Sales training program. Training in the sales department: a step-by-step algorithm for employee training

Competition often prevents a business from succeeding. She is the reason for the growing demand for sales specialists: more than 50,000 vacancies are open in Moscow alone! The market makes advanced training courses in sales in demand. They provide an opportunity for beginners to obtain a highly paid specialty, and for business owners to improve the competencies of their sales team.

The Russian School of Management invites you to sales courses in Moscow. The training program includes a large number of trainings for specialists at various levels: from sales department managers to call center operators.

Features of training at the Russian School of Management

Trainings on effective sales are conducted by experienced teachers - practicing experts. They will be happy to share their experience and current technologies that work in modern market conditions. At the seminars they use teaching methods:

Business games.

Workshops.

Case analysis.

Each training is a theory, an analysis of successful business cases with colleagues and teachers, a search for the best solutions in difficult situations and an analysis of popular mistakes. Sales training takes place in a comfortable environment. Choose the right training for yourself and gain knowledge!

Learning outcomes

At RSHU trainings you will receive the necessary knowledge. Attend sales seminars where you will become familiar with sales systems, learn project sales formulas and learn:

Influence potential clients.

Collect client bases.

Use telephone sales scripts.

Identify consumer needs.

Close problematic transactions.

Increase the average check.

Deal with objections.

Work with large clients.

Increase the efficiency of the sales department.

Each sales training is a study of a specific problem using real examples, without general information that is difficult to use in practice. The goal of our sales training is to improve skills and train personnel.

Who will be interested in RSHU courses?

RSHU seminars are suitable for all sales professionals. Using the knowledge gained, you will develop customer services, conduct marketing events and organize call centers.

Sales training is designed for a wide audience. The training program will be useful for both beginners taking their first steps in the profession and experienced professionals who want to improve their skills. Effective sales training will be a good opportunity for those who want to improve their professional competencies.

Sales training at the Russian School of Management will be interesting:

Business owners.

Commercial directors.

Heads of sales departments.

Sales managers.

Development managers.

Client relationship managers.

Call center operators.

Realtors.

Sales training can be part of the corporate training process. Often, department heads lack a competent analysis of their activities: the training conducted by the RSHU will help identify promising employees in order to rely on them in the future.

The cost of sales courses is from 19,500 to 55,500 rubles. Choose a program and sign up now!

Conducting training for employees is a mandatory step on the path to obtaining maximum profits. It is logical to assume that the greatest benefit will be obtained from a high-quality, effective system that deserves the title of the best. Is it possible to definitively identify the best sales training among the options on the market?

What types of sales training are there?

A simple answer to this question takes you to the ratings of the best business trainers who conduct seminars and lectures in Russian. Alas, the best sales experts are unlikely to be useful if you need to teach the basics of conducting transactions to a team of beginners: novice specialists will not be able to apply the acquired skills in practice, which means the funds invested in their training will be wasted. Thus, we come to the conclusion that the search for the best course should begin with determining the initial level of training of future students and the topic of sales training.

Successful sales training for beginners

In organizing an onboarding series for newly hired soldiers, seek assistance from department best practices. It is best if the training is conducted by an experienced manager, director or owner of the company. This way, young fighters will be able to become familiar with the transaction policies specific to your company. The company's employees will promptly acquaint novice colleagues with all the subtleties and secrets characteristic of a particular department.

By the way, how effective is your sales department? I suggest you check, for this I will leave you the self-diagnosis questionnaires of the sales department. Use it!

Get profiles

It is worth conducting such trainings in the very first days after young fighters are hired. The minimum adaptation period is one day. For higher efficiency, it is recommended to increase the training time to five days, and in some cases - two weeks. This decision should be made if the product sales technique involves the presentation of technically complex equipment or non-standard services. Then, not only managers should be involved in conducting a course of lectures, but also technically savvy specialists who will be able to conduct several seminars regarding the specifics of the product.

Sales training for experienced employees

For the dynamic development of your business and stable profit growth, it is necessary to improve the qualifications of each employee. The most experienced managers will be able to gain a lot of useful knowledge from seminars and lectures conducted by recognized experts. Investment in developing the skills of managers and directors will certainly pay off in the future, because they will be able to transfer the knowledge gained during the training to other employees of the department. This will make the onboarding process for newcomers much more efficient.

The main goal of any training is to make the business efficient and increase profits. Depending on how professionally the course is organized, employees will be able to put the acquired knowledge into practice with varying degrees of benefit. Most of the courses that deserve the attention of successful owners address several aspects at once that ensure profitable transactions. Let's look at what types of sales training there are.

