Train a Sales Team

A strong sales team needs careful guidance and training to become successful. If you have just formed a new sales team, make sure that they understand both the practical aspects of the company as well as the company’s culture and goals. This is a process called onboarding. As your team develops, check in with them to make sure that they are reaching the right targets. Training is an ongoing process. If you’re looking to teach new skills to an established team, there are many resources available to help them continue learning.

Steps

Onboarding a New Sales Team

1. Teach your team about the mission and goals of the company. It can take up to 90 days to completely train a new sales team. On the first day, however, they should know who the company is, what they are selling, and who they are selling to. Schedule a day or half-day for this introduction. During this day, you should:
   • State the company’s mission and development. Here, you should describe what the company sells as well as their role in the industry.
   • Describe the features of the product in detail. Give a demonstration of how it works. Teach your team everything they need to know to sell the product. What does it do? How is it made? What makes it a good buy?
   • Give a thorough introduction to the types of clients interested in your product. Describe what they need and how your product can fill that need.
2. Develop useful materials to teach your sales team about the industry. Good training materials are brief. They provide models and definitions to help your sales team succeed in the industry. The team can refer back to these materials as they begin work. Some good training materials include:
   • Buzzwords and lingo: New employees may not understand the lingo that both you and your customers may be using. Draw up a list of definitions for common terms and give it to the new team.
   • Case studies: Provide specific stories about past sales that both worked well and failed. Use the case studies to instruct the new team on what does and doesn’t work in your industry.
   • Executive summaries: Instead of bombarding your new sales team with several long documents, summarize the main points. Give them a synopsis of major clients, competitors, and vendors.
3. Demonstrate how to use the technology for your sales team. If you want, you can invite someone from IT to come in and do a demonstration for the entire team. You can also coach new employees individually by walking them through the process of using the software.
   • Remember to show them how to use all forms of technology, including any software, phones, point-of-sale systems, and website.
4. Provide scripts for selling the product over phone and email. Scripts provide a general format that your sales team can follow while they sell your product. You can also provide scripts for how to deal with a difficult customer or how to convince a customer to repurchase.
   • A phone script might look like: “Hi, I’m Mandy with Office Supplies Incorporated. I’m calling today about your inquiry regarding our special Office Box plan. Here at OSI, we offer special bulk discounted plans to help your start-up thrive. May I send you a catalogue?”
   • An email script might look like: “Dear valued customer, I am writing today to ask you if you would like to renew your subscription to Boats Monthly. Boats Monthly offers the top industry advice for those in the maritime industry. If you would like to continue your subscription, you may email me or use the link below. Best regards, Mandy.”
5. Ask the team to sell you something. Pretend to be a client interested in buying your product. Either as a team or individually, have your employees try to sell you the product, just as they would to an actual client. Take notes on how they do this. Praise them for what they did well, then offer suggestions for how they could improve.
   • For example, you can say afterwards, "You did a really good job on emphasizing the benefits of our product. You may want to be a little more assertive though if the customer is uncertain about buying the product."
6. Pair newer workers with established or experienced employees. If there are a few veterans on the team, ask them to mentor some of the newer employees. Encourage them to give the new team members advice. Allow the new team member to approach their mentor with any questions that they may have. This will help members on the team feel supported in the new environment.

Reinforcing Goals and Targets

1. Check in with your team weekly. Hold a meeting with your team each week, and ask them how they are doing. Go over any reports or quotas that they may have. If they are doing well, praise them. If they still need work in some areas, coach them through their difficulties.
   • Encourage an atmosphere in which the team can be open and honest about their difficulties. If they come to you for help, provide helpful advice to get them up to speed.
   • Remember that it can take between 3-6 months for a new sales team to start reaching quotas. Make sure they have enough support, but be patient as they find their grounding.
2. Give the sales team monthly goals to achieve. At the beginning of the month, tell the sales team clearly what their goal is. You can also post the goal in a public area. After 6-9 months, set quarterly goals instead of monthly goals.
   • Start small with your goals. If your sales team is new, they will need some time to find their footing. You might set a goal such as learning how to use the sales software fluently or memorizing their sales script.
   • As your sales team gets more successful, implement sales-based goals. Ask them to hit a certain number of subscribers, make a certain number of sales, or earn a certain amount of profit.
3. Publish numbers and analytics for the team. Your sales team should be aware of how well they are doing at all times. Each week, post the number of sales or the profit made. You can share this at a team meeting, send it out in an email, or post it in a public area, like a snack room.
4. Share success stories at team meetings. A good way to motivate your team is to make sure that their work is appreciated. At each team meeting, praise the team for something they did well. If 1 team member had a great success, call them out. Not only will this show the team that you notice good work, but it will provide a model of success for other team members to follow.
   • For example, you might start by saying, "Let's all take a minute to recognize your team's good work this month. You managed to exceed our sales goal for the month. Congratulations everyone!"
   • To recognize an individual, you can say, "Everyone, let's give Robert a round of applause. He managed to recruit the ABC company from our competitors. This is due to his assertive but friendly sales style."
5. Reward your employees for good work. Incentivizing work can help motivate your sales team to do well. Set both short-term and long-term goals for your sales team. When they reach these goals, do something nice for them. You can:
   • Throw a company picnic
   • Upgrade their desks
   • Provide new equipment in the lunch room
   • Grant commissions for each sale
   • Give small gift cards
   • Give an annual bonus

Building Skills for an Established Sales Team

1. Send your team to a training seminar once or twice a year. Ask an experienced sales person, a company executive, or even an outside business consultation firm to do the seminar for you. At the seminar, your team can receive new and valuable input about how to improve their sales technique and numbers.
   • Try to keep seminars and lectures down to 2-3 hours. Your team may lose focus if training lasts longer than this.
   • Many business consultation firms can be hired to come in and do specialized seminars for your company. Just provide information about your product, company culture, and goals.
   • Choose a theme for the seminar that will be useful to your sales team. This might something like "dealing with difficult customers" or "attracting repeat customers."
2. Take the team to industry conferences or events. If there are any large conferences, conventions, or product launches for your company, invite your sales team along. They will appreciate the opportunity to learn new skills in a professional setting while networking with others in the company or industry.
   • For example, if you work in the toy industry, bring them along to a toy convention so that they are up-to-date with the latest trends and fads.
   • If you sell finance software, you could bring your team to a conference for Wall Street financiers. They can practice their pitch in person with conference attendees.
3. Do team-building activities occasionally. Once every month or 2, devote some time to team-building. These activities help the team work together more efficiently. Some great team building ideas you can use for your sales team include:
   • Group personality tests: These will show each member what their strengths and weaknesses are. Ask your team how they can work together to maximize each individual’s strengths.
   • Escape room: Take the team out 1 night to complete an escape room together. In an escape room, you need to work together to solve puzzles and escape a locked room.
   • Fitness tracking: Set a fitness goal for the entire team. Each member of the team must work to reach a collective fitness goal, such as reaching a certain number of steps or competing in a marathon together. If the team is able to reach their goal, reward them with a gift card or dinner on the company.
4. Recommend useful blogs and videos to your team. The internet contains tons of useful material about business, sales, and customer service. Stay up to date on both industry and market research blogs, videos, and podcasts. If you find a good article, send it out to your team and encourage them to use the advice.
   • Forbes, Entrepreneur, and Inc. are good places to start for finance and business-related articles.
   • TED Talks and YouTube may have useful lectures and videos for your team.
   • Look at major business leaders and motivational speakers for inspiration. Read their book or watch their lectures online to find useful material.

References

__

See also

• Sell to Businesses
• Sell to Hospitals
• Complete the Sales Process from Prospecting to Closing Sales
• Improve the Effectiveness of Sales Training
• Make a Sale
• Use the GUEST Process in Sales
• Intern at an Advertising Agency
• Get a Marketing Jobs in Pakistan
• Maximize Your Sales
• Get the Perfect Mindset for Cold Calling

Read more ...