The Business Development Series
Hosted by
This is a monthly training series offered to distributors and integrators that do business with AVPro Edge, each session will cover a topic that has nothing to do with technical product training, it will instead focus on a topic that relates to your business as an audio video professional. The goal of this series is to strengthen the business’s we are aligned with and build stronger industry bonds at the same time.
To host these sessions are none other than Alan and Jonathan Brawn of Brawn Consulting. The Brawns have been a major force in AV for many years winning countless training awards and consulting the biggest brands in our sector. Now you have a chance to gain the brawn wisdom though these specialized online training sessions that will make you a smarter & stronger company.
We are Kicking off the Business Development Series in the Month of May with our first session. Below you can find the entire schedule as well as links to register for the session:
Training available for you, and your co-workers
Registration is complete free if you are a customer or partner of AVPro Edge, we have all the sessions we are offereing below, feel free to sign up for one or all of them. Skip to the bottom if you are looking for a more specialized industry training for your staff only.
Register Here:
An Industry Evolves - May 27th, 2pm CST
This seminar illustrates how the AV industry has evolved from total product centricity “in the day” to the current AV experience. We explore the past, and present with the stark realities of the appearance of parity and commoditization. We illustrate new directions in sales and marketing. We reveal the manufacturers direct model, the distributor model and vertical market business development.
Facing a Commodity Paralysis and What to Do About It - June 24th, 2pm CST
Today customers are confronted with an avalanche of “sameness” and tend to buy based on price alone. This seminar establishes the concept of commodity paralysis as one of the most serious things we face. The course teaches the concept of differentiation and solving problems for customers and adding real value while avoiding sounding alike. The course introduces the concept of proactive selling peripherals as part of the total solution and differentiating your company. By understanding and addressing the market realities of the 21st century we can increase sales, improve margins, reduce competition, and avoid the negative impact of commodity paralysis.
Customer Service Inside Out - July 29th, 2pm CST
This course is a tutorial on customer service and what it means. The course looks at the importance of “good” customers versus the effects of “bad” service. It covers setting up a customer service environment in a company and the types of people needed to be part of that group. The course examines active listening and the key role it plays. Customer complaints are discussed and what we should learn from them. It looks at what customers “really” want before a complaint becomes a real problem. Addressing complaints on the first contact is explained as well as the creation of a complaint escalation plan within a company. The course wraps up with a quick look at the ABCs of customer service and the creation of a satisfaction survey system to track performance.
Understanding Customer Personality Types - August 26th, 2pm CST
The common denominator in sales is dealing with people. While your previous training probably taught you how to find a potential customer and set up an appointment, it most likely did not prepare you adequately for the different personalities you will encounter. To negotiate with different buyer types, we need to be able to adapt our behavior and be flexible in our approach. This seminar focuses on the 4 basic personality types of buyers as well as combinations of types. It delves into understanding, handling, and negotiating with each type. By knowing the variables of personality makeup, a salesperson can reach their own goals more effectively.
Productive vs Busy - September 30th, 2pm CST
There are only 24 hours in a day and in these hectic times, it seems that there is never enough time! The concept of being too busy to get it all done begs a critical question is: In your day-to-day lives are you being busy or productive? There is no question that many of us are too busy but digging beneath the surface of being busy with task after task, what are we really getting done, and are we moving closer to our goals and objectives or just treading water? This course focuses on the difference between busy and productive and how the difference can change your life.
Problem-Solving in the Workplace - October 28th, 2pm CST
Are “problems” part of your everyday work life? Most would answer emphatically, "Yes!" The fact is, most of us have no training in the process of problem solving or decision making and do not know how to do it effectively. People tend to experience three things when faced with a problem:
- They suffer apprehension and a degree of fear wishing it would simply go away.
- The urge is to produce an immediate answer and point the finger elsewhere.
- There is a feeling of a need to produce the “right” answer.
This seminar introduces the 7-step process to problem solving at work. As one pundit opined, “Being faced with a problem becomes a problem. And that in itself is a problem because, in fact, there are always going to be problems!”
We are also going to be offering specialized courses for management as well as sales training, these sessions will be a little different and more focused for specific job duties. If you would like you management team or sales team to take one of these classes please email tom@avproglobal.com so we can lock down the time that works for you and the hosts.
Effective Management a Proven Approach:
In Pro AV, IT, and digital signage we study technologies, design, and integration but often we ignore the area of management. The ability to manage a team is paramount to success. In this tutorial based on the best seller “First Break All the Rules” we explore the conventional wisdom of management and how this often impedes our progress. We introduce management techniques to select/hire for talent and manage the end results. We provide a simple group of 12 questions that when answered will tell you more about your own company’s management and the psyche of your employees than you ever thought possible.
Sales, Your Role and the Importance of You (Eight-hour long sessions broken up into 4 two-hour seminars)
Every year we celebrate AV, IT, and digital signage technologies. Left out until now has been teaching new sales skills necessary to take advantage of the solutions we provide. How we sell is different today than ever before. The goal of this seminar is to bring the sales profession on par with the level of what we sell by showing best practices and new techniques that have most recently come into prominence.
Today the technologies we sell are different but so are the relationships with our customers. The focus is no longer about a product but rather solving problems and creating an AV experience that adds value beyond the products we sell.
The only constant is change and the pace of change is accelerating bringing new opportunities. We discuss impediments to new opportunities including the “appearance” of parity and commodity paralysis. We explore the need for differentiation and that today the difference is “you” the salesperson. The course includes:
a. The history of sales.
b. Exploring “you” the salesperson.
c. Synthesizing today’s sales models.
d. Differentiate by adding your value.
e. Understanding customer personalities.
f. Handling objections/continuances/rejections.
g. Being productive versus busy.
h. The buyers, sellers, and influencers.
i. Keys to success.
Alan C. Brawn – CTS, DSCE, DSDE, DSNE, DCME, ISF, ISF-C
Alan Brawn is a principal of Brawn Consulting, an audio visual consulting, training, educational development, and market intelligence company with national exposure to major manufacturers and integrators in the industry. He was formerly President of Telanetix and previously National Business Development Manager and National Product Marketing Manager, Pro AV Group, Samsung Electronics. Alan is an AV industry veteran with experience spanning over 3 decades including management of a Pro AV systems integration company for 7 years, and one of the founding members of Hughes-JVC back in the early 1990s. He is a recognized author for leading AV industry magazines such as Systems Contractor News, AV Technology, Digital Signage Magazine, and Rental & Staging. Alan has been an Imaging Science Foundation fellow and instructor since 1994, and co-founder of ISF Commercial. He holds CTS certification, is a senior faculty member of InfoComm and the moderator of the ANSI Projected Image System Contrast Ratio (PISCR) standard. Brawn was awarded the InfoComm Volunteer of the Year Award in 2011 and he is the past Chairman of the Digital Signage Federation and the Pro AV Hall of Fame recognition from rAVe in 2004. Alan Brawn received the Fred Dixon Lifetime Achievement in AV Education from InfoComm in 2015