As a rule, the seminars cover issues such as:

• Techniques for organizing a transaction system;
• Organizing the actions of employees within the department;
• Features of recruiting new employees;
• Optimization of working time;
• Increase in sales volumes;
• Receiving orders that have a positive impact on increasing profits and reputation.

Trainings for the sales department, the topics of which are described above, will bear fruit only if the seminar participants are experienced transaction experts. Such lectures are not optimized for average managers and are unlikely to benefit the department’s young fighters.

Experienced employees delegated to such trainings will be able not only to raise their own professional level, but also to transfer the acquired knowledge to junior colleagues, which will have a positive impact on the achievements in the work of a particular department.

Name of sales training

Depending on the main topic chosen for discussion within one course, the name of the sales training is chosen. Based on this information, you will be able to determine exactly the course that will cover issues related to the weaknesses of contracting techniques.

The main areas of discussion fall into four categories:

• Discussion of price during the transaction, increasing profits;
• Fight against competitors;
• Basic rules for staff selection;
• Drawing up a sales plan.

The main topics of sales training are divided into many specific issues that will be discussed during the lecture. Experienced practitioners devote equal amounts of time to both the theoretical and practical components of the training. Each thesis describing a technique for solving a problem is followed by its study in practice. To do this, teams are formed among those present, within which they simulate a situation characteristic of the topic of the lecture.

Each team provides its own plan for resolving the difficulties that arise and independently assesses the possible benefits and risks. Next, other training participants, led by an expert, discuss the proposed solution. In this way, businessmen not only learn the theoretical part of the issue, but also acquire basic skills in applying the advice received in practice.

Depending on the topic, focus and other characteristics, the time of the course is determined. Within a given department, training can last from several hours to several days, while popular lecture courses from top trainers can last a whole week. As a rule, the seminar is divided into two main stages: theory and practice.

To organize the theoretical part within the topic of the seminar, several issues are identified to be discussed.

For example, if the training is dedicated to techniques for increasing profits, several basic points should be covered:

• How to stop being afraid of big deals;
• Comparison of aggressive and professional;
• Approach to selling a product or service;
• The main stages of sales.

To do this, it is customary to draw up documented manuals that department heads or directors can use over and over again, gradually making additions. This pattern is most obvious in the case of telephone sales training.

The skills acquired by employees during such a course can be of assistance both in communicating with the existing customer base and in attracting new potential customers. You should not expect that purely telephone conversations will lead a businessman to the conclusion of a large contract. However, scheduling appointments remotely, or communicating with potential clients attracted through an advertising campaign, will have a positive impact on generating profits.

Sales experts identify several main goals pursued when communicating with customers over the phone:

• Negotiations with a potential client, scheduling a meeting;
• Concluding a transaction for a small amount;
• Dialogue with a buyer attracted through advertising;
• Customer base service and support.

For each of these points, it is necessary to prepare a unique, documented call script developed by an experienced practitioner. At the first stage of the course, employees become familiar with the manual and study its materials in detail. Next, the practitioner shows a master class in conversation, teaching businessmen how to resolve difficult situations and answer tricky questions. At the final stage, employees are divided into pairs, in which one of them plays the role of a consumer, and the other conducts a dialogue on behalf of the manager. Each round of negotiations is subject to detailed discussion, in which it is important to note both the merits of the negotiators and the shortcomings.

The appropriate duration of this type of activity varies from two to four hours. The maximum effect is achieved if classes are held at least once a week.

After novice fighters have been able to practice negotiating with their colleagues, they move on to communicating with real clients in the field. Thus, businessmen simultaneously hone their skills, analyzing in detail each call made, and conclude new contracts.

The best sales training

An optimal lecture system should combine several important factors:

• Comply with the specifics of the company;
• Take into account the professional level of employees;
• Contain theoretical and practical parts; carried out by an experienced practitioner;

The issue of improving the qualifications of management personnel also cannot be ignored. The funds spent on successful sales training from a top trainer for directors and managers will be incomparably small in relation to the profit that department employees will bring as a result of acquiring new knowledge and skills.

By delegating the best employees to popular seminars, you will not only raise the company’s rating, but also get an experienced practitioner and trainer on staff, who in the future will carry out adaptation of junior colleagues.

© Konstantin Baksht, General Director of Baksht Consulting Group.

