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sales training

Why Sales Coaching is the Most Effective Way to Scale Up Your Business

In sales productivity training, sales coaching is the most important lever to pull

But what is sales coaching?

The process begins with a conversation between the manager and the rep, who will work together to set goals for the next quarter or year. The manager will also review their performance over the last three months, including calls made, lead generation, and close rates.

After this initial discussion, it’s time for some training! First, the manager will provide a list of resources for the rep to use during their time off from work, including books or online courses that focus on improving specific parts of your sales process (such as prospecting).

Once the rep has completed their training, they’ll enter the field armed with new knowledge. Their manager will check in regularly with them by phone or email while they’re working—and if they need help with anything along the way, there are always experts who can provide further assistance and mentoring as required.

What to Expect from Sales Coaching

What to Expect from Sales Coaching

Sales coaching is a method of developing and maintaining your sales team’s skills so they can achieve their goals. It is a process that involves giving feedback to reps, who will then use this feedback to improve their performance.

Here are some benefits that a sales team can acquire from sales coaching:

#1: Retention Rates

Sales coaching improves employee retention rates by helping managers understand their employees’ goals and motivators, so they can help them achieve those goals within the company. It also helps employees understand how their work fits into the bigger picture of the company’s goals, so they don’t feel as disconnected or unappreciated as they might otherwise do if left entirely up to their devices.

It includes:

  • Encouraging the employee to set goals and make plans for achieving those goals;
  • Helping employees identify what they need to do to succeed;
  • Providing feedback on how well employees are doing and helping them learn from mistakes;
  • Assisting employees to develop a realistic view of their strengths and weaknesses; and
  • Making sure that managers have the skills they need to coach effectively.

#2: Best Practices

Sales coaching is an excellent way to share best practices and learn from others.

It’s important to remember that sales coaching is not just about you and your business. Instead, it’s a chance to learn how other people do things, how they handle certain situations, and what methods work well for them.

Sales coaching can also be an excellent opportunity to share your best practices and help others improve their sales skills.

#3: Maximize Training

Training is essential to the success of your organization’s sales team, but it is not enough. A large part of becoming a great salesperson is developing the skills and confidence to implement that training.

Using a qualified sales coach is the best way to ensure that your sales training is practical. In addition, sales coaching maximizes your investment in sales training by helping you to apply what you’ve learned, providing feedback on how well you are doing, and helping you to develop new skills and strategies.

Coaching Goals

Coaching Goals

Sales coaching is an integral part of improving your business’s sales. Your sales team should be coached on building relationships with potential customers, developing a rapport, and closing the deal.

There are many different types of sales coaching that you can implement in your business. For example, you can choose from one-on-one coaching, group classes, or webinars. Each kind will have its advantages and disadvantages.

For example, one-on-one coaching allows you to get individualized attention for each employee but can be expensive and time-consuming. Group classes allow employees to learn from each other but may not provide enough support for some people who need more individualized attention. Webinars are cheap but have a lower retention rate than different types of sales coaching because they do not involve face-to-face interaction between coach and employee.

If you’re in a new market and trying to build a foundation of relationships, it might be more important to focus on developing rapport with clients than closing deals. On the other hand, if you’ve already achieved some traction in the market, but want to improve your conversion rates, then it might make sense to focus on improving how you present yourself and what you say during sales calls.

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Sales Technology sales training

The How and Why of Building Your Sales Stack

64% of Sales Reps’ Time Goes to Non-Selling Tasks: Here’s How to Fix This

Did you know the average sales professional uses 64% of their day on tasks other than selling? That’s 64%! That’s a lot of productivity lost. Most of the time, that’s because reps aren’t equipped with the right technology for today’s buyers, or they don’t have the skills or knowledge to access or deliver data from their CRM.

Fortunately, there are dozens of sales tools that can help. In this post, we’ll cover some of the best apps for sales and rate them based on multiple factors.

Working Smarter with a Sales Stack

What is a sales tech stack? It’s a collection of tools that help sales teams do their job better. Put simply, using a sales tech stack helps sales reps boost productivity and access essential data. The right sales technologies can turn your helpless team into an invincible sales machine in no time.

Having a sales technology stack enables sales teams to spend less time on administrative tasks, freeing them up to focus on what they do best — selling! It also simplifies the sales process by automating the collection, organization, and management of data and accounts. For example, salespeople can easily access their prospecting lists and search through past records of conversations and notes.

