Sales Coaching

Sales Coaching … people who are the most knowledgeable and experienced in sales know that sales coaching isSales Coaching - Sales Rep to Sales Manager worthwhile; it can make a difference; and it needs to be a priority.  The jury is in on the notion that coaching is a critical piece of the puzzle if you want to develop a sales team that is a competitive advantage

Sales Coaching is a coaching program designed specifically for Sales Managers. It is focused on the skills and expertise required to develop the sales performance that can make a difference on the bottom-line. During the program the participants explore:

  • What to Coach. The worse thing that can happen is to do a good job coaching the wrong thing. To address this challenge participants explore sales best practices from market leading companies and capture those that have the most impact in their marketplace. In the end you can’t coach it if you don’t know it – so this topic is critical for success.
  • How to Coach. You can also know it and not know how to coach it.  So participants review the sales coaching best practices of top performers and have the opportunity to add to the list. In the end it is always about execution so the participants also examine how best to implement an effective coaching effort by addressing the field-based practical barriers to coaching.
  • Who to Coach. One thing for sure is “one size fits all” does not apply when it comes to sales coaching.  With that caution in mind, participants complete a gap analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of their sales team members. They also investigate various coaching models for assessing individual differences and examine the significance of those differences for improving performance.

There is general agreement on the importance of coaching and lot of great companies start coaching initiatives with tremendous energy and commitment. But far fewer exit the tunnel successfully.  This program is one piece of the solution to that failure.

Take a Deeper Dive into Sales Coaching …

Sales coachingIs sales coaching really necessary? – Sales leadership talks about it all the time.  Sales consultants advocate it and Sales Managers say they would like to do more of it if they had the time.  The “it” of course is sales coaching.Yet if you nose around, you will often find less sales coaching is occurring then might be expected given all the voices of advocacy.  Why?

Sales coaching feedback – do it now, keep it simple – There is a wealth of literature on the how-to’s of sales coaching.  Some aspects have been explored in-depth; others not so much.  Providing feedback is an area that is critical and one we think deserves a little more attention.  Let’s take a deeper dive by examining one particular proposition.

A different perspective on strategy review sessions – Crafting a sales strategy is a key to success – especially when selling into major accounts. While front-line sales managers agree, we often hear comments like, “I don’t have the time” and “My territory is spread out and I don’t see my people face-to-face”. This post describes a three-step process for conducting a Strategy Review Session with an entire sales team.

Three self-imposed pitfalls facing new sales managers – There are institutional obstacles – such as HR concerns, “paperwork” like CRM systems – that are difficult for sales managers to avoid because they don’t go away – so the answer centers on time management not prevention. On the other hand, there are some self-imposed pitfalls sales managers can avoid.  This post looks at three self-imposted pitfalls and offers best practices for tackling them.

Sales excellence – understanding the clutch player – B2B sales since major sales people clearly face their fair share of high stakes moments. This post describes three research insights on performing when it matters most and the implications for B2B sales – and implications for sales coaching.

Selling sales managers on sales coaching – Companies know they can’t have superior sales teams without great front-line sales managers who know how to coach.We’ve written about this in the July 2011 issue of Chief Learning Officer magazine (p. 40) – Selling Sales Managers on Coaching. Take a look about how they can avoid one of the reasons we hear most often as to why sales managers don’t coach.

Eleven questions for managers when sales coaching – After launching this blog, we received an email from an old friend who is a sales training manager at a medical device company. We worked together closely over many years and after trading emails about family and  car preferences, he closed saying, “and please tell Dick I often use his question: ‘When would that not be true?’ when reps come up with ideas that are not quite as good as they think. Here are 10 more.

 

 

 

 

Sales Momentum offers a new generation of sales training programs built for today's hyper-competitive marketplace. To learn more about our programs, email Richard Ruff at [email protected], Janet Spirer at [email protected] or call us at 480-513-0900