3. Several sites are available on the Web that provide benchmarking services. One such site is Best Practices, LLC (www.best -in -class.com), a research and consulting firm that provides business insight and analysis of how world-class companies achieve exceptional economic and operational performance. Access this site and review its services.

a. How can a company such as this be useful to a sales manager attempting to improve the sales organization?

b. From the Best Practices, LLC home page, click on the “Products and Services” tab. Next, locate and click on “Best Practices Database” and scroll through the listing of available databases. In the listing of databases, locate and select “Sales Leadership.” You do not need to be a subscribing member to look through their database of best practices in sales leadership. Notice the different areas of sales leadership for which they provide best practices. Click on “Sales Force Effectiveness” and examine the diverse reports available. Select one that offers Free Excerpt to Non-members and read through the excerpt. Look through the other areas comprising the Sales Leadership section and some of the other free excerpts available. Identify two reports that might be helpful for improving a sales organization’s effectiveness and briefly explain how each report’s information might be used.

c. Locate another benchmarking service on the Web. Identify its address and briefly describe its services. Compare and contrast its services to those of Best Practices, LLC.