All Entries in the "Sales Coaching" Category

Break Down the Barriers to Building Relationships!

It’s easy for clients to think of salespeople as the product they’re selling. And, it’s just as simple for a salesperson to look at clients as the products they’ll buy. The problem with dealing with people this way is that in this equation, each of you is interchangeable. The very moment that either of you believes there could be a better deal elsewhere is the very moment when a potential sale is lost.

So if you want to be unique (and therefore specific to the equation), it’s imperative that you build a relationship with your clients. And what’s the first step to building a relationship? Breaking down the barriers that separate the two of you!

Embracing Diversity. Selling to the (4) Generations.

Embracing diversity in the workplace and showing respect for human differences in the world are keys to developing strong Sales organizations and having success in building diverse community relationships.

Reinforcement of human rights builds bridges with people that come from different backgrounds, beliefs and genetics.

We now work in a workplace environment that is multi-generational.

Here is the breakdown:

The majority of workers are spread across four generations:

(08.5%)   Traditionalists – (BORN 1925–1940)  AGE 85-65, Retirement / Veterans

(39.9%)   Boomers – (BORN 1946-1964)  AGE 64-46,  Largest group, Mgmt, Leadership

(35.7%)   Gen X – (BORN 1965-1981)  AGE 45-29,  Smaller group, Entering Mgmt

(15.8%)   Gen Y – (BORN 1982-2000)  AGE 28-below, Entry Level Employment Rising

Sales Trainers should question:

1.   How should sales training be delivered to address diverse attitudes at work and with clients?

2.  What are the advantages and disadvantages of selling in multi-generational workplaces?

3.   How does management and executive leadership embrace selling in a diverse environment?

Sales Training Drivers will take a look at how Sales Training and Field Managers identify and approach work, work/life balance, loyalty, authority, and sales decision making.

We will also look at the behavioral issues required to create rapport, develop trust and establish long-term relationships within the 4 generational groups of buyers.

Are your Sales Goals “Unachievable”?

What do your Sales Reps Think?

According to an article on a Bloomberg BusinessWeek blog, posted 5 April 10 by Josh Setzer, He comments on the advice of a Coach he interviewed entitled: “Run Your Stars Hard”. After asking several sales people in a survey about meeting expectations, 73% of reps believe that their sales goals are unachievable. WHY?

Sales organizations do ask a lot from their sales representatives, particularly in an economic slump, and as Sales Managers continue to push them to drive performance harder, burnout is a risk – which leads to gross under-performance. Where is the positive psychological SALES MANAGEMENT BALANCE in this? From a Sales Training perspective, it sounds severe. There are logical arguments for slowly growing the behavior of your team members through practice and patience. But, there is an ROI to worry about when you are investing in your sales performers.

Is it FAIR to push your Sales Reps and set them up to think they have unrealistic goals?

Should high expectations after training be enforced (or else)?

or

Should training be based on individual Human Performance assessments to build each team member?

or

Should the company tell the Sales team member that their performance is being monitored against business ROI?

POST A COMMENT and let us know!

We will discuss it!

What to Expect from a Sales Coaching Program

A successful sales coaching program will instruct your sales team to use the following approaches.  How does your coaching program relate (if you have one)?

Your sales coaching program should help you and your team:

• Hire the right type of person by interviewing them with stringent criteria that will meet your organizations goals
• Lead and reward with positive reinforcement, instead of implementing a negative coaching system
• Provide blueprints and mind maps your sales team can follow, thereby alleviating common questions and increasing understanding of the organizations process
• Hold monthly meetings with question and answer sessions
• Discuss sales team members approaches that are working well
• Ensure each member of your sales force learns these important techniques. Additional strategies include: determining the proper timing to deliver a sales pitch; know what kind of approach will be the most effective for a particular type of customer; and expert follow up strategy and implementation.

What Makes Successful Salespeople

What do sales coaches need to know in order to help their salespeople succeed? More importantly, what does a complete, well-rounded, super-star sales professional do anyway? Surely, if you cornered one of these high-performing sales professionals at a social event and asked them what they actually did as a sales professional, there would be more to it than “I help people.”

What exactly is it that salespeople DO anyway? I’m talking about what they actually do, not what their company does or what their value proposition is, but what THEY DO day in and day out as a sales professional?
To be a complete sales professional, their daily activities should be in support of creating customer satisfaction and loyalty. What are these daily activities?

I have analyzed the outputs and deliverables of thousands of sales professionals. I found that these tasks can be grouped into eight key areas. The idea is to help them become highly competent (i.e. superstar) sales professional through helping them:

1. Manage Themselves – highly competent salespeople keep their personal life in check. They stay healthy. They set goals, they make plans for your future. They keep their finances in order. They find stress-reducers.

2. Manage the Sales Cycle — The highly competent sales professionals seek out continuous comprehensive training and education to support their sales process. You should also be able to initiate, plan, and execute a sales process in order for your product or service to be assimilated into the buying organization. There are many systems out there to choose from.

3. Manage Opportunities – Highly competent sales professionals understand how to identify, manage, develop, and close the right sales opportunities. To do this, they’re experts at opportunity planning, territory management, opportunity development, and closing.

4. Manage Relationships- Highly competent salespeople become a trusted advisor to the buyer only happens when the sales professional is successful at building relationships, communicating, distributing information, and influencing others ethically through collaborative dialogue. Building relationships within your own organization is just as critical. Make sure that you take the time to forge relationships with your support teams, delivery teams, management or any other party that is involved in your sales process.

5. Manage Expectations – Highly competent salespeople continue their relationship after the sale. Providing top-notch service to buyers ensures repeat business and a solid sales reputation.

6. Manage Priorities – Highly competent salespeople understand the crucial elements of managing personal time to achieve ones goals and objectives. Great sales professionals understand that they must define the right tasks for the day or month, prioritize them, schedule them and execute.

7. Manage Technology – Highly competent sales professionals utilize technology in order to maximize personal and organizational effectiveness.

8. Manage Communications – highly competent sales professionals understand their choices in selecting, delivering, and leveraging communications strategies and mediums in order to effectively get their message across.
There are many people that wonder why sales professionals are “harried,” have short attention spans, are always too busy, or seem a “little flustered”. Perhaps by identifying and understanding these eight areas, you have a new found appreciation and an understanding of why?

So the question is, does you sales coaching program help salespeople become better in each area? How can you help them understand which area they are the strongest in? Or which area they are the weakest? A well designed sales coaching program provided by a reputable organization can help sales managers and sales coaches build action steps and coaching programs that help salespeople improve in each area every single day.