The best way to quickly master and implement the technology of building a sales department is to attend K. Baksht’s training on sales management “Sales System”.

“Sales manager” sounds very proud, especially in the context of modern business development. This profession requires organization, professionalism, and a creative approach. Many people are interested in how to become a sales manager and think that they need an economics education, but even graduates of economics or business faculties often ask the same question.

Sales manager tasks

First of all, let’s look at what is included in the job description of this specialist.

From the name it is clear that the task of a sales manager is to sell. This process occurs differently in different companies. In one company, sales managers advise customers who call by phone; in another, they call them themselves and offer their products.

Also, the scope of activity of many employees includes processing incoming applications when customers have left a request for a product, service or consultation, or simply ask any question about the product range. The manager's task is to help the client find answers to questions.

Many are afraid to take on this work, because either sales are perceived as a banal imposition, or the person is embarrassed by his inexperience. In fact, if the first reason is just a myth, then the second is stupidity. Because it is quite possible to become a sales manager without experience, provided that the applicant has at least the minimum set of required qualities. Let's take a closer look at them.

Required qualities

First of all, it is important to understand that there are no uniform criteria for quality work for all sales managers, since depending on the scope of action, you need to be able to adapt to the environment. But the most basic and necessary thing is the ability to sell a product or service legally.

So you can become a sales manager only if you have a certain set of qualities, let’s look at them in more detail:

• Understanding of business and marketing principles.
• Communication skills, ability to negotiate and communicate with clients.
• Non-conflict and stress resistance.
• Good manners.
• Neatness, presentable appearance (if we are talking about offline work).

Since becoming a sales manager is both easy and difficult, you need to understand that the professional portrait of a specialist in this field consists of many characteristics and conditions. One of the criteria is specialized education. It is an advantage rather than a requirement.

Professional education

Many online courses for young professionals talk about how to become a sales manager, but not a single educational institution offers such a specialty. But there are more extensive and multifaceted ones: management, management, business and entrepreneurship, psychology, economic psychology, economics and the like. Graduates of each of the listed faculties may well be sales managers. Moreover, it is much easier for them to learn their responsibilities since they already have an understanding of how the business works. Graduates of the specialty "Entrepreneurship Psychology" and others like it have a particular advantage, since they know how to communicate with clients.

Since it is quite possible to become a sales manager from scratch, specialized education is not at all necessary, although it is valued in many companies. Practice has shown that sales department managers value the practical skills of a specialist more than having a list of documents about studying at the university, advanced training, participation in conferences, and so on.

Criteria for the success of a specialist

It’s not enough to know how to become a successful sales manager; you need to put it into practice.

Detailed success criteria are built based on what tasks the sales manager faces. The main criteria are:

• Sales level of services or goods.
• Communication skills.
• Literacy in oral and written communication.
• Knowledge of the range of products or services, the ability to correctly and clearly answer customer questions about the range.

And based on your successes, you can discuss how to become a better sales manager.

First steps to the profession

Let's move on to the question of what it takes to become a sales manager. First of all, you need to make sure that you really want to develop in this area, since doing something you don’t like will ultimately lead to the so-called burnout syndrome; you will not be satisfied with yourself either as a person in general or as a specialist.

If for some reason you are forced to get a job as a sales manager, although you are not at all interested in it, either look for other options, or try to find the advantages in this job. The service industry requires constant contact with people, and many people quite clearly sense the specialist’s mood, and the impression from communicating with him directly affects the level of sales. And how to become a sales manager if you don’t like communicating with people?

Prepare yourself psychologically for the upcoming work.

Be sure to learn the basics of marketing if they are not familiar to you. This is necessary so that you understand the principles of operation of any business and trading activity in general.

Understand which business niches are most and least successful in your region. This will help when choosing a company to work for, especially if they offer a percentage of sales as a salary.

The role of a manager in car sales

The auto business is one of the most profitable in many countries. A car has long ceased to be a luxury; it is perceived as a necessary thing. This is why working for corporations that sell cars is truly profitable. At the same time, this is a very responsible job.

Let's take a closer look at how to become a car sales manager.

As in any area of ​​business, a sales manager must have an ideal knowledge of the product range and the portrait of the target audience. Understand the technical characteristics of all cars, find out the desires and preferences of potential customers (you can simply read motorist forums), and do not be lazy to find out on the same forums the car owners’ impressions of their cars.

Many showrooms offer a so-called test drive: an opportunity for the client to try out a car before buying. Don't neglect this service if the salon you work at offers it.

