Sales Training Seminars and Tips

How To Identify Sales Training Needs

With all the discussion about how professional sales training may not necessarily contribute to sales success, many training managers will still have to implement professional sales training, simply because it will be very difficult to explain to management why professional sales training has been taken out.

However, management will also want to find out what return on investment they are getting from their professional sales training, and will want sales training managers to address specific areas of improvements for their salespeople. Hence, I get a lot of sales training managers telling me that they would like to help their salespeople be more "professional" when selling.

When I asked then them what they mean by "professional", they couldn't give an answer.

Well, to help sales training managers, and even senior management, define what is meant by "professional" sales behavior, here are some attributes provided by HR Chally after decades of research worldwide.

If you want to train Hunters to be better Hunters, you may want to focus on one or more of the following attributes:

* Effective networking (and being resourceful to source for qualified leads) * Qualifies prospects with standard probes (rather than chase after leads with low chances of materializing)

* Closes through logical, incremental steps (questioning, understanding customers' decision making processes and requirements etc.)

* Problem-solving (for customers)

* Opportunistic (able to seize and create sales opportunities when there are none)

* Commits time and effort to ensure success

On the other hand, if you want to train Farmers to be better in what they are doing, here are some other areas of consideration:

* Optimizes results by increasing sales to existing accounts

* Promotes customer relations by soliciting feedback (and able to act on any negative feedback received)

* Educates customers through structured training

* Maximizes results by systematically managing an account plan (the key word here is "plan")

* Works the system for the customer (making sure customers' needs are fulfilled)

* Responds at any hour

As you can see from the above attributes, most professional sales training is centered on cultivating Hunting skills, and Farming skills are by far rather neglected. Hence, if you have sales people whose job is to generate more sales from existing customers, you may want to focus more on the latter attributes in professional sales training.

There are also different professional sales training attributes available for staff members who handle Strategic Accounts, lead and manage sales people, and even for senior management.

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Article Content: Professional Sales Training