Building Your Sales Stack

Do you want to know what sales stack is the best fit for your company? Chances are, most, if not all, of your competitors, also run into this dilemma. Your decision is going to come down to what works for your company the best.

There are certain tools companies use and swear by — yet there are other businesses that have the exact opposite stack. Everyone has their favorite tools (sometimes called stacks) that help them do their job — whether they’re a developer, designer, or marketer. This is ultimately what sets you apart from your competitors: the solutions you’re able to create with the right tools. 

CRM

CRM

If you’re like us, you work with a vast number of leads each month. Some are old, and most are cold, so it’s not easy to remember who they are and where they are in the sales process, right? That’s where a CRM comes in. A CRM database is like a giant database that stores all your leads (or contacts) information. A CRM makes it easy to keep track of all the critical information that you need to know about your contacts, so you can easily reach them when the time is right.

Having a CRM that works for you can drastically improve your marketing and sales process. For example, if you’re not catching every lead and customer and staying organized with the lead follow-up process, then you could be losing out on potential customers. And missed opportunities to convert can cost you money – and lots of it if you’re not doing things correctly.

Popular CRMs include:

Lead Generation

Lead Generation

When we think of sales, we might picture a guy in a pink shirt with a cigar smoking on a boat. Times have certainly changed, but lead generation is still an essential part of the sales process.

For some people, prospecting can be an arduous task. You may get lost in the day-to-day tasks, struggling to find the time to research new leads and contact them. If you’ve ever had one of those days when you’re just not feeling it, lead generation and prospecting tools can help.

Popular lead generation tools include:

Automation

Automation

Automation is the key to boosting your sales team’s productivity.

Hiring a new employee takes time, money, and resources. Not only that, but the employee will need training and development before they can perform at the level your business requires.

Automation is fast, reliable, and cost-effective. It can be set up quickly without any additional training required for your staff. There are no supplemental materials or costs involved in using automation software compared to hiring an employee who would need these things!

If you want to grow your business and make sure it stays profitable every year—automate!

Popular automation tools include:

Sales Training Systems

Sales Training Systems

Sales training systems help companies provide employees with the information they need to succeed in their jobs. Using a sales training system is an effective way for companies to train employees in a systematic manner that reduces costs and improves performance.

Sales reps are the lifeblood of your business. Without them, you don’t have a company—you just have a bunch of people who work in an office.

So it’s essential to make sure your sales team is equipped with the knowledge and tools they need to be successful. That way, they can deliver on their end of the deal by selling as much as possible and bringing in revenue for your company.

We’ve got you covered with sales training systems!

The best sales training systems include:

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pipeline development Sales Management sales performance sales pipeline Sales Play Sales Process sales skills sales strategy sales training

Why Knowing Key Decision Makers in Prospective Accounts Matters

Sometimes, we find ourselves with too many prospects sitting in front of us. The problem is that not all of them are good.

How do you know which ones are worth spending time on? And how do you ensure that the people who are ready to buy your product or service do? 

Here’s a quick guide to help you out:

  • Set up meetings with people who have expressed interest or are willing to commit to your product/service. This can be done through inbound marketing or a cold call.
  • Use qualifying questions during the initial phone call to determine whether they’re a good fit for the position. They should be able to answer these questions without hesitation:
  • What problem does this solve for your company?
  • How much money will this save you over time?
  • What impact will this have on your business operations?
Focusing on the Right People

Focusing on the Right People

It’s no secret that making a sale is more than just finding a lead. You need to be able to convert that lead into a customer, but how? The answer is simple: by using social media.

With the right social selling strategy, you can get in front of the people who will most likely buy your product or service. It’s a great way to increase sales and reach a new audience simultaneously.

Most B2B companies are using social media these days to find potential customers. They’re using it to connect with them in real-time and build relationships that lead to sales.

This is because social media has become an essential part of business culture. The average consumer spends about five hours daily on social media sites like LinkedIn and Twitter! That’s a lot of time for companies to connect with potential buyers—and win new clients.

Having More Than One Key Contact Per Account

Having More Than One Key Contact Per Account

If you work with just one person in each account and they leave, or something happens to them, you will be left without access to that client. So it’s much better to build a team of people who know you and your product well.

