Have you ever been have not been satisfied with the results you received from sales or sales management training courses? In many cases, after spending tens of thousands of dollars on sales training courses, there was no positive change in behavior or no measurable improvement in sales results. This article will tell you why.
Have you ever been have not been satisfied with the results you received from sales or sales management training seminars? In many cases, after spending tens of thousands of dollars on sales training courses, there was no positive change in behavior or no measurable improvement in sales results.
Most Sales Training Programs Don't Succeed. Here's Why!
The methods of the training program itself is the main reason for these cexpensive mistakes, not the size of the investment or the skill level of the students As quantified in Dale's study, the average person forgets 90% of what they hear in a lecture based training course. Yet most sales training programs are still conducted with participants sitting at a board room table, while listening to a lecturer as he writes on a white board.
When you think about it, lecture based training is like trying to train a professional baseball team by inviting a "facilitator" to talk to your team about how to play the game and then sending them onto the field and expecting them to succeed. Ludicrous, isn't it? So why then do so many managers think they can train their sales people by sending them to sales training programs where they only listen to a lecture for a few hours and expect them to be able to sell when they hit the streets the next day?
Think about it. Participants can't learn all there is to know about sales all at once. Training is much more effective when it takes place over time and when it builds on previous skills already mastered. Sales is a process that can be repeated, but no one ever learned to play the violin in one afternoon.
The second reason most sales training seminars fail is that the buyer doesn’t know what it is exactly that he needs to learn from the training seminar More specifically, they don’t have any clear goals or objectives. What is it that you want to accomplish from your sales or sales management training course? Are you experiencing troubles in one specific area of the sales process where you need a concerted effort?
Since no two sales or sales management training programs are created equal, you must know exactly what your goals and objectives are before you make any purchases. What specific competences do you wish to acquire? When the training is complete, what is it that you will have learned?
Don't act too quickly however. Don’t just focus on the symptoms of the issues you must center on the real problems themselves. For example, is it that you are not making enough prospecting calls to be successful, or is it that your prospecting approach itself that needs work? Is one of your issues that you are asking the wrong questions in your fact find meetings, or is it that you are not [meeting with the right|are meeting with the wrong] contact in the first place?
Before you invest in sales training, be it for you or your sales team, you should know why most sales training seminars fail, so that you can avoid these common mistakes, and make a smart buying decision.
Aim Higher!
Susan A. Enns, B2B Sales Connections
