Everyone knows that when it comes to the business world, it’s important to sell a quality product. For some things, this is easy to determine.
If you’re making stuffed animals, for example, the quality is in the materials. Is the fabric used thick or thin? Soft or rough? Is the filling soft or hard? Is the stitching large or small? Is it neat or is it sloppy? Are the eyes and buttons thin and flimsy or thick and sturdy?
The customer will look at all of these elements in order to make a decision about whether or not to buy. It’s all pretty straightforward. They can make these assessments at a glance. But not all commodities are as straightforward as stuffed animals.
If you’re reading this article, you’re probably interested in hiring a company to provide training for sales course to help your salesmen and women and people who are gender nonbinary to take their skills to the next level.
There are many books, classes, and experts who claim to have the knowledge to help you achieve all of your sales goals. Few are able to deliver what they promise. If you’re going to spend money and time on training, you want to make sure that it’s worth your while.
In this article, we’ll take a look at five things that set a successful training course apart from the competitors.
History
Americans have been selling things to each other and abroad for hundreds of years. But it was only with the industrial revolution that the nature of sales changed.
All of a sudden, it was possible to produce more products faster than ever before. These ranged from automobiles to luxury ocean liners. Consumers were flooded with products faster than they could learn about them. It became necessary to hire company representatives to help customers make informed decisions.
During the twentieth century, the sales profession grew exponentially. Some sold door-to-door. Others used the phone to call businesses and even private consumers at home. Others traveled all across the company in order to demonstrate the quality of the product in person.
This meant lots of well-paying jobs for Americans. A successful salesperson could live off of their salary and support a family as well.
A really successful salesperson could become a millionaire or even a billionaire. This gave them power and prestige. A sales job was highly sought after. Click the link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sales for more information about the history of sales.
At the turn of the century, we were on the verge of a new marketplace. Many of the old techniques were dying out. People were choosing to do their research online. They were starting to move to the internet to make their purchases instead of in person or over the phone.
It was predicted then those sales would soon be entirely online. But here we are, twenty years later, and a good sales team is still integral to the business. That’s for one important reason: the human element is irreplaceable.
Secrets to Success
If you’re in sales, you may remember the most famous sales motivation speech in film history. It is in the film Glengarry Glen Ross. In it, Alec Baldwin is brought in to help motivate a team. He is fiery and passionate. Click here for more information about the movie.
Baldwin’s character tells the men that “coffee is for closers,” indicating that your career in sales lives and dies by your ability to close, or complete, a deal. It was such a powerful performance that Baldwin was given an Academy Award and the film was made into a successful play that ran for years.
But you can’t hire Alec Baldwin to come to speak to your team. Not that you’d want to. Those harsh methods are outdated. What does a real-life, modern-day training course look like?
First, you want a trainer to be highly skilled in reading body language. Most of our communication is done through our bodies rather than our words. That’s why so much of our business during the pandemic was done through Zoom. We need to see each other to really understand what is really being said between the lines.
A skilled trainer can walk your team through many minute gestures that can help clue them in about what a potential customer may be thinking. For example, if the client is sitting with their arms folded across their chest, that can often mean that they are not receptive to what they are hearing.
Armed with this knowledge, a salesperson can stop and address the issue. They might do this by asking the customer if they have any questions. Once the question is addressed, the client can really listen and give their full attention.
Another trick is to change the customer’s body language. Giving them something to hold is an old trick that moves them out of their fixed mindset.
The second element of a successful training course is an action plan. Many promises to reveal secrets that will guarantee sales success and then offer a lot of inspirational talks but no real action. A good training course should have a measurable metric for success.
The third thing to look for in a training course is follow-up. A good trainer will check back in to make sure that their action plan is effective. They can offer advice and suggestions tailored to your team’s particular experience.