To be sure, establishing multiple relationships with key decision-makers is crucial. But what happens when you’ve identified your entire target list and have built relationships with everyone on it? You still need to keep working and growing those relationships because they are not static—they change and evolve like your company.

When you have one relationship in an account, you have a greater chance that the other people in that account won’t know you or your value proposition. If they don’t know you or your value proposition, they won’t be able to help you make deals. This can lead to wasted efforts because nobody knows who you are or why you’re there.

On the other hand, if you build multiple relationships within an account and with different stakeholders (for example, executives and mid-level managers), then these people will be able to introduce you to others within their organization who might also benefit from knowing about your product or service offerings. In addition, this strategy allows for more opportunities for introductions and referrals without relying solely on one person who may not always be available due to their busy schedule or priorities within the company.

The fact is that your customers are going to change too. That means that if you don’t stay involved in your customers’ lives and how they use your product or service, you risk becoming irrelevant—and potentially losing them altogether.

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Sales Advice sales fundamentals Sales Inspiration Sales Play Sales Process sales skills sales strategy sales training Social Selling Social Selling Tools Social Selling Training

4 Storytelling Techniques That Will Rock Your Sales

Sales professionals have always used storytelling to persuade and inspire. Abraham Lincoln used advertising stories to speak out against slavery with the help of the newspaper. Mary Kay Ash took part in personal development classes through storytelling. 

Today, salespeople and other professionals rely on marketing stories for different purposes such as sharing tips, inspiring, or even persuading customers. Mark Zuckerberg has admitted that Facebook was initially built because he wanted people to share their stories. 

Have you ever had a salesperson tell you how good a product or service was, and it just left you cold? You’ve heard the story before from another seller — the same features, the same benefits, the same story — and decided to buy from someone else. 

I’m not interested in telling you that my product will save your business $10,000 per month. I’d rather show you. This is the mindset you should always have when making your pitch.

How To Craft Stories That Sell

#1: Create a connection powered by relevance

Create a connection powered by relevance

Stories have the ability to create a connection between your audience and what you are trying to sell. It should be based on real-life experiences and not be theoretical or too much in the future.

For example, if you’re selling advertising space for a website, don’t talk about how great it would be to have an unlimited supply of targeted traffic. Tell them what happened when your client ran out of targeted traffic and couldn’t afford to pay their bills.

If you sell medical insurance, tell them about a client who lost her job due to an illness and had no way to pay her medical bills.

If you sell financial services, tell them how you were able to help someone get out of debt or plan for retirement by using those products.

#2: Compel through concrete storytelling

Compel through concrete storytelling

When we tell stories, we’re not just recounting events — we’re building connections. A story is a way of showing the kind of person you are and the values you hold.

When you tell a story, you’re doing more than just sharing an experience — you’re creating an emotional connection with the other person. And when they connect with you, they see themselves in your story and realize that they can relate to it as well.

To make your stories memorable, use concrete details.

In order to make your stories more powerful and compelling, you need to be able to tell them from different angles. That’s why most people have a hard time telling good stories. They can only think about one angle at a time.

But when you understand how stories work on multiple levels, you can change your perspective on any given story and see it from many different angles. This will help you make your stories better and more engaging for your audience.

#3: Honesty is still the best policy

Honesty is still the best policy

Storytelling is an art form that can be used to connect with your audience, create a sense of community, and prompt them to take action.

The best sales stories are simple, authentic, and memorable. They’re told in a way that feels natural and relatable to the listener.

Stories help you connect with your customers on a deeper level by getting inside their heads and making them feel something genuine — empathy, excitement, or even fear.

But too many salespeople fall into the trap of using canned or trite phrases when they try to tell a story. This makes it harder for listeners to relate to what you’re saying because it doesn’t sound like something they would actually say.

A great way to illustrate concepts or processes is by using examples from your own life or from other people’s lives. For example, if you’re selling software that helps businesses track their inventory, talk about how this software has helped other businesses reduce costs because they didn’t have to ship out extra inventory when they sold out of a particular item. Or if you’re selling an online course on personal finance management, share stories about how people have been able to pay down debt by setting up savings accounts for emergencies and sticking to their budgets.

#4: Tell your story with flair

Tell your story with flair

Storytelling is about more than just telling a tale; it’s about sharing an experience that connects with the audience. And this is how you get customers to buy from you: by making them feel something.

So if you want to be an effective salesman, be an effective storyteller first!

