Monday, September 29th, 2025

There is no silver bullet

Why the future of B2B selling must be situationally adaptive. For decades, authors of books about selling have sought to promote the perfect methodology – the idea that there is “one best way” to sell. Whether SPIN, Challenger, Value Selling, Sandler, Miller-Heiman, MEDDPICC or many other approaches, each has claimed to provide the formula for sales success. But in today’s… 


Monday, September 29th, 2025

Buyers need human salespeople as guides in complex B2B environments to escape preconceptions

In today’s B2B landscape, buyers conduct significant research and vendor comparisons prior to ever contacting a salesperson. At the same time, vendors assume that buyers are likely to be confident in understanding the problems they are trying to solve, which can lead to sellers failing to conduct a robust discovery process once they do get involved. More paradoxically, however, buyers… 


Monday, September 29th, 2025

Buyers prefer self-service, but choose sellers for key tasks

Buyers favour online self-service tools over sellers when searching for general information and learning new things. However, for buying tasks requiring contextual intelligence, such as determining whether a product or service fits their company’s needs, buyers prefer to seek seller input. That’s according to Alice Walmesley, Director Analyst in the Gartner Sales Practice. “Instead of offering generic information that buyers… 


Monday, September 29th, 2025

Most B2B buyers will prefer human interaction to AI by 2030 – Gartner

While AI-driven solutions offer speed, efficiency, and convenience, especially in the early stages of the sales process, recent analysis suggests that the demand for genuine human engagement is far from diminishing. In fact, by 2030, Gartner predicts that 75% of B2B buyers will prefer sales experiences that prioritise human interaction over AI, prompting organisations to rethink how they structure their… 


Monday, September 29th, 2025

Aviso and Consalia partner to smooth agentic AI adoption

Agentic AI-powered revenue execution platform, Aviso announced a strategic partnership with UK sales business school Consalia on 16 September. The initiative aims to address a critical challenge facing chief revenue officers: sales teams struggling to effectively embed AI tools and autonomous agents into workflows and company culture. “AI succeeds when it aligns with human psychology, not when it fights it,”… 


Monday, July 7th, 2025

30% of genAI initiatives to fail in 2025 – Gartner

Gartner suggested last year that at least 30% of generative AI businesses in the testing phase would be abandoned after proof of concept by the end of 2025, according to a report in AI Business. Organisations have been struggling to justify genAI investments due to the substantial costs involved. The analyst firm found that early genAI adopters were finding that… 


Monday, July 7th, 2025

Consumers wary of social media

Consumers report that social media is their least trusted source when making buying decisions; at the same time, it’s where they interact with family and friends, who also serve as their most trusted sources. These are among the latest findings in a 9 June article from consultants McKinsey: “State of the Consumer 2025: When disruption becomes permanent”. When ranking sources… 


Monday, July 7th, 2025

Success in an “AI-first” world

Top-performing go-to-market teams have aligned on three objectives that unlock success in a so-called “AI-first” world, according to the State of Sales Enablement Report 2025 from enablement platform Highspot. The survey found: The 11th edition of the State of Sales Enablement Report surveyed some 350 enablement (46%), marketing (21%), sales (12%), and revenue operations (10%) professionals. +


Tuesday, April 8th, 2025

Making a career of sales

There is no doubt that sales can be an excellent and satisfying career. As a reader of this Journal, I hope that you already believe this as strongly as I do. I am encouraged by the work being done by a growing number of schools, educational establishments and bodies like the UK’s Institute of Sales Professionals (ISP) to establish and… 


Tuesday, April 8th, 2025

A global sales playbook

Why winning globally starts with one consistent sales methodology. Global sales success demands precision, alignment and a relentless focus on delivering value. Yet many sales organizations expand internationally without a unified plan. This haphazard approach leads to fragmented strategies, inconsistent messaging and unpredictable results. To succeed globally, companies need a single, consistent playbook built on a proven sales methodology. This… 


Tuesday, April 8th, 2025

81% of buyers dissatisfied with chosen suppliers – Forrester

Tight budgets, AI’s influence in buying and selling, negative buying experiences, and long purchase cycles are further complicating the B2B buying process and frustrating buyers and sellers alike. According to Forrester’s The State Of Business Buying, 2024 report, 86% of B2B purchases stall during the buying process and 81% of buyers express dissatisfaction with their chosen providers. While buyers rely… 


Monday, April 7th, 2025

How do customers want to be sold to in 2025?

What core values should underpin sales from a customer perspective in 2025 and beyond? Back in 2009 a seminal doctoral thesis helped to usher in a new approach to sales: How can a client-centric values approach to selling lead to the co-creation of a new global selling mindset? Dr Philip Squire, who conducted the original research, is looking to run… 


Friday, January 10th, 2025

The AI advantage in KAM

How AI can help to create ideas and boost efficiency for key account managers. Implementing a strategic KAM plan that generates profitable growth for both the supplier and the key customer is notoriously difficult. As consultants and advisers to hundreds of key account managers working in multiple organisations and varied industries, we see talented managers struggle to be consistently effective… 


Thursday, January 9th, 2025

Omnichannel, AI and the future of B2B sales

How are B2B buyer expectations changing and where is B2B sales headed? In the previous edition of the Journal, we ran a story on McKinsey’s ninth global B2B Pulse report (released 12 September), which questioned 4,000 B2B decision-makers across eight major industries. This identified how B2B suppliers are responding to “consumer-like” purchasing demands from buyers. Here we talk to the… 


Wednesday, January 8th, 2025

Brave new world of AI in sales

Gen AI could take on the role of a sales agent within a team, according to a 16 September article from strategic consultancy McKinsey: “An unconstrained future: How generative AI could reshape B2B sales.” The consultants suggest that Gen AI agents could eventually act as “skilled virtual coworkers, planning and booking complex logistics and handling routine customer inquiries”. The article… 


Wednesday, January 8th, 2025

But will there be enough power to run AI?

Artificial intelligence and generative AI are driving rapid increases in electricity consumption, with data centre forecasts over the next two years reaching as high as 160% growth, according to technology analysts Gartner. Some 40% of existing AI data centres will be operationally constrained by power availability by 2027, Gartner predicts. Gartner estimates the power required for data centres to run… 


Wednesday, January 8th, 2025

Firms look to step up enablement but Gen Z wary of AI

Investment in enablement tools such as sales content management and automation, training and coaching, buyer engagement, strategy and planning, and recent research is poised to increase, according to a 2024 survey by Seismic, an enablement firm headquartered in San Diego. Generation Enablement Report: The Rise of Enablement’s Influence found that most organisations (89%) plan to retain or increase investment next… 


Monday, September 30th, 2024

Using AI to prepare for sales conversations

Whilst AI is unlikely to completely replace salespeople in complex B2B environments, it certainly has the potential to make good salespeople even more effective. Here are a few of the most important ways in which salespeople are using AI: +


Monday, September 30th, 2024

Leveraging AI to coach your salespeople

There is no doubt that AI is going to play an increasingly important role in facilitating complex B2B sales. Here are a few ways in which sales managers can harness AI to coach their salespeople more effectively: +


Monday, September 30th, 2024

Artificial intelligence in Sales: two scenarios

Salespeople have a role to play irrespective of whether AI is a positive or negative influence. Sales organisations will play a key role as AI is deployed and extended into relationship development and business models. Let’s explore two key scenarios: 1) When AI is used in “nefarious” ways and 2) when it is “advantageous” to the client. 1 Nefarious WHEN…