Real estate: tasks of a sales manager

In the real estate industry, we are talking about quite a lot of money, and this involves hiring responsible and professional specialists. How to become a real estate sales manager? This is more difficult than, for example, being a sales manager in a mid-level gadget store; you must have some experience, if not in real estate, then at least in a similar price segment and level of responsibility.

The scope of activities of a real estate sales manager may include providing assistance in the following services:

• Rent of premises for private use or business.
• Sale of premises.
• Construction.

In any of these areas, it is necessary to create comfortable conditions for the client and help him choose the room that suits him.

A good specialist usually studies all the pitfalls of the profession at any stage of work. Basic tips on how to become a sales manager can only be useful to complete beginners, but to those who are ready to develop further.

1. You must have a perfect understanding of the range of products and services that you offer. In this case, you will not have any difficulties if a potential buyer asks a question about the technical characteristics of the item being purchased or the features of the service provided.
2. Banal politeness and business ethics are the most important laws of a sales manager. Even if the client is rude, gets personal, behaves rudely and inappropriately, you cannot answer him in the same way. It’s elementary that you shouldn’t stoop to the level of rudeness, not only as a specialist, but also as an adequate person.
3. Practice your communication skills during non-work hours. Listen from the outside as you conduct a conversation, for example, by asking friends in advance to pretend to be buyers and recording the conversation on a voice recorder or video camera. You can also ask your friends for their opinion.
4. Learn sales formulas and marketing fundamentals. Don’t try to manipulate the client, people don’t like that and are unlikely to want to buy something from you. Even if they buy, they are unlikely to want to recommend your store to their friends or contact you again.
5. You can't lie to a client. If, after purchasing a product or service provided to him, he is justifiably disappointed, negative reviews and loss of a client are guaranteed.
6. Constantly improve. Read literature, forums on the topic, follow business news, especially in your niche. Don't get caught up in the idea that your job is to sell and nothing else. If you stand still in terms of professional development and self-education, you will not be able to grow as a professional.
7. Negotiate the terms of cooperation with your superiors in advance. This can be a salary (a specific monthly salary amount), a percentage of sales, or a salary and a percentage of sales combined.

Conclusion

The question of how to become a sales manager can be asked to yourself and others repeatedly, but actions are much more important and more effective. A job that seems simple at first glance requires attention, stress resistance, marketing skills and communication skills.

Have you risen to become the head of a department, or has your business grown and the question of training your sales department employees has arisen?

Let's figure out how to do this. First, answer the question: have they already given people who will work as sales managers in your department, or do you need to find them? If they handed you people, then everything is bad. Well, not as bad as you thought. But it’s better when you recruit managers yourself. I’ll explain how this relates to department training.

1. Which is better - the old or the new department?

At the market, sellers are taught at random and whatever. Only a small proportion of salespeople achieve real skills after training. Therefore, if you want your managers to really sell, you need to teach them from scratch, oblivious to the scraps of knowledge they have. The ideal situation is when you can recruit managers yourself without work experience or training experience, because into an empty head you will put exactly the knowledge that is needed for sales.

If you get existing managers, you can enhance the effect of the training by saying that only those who successfully complete the course will remain employed. During the learning process, take a closer look at people and decide whether they will be of any use. You, of course, can test managers’ existing knowledge, break it down into levels, and conduct training in areas that are important for a specific group of employees. But this is difficult and ineffective, because a holistic system of knowledge about sales is not created.

2. Who should train the sales team?

Looking for a new coach? Use the services of an internal trainer for training, or send a person to study in one of those hundreds of courses that the Internet is replete with?

Answer a few questions:

• Do you want to train sales managers to sell in principle, or teach them to sell a specific product or service?
• Do you want managers from the department to increase sales after training, or to know the theory of sales?
• Do you want them to have knowledge of hundreds of techniques in different markets, or do you want them to automatically develop specific skills that they will use?

Do these questions seem stupid to you? To be honest, me too. Then explain why 90% of corporate sales training is conducted as if people do not know the right answers to these questions?

3. What is most sales training?

A specialist arrives for 1-3 days. He explains the theory of sales and says: “Well, how you use my knowledge depends on you.” You might as well buy your employees a sales book. There might have been more sense, because after the book you wouldn’t expect an explosive increase in sales. You can find effective sales trainings that are aimed at obtaining and practically consolidating sales skills.