Here are some storytelling techniques that will help you sell like a pro:

  • Use vivid details
  • Tell stories that reflect your audience’s concerns (and not yours)
  • Create characters with whom people can empathize
  • Focus on what matters most to your audience

Storytelling is an art form that engages people at an emotional level — it’s not just about facts and figures. It’s about connecting with people as human beings who have problems they want to be solved or desires they want to be fulfilled. When you tell stories in your presentations, you make yourself approachable as a person instead of just another vendor trying to sell something.

Alternatively, use analogies and metaphors to explain complex concepts more clearly.

Conclusion

Storytelling is an ancient art form.

It’s been around for thousands of years and has been used to tell all kinds of stories. The Bible, for example, is full of stories about people’s lives, struggles, and triumphs. Ancient Greek mythology is full of tales about gods and goddesses. And today, we are still telling stories through books, movies, television shows, and more.

But storytelling isn’t just for entertainment purposes — it can be a powerful tool in business as well. If you haven’t already realized this, then you need to start incorporating storytelling into your sales process immediately!

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The Importance of Reskilling Senior Sales Professionals

Maintaining competitive agility is becoming an essential corporate demand as new-age technologies dominate the business environment across industries. Traditional corporate operations are being disrupted, and new growth strategies and organizational processes are being implemented due to the ‘digital age.’

For both B2C and B2B markets, more businesses are changing how they sell and recognizing changing consumption trends. Artificial intelligence, natural language processing, machine learning, virtual reality, and chatbots, among other emerging technologies, are increasingly finding uses in sales.

Finding industry-ready people is getting more difficult as sales processes undergo this technological update, with a large gap between available and desired skill sets. Any investment in new-age sales tools will be a waste if teams cannot successfully use or interpret them.

The annual cost of lost production owing to a lack of essential attention to training and other learning activities is estimated to be almost $7 trillion. As a result, businesses must upskill their senior sellers for effective sales enablement, and they may ensure that their sales team remains relevant by implementing regular training efforts. This will ensure that they are prepared to respond to market shifts and technological advances.

opportunities for current and future sellers

Providing opportunities for current and future sellers

Sellers play a critical role in propelling the global economy forward. In today’s digital world, when tech-powered sales enablement tactics reinvent the seller’s journey, staying relevant necessitates knowledge with the most up-to-date tools. With practically every market player using cutting-edge tools, sellers must be kept up to date on the latest developments at each stage of the trip, or they will be left behind.

Sellers utilize AI-powered intelligent database systems to find new clients and expand their market penetration. Advanced data analytics and predictive modeling are becoming increasingly important tools for identifying potential buyers.

Similarly, firms turn to intelligent CRM technologies and marketing process automation for faster prospect outreach and better-qualified leads. Contrary to popular belief, data-driven, automated processes result in quicker sales, allowing sellers to manage their time better and prioritize their tasks. As a result, familiarizing your senior sellers with digital technologies and providing them with the necessary training is essential for a company’s sales divisions to become future-ready.

proper training strategy

Incorporating the proper training strategy

While training is essential for future-ready sellers, selecting the correct training concept and the program is equally important. You may start with an overview examination of the business functions to be trained and the identification of skill gaps and other factors, including location, medium, duration, and accessibility. The data gathered can be used to create an appropriate training structure aligned with essential business goals.

You may then streamline tasks following the training delivery plan. Finally, you must conduct a full assessment of the training program to determine top learning and make necessary modifications.

This training process can be considered a cycle aimed at sustaining sales team development in the face of technological disruption, diversification of the company’s operations, or even labor churn.

Aside from a well-thought-out approach, it’s critical to remember that the primary goal of training should not simply be to conduct an employee upskilling session. Instead, the focus should be on developing a long-term practice that adapts to shifting needs and market trends.

Furthermore, these programs should hone the analytical abilities of the sellers to use data-driven reports and draw meaningful insights, in addition to providing them with the know-how of the latest sales technologies.

In today’s technology-driven world, training programs must recognize the importance of the human voice and teach sellers how to improve their soft skills and have more personal client conversations. While most sellers acknowledge that quality training programs positively impact their engagements, businesses may reach 73 percent quota attainment with constant coaching methods. These efforts can aid companies in developing multitasking, dynamism, and culture of staying current in their sales force.

