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| Sales Training Information |
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Whats Your Sales Training Goal - Exposure or Behavioral Change?
When your company invests in sales training, what is the expected outcome? Is it a change in how your salespeople perform their daily activities - in other words, a change in behavior? Unfortunately, most companies drastically underestimate the amount of time and effort that must be invested to accomplish behavioral change. Sitting in a class for a couple of hours or days is a good way to expose salespeople to new skills and techniques. However, new skills and techniques often feel strange and uncomfortable. Many salespeople worry that attempting to use the new skills and techniques with real, live prospects or customers will cost them sales and hard-won credibility. So, they abandon the new skills and techniques and continue to rely on "old" behaviors that are comfortable for them. Here is a real-life example of a sales training program failure: Executive management at a company I worked for invested more than $600,000 to teach the entire sales team (100+ salespeople) a new sales approach. However, at every turn they looked for ways to reduce training costs and time out of the field. As a result, the sales manager training session was cut from a full day to half a day, and the sales team training was cut from three days to a day and a half. Plus, post-training conference calls (intended to reinforce key concepts) were rescheduled multiple times and eventually cancelled. What was the return on the company's $600,000 investment? Only 10% to 20% of the salespeople ever applied the new sales approach in the field. The training project was considered a failure. If you want your sales training investments to produce changes in your salespeople's behavior, your company's entire management team, from top executives to individual sales managers, needs to make a different level of commitment to sales training. The skills and techniques that are taught during training sessions must be repeated and reinforced on a regular and consistent basis. Plus, you should provide your salespeople with a non-threatening environment where they can practice new skills and techniques until they become second nature. To further demonstrate the level of management commitment that is required to accomplish behavioral change, consider the following two scenarios. Scenario #1 A top executive mentions the importance of a new sales approach in a company meeting or conference call. They mention it again occasionally (once a month or once a quarter). The sales manager also mentions the new approach in a few sales meetings before or after the training session(s). However, the focus soon returns to "business as usual". Scenario #2 A top executive explains the importance of a new sales approach in a company meeting or conference call. From that point on, they repeat the message in any conversation they have with any member of the sales or sales management team. The new sales approach becomes part of the executive's daily dialogue, and they mention it multiple times a day. Sales managers invest the time required to become proficient in using the new sales approach. They also explain to their salespeople that each salesperson will be held accountable for using the new approach effectively in the field. They help their salespeople become comfortable using the new approach by conducting repeated role plays in individual and group meetings. They also inspect for use of the new approach in a consistent and predictable fashion. This level of management commitment causes the salespeople to recognize that the new approach is not "the flavor of the month", and it will NOT go away if they ignore it. As a result, the new approach eventually becomes part of the company's sales culture. Do you see the difference in the level of commitment described by the two scenarios? Do you see why the second scenario is much more likely to produce lasting behavioral change? In summary, if you want to change your salespeople's behavior, your company's entire management team needs to demonstrate a different level of commitment to sales training. Here are the recommended steps for this process: Copyright 2005 -- Alan Rigg Sales performance expert Alan Rigg is the author of How to Beat the 80/20 Rule in Selling: Why Most Salespeople Don't Perform and What to Do About It. To learn more about his book and sign up for more FREE sales and sales management tips, visit http://www.8020performance.com.
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You don't have to be a salesperson to do this, yet you do need to put at least some of your focus on sales to be successful, whether it is yourself doing the closing or are someone you hire. After you have done the difficult part, which is prospecting, you need to close. This is not really hard but is the singlemost important step. The final close happens when you ask the prospect to make a decision. Selling and marketing, as you may have guessed by now, are actually 2 seperate things completely. Have You Prepared for Success in Sales? My wife and I watched the movie Ray a couple of weeks ago when it came out on DVD. In the movie Jaime Foxx plays the legendary singer Ray Charles. I was amazed at how Jaime had captured the essence of Ray Charles. Many times throughout the movie I wondered if it was Jaime Foxx or Ray Charles I was seeing on my TV. 10 Power-Packed Ways To Spark Your Sales 1. Spend money on targeted advertising instead of mass media advertising. You don't want to waste your ad dollars on people who aren't interested. Its All in the Questions Contrary to many of the books on how to be an effective salesperson, selling in today's market place is just the same as yesterday's. Goods and services are still being bought and sold. Success is still measured by how many sales you close and the profitability within each sale. 10 Killer Ways To Multiply Your Sales Would you like to multiply your web site sales? Or course you would, who wouldn't? :) Then take a close look at the following 10 killer ways to multiply your sales... How to Sell to the Devils Advocate There is a car commercial running were a husband is sitting in a car with the salesperson. The wife is standing outside the vehicle looking in on her husband, but unable to hear the conversation inside. Though the husband has a "I'm beating up the sales guy for the best deal" look on his face, he's nicely asking the salesman to just "play along" to make his wife think he's working the salesman over in order to get a great deal on the car. The Processionary Caterpillar Syndrome Costs You Sales? Some years ago I read and interesting story that illustrated why many of the sales and service industry professionals that invest their time and money in my personal telephone coaching sessions ( http://www.TheSellingEdge.com/personalCoaching.htm ) have until the coaching sessions have failed to move beyond an intellectual understanding of sound selling principles. Do you have the processionary caterpillar syndrome? Maximize Sales and Minimize Returns with Learning Styles In the day-to-day operation of an online business we can sometimes lose sight of what we want to achieve as opposed to how we actually go about achieving it. For us to achieve our goals of financial independence and time freedom we need to have customers. Most peoples understanding of customer acquistion stops at this point. As They Approcah the Finish Line... The Winner Is? Recently, right before I was about to deliver a motivational speech at a sales conference, the Director of Sales took the stage and began talking about the importance of teamwork and how all the reps needed to work more effectively together. At the conclusion of his presentation, he turned to a large flip chart and turned the front page over. Business Appointment Success or Failure One of the quickest ways to loose a sale is to be late for an appointment. A businessperson's character, among other things, may be judged by their punctuality. Some prospects may see it as a slap in the face if you are late for your meeting with them. They may view it as a sign you have no regard for your own word, or their time. And you cannot be depended upon. So why should they do business with the likes of you? Sales: The Secrets Of Super Salesmanship Exposed Most people tremble when they hear the word "sales". Follow-Up Marketing: How to Win More Sales with Less Effort A study done by the Association of Sales Executives revealed that 81% of all sales happens on or after the fifth contact. If you are a small business owner and you are only doing one or two follow-ups imagine all the business you are losing. Assumptions The Hidden Sales Killer Assumptions can kill a sale. In my sales training workshops, I frequently discuss the importance of not making assumptions about a person before, during, or after the sales process. Participants frequently nod and tell me that they NEVER make assumptions. One person (Doug Maquire, www.MaquireMarketing.com) sent me this story of a situation that occurred in a department store he worked in many years ago.
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