4. What is the main task of training a sales manager?

Tell me the classic theory of sales?
Tell us how super-effective salespeople sell?
Show a super motivating clip from the sales films “Boiler Room” or “Wall Street”?
Play one role-play with a product that has nothing to do with your product?
This is all great, but none of these elements will help a sales manager learn how to sell a specific product.
Sales will only be helped by specific skills developed for a specific manager, on a specific product, with a specific type of customer.

5. To organize effective training for your sales department, you need:

• test managers and identify their individual characteristics;
• study the product in terms of sales;
• study the portrait of clients with whom managers will have to work;
• talk about the skills that may be needed in sales;
• create an individual sales style for each manager;
• develop skills that correspond to your individual style to the point of automaticity;
• monitor the use of skills in sales;
• make adjustments during this process.

You must understand that training a sales department is not a one-time job, but an ongoing process. Firstly, sales managers are the most fluid contingent. You have to come to terms with this if you don’t plan to create the best conditions on the market for them. Therefore, you will have to constantly train someone. Secondly, any information is forgotten without use, even the most interesting and important. How can you control whether the manager uses this information? That's right: you need to go to a meeting with each manager at least once every two weeks. Analyze his weak points and in the next stage teach him what he cannot do.

Can this be done in 1, 2 or 3 days? Never. If you don’t need training for your sales department just for show, you need to develop a unique training system that will contain theory, practical application of this theory and skill development, taking into account the individual characteristics of the manager. I will tell you how to create a system or program for training a sales department in the process of work in the article “

Thanks to this article, you will learn how to more rationally select employees and train sales managers.

The new sales manager needs to be formatted immediately according to your requirements. In a few months it will be too late: the employee will get used to his own, not the most effective work models, and belated attempts by management will be perceived as “tightening the screws” and nagging. Therefore, every manager must go through four stages of preparation before he starts selling directly.

Sales manager training program

Sales manager training, stage No. 1: Introduction to the company, introductory briefing (1-2 days)

• The HR manager introduces the newcomer to the company's policy (finds out the goals, gets acquainted with the code of corporate ethics, conditions and remuneration system);
• He also introduces the new employee to the staff and shows the main premises of the office, including the workplace (desk, equipment, storage areas for documents and other common materials);
• The system administrator provides instructions on the use of technical means, if necessary. At the same time, he talks about all the features of using the company’s network and gives introductory advice on the use of specific software products;
• The head of the sales department explains to the manager his tasks, outlines the requirements for his work and answers questions;
• The HR manager introduces the sales manager to work instructions, regulations and standards;

Sales manager training, stage No. 2: What does the company sell? (1-2 days, but depending on the complexity of goods and services can last up to 3 months)

The manager can, in parallel with other stages of preparation, move on to searching for new clients, collecting information about the potential of enterprises and contact persons. Otherwise, after a week of training, when you put an employee on “cold calls,” it may turn out that, due to personal characteristics, he is not able to engage in active search.

Example. At a telecommunications company, a new sales manager was trained within 10 days of being hired on services, tariff policies, and sales techniques. The newcomer then began cold calling. 50% of interns dropped out: some could not overcome the fear of calls, others could not meet the standards existing in the company. In order not to waste time, we changed the learning process. After initial instruction on services and sales stages, over the course of two days, the employee was given a tele-algorithm (script) for a “cold call” and was assigned to call potential clients. After some of the new employees were eliminated, the rest were trained in more depth on services and tariffs, without wasting the manager’s time and energy on “refuseniks.”

There are several ways to introduce a future businessman to what he has to sell, and it is better to use all methods in combination:

• Studying information about the company’s products (services) using catalogs, websites, and information materials. Important: the manager must master the characteristics of locomotive products, that is, those that occupy a large share of the company’s sales volume. If there is staff turnover in your sales department and the manager regularly has to train new sales managers, then it is better to make an educational video about the products. You can record a video demonstration of slides prepared in advance and voiced, for example, by a commercial director. You can also add video recordings of the provision of a service or the production of a product to the film. This task can be entrusted to the HR manager together with an internal product expert (this could be the head of the sales department, buyer, merchandiser or production director). It will take several hours to create a film, but this will free the sales manager or HR manager from constantly repeating the same information to newcomers;

Example. In a company selling PVC windows (23 sales offices in one region), there was an acute question about organizing remote personnel training and development. To organize it according to uniform standards, the director assigned the task to a technical employee (calculator) to create an educational film on the products. He also brought in representatives from suppliers. They talked about the supplied components (profiles, double-glazed windows, fittings), and he recorded them on a regular video camera in his office. The result was a training video course of 19 lessons. He encoded these videos for copy protection and placed them on computers in all sales offices. After the certification, employees received high scores in product knowledge. This also made it possible to train sales managers 2 times faster.

