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Imagine a sales team that consistently achieves high close rates and operates at peak performance. As a business owner, while you may have already built a successful sales team, you’re probably driven to unlock their full potential. That’s where sales training can make a significant impact. By providing your team with the right skills, tactics, and strategies, you can optimise their performance and maximise results – which means more revenue for your business. At the same time, you don’t want to waste your time with sales training if you don’t even need it. In this article, you’ll find out exactly what sales training is and determine if it’s the missing piece to drive your sales team’s success.
What is Sales Training?
Sales training goes beyond product and service knowledge and instead focuses on developing essential competencies such as effective communication, relationship-building, objection handling and negotiation.
You might think that coaching your team to better understand your product or service is the way to make better salespeople for your company. However, a deep understanding of your product or service only goes so far.
What has a bigger impact on sales teams is their ability to communicate effectively, negotiate, and build relationships. Focusing on building these fundamental skills will equip your sales team with the foundation they need to sell any service or product you’ve got.
The difference between sales training and business training
There are various types of business training, but sales training is just one subset of business training, which hones in on enhancing sales-specific skills and techniques.
Unlike general business training, sales training provides targeted guidance and actionable insights tailored to the unique challenges and dynamics of the sales environment.
If you want to learn more about the other types of business training, check out our article on the types of business coaches in Australia.
The difference between sales training at RedPandas vs other companies
At RedPandas, we take a sales-first approach by coaching businesses on implementing the ‘They Ask, You Answer’ framework.
‘They Ask, You Answer’ (aka TAYA) is a practical framework and sales and marketing philosophy that assumes one simple truth: if your prospect or customer asks a question, you answer, and in doing so, you will become the most trusted voice in your space and will gain more business than you ever have before.
A key tactic is that the sales team send prospects content throughout the sales cycle. Not just any content, content written by the marketing team that answers questions, concerns, fears and worries of consumers.
When it comes to sales training, we recognise that sales is only as successful as marketing, and vice versa. As such, we take an all-encompassing approach to sales training.
By implementing the TAYA framework, businesses have witnessed significant increases in website traffic, leads, and sales, all while gaining self-sufficiency in their sales efforts. In particular, Marcus Sheridan, the founder of TAYA, recorded an increase in his close rate after implementing the system from 15-20% up to 80%.
Now that you know what exactly sales training is and the type of training we offer at RedPandas, let’s take a look at some of the benefits of sales training.
Benefits of Sales Training for Businesses
The benefits of sales training for your business include:
- Higher close rates
- More efficient sales teams
- Enhanced customer satisfaction and loyalty
Higher close rates
With a more effective sales team, you’ll experience higher close rates and shorter sales cycles. In fact, Marcus Sheridan, in his book ‘They Ask, You Answer’ states that his close rate went from 15-20% up to over 80% when he implemented these sales tactics.
With sales training, your team can be equipped with these game changing tactics, which can result in drastic increases in your close rate.
More efficient sales teams
With the right training, your sales team can streamline their sales processes, become more efficient in their everyday tasks. For example, training your team to use HubSpot can save time, increase productivity, and ultimately help your team excess their sales targets.
On top of this, sales training provides your sales team with the opportunity to sharpen their skills and master effective sales techniques.
With a more efficient team you’re going to get better results within the same amount of time.
Enhanced customer satisfaction and loyalty
A well-trained sales team understands how to build strong relationships with customers, provide exceptional service, and meet their needs effectively.
By delivering value-driven sales interactions, your team can foster long-term customer relationships, drive repeat business, and generate positive referrals.
Signs Your Business Might Need Sales Training
Your business might need sales training if you experience any of the following:
- Low close rates or long sales cycles
- High employee turnover
- Inconsistent sales processes
- Poor customer feedback
Low close rates or long sales cycles
If your sales team consistently falls short of meeting their targets it may be a sign that they need sales training. Lower close rates (less than 20%) or significantly long sales cycles is a good indication of the need for sales training in your team.
Lack of proper skills, outdated techniques, or ineffective strategies could be hindering your team’s performance. Sales training can address these gaps and provide the necessary knowledge and tools to boost performance and drive better results.
High employee turnover
If you’re frequently hiring and onboarding new salespeople, it may be a sign that existing team members are not equipped with the skills and support needed to thrive in their roles.
Sales training can improve retention by providing ongoing development opportunities, enhancing job satisfaction, and equipping your team with the tools they need to succeed.
Inconsistent sales processes
Inconsistency in your sales processes can lead to inefficiencies and missed revenue opportunities. If your team lacks a standardised sales methodology or struggles to follow a cohesive approach, it may be time for sales training.
Training can help establish a structured sales process that aligns with your business goals and enables your team to work more efficiently and effectively.
Poor customer feedback or dissatisfaction
If customers are expressing dissatisfaction with the sales process, it’s essential to assess whether your team has the necessary skills to deliver a positive customer experience.
Sales training can improve interpersonal skills, customer communication, and overall customer satisfaction.
By recognising these signs within your business, you can identify the areas where sales training can make a significant impact.
So, what’s next?
Take a look at your business and think about whether any of the signs we’ve covered exist in your team. If they do, then you might want to consider engaging in sales training.
At RedPandas, we offer ‘They Ask, You Answer’ Coaching, a sales first initiative that helps businesses increase traffic, leads and sales, all while becoming the most trusted voice in their space.
If you want to learn more about what’s involved in ‘They Ask, You Answer’ Coaching, check out this article.
