The Sales Force – Your Best Advertising Link
It is often a sad fact that the long and short of sales force training start and end with product knowledge.
Different products we all know require different treatment. The sales force therefore has to be equipped to handle the continuously growing and complex world of selling in different trade conditions. The sales force gives a company the human face that deals with the public. They are the indispensable part of one on one meeting with the buyers and institutional decision makers. They are the ones who adjust to individual buyers and translates communicates the message that the company wishes to convey about itself. They to a large extent, define the company’s identity.
Even small businesses should allocate funds to train the sales force. A company’s sales force should be trained to do presentations, respond to inquiries, handle objections, close transactions, develop their market, handle and grow the accounts list. They have to be closely integrated with telemarketing, media releases, and promotional effort out side of their regular function as direct endorsers. Like the walking advertisements that they are, they should reflect the company’s image.
The days of the glib talking devil of a salesman ended a long time ago. Customers just won’t fall for tactics that says a lot, makes good ad libs but means nothing. Businesses just can not rely anymore on the salesman’s previous training from another company to represent the product he has.
Because good salesmen were never born, they were trained.
Having said a lot already, there are guidelines that company’s apply in the training of its sales force.
The intensity of the training by large, depends on the applicants experience. However here are the common grounds.
• Training programs usually includes - and here’s where it all starts – product knowledge, the company’s policies and procedures and the agency’s selling techniques.
• For the training program to be effective, trainers include the programs goals, methods, content, training staff and location. The program should define precisely the information it wants the trainees to learn, skills and ideas that will have to be developed and imparted. Without clearly defined objectives, the training program fails and looses its purpose and direction.
• The content of the training must include the nature and behavior of his target market. It should also provide the salesman with the general rule and techniques that the product he will be endorsing requires.
• Training personnel issues has also to be resolved. Will it be better to use a salesman to train a salesman or should a professional trainer be used.
• Depending on the nature of the product, the length of a salesmen’s training program can be done in a day to several week and months.
• Should the salesman s training be centralized or not.
• If the budget allows it, many company’s train its sales force in resort, hotels and retreats if only to for the salesman to be in an environment that is more conducive to his learning process.
• Follow though are also to be done right after the formal training sessions to ensure that the training methods learned in the classroom is applied.
• Training and retraining is also highly advisable.
In other words, a trained sales force is an assurance that the company’s message is coherent, credible and efficient. It insures that their product get out in the market with the care and professionalism it deserves, it also insures that the advertising and all other marketing efforts are in the cutting edge of competition.
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