• Familiarization with the range of goods in the warehouse (if the company provides services, it is better to demonstrate them clearly to the manager while other employees are working);
• Familiarization with the price list;
• Familiarization with the terms of delivery (delivery time, the possibility of deferred payment, features of working with new and existing clients, etc.) or provision of services;
• Then survey the manager to determine whether he has acquired basic knowledge about the product or service. This can be done in writing (fill out a form, for example) or in a conversation format. For example, what to do if a product is out of stock and the client needs it urgently?

At this stage, it is not important to have a thorough knowledge of the product or service, but to understand the key points of the assortment.

Sales manager training, stage No. 3: How to sell (1-2 days)

In a number of companies, a newcomer, for mastering key sales skills, usually assigned to an experienced employee. The method is the most economical, but also the most unpredictable - you cannot be sure that the “veteran” will train a new manager only useful. One of my friends still remembers his first day at work. The first words the mentor said to him were: “I will teach you how to write off gasoline.” To avoid this, it is necessary to select employees as mentors who have the desire and ability to teach others. It may be worth paying the mentor extra for the extra workload. Moreover, it is advisable to link the size of the bonus to the newcomer’s results (fulfillment of plans for the number of successful calls, completed customer cards, collected applications, volume of orders, etc.). If the company does not have candidates for mentors, then this responsibility should be fulfilled by the head of the sales department. The mentor must demonstrate the following:

• How can a manager work with documentation (draft proposals, draw up contracts, applications, reports);
• What algorithms have the company adopted for interaction between sales department employees and employees of other departments when reserving goods, signing an agreement, issuing an invoice, shipping goods, preparing transaction documents;
• How to work with a client database (CRM system), including what information needs to be entered there after contacting a client;
• What is the division of clients between sales managers in the company;
• How does the company segment customers?
• Where to get information about potential clients and how to work with databases (if the sales manager is actively searching)
• How to work with a commercial proposal template based on the price list. That is, calculate the cost of a product or service based on the terms of delivery (for example, the size of the discount depending on the volume of the order and the deferred payment period);
• What are the features of the company’s sales techniques for goods or services? The manager needs to explain the stages of their sales (not to be confused with the five stages: establishing contact, identifying needs, presenting, handling objections, closing the deal). Each product or service has its own sales logic (differing in nuances from the classical stages), in accordance with which most transactions are concluded. These are certain steps, following which a potential customer gradually becomes a client.

It is also advisable to provide a TV algorithm (script) for cold calling.

Example. In a web studio, a new employee had to first make a call using a script in order to reach a contact person: “Please tell me the last name, first name, patronymic and position of the employee responsible for the institution’s website?” If they ask what issue he is needed for, he must answer: “On the issue of changing the institution’s website in accordance with Federal Law No. 8-FZ.” The sales manager then recorded the information in the CRM system and planned contact with this official. He made the next contact with the required employee using a different script. This approach allowed the newcomer to get a small intermediate result and a positive incentive for the next call.

Firstly, scripts simplify the learning process. Secondly, this way the new sales manager will make fewer mistakes when making “cold” calls - he will not need to figure out what to say, he will only need to voice the written speech modules. Thirdly, it makes it easier to control newcomers - it’s clear how they will behave when communicating with clients.

Sales manager training, stage No. 4: Getting started

After training, the sales manager begins working with clients. It is advisable to begin this stage as quickly as possible after passing the previous key points. It is better to gain deeper knowledge in the process of working with clients. His responsibilities at this stage include searching for potential clients and entering them into the CRM system (compiling a list), calling clients using the database provided by the manager.

Example. At an IT company, new sales managers started making calls on the 2nd day. It was done in the form of a survey in order to update the database, collect information about the potential of organizations (number of computers, use of a local network in the organization, etc.) and contact persons. To encourage IT specialists from client organizations to participate in the survey, sales managers promised to send them an e-book on setting up MS Office for system administrators after receiving their responses. As a result, even beginners managed to collect 60% of completed questionnaires. To make such calls, the employee did not even need to have knowledge of the product. The newcomers made subsequent calls to promising customers after passing an exam on the company’s product line.

Training of a sales manager in the process of working with clients (table):

Completing all of the above steps will significantly reduce the risk of excessively high costs for training sales managers and make this process as effective as possible.