Coordinated actions to achieve actual reforms

Coordinated actions to achieve actual reforms

The training or learning strategy will need to be changed to account for the different skill requirements and forthcoming trends to tackle the problem of extraordinary market developments. It will also be critical to develop future-ready sellers by establishing a flexible and innovative curriculum in academic institutes and combining it with vocational courses and R&D centers to prepare the workforce to be industry-ready.

It is feasible to find and outline solutions for the most prominent learning demands of sellers by bringing together government functionaries, industry experts, and leading academics worldwide, thereby adjusting future sales teams to technologies that will likely arise.

Such coordinated efforts will not only build teams capable of delivering results in a fast-paced, continuously changing sales environment but will also instill a growth attitude in salespeople, allowing them to upskill and re-skill to stay ahead of the competition constantly.

As a result, educating the sales force and providing them with the abilities they will need to succeed in the future is critical to establishing long-term success.

To guarantee that learning experiences are engaging, enjoyable, and challenging, businesses must prioritize the need to upskill and reskill their sellers, especially the senior ones, and promote learning.

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Why Sales Professionals Should Make Time for Education

The current sales role necessitates constant learning, which demands enablement beyond onboarding. The sales market is more cutthroat than ever, requiring sellers to do more than just present the features and advantages of the solutions or services they’re offering. To attract buyers, sellers must build relationships, learn about their specific environment and difficulties, and demonstrate that their product is the best.

To prepare your sales team to achieve and surpass their requirements, you must provide them with continuing training and mentoring. As a leader, it is your responsibility to guarantee that your team is prepared for success by building a learning and coaching culture.

Sales training onboarding is an excellent approach to presenting your company’s history, solutions, culture, sales processes, etc. However, as your company, industry, and buyers evolve, your sellers must keep up to stay viable in the eyes of your prospective clients.

Beyond onboarding, continuous education — with the periodic review process, skills certifications, learning courses, and so on — provides a boatload of benefits for both your company and potential buyers. 

Benefits of Continuing Sales Education

Benefits of Continuing Sales Education

Improved sales preparation 

Sales preparedness, or how ready your sales team is to connect with clients throughout their journey, is improved by providing continuing development to your team. Sales reps are prepared and equipped to handle any buyer engagement when they master essential skills like communicating, product and industry expertise, managing objections, and building pipelines.

Higher winning rates

Your sales staff will perform better due to being more prepared for buyer discussions and having the abilities they need to personalize messaging. Increasing your success rates should be one of your sales training goals because it is a leading sign of your company’s market competitiveness.

Better employee retention

When sales professionals meet their objectives, they are more likely to stay with your organization. They will experience an increase in performance and, as a result, will be more willing to wait for the long haul if they receive the ongoing support they require from leadership. Over half of sellers who regarded their learning as successful were also very happy with their jobs.

How to Get the Most Out of Sales Training

How to Get the Most Out of Sales Training

Change your habits, and your life will change.

It doesn’t count toward your quota if you watch YouTube videos instead of studying the latest sales techniques. Browsing the news and watching the latest videos is a popular distraction, so ensure you and your team understand what constitutes effective sales practices, such as scheduling sales training at specified times.

Tailor your sales training to your business. 

While sales methods can be applied across businesses, special skills are frequently necessary for different industries. Selling vehicles, for example, necessitates another skill set than selling software to oil and gas businesses. Make sure the training you provide your sellers is specific to your industry.

Even if the training courses you look at don’t have much information about your sector, you and your team can best brainstorm how to utilize them for your target audience. Building a repository of industry-specific examples, anecdotes, case studies, activities, and resources is a vital first step in enhancing sales training that works.

Find out what your team expects from training and coaching.

Inquiring about your team’s preferred sales training materials and methods can go a long way toward gaining greater buy-in. If a team member enjoys webinars but prefers in-person or YouTube training, they may not be getting what they require. Try out webinar training to observe how your staff reacts.

Getting even one person enthused that you listened to their suggestions can encourage them to push the ball ahead and motivate others.

Appoint a notes and materials keeper.

It’s possible that going through notes gathered during training is just as crucial as the instruction itself. Ensure you have a system set up that allows teams to interact and access the content. Few things are more frustrating than investing in learning and having ideas fall by the wayside after a long weekend that pushes training to the back of your mind.

Conclusion

Confidence breeds success, and knowledge breeds confidence. You can help your sellers feel confident in what they’re doing, hold even the most demanding client contacts, and turn the most challenging situations into possibilities by providing competent and well-organized training.

