196: Changes in the B2B purchasing world - with Gary Kurtz

About Gary Kurtz

Gary Kurtz is a sales and marketing professional, father of three, husband to an incredible woman, and a great friend to a lot of great people (not in that order). Gary works each day to be a little bit better in each part of his life and to make life better for those around him. Gary is known for hard work, big laughs, and going all out in everything that he does.

 

Where do sales and marketing meet?

“The difference between a salesperson and a marketing person is that a salesperson talks to customers and does more traveling. Other than that, they’re kind of meeting in the middle.”

 

What do you look for when interviewing new employees?

“More so than ever, cultural fit, I think is more important. Are they going to be reliable? Is there integrity? Can they stand up to your company's values and also do the job?”

 

What are the trends in the B2B purchasing world?

“The biggest trend that we're seeing in in B2B, and probably the same thing with B2C, is that there's a large, very large amount of decisions that are being made prior to anybody picking up a call. You know, people know that as soon as they are clicking on a link on something that they're going to be being followed in the nurturing campaign start.”

“You see an iceberg and there's only, you know, an eighth of it that's showing out of the water, and everything underneath it is where people are making decisions now.”

 

Can you share with me your most successful or favorite networking story/experience that you’ve had?

“I met somebody at a trade show, like seven years ago. And like a half a year later…they called me, and they asked for just a small auxiliary product that costs like $300. And like we got to talk in that time. I was kind of saying them a bunch of headaches because their immediate supplier had ran out of something. If you fast forward, you know, five years now, we've done like $3 million with that company. And it all started with a conversation at a trade show.”

 

How do you stay in front of or best nurture your network community?

“The best thing that you can do for somebody is to reach out and just say hello every once in a while.”

 

What advice do you have for the professional on growing their network?

“Don't stop. I would say even when you're tired, and there's that event that's happening, go to it. When you're out and you're like, ‘okay, well, maybe I'll call it an early night tonight’, go out and do it.”

 

Digital networking or traditional networking?

“It's probably traditional, but when you're digitally networking, I think the best way to do it is to be moving towards traditional networking.”

 

If you could go back to your 20-year-old self, what would you tell yourself to do more or less of regarding your career?

“I would save more, for sure…I would definitely say saving is one of the things that you have to do no matter what, even if you're putting away 3%.”

 

We’ve all heard of the 6 degrees of separation… Now, who would be the one person you’d love to connect with, and do you think you could do it within the 6th degree?

“Shaq is a sales and marketing powerhouse…everything he touches, it turns to gold basically.”

 

What book are you reading right now?

“I just started reading Rocket Fuel in the EOS stuff. And that would probably be the second thing that I would tell people if you're a young person, is that you just can't stop reading.”

 

Any final words of advice for our listeners?

“Do something that's going to impact not only your life but other people so that they can find out who you are.”

 

You can get in contact with Gary at:

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