Sales Training Classes:

Sales Training America is a world class sales training and custom development training company specializing in sales training and sales skill development of our client's sales force. At Sales Training America we help our clients improve their sales profitability through the development of their sales management and sales efforts through SalesForce.com implementation. Sales Training America offers both public (open enrollment) sales training classes well as the development of customized sales systems and sales classes for Fortune 1000 companies across United States and Canada.

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Sales Training Tips:

Sales Class: Create Outstanding Sales Results by Focusing on the Customer

I have been asked this question by many retail or FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) companies if the concepts that we have been applying successfully when selling to corporate or businesses can also be applied onto selling to consumers.

The fact is, since we focus largely on B2B (Business-to-Business) sales, we don't quite have the exact answer. That is until recently.

We happen to have this "confession" of a skincare cosmetics promoter, Sharon, who was very new to her job and was almost hopeless with numbers, but is now the top sales person of her team and is currently coaching her more senior colleagues how to improve their sales too. Here are some excerpts of Sharon's "confession":

"I started my new job on 1-Sep-2010 as a cosmetics consultant because a long time friend whom I lost the number called me asking me if I know anyone who wants that position. I took the job, without time for interview, put to be the make-up artiste there because of a discussion I had with my friend (my new boss) who happened to see me doing a demo for a customer who bought all the colors I recommended $400 in all.

"Best of all I didn't know what the promotion mechanics were so all the items I sold were not discounted or 'vouchered' as I was NOT informed about them......I was put to work immediately after a brief training. I broke the sales records, 80% of my receipts were high-value items in ala-carte items undiscounted. The balance 10-20% were small items like single lip balm items or small hand creams mainly because those customers are really on a tight budget and were willing to give one out of 3 or 4 my recommendations a try."

"To my surprise, those non-discount customers were the ones who came down from Orchard to Raffles City (quite a distance in Singapore) to look for me when they hear from my colleagues that I am on duty at Raffles City. They came to me with their friends to seek advice for their skin/hair/body-care problems and they also paid WITHOUT discount and/ or free gifts. Hey...come to think of it may be I am the gift!"

"It's not even end of September, and I don't even know the ingredients and technical details in the products! Yet, I am already training the new girls who only came in days later than me and giving refresher training to the girls who came in earlier than me. To my surprise girls with problematic attitude opened up to me about their concerns and dissatisfaction. These are the two girls my boss says were fighting with each other, and they don't fight anymore after the 2 sessions of training with me."

"She (my boss) asked me what I did? I said I really don't know......I only shared what I know and think can help my customers and colleagues. All constructive and non-constructive details were sounded out there and then."

"My only fear is my boss test on my technical details. I only know how to sell them by the usage or the solutions they provide. I don't know what are the technical details that make them different from other brands. People buy from me because I got them to open up their skin/hair & body-care problems and I just bring the bottle as the problem solver to them - based on the bottle's labels. I am still learning the technical details at my own time and I hope my boss doesn't think I am incompetent or ask me lots of weird questions on 'how I did it?' *Shrugs*"

I wish I can say that Sharon was one of our trainees, but unfortunately for us, she is not. However, if we were to take a closer look, here are some reasons behind Sharon's success:

• Customers don't care about the discounts or vouchers as much as they care for how they can look beautiful without damaging their skin. This is especially so for high-value items where their objective is to get value for the money they spent much more so than the little price savings on the vouchers. Hence, had Sharon known about the vouchers, she might have ended up selling the vouchers than to sell the value as she had done;
• Sharon's customers came all the way hunting for her for advice about skin/ body/ hair care. It goes to show that Sharon can engage and connect with her customers. She cares for their well-being too. Hence, Sharon is right to say that she is THE gift to her customers;
• Helping her colleagues to engage and connect with customers actually help them (those colleagues) to generate more sales. It's not at all surprising that they will have a drastic change in their attitudes towards work, since they can see the improvements they've gotten at work, with Sharon's help;
• While it's good to gain knowledge of the technical details of one's products, it's evident that customers value Sharon's skin care advice much more than the technical details of those products;
• While understanding the technical details may not be Sharon's strengths at the moment, I don't think her boss is ever going to make things difficult for her top sales person, as well as a highly effective sales manager or coach (which happens ONLY to 15% of top sales people).

It's also noteworthy that Sharon sees her products as "solutions" to her customers' problems. The term "solutions" seems to be used more frequently in B2B sales than for consumer sales, but in this case, it has become relevant to consumers.

Also, Sharon probably thinks she is selling "solutions" to her customers, even though what she is doing is to provide a solution that fits individual customer's needs. Her skincare/ hair care/ body care advice are an integral part of her customers' solution as it is the products they buy. If only more retail sales promoters could be more sensitive to customers' needs, they will also see faraway customers beating a path to buy from them too!

Source: C.J. Ng link

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