenda in many organizations, according to a LinkedIn report. Korn Ferry estimates an 85-million person talent shortage by 2030, and McKinsey likens the challenge to the shift from agricultural to manufacturing work that occurred in the...
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- October 2022 (Revised December 2022)
- Case
Aphro Beverages
By: Frank V. Cespedes and Amram Migdal
This case focuses on distribution, sales, and product decisions as Aphro Beverages reaches an inflection point in its growth trajectory. In 2020, Aphro Beverages, based in Accra, Ghana, successfully launched its brand and brought two new alcoholic spirits products to...
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Keywords:
Agribusiness;
Plant-Based Agribusiness;
Business Ventures;
Business Growth and Maturation;
Entrepreneurship;
Food;
Geography;
Geographic Scope;
Management;
Growth and Development Strategy;
Growth Management;
Resource Allocation;
Marketing;
Brands and Branding;
Digital Marketing;
Product Marketing;
Product Launch;
Product Positioning;
Social Marketing;
Operations;
Distribution;
Distribution Channels;
Product;
Product Design;
Product Development;
Supply Chain;
Sales;
Salesforce Management;
Food and Beverage Industry;
Africa;
Ghana
- 2022
- Chapter
Coordinating Marketing and Sales in B2B Organizations
This Handbook is targeted at academics and graduate students who want an overview of the academic state of the business-to-business marketing domain and at B2B practitioners who want to be aware of the current state of knowledge in their domains. This chapter examines...
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- August 15, 2022
- Article
Preparing Sales for a Changing Economy: Part 2: Getting More from Your Training Spending
A previous article discussed changing business development requirements and some implications. This article discusses three areas that are fundamental to getting ROI from training initiatives and how engagement between Sales and L&D professionals, completed by smart...
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- August 9, 2022
- Article
Preparing Sales for a Changing Economy: Part 1
Companies spend more per capita on sales training than any other function, but the return on investment is disappointing. One recent estimate indicates “that 85-90% of sales training fails to translate into a lasting improvement in productivity.” A major reason is...
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- July 8, 2022
- Article
How to Conduct a Great Performance Review
Dissatisfaction with performance appraisals is pervasive, but they remain an essential managerial responsibility. The purpose of performance reviews is two-fold: an accurate and actionable evaluation of performance, and then development of that person’s skills in line...
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- February 15, 2022
- Article
How Managers Can Build a Culture of Experimentation
By: Frank V. Cespedes and Neil Hoyne
Testing in business presents qualitatively different challenges than those in clinical trials and most scientific research. There are very few opportunities for randomized control experiments in a changing, competitive market. Yet, change and competition make testing a...
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- December 16, 2021
- Article
Avoid a One-Size-Fits-All Approach to Sales Coaching
Coaching sales reps is about clarifying relevant behaviors and whether the issue is motivation or ability. Some reps may work hard, but lack certain capabilities while others demonstrate capability but seemingly lack motivation or effort. Good coaching helps to clarify...
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- August 2021
- Article
Improving Sales Hiring
Sales hiring presents inherent challenges not found to the same extent in talent management in other functional areas. Moreover, common hiring practices make a tough job needlessly harder. This article suggests practical ways to improve sales hiring: Hire for the Task,...
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- May–June 2021
- Article
Getting Up to Speed in Your Sales Efforts
By: Frank V. Cespedes and Zoran Latinovic
In a study before the pandemic, Pricewaterhouse Coopers found that companies had made little progress in the previous decade in speeding up their cash-conversion cycle, as the cash crunch generated by the pandemic painfully demonstrated. In most firms, sales velocity...
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