Author: Michelle Moore
The sales landscape is evolving fast and becoming more challenging. According to a 2024 HubSpot report, 54% of salespeople say selling had become more difficult in the last year.1 Growing competition, shifts in consumer behaviour and rapid digitization are key drivers impacting sales performance. To adapt to these changes, sales leaders can focus on training and equip their salespeople with the necessary knowledge and toolkit.
The importance of a sales training program
Empowering a salesforce with the proper training takes effort, but the payoff is significant. Every dollar invested in sales training earns a return of USD4.53, reports Accenture.2 When sales teams reach a plateau, exhaust leads or struggle to close deals, training can help improve confidence and upgrade skills needed to thrive in today's competitive sales environment.
Benefits of sales training include:
A consistent selling process and vocabulary
Enhancing a sales team's performance begins with establishing a standard sales process and a vocabulary. Aligning salespeople with this process enhances efficiency in sales operations, assists leaders in coaching them and ensures a consistent client experience.
Increased confidence, mindset and motivation
Confidence is a key ingredient to sales success, and often, a shift in mindset precedes this behavioural change. Sales training boosts the confidence of sales professionals by providing them with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed.
Additionally, training focused on topics like "growth mindset" can help sales professionals identify opportunities to try new strategies or overcome hurdles in achieving their goals.
Improved sales performance
Sales skills training equips sales professionals with the techniques and strategies to effectively engage with prospects, handle objections and close deals. This training leads to increased sales performance, higher conversion rates and, ultimately, greater revenue for the organization.
Enhanced customer relationships
Training helps salespeople develop better communication and interpersonal skills that are crucial for building strong client relationships. By understanding customer needs, sales professionals can offer tailored solutions to their clients, fostering trust and loyalty that leads to long-term customer retention.
Building an effective sales training program: Key success drivers
Customize your sales development program
While off-the-shelf sales training may effectively develop certain skills, it may not target the most critical skills required to achieve a company's goals. An effective sales training program should align with the company's business strategy and consider the length and complexity of its sales cycle. By considering these factors, Michelle Moore from our Sales and Leadership Development team believes that sales training programs can be structured to generate a significant return on investment.
Make learning engaging
Improving selling skills requires practice. Effective sales training should include various application activities, such as role plays and case studies. Giving sales professionals the chance to practice using real-life scenarios is highly effective and makes training more personal.
Leverage data
Sales leaders can use data to evaluate individual performance and create personalized learning plans for team members. A data-driven approach helps leaders monitor team members' progress, enabling them to provide actionable feedback. Finally, data can be used to identify team-wide skills gaps to guide decisions about additional training to improve team performance.
Focus on reinforcement
Research firm Gartner reports that sales professionals struggle to retain 70% of the information they learn within a week of training.3 To make training more effective, include a series of application activities that can be measured after training. Reinforcement activities can incorporate competition, such as conducting a six-week challenge focusing on a skill from the training and rewarding those most successful in applying the new skills. These activities maximize engagement and ensure that new skills are broadly applied.
Engage sales leaders
Sales leaders' effectiveness in setting expectations before training and supporting team members afterwards is crucial for maximizing the return on training investment. Sales leaders should collaborate with salespeople to help them set personal learning goals as they prepare for training. They should also frequently meet with their team members after training and provide feedback and coaching as people try to apply what they learned.
Stay ahead of your competition
Just like many other aspects of work, modern digital tools and channels are reframing the way sales are conducted.4 From harnessing the power of artificial intelligence (AI) to adapting to new consumer behaviour, sales professionals are at the forefront of this adaptation. An effective sales training program always considers how technology can help salespeople be more productive and effective.
To learn more about how we can maximize your team's potential, contact us.
