Creating Sales Success

I work with thousands of sales people. I am consistently amazed at how many fail to deliver targets that are not very stