It’s the old nature versus nurture debate as to whether good salespeople are born with some sort of natural ability or can someone be trained to reach a good, competent level. You may think that we have sales skills from a very early age as you try to negotiate staying up later than bedtime or getting a raise in pocket money but this is incomparable to your working life where you’ll need to be at the top of your game to compete on a much bigger stage. The truth is though that no one is a born salesperson. We use this phrase all the time but it’s illogical if you think about it. You would never say that someone was a born doctor or a born accountant. The reason the term is employed is most likely because it is used to describe someone who has learnt quickly or had some early success but it’s not a real thing. Obviously though there are some traits which will make becoming good at sales easier. For example, if you are resilient, have an analytical mind it’s actually a long road to becoming very good at sales but with the right training as well as the right attitude, people who excel at it often go on to have very successful careers.
So, what sort of training would people need to become good at sales? At Aexus, everyone goes through our in-house training. It’s largely on-the-job training, which is good for the salespeople as they can see what they have learnt being put into practice every day. Within the training, new hires will be taught how to prospect properly with a focus on quality and continuity over just quantity. Further to that, as we’re data driven, we use a wide variety of tools and the latest technologies for testing, measuring and optimising to make every outreach as effective as possible. We also teach proven methodologies that have been gleaned from best sales practices as well as our own twenty plus years of hands on practical experience. However, outside of our high brow training there are some more ‘administrative’ tasks that salespeople need to get good at. These include:
Time Management
In any sales job, there is always something to be doing. The trick is to prioritise your time and draw up your schedule based on that.
Communication
Whether it is written or spoken, the way you communicate will be of critical importance. It will define how you are perceived and how first impressions are made.
Reporting
Reports are the best way for your manager and your team to be updated on your progress. Keep them direct and to the point. If people have questions, they’ll ask.
Setting Activity Goals
You should always be testing and measuring activity versus results. So, if a salesperson knows on average how many calls they need to make to convert one prospect, they’ll know how many calls they need to make per day to meet targets.
Research
The company the salesperson is representing will most likely already have a list of buyer personas. They will need to study this thoroughly as it will help enormously in identifying prospects.
So, as you can see, training is crucial to a salesperson’s chances of making it big. If you’d like to find out more about the training that makes our salespeople so successful, get in touch. We’re always happy to jump on a call.