Sales 101 Alone Doesn’t Get the Job Done Anymore Anymore

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Sales professionals are all after the same goals: Win more business, sooner, and at higher contract values and margins.  Unfortunately, knowing which skills salespeople should master to achieve those goals—and continue performing at that level—remains persistently and strikingly elusive to many companies.  There is an answer, but it requires some explanation.

ESR often assists companies as they develop a sales training requirements definition. At virtually every company ESR works with, we identify distinct gaps between their salespeople’s current selling capabilities and what is required for the sales organization to be consistently effective.  In other words, while salespeople are equipped to carry out certain essential tasks, they are ineffective at others.  Those selling skills can be broken into two general categories: “basic” and “advanced.”

Some basic selling (Sales 101) skills include:

• Managing a territory;

• Planning and executing an end-to-end sales campaign;

• Uncovering and understanding the customer’s business challenges and opportunities;

• Planning and executing a successful meeting with a prospect;

• Articulating the company’s value proposition to customer executives;

• Delivering a presentation about the company and its products, including information that reveals an understanding of the customer’s business;

• Following the company’s sales processes;

• Understanding the competition’s company and products;

• Managing objections;

• Negotiating;

• Writing a proposal/responding to an RFP;

• Effectively leveraging social media; and

• Closing.

Advanced selling capabilities, on the other hand, can include:

• Determining the competition’s selling strategies and devising effective counter-strategies;

• Successfully employing competitive selling tactics, such as setting traps and immunizing the customer against a competitor’s negative selling assertions;

• Linking the strategic value of a product or service to the customer’s long-term business objectives and presenting it to the client’s executive committee;

• Identifying, recruiting, and leveraging politically powerful people within an account to influence an evaluation team or decision-maker;

• Employing personal capital to effect an introduction to the CEO of a targeted company;

• Consistently outselling a competitor who slashes its prices to win;

• Being treated as a trusted peer and business adviser by customer executives;

• Effectively leading and managing a mutually profitable, long-term relationship with a strategic account;

• Negotiating strategically, beginning with the first sales call; and

• Writing a proposal that significantly differentiates their company from their competition by effectively addressing the customer’s strategic business objectives.

Sales 101 skills will only get salespeople so far.  In today’s selling environment, that’s often not far enough to consistently and predictably outsell competitors.

The Challenge

In many companies, we see an excess of product training being delivered at the expense of the skills training that is actually needed. The skill gaps that prevent salespeople from delivering their numbers quarter after quarter are not being closed.  And, it’s not due to a lack of suitable training providers; a variety of trainers and training companies can deliver advanced selling skills content. Product training is important, but without the required sales skills training, a salesperson’s success will remain limited.

Here’s a question: What happens when four companies with basically comparable offerings compete for the same business and none of the salespeople managing the opportunities have the advanced selling capabilities listed above?  The customer will likely base its decision on features, a sexy demo, the most well-known brand, or most commonly these days, price.  Since no one sales rep in this example enjoys the competitive advantage that results from having the appropriate selling capabilities, the customer will perceive the four reps as interchangeable at best, and irrelevant at worst.  If, however, one company’s salesperson possesses the advanced capabilities outlined above, how do you think that rep is going to fare?  Right.  They’re likely to win. Handily.

Not every salesperson in every company needs advanced selling skills, but if you’re in a complex selling environment and you haven’t provided your salespeople with the advanced skills required for them to win, you are inviting them to fail.

To learn specific details about three essential advanced selling capabilities: financial acumen, political leverage, and competitive strategies and tactics, join my session at ICE on Monday morning.

If you'd like more, please consider attending ASTD 2013