Your company’s growth and prosperity hinge upon the success of your sales force. In today’s fiercely competitive business environment, your company simply cannot afford to skimp on sales training. By creating an award-winning sales readiness plan, you can make sure that your new sales representatives quickly master essential sales skills like rapport-building, active listening, and following up with customers. Below are ten training topics to cover to help ensure that your new sales representatives are ready to hit the ground running.

1) Targeting the best prospects

The path to sales success begins with a sales rep’s ability to identify the best prospective customers and entice them with targeted marketing strategies. Effective sales training arms new reps with the skills they need to determine whether a lead is hot, cold, or somewhere in between.

2) Establishing rapport with a prospect

Connecting with prospects is vital to building a trusted relationship with customers. Top sales readiness training initiatives include virtual simulations that feature examples of rapport building between sales professionals and prospects. Whenever possible, these simulations should feature the following: 

  • The proper way to engage in self-disclosure to earn the trust of prospective customers
  • Interactive exercises that encourage sales reps to practice active listening techniques
  • Simulations of effective cold calling techniques
  • Multi-cultural awareness training, especially for companies with a large international client base

3) Lead prioritization

Sales reps receive inquiries from a variety of sources such as trade shows, referrals, the internet, and phone calls. Knowing how to prioritize these leads should be an essential part of any sales readiness plan. Sales training online is effective because simulation can be used to introduce and compare examples of varying lead types simultaneously.

4) Introduction to sales software

Mastering the art of selling and negotiating is only part of the learning process for a new salesperson. Most companies use sales software that new reps must learn how to use. Training initiatives should include an introduction to your company’s sales software and cover the following points: 

  • Entering new customers into the system
  • Preparing and sending formal quotations to customers
  • Tracking inventory and looking up products
  • Preparation of sales orders

5) Overcoming Objections

Learning how to avoid the word “NO” is a critical skill for new sales reps to master. Training programs should cover strategies that help eliminate customer excuses and subtly overcome customer resistance to investing in your products. By featuring the following types of virtual training scenarios, an LMS can help sales reps overcome customer objections:

6) Following up on leads.

Roughly 80% of sales close after the fourth follow-up attempt. However, nearly half of all salespeople never follow up at all on their leads. Ideally, sales training should highlight these statistics and demonstrate effective follow-up strategies such as the following: 

  • Showing sales reps how to accurately estimate the customer’s purchasing timeframe
  • Employing virtual simulation to show sales reps how to be tactful when following up
  • Using the sales software system to schedule regular follow-up reminders with customers

7) Shortening the sales cycle

Closing opportunities faster is a major challenge for virtually every sales representative, regardless of tenure. Top sales training programs utilize a multi-media format to introduce sales reps to strategies that can shorten the sales cycle. Examples include the following: 

  • Presentation of time-sensitive discounts to incentivize customers to purchase more quickly
  • Simulations that feature sales reps effectively creating a sense of urgency among customers
  • Effective ways to use promotions to spur customers to purchase

8) Product training

Selling a product is typically easier if you have a strong working knowledge of its features and benefits. Sales training software makes product education interesting and interactive by enabling sales reps to engage in learning through the following: 

  • Gaming simulations that allow sales reps to compete against each other to master product features
  • Online quizzes and exams to assess knowledge of product features
  • Delivery of product mastery certificates that sales reps can post to social media

9) Asking for the order

Some sales reps can master every phase of the sales process but then fail to ask for the order. Whether this tendency is due to fear of rejection or sheer forgetfulness, sales reps need to be trained to ask for the sale. Highlights to cover include when to ask for the order and subtle ways to ask for a customer’s business.

10) Post-sale follow-up

Dropping a customer like a hot potato after closing a sale is a sure fire way to send that customer running to a competitor the next time they need to place an order. Fortunately, you can prevent this from happening by ensuring that your sales training emphasizes the importance of post-sale follow up.

How to Develop the Most Effective Sales Readiness Training

The most valuable sales training tips in the world will not bolster a sales rep’s close ratio unless they are presented in a format that captures and maintains the sales rep’s attention. The most effective sales readiness plans feature the following qualities: 

  • A style that keeps sales reps fully engaged during the learning process
  • Sales training techniques that are interactive for learners
  • A multi-media approach that includes images, videos, quizzes, and virtual simulations
  • A means of tracking each sales rep’s learning progress and acquisition of selling skills

The learning management professionals with Knowledge Anywhere are experts at developing sales training programs that incorporate these elements. Check out our learning management software to see how your sales reps can exceed their performance goals with the help of virtual reality training courses. We look forward to helping you enjoy record-setting sales!

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