While you head out to visit clients and prospects, here are some promotional ideas for November:

November will be Aviation History Month, Lung Cancer Awareness Month, MADD’s Tie One on For Safety Month, National Adoption Month, AIDS Awareness Month, Alzheimer’s Disease Month, and National Vegan Month.

Kids’ Goal Setting Week - November 15-19
National Family Week - November 18-24
National Men Make Dinner Day - November 1st
Sadie Hawkins Day - November 3rd
Daylight Savings Time ends - November 4th
General Election Day - November 6th
Veterans Day - November 11th
America Recycles Day - November 15th
Great American Smokeout Day - November 15th
Thanksgiving Day - November 22nd
National Salespersons’ Day - November 23rd
Black Friday - November 23rd

A great resource for managers (and sellers who will be managers one day) is Sales & Marketing Management magazine. I recently read a post I thought would interest those of you trying to solve one of the greatest challenges managers face…hiring superstars.

Mistake 1: Relying only on interviews to evaluate a candidate
Mistake 2: Using successful people as models
Mistake 3: Too many criteria
Mistake 4: Evaluating “personality” instead of job skills
Mistake 5: Using yourself as an example
Mistake 6: Failure to use statistically validated testing to predict job skills most critical to success
Mistake 7: Not researching the reasons that people fail
Mistake 8: Relying on general “good guy” criteria
Mistake 9: Bypassing the reference check

Click here to read the entire post.

Want to really turn-off an advertiser? Want to over-hype your sales presentation? Want to look like a marketing amateur…instead of a marketing pro? Then you should just keep on using those CAPS, Bold text, and exclamation points!!! in your sales presentations. It’s not that they can’t ever be used, but only do so sparingly (very sparingly). All this over-hype only makes your pitch less meaningful.

Sit in your prospect’s seat. If your sales points are truly compelling, they should speak for themselves without the embellishment of dramatic text and punctuation. Selling in today’s business environment has become more and more delicate. No one wants to be sold…we want to buy. And when you overuse bold text, CAPS, and exclamation points!!!, you’re screaming at your prospects…and who wants to be screamed at during a sales pitch?