Don’t Let Corporate Sales Training Be as Confusing as Bitcoin

Bitcoin is a secure system for storing and exchanging money anonymously on the internet. Got it? Easy to say, but don’t ask me to explain how it works. Similarly, corporate sales training is easy to define. But like bitcoin, it can take forever to explain.

Seriously.

It makes your head spin trying to figure out which program will work best for your organization.

I’m mostly talking about outsourced corporate sales training. You know, the latest flavor of the month type of training. So, which one is for you? How do you apply it? And where do you start?

These tips will help you prepare to implement a corporate sales training program and measure the return on your investment.

1. Align the corporate sales training to your corporate strategy

Examples:

• Growing organically
• Selling a new product
• Expanding into a new territory
• Competing in a new market
• Improving marketing and branding

Create a list of selling skill gaps between what exists now and what you’ll need. Make sure your corporate sales training consultant can fill these gaps.

2. Survey your salespeople

Surveys are a good way to quantify skill gaps in specific areas. Your outside corporate sales training company should help you develop these.

Examples:

• Ability to generate cold leads
• Ability to generate referrals
• Quantity and quality of meetings with decision makers and key executives
• Effectiveness of in-person prospecting sales calls
• Effectiveness of phone-based prospecting sales calls
• Keeping prospects engaged throughout the sales cycle
• Customer opportunity to close ratio
• Effective CRM system use
• Ability to qualify and disqualify new opportunities
• Customer relationship building skills
• Strength of relationship with the rest of the organization
• Time management effectiveness

Survey participants on how useful the corporate sales training was for them.

Things you want to know include:

• Has training helped people to become more productive?
• What did they stop doing?
• What did they start doing?
• How many bad habits were undone?
• How do they measure the success of the corporate sales training?

Survey your customers as well. Pick the top three questions you would ask. The list below gives some examples:

• How well did the salesperson present what the company does?
• Did your salesperson ask useful questions to help you determine your goals?
• How effective was the salesperson’s follow up?
• Do you trust and have confidence in your salesperson’s abilities?
• Would you continue to buy from your salesperson and why?
• How would you rank the overall performance of your salesperson?

3. Use a discovery model

Use discovery-based vs. lecture-based curriculum. And include dialog and exercises that allow participants to figure things out for themselves. Lessons learned from lectures don’t last long for the trainee.

Include these topics in the corporate sales training program:

• Dealing with self-limiting beliefs
• Developing workable relationships with new and existing customers
• Being a problem solver throughout the sales cycle
• Using questioning and active listening techniques
• Telling third-party success stories effectively
• Developing & delivering engaging 30-second introductions
• Targeting new business correctly
• Developing prospecting action plans
• Generating new leads and converting these to opportunities
• Running productive in-person and phone-based sales meetings
• Keeping prospects engaged after the initial call
• Developing winning proposals
• Capturing and using corporate sales training best practices in a Sales PlayBook

4. Track Key Performance Indicators

Make indicators SMART: specific, measurable, agreed upon, realistic, and time-based. Make sure the corporate sales training program addresses all of the indicators listed below:

• Meetings and phone calls
• Referral requests
• New leads
• New opportunities
• Lead to opportunity conversion ratio
• Opportunity to “won” business conversion ratio
• Prospect meeting follow up emails
• Proposals sent
• Customer testimonials and success stories

Conclusion

Corporate sales training shouldn’t be as hard to figure out as bitcoin!

Your plan for implementing, delivering, and measuring corporate sales training results should be simple and effective. Corporate sales training should be engaging, memorable, and something people enjoy. It should also be ongoing.

I wish you good luck in selecting the type of corporate sales training that gives you the maximum return on investment. And I wish you much sales success!