Your sellers will become authentic representations of your company’s brand, vision, and values if adequately trained. Use these suggestions to help you structure your training program for optimal advantage and create a highly-skilled sales force where every new member is given the chance, knowledge, and support to succeed.

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sales training Workshop

How to Measure the Success of Sales Training

You have a fantastic product and a sales team eager to sell it. Maybe you are getting a regular stream of leads, and everything seems to be going well. However, it is natural to wonder if things can be better even when things are already going well as a business owner.

It can be difficult to assess your sales team’s efforts and effectiveness. You want to make sure they’re constantly doing everything they can to generate new sales for your company through lead generation and prospecting. However, you are aware that the modern B2B selling process takes time and, at times, luck.

So, how can you get rid of some of the ill-defined measures that have traditionally been used to measure sales effectiveness and replace them with valid, accurate key performance indicators? What metrics do you need to keep track of to get a clear picture of your sales team’s progress?

Elements to Consider When Monitoring Performance Post-Training

Elements to Consider When Monitoring Performance Post-Training

To acquire a comprehensive view of their sales team’s performance, every sales manager should track these essential elements.

Activity

Simply said, activity is a metric that tracks the daily actions that your sellers engage in to produce more leads and boost conversions. The manner you track activity will be determined by how your sales team typically tackles lead creation, but your KPIs might look like this:

  • Quantity of potential accounts in the seller’s pipeline
  • Daily outgoing or cold calls made
  • Emails sent out as part of an outreach campaign
  • Amount of scheduled demos
  • Number of booked meetings

Because all of these measures are simply quantifiable, sales managers can see what each seller’s daily output of effort looks like.

Sellers have little control over how many people respond to their email communications or how many cold calls are returned, but they have complete control over how many they make. As a result, assessing output is a better approach to gauge effort than using a response rate.

Quality

The quality of a sales team’s pipeline is the following KPI to consider when evaluating their performance. This will give you a good picture of how well your seller is prospecting and how well they understand your ideal consumer.

Quality can be quantified using KPIs such as:

  • Rates for return calls
  • Open rates for emails
  • Setting up a warm sales appointment
  • Trial demos given vis-a-vis sign-ups
  • How far leads get into a seller’s funnel

These KPIs are also simple to track, and they should be able to inform you which of your sellers have nailed their prospecting and outreach strategies and which need some improvement.

Tracking these KPIs is also an excellent opportunity for your sellers to share best practices with the rest of the team. Let’s imagine you see that every email sent out by one seller receives a 60% or higher open rate. Maybe they can discuss the kind of subject lines they’re using with the entire team and the methods they’re using to expand their email list.

Conversion

The result of all of the above processes is measured by conversion. Usually, conversion is determined by factors such as:

  • Conversion value on average
  • Ratios of a quote to close
  • Methods of contact sales
  • Customer retention
  • Time to close

While most sales managers use the list above to track their sales teams’ progress, you can’t just rely on conversion KPIs to determine success. You won’t get a complete picture of performance unless you combine conversions with the other two types of KPIs mentioned above.

One of your sellers, for example, may have a low conversion value. However, based on these KPIs, you can see that they are closing more sales than the rest of the team. This could signal that they are particularly adept in lower-tier, speedier sales.

Alternatively, say one of your sellers isn’t completing many transactions, but you observe that most of their leads are moving quite deep down the funnel. Perhaps their low close rate is due to terrible timing, poor luck, pricing, or other factors beyond their control.

Conclusion

The indicators mentioned above will disclose whether or not your training initiatives are producing the desired effect on the business. Understanding your data will assist you in optimizing your sales and marketing budget and generate excellent outcomes, regardless of the size of your company.

We propose that you evaluate these indicators regularly to observe how they’ve changed over time. This will assist you in determining what is most important to work on.

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digital selling training Sales Enablement sales training Social Selling Social Selling Training

How To Choose The Right Sales Training Program

Now that most sales motions are happening digitally, it’s never been more important to invest in your team’s digital selling skills.

The easiest way to achieve this is by investing in a digital sales training program that will standardize and formalize the way your revenue team’s prospecting, account growth, and account retention efforts.

Your efforts to modernize the sales process should be supported by the entire organization, from the top-down. Everyone needs to be on board, from your revenue leaders down to your frontline sales reps. The sales training program you choose should also be integrated within your existing oversight and coaching framework.

