Let’s talk 49ers. No, not those 49ers. This isn’t another sports related posting. We’re talking gold in the hills. More specifically, we're talking about mining that gold. 

We humans crave the stuff. And Planet Earth, just you try and stop us from getting at it. Billions of tons of rock and dirt in the way? Extreme risk of bodily harm or death? Well, sure, but look how shiny it is! We want it, we love it, we need it! And this sentiment has remained pretty much unchanged since the dawn of civilization.

What has changed a lot, however, are the methods for finding and extracting it.

Just to name a few, the ancient Egyptians used a method known as fire-setting (which actually dates back to pre-historic times), where fires were set against rock walls to heat the rock until it cracked and could be removed more easily. Then in the 19th century, explosives were a huge game changer, for obvious reasons. And modern hydraulic mining, where high-pressure water was used to literally move mountains to get at the gold, was developed during the aforementioned California gold rush.

And hand tools for just good old fashioned digging have been made from all kinds of things over the years. At one time we used deer shoulder blades to make shovels. And of course human kind’s long time partner in grime, flint, was used to fashion digging tools long before we mastered metals. Now we even use robotics to increase effectiveness and safety.

Prospecting, the practice of figuring out where gold is most likely hiding, before the heavy digging even starts, has seen massive technologically driven changes too. What was previously a lot of guesswork and hoping (though that’s always going to be part of the equation), modern methods now utilizes satellite imagery and seismic wave detection.

Selling has seen its own big shifts over the years. Like getting at gold, finding customers is really hard work, so a lot of effort and ingenuity has been put into upping the chances of success.

We in the sales game have always jumped on technological advances in communication and analysis (at least the smart and successful ones). Not long after Alexander Graham Bell told his assistant, “Mr. Watson. Come here. I need you,” in the first ever telephone conversation, salesmen jumped on the phone to let prospects know that they needed to come buy his product. And it continued from there. Ever made a sale with email? Actually a better question would be, when was the last time you made a sale that didn’t involve the barely two decades old technology? Now there’s search, and social, and on and on.

Here at salesforce.com, we’re pretty proud of the contribution we’ve made to the world of sales technology. Our main prospecting tool, Data.com, is a ground breaking new way to find new customers. Like those advances in prospecting for gold, Data.com helps you considerably up your chances of striking it rich by letting you know where potential customers are. It’s putting the cold call out of its misery.

Free prospecting webinar

Interestingly enough, one of our biggest success stories for taking advantage of sales technology is, well, us. (How’s this for a testimonial ad headline? “Salesforce.com has used Salesforce to become a $24.7 billion company in 13 years.”) And fortunately for you, we’ve never been shy about sharing the methods that have helped us obtain so many customers so quickly. After all, what better way to spread the word on how well products like Data.com works than showing off how well it works for us?

As a matter of fact, we’re going to be doing some sharing in the near future in the form of a free webinar, “Prospect like the pros at salesforce.com.” Sales pros from salesforce.com will be teaching 5 key steps to better prospecting, including how they use Data.com. Register now and join me to get the lowdown on some of the unique methodologies that have helped our reps score some serious gold.

Speakers:

Michael Cammarata, Manager EBR team, salesforce.com
Jim Sinai, Director Product Marketing, Data.com

Date: February 13

Register now to join me.