As a sales manager, your team is counting on your support. If everyone has to fend for themselves, they won’t meet expectations which will effectively prevent you from meeting expectations. The amount of support that you give your team and the way that you manage relationships can have a significant impact on a team’s revenue The best way to help a team reach its potential is with training and counseling. Here are some ways that training can help everyone do their best.
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1. Make Your Team Experts
Even if your team sells products or services that are fairly straightforward, everyone must possess expert-level knowledge in order to conduct effective presentations. Customers feel more willing to finalize transactions when they have some assurance that they’re interacting with someone who can offer them authoritative guidance on what they’re purchasing and how it will benefit them. If salespeople appear to be more knowledgeable about sales tactics than whatever they’re selling, it will almost certainly cause a lead to look askance at all of the information that they present. Authoritative expertise instills confidence by creating an impression of competence and trustworthiness.
To make your team experts in their field, you’ll need to devise thorough training programs to teach them about all of the intricacies of what your company sells. You’ll need to continue training efforts as products and services change or you modify any key aspect of your customer relationship management process.
2. Help Your Team Be Strong Communicators
Some of the training in your curriculum for salespeople needs to include information that goes beyond plain product knowledge. General sales skills are essential components of a comprehensive training initiative in a sales-driven field. Training models that center on communication can give your team tools to improve all of their interactions with customers.
General communication skills that successful salespeople need include active listening, problem solving, and personability. Building rapport with customers doesn’t come naturally to every salesperson, and some find themselves able to connect well with only certain types of customers. However, it’s critical that they be able to forge interpersonal connections with everyone. Targeted training directives can equip people to find angles to connect with virtually every type of customer.
Negotiations training is a great concentration to build into training initiatives. The power of negotiation facilitates closings by giving salespeople strategies to address obstacles in the sales process. In effect, salespeople can use these skills to find out what a customer’s concerns are that may be holding them back from making a purchase. They can then hone in on crafting responses that persuade customers to reevaluate their perspective and receive information more neutrally.
3. Make Training Sessions Meaningful
It is preferable to have interactive training sessions rather than simply handing people written materials for them to study on their own. A presentation with visual aids and practical examples of how information about a product or sales tactic should fit into your company’s selling process can maximize your efforts to make your team experts. Ideally, they should feel comfortable enough about their command of product knowledge to field any questions that come up when they’re trying to close a transaction with a customer. In fact, you should try doing some role play exercises. Have people on your team try to stump one another and put their expertise to the test.
Structure training sessions to be engaging by inviting participation. People will absorb information better when they are actively involved in how it is presented to them rather than simply just taking it in passively. Encourage questions and invite people to answer one another’s questions when possible.
Investing in your team members with training will show them that you believe in their capabilities and you value their contribution. It will help people achieve better numbers and feel increasingly confident in their positions. It may also inspire them to continue their professional development with your company rather than moving on to another opportunity in sales.