Category: Business Sales Training

In about 30% of all business trade relations between sales people and sales managers, both parties fall out with each other each year and is one of the reasons why you want sales training courses.

This has encouraged the Institute of Psychology of business to conduct a comprehensive study to interpret the hidden points of friction and potential areas of conflict between the sellers and sales managers.

The study in-depth interviews with representatives and sales managers about their experiences of working together. The evaluation was conducted, both as a comparison group and a specific torque.

What respondents think that the focus of this partnership is the company? The proposal shows that there are large differences in the way of thinking. Only three couples had a competition on the objectives of the company. Only half of all sellers believe that the increase of the rotation is the goal of leading the business. A third of sales managers, said the goal is to increase the market share of business basis.

These different views are quite surprising, taking into account the work of the same company. In essence, this serves to demonstrate the lack of communication in the relationship.

The issue of sales training courses targets confirms the lack of communication: only two couples were present. 40% of all providers said that sales goal is to become dominant, 40% said that creating a livelihood was his ambition predominant.

On the other hand, only a third of sales managers believe that increasing the rotation was the sellers ambition. No mention of the creation of life as a target and a third do not even identify their individual goals of the team were.

Gender and the distinction of support. Most sales of respondents said they felt supported by the previous cabinet. The type of support is assessed differently, however. Sales managers in essence, said he supported the representatives through sales training courses and meetings.

Almost all the representatives, however, seems to have been supported mainly through catalogs and brochures. Some thought they had received support from his former employer, or do not agree on the type of media impersonal company had given him.

What are typical problems in society? Half of the respondents said the main stumbling block is the difficulty of rotation, followed by corporate policy. A quarter of respondents said that cooperation with his former partner failed, mainly because of problems of information and communication, but only a few of the respondents see it as a management problem.

The turnover problem are based on a side, with a lower volume, and the arguments of others, on commission payments.

Most managers believe that sales of the vendors lack commitment.

The problems of corporate strategy resulting from differences in the strategy of paying the grievance procedure of the company to try and deliverability. In addition, some providers felt that the positive opportunities that are denied. Communication problems are mainly based on a lack of feedback, which has complained for many sales managers.

A typical problem encountered in the management of the vendor’s declaration that: “I called almost every day (for the sales manager) to see if I had no business” Sellers often felt were controlled and so that their free time are violated.

While sales managers constantly lament the management sales training courses that vendors do not contribute enough information about what is going on the market, sellers disagree with the teacher or demanding attitude, even their sales managers. Marketers emphasize their autonomy, while sales managers demand that their obligation is met control.

What experience is crucial usually the cause of division? Sales managers have had the excuse to break the most important relationship of a company is declining sales volume or quality of work ineffective in the interests of its sales force, leading to services disability and / or customer complaints.

Sales staff, meanwhile, attributes the causes of the decline in sales with the method of poor sales of the company or market changes.

How does the break take place? The break itself was considered by most as totally spectacular. The sales staff had a valid contract, were dismissed in accordance with the rules. Many companies, however, he tried to fill the place left for people before the expiry of the notice.

Plucots? Peacharine? Plueberry? In search for the perfect fruit, breeders are creating new hybrids. These hybrids seek to be juicier, sweeter, and easier to eat. As I walk through the grocery store and notice these new hybrids, it reminded me that a corollary exists for sales training. Just as people buy fruits they’re familiar with, companies have historically brought sales training around easily identified skills like: sales strategy, call execution, and negotiation. Why? Well first, that is how training vendors have organized their training offerings. Second, decision-makers are familiar with these topic programs – they’ve been around a long time and many decision-makers have been through them. However, just as our fruit breeding friends have become more innovative so is the case with sales training companies.

The sales training equivalent of a Peacharine has now been developed, tested, and the results look very promising. Second, if you are a major company in the B2B market you have already done the “topic” programs. Doing another one or replacing one with another is unlikely to move the needle on sales effectiveness. As a matter of fact the replacement approach is likely to lead to a degrading of results because the pluses of having a common language will be lost. Programs that focus only on one topic are not optimized to help a sales team meet a company’s strategic initiatives. To achieve a strategic initiative, effective sales training needs to be organized around achieving the strategic initiative – incorporating whatever skill sets and bodies of knowledge required to drive the initiative. In other words – a sales training hybrid. Today sales people must possess a new integrated skill set to get the job done successfully. They won’t develop this integrated skill set by attending more sales training programs – each containing a piece of the puzzle and leaving it up to sales people to “connect the dots”. Although some will, many won’t. For those of us in sales training meeting this challenge requires the following:

Working with the sales leadership to understand the nature and scope of the company’s strategic initiatives.
Identifying the new skill sets needed to drive the initiative and crafting them into learnable chunks.
Recognizing that programs need to be customizedto a greater degree than in times past.
Crafting hybrid programs that utilize state-of-the-art learning designsthat help sales reps learn the skill sets and connect the dots.
While the plums and cherries individually are quite tasty, there is a place for the Plueberry. The Peacharine won’t move peaches and nectarines off green grocers shelves. And plums and apricots will still be desired, along with Pluots. Well, the same is true with sales training. There is still a need for topic programs to master the sales essentials like how to plan and execute a call. But, there is also an emerging need to take the next step – hybrids are a part of that next step journey.

With a great product, must come great education too! Your product won’t be any good if the sales team is not given adequate sales training. It is an important aspect of the sales process and helps in generating new leads, developing and achieving sales targets, and acquiring new business. Did you know retaining a loyal customer base is 7 to 10 times less costly than acquiring new ones?

However, a recessionary period and a plethora of options available to customers have made the sales process demanding one. You need to invest in it through training to reap the profits of increased revenues.

How to go about sales training? Here are 7 steps which will help you in doing so:

1. Develop a strategic plan

You need to establish what you need the training to deliver. For instance, according to research, 92% of communication with clients is telephonic in nature. If your sales are seeing a drop, you might want to conduct a training session highlighting basic telephone etiquettes as well as sales skills such as fact finding.

2. Develop targets

With sales targets in place, you will know what to achieve out of the sales process. You want your sales to increase and know that 80% of your sales team contributes to less than 20% of your sales objectives, you know which non-performers to weed out.

3. Sales training schedule

Instead of investing in one or two day seminars, go for regular sales training. There is a limit to what a human brain can absorb in one day seminar. Learning schedules which are shorter and more regular as well as consistent will deliver you greater results. They will engage the sales force and improve their skill set.

4. Attitude improvement

More than lack of knowledge, it is poor attitude which leads to dropping sales performance. Successful training should not only build on the knowledge of the sales force but also build positive habits in them.

5. Sales training curriculum

Adapt sales training curriculum to your industry, organization and product strategy. Make use of interactive tools such as team building exercises. Successful training will be rounded off by an experienced facilitator.

6. Communication

Communicate your expectations from the training to facilitator as well as the team. Your sales force will be more engaged in training if they know it is an investment on them and is playing a crucial role in the success of the company.

7. Commitment

The sales team will take some time in forming, norming(resolving issues) and then performing. It needs to stay on track for extracting the most out of training. Time and motivation is needed for sales training to deliver great results.