A few weeks back, I came across this scenario on LinkedIn (slightly anonymized to protect identities).

Judging by the constant stream of job postings in the Inside Sales Experts LinkedIn group, the market for Inside Sales talent in Europe is hot.

Recruiting a German-Speaking Inside Sales Specialist in (Reading, UK)
Looking for Dutch-Speaking Business Development Agents for an IT Co. (Barcelona, Spain)
Hiring Multilingual Inside Sales Reps Based in Dublin (Ireland)

Through numerous conversations with clients, we've been hearing anecdotal feedback about the challenges US & Canadian companies are facing when building inside teams targeting the European market: the more active role of resellers, hiring for sales/language skills, list & data sources, acceptance of phone & web selling, etc.

It’s 2012 and high time to revisit 9 predictions that Laurie Page and I made early in 2011. I thought it might be interesting to see how well we did.

We’ll be scoring our predictions like a 9-hole round using this point system:

1. No longer will the Inside Sales Rep be a “jack of all trades”. Roles will be clearly defined and measured based on specific desired outcomes.

   Segmentation/specialization is still a hot topic. We are seeing some hesitance on the part of smaller organizations to specialize but, for those that have adopted the strategy, specialization often leads to dramatically increased productivity.
   Score: Birdie

2. Data will become an integral component for predicting the likelihood of Inside Sales success. No longer will companies buy data from one vendor but rather they will create a network of data providers to deliver to them the specific information in their target markets.

   I actually think this problem got worse last year. People will invest in everything but data. If you got something wrong 30% every time you tried it, wouldn’t you look for a better way? Well, at least 30% of your database is bad and your sales and marketing teams have to work with it … not good!
   Score: Snowman

"There's something happening here." That was the thought that went through my head when I learned that three folks I respect tremendously (Paul Roetzer, David Meerman Scott & Mitch Joel) are all reading the same book:

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson.

My second thought was back to a piece of advice from Trish’s new ebook Sales Onboarding: the express route from hire-to-revenue.

So heading over to Amazon, I was blown away to see the Jobs book at #2 in the Top 100 Books (not just business books – all books).

I’d argue that if your perfect buyer cares deeply about:

• Products
• Marketing
• Innovation
• Entrepreneurship
  -or-
• Leadership