1) Sales Increase - If someone says sales went up 50%, always inquire about the quota because if sales were below quota before moving up, that's not as impressive as sales being at or above quota before going up 50%.
2) Quotas - Many people would be surprised to learn that a quota can mean something entirely different depending on the job, company or industry. For example exceeding the quota by 25% in the carpet cleaning industry probably wouldn't raise an eyebrow outside of the industry, yet that 25% is about the same as exceeding quota by 3 to 4 times in other industries (plus it can get you raves from your carpet cleaning manager - part of the reason for this difference is that no horizontal selling is involved in the carpet cleaning business for the order taking rep).
3) Two mail order businesses can sell the same item, yet one may be successful while the other may fail because that item can be a loss leader designed to generate names for the successful business to mail a catalog to while the unsuccessful business hasn't produced a catalog to help out with the backend.
Remember the big picture when you sell.