This way, everyone in your sales team can properly receive the sales coaching and guidance that they would need to succeed.

Your organization’s leadership committee also needs to be involved. As this might be new information to them, they might not see the need for digital sales training. By involving them in the process, they can better understand why a digital sales transformation is necessary. 

But how can sales leaders choose the right sales training program for their organization?

What makes a good digital sales training program

There are dozens of sales training programs available for all types and sizes of businesses, focusing on different aspects of the sales process. With so many options available, choosing the right one for your team can be daunting.

Here are four criteria that you should consider when deciding on a digital sales training program for your organization.

A good digital sales training program…

1. Should Sufficiently Address Skills Gaps
To create a tangible impact in your organization, start by identifying the most prevalent sales skills and performance gaps that your revenue team is facing. This is how you can find opportunities to upskill the members of your revenue team. Here are some of the most common issues that should be addressed immediately:

  • Lack of communication skills: Communication is a two-way street. While most sellers are great at talking, not all sellers can listen well. The best salespeople actively listen to their prospects, asking intelligent questions and using both verbal and nonverbal means to get their customers to warm up to them. Low performers usually spend at least 70% of their calls and meetings speaking.
  • Lack of preparation for sales conversations: You’d be surprised at the number of sales representatives who go into sales calls and meetings without a back-up plan or even a specific objective. There are even sellers who take on calls without knowing anything about the prospect or how your product would specifically benefit the customer.
  • Lack of a prescriptive sales process: Your whole revenue team needs to be consistent when it comes to your sales process. You can’t have a seller skipping certain steps or adding unnecessary ones—that’s how they can miss important tasks like following up with leads or sending email sequences. Even the smallest inconsistency or inefficiency could affect your whole bottom line. 
  • Lack of social selling knowledge: While the term social selling is well-known, not all sellers are aware of the techniques and best practices it involves. They might know that LinkedIn can be used for networking and prospecting, but they don’t necessarily know how to do so. And if your organization doesn’t have a prescriptive process for social selling, it’s pretty much like the blind leading the blind. Which leads us to the next point…

2. Should Teach Social Selling Skills
In this age of digital networking, social selling is no longer optional, but a must-have. It’s an incredibly important skill set that drives actual pipeline and sales. And with pipeline creation being one of the most crucial aspects of the sales process, your team needs to utilize all tools and resources at their disposal.

3. Should Be Incorporated Into Your Existing Sales Process
Training wouldn’t produce results if it’s not aligned to your company’s goals, values, and strategy. That’s why the concepts that will be taught in your chosen sales training should be integrated into your existing sales process to make it more efficient and effective. A good digital sales training program should optimize your sellers’ style, adjusting specific actions for better results instead of dictating a non-negotiable list of things to do per situation.

4. Should Be Reinforced for Optimum Learning
Reinforcement of skills is also important, as long-term growth is rarely produced by one-time training. Learnings need to be applied, and tested, a feedback loop should be established, and sales managers should be able to provide coaching and mentorship.

Wrapping It Up

When it comes to your sales team’s performance, there’s always room for improvement. A good sales training program is necessary for developing your sellers’ skills, tapping into their expertise and talent to increase sales and profits, drive growth, and cultivate a high-performing work environment. 

While there’s no harm in investing in marketing, recruitment, or tools, companies shouldn’t forget about their current sales force—your most important asset and revenue-driver. By enabling your sellers’ transformation into high-performing salespeople, you’ll be better equipped to blast ahead of your competition.

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Blog Sales Process sales training Social Selling Social Selling Training

Tom Peters States “Training Is the Number One Profitability Strategy for Your Company”

Tom Peters’ 2018 book The Excellence Dividend  talks about how critical skills and capability development is for any department in your organization. In fact, he states that training is the number one profitability strategy for your company.

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Blog Sales sales for life Sales Leadership sales organizations sales professionals sales skills sales strategy sales training social media selling Social Selling Training

The Emergence of Investments in RVP/AVP Coaching Training

Leadership

I’m blessed to have developed a strong relationship with my fellow CEOs at sales training, consulting and advisory firms around the world.  We chat at conferences, via email, and exchange notes quite often.  There is one topic that we all unanimously see as high growth, and customers scrambling to level up – training/coaching for the Regional VP’s or Area VP’s of Sales.