This article will address sales training in cases where the trainer that has not been able to gain insightful information about the audience in attendance. Whenever possible, an accomplished sales trainer will endeavor to learn something about those that will be in attendance.
But again for a variety of reason, such as logistics, multiple products and/or services, it’s not feasible to know your audience. Oftentimes, the seminar or training is purposely meant to be generic in nature to attract a wide audience with different backgrounds. Enough about the attendees and their experiences—let me share some topics and benefits that lend it to this type of training.
Without insulting anyone’s intelligence, the list of topics is known to most. For the purpose of simplicity, I’ll break down the discipline of selling into just a few major categories. Remember, this is a gross over-simplification of the process, and not meant to be all-inclusive. When I’m training anyone in sales (irrespective of the product or service they represent) I make it sound uncomplicated (until I go to the next step of breaking down the statement).
First, find someone interested in your product or service. Next, convince them that you’re the person they should engage to provide the product or service. Last, ensure that the transaction closes and funds. Easy, right? Well if it were, everyone would do it and people wouldn’t have to pay the trainer much compensation for having done so.
In the quest to find someone interested in your product or service, many disciplines come in to play. Marketing, social media, promotional efforts and prospecting, to name a few, require some level of experience and/or expertise. That expertise is usually best left to professionals who engage in this type of activity on a regular basis.
Many companies have separate departments whose task is to provide leads, but for those that don’t, it’s not as simple a task as it might sound. Regardless, once a lead is generated, the art and discipline of sales technique will determine the level of success once contact is initiated.
Once contact is made, the sales person must then convince the prospect to allow the sales person to satisfy this need. Again, a variety of selling techniques must be employed to accomplish this goal.
The effectiveness at this part of the selling process will obviously determine whether the sales person is able to solidify the sale. And, lastly, the sales person must ensure that the transaction closes and funds successfully. For most, this is the end of the sales journey—for others, the process is a continuum. This last statement will be addressed in future articles, but suffice it to say that every closed sale provides a myriad of future opportunities.
In all of the aforementioned three phases of the selling process (i.e., finding a prospect, convincing the prospect to work with you and ensuring the transaction closes and funds) the same disciplines of selling applies. Again, to oversimplify this process for the sake of brevity, I’m referring to sourcing business, satisfying need, making effective presentations, qualifying prospects, handling objections and effectively closing.
Stephen Greenberg is the founder and chief executive officer of Synergistic Associates Inc., a national sales training and coaching organization. For a free consultation, or any questions, Steve can be contacted by email at steveg@synergisticassoc.com or by phone at 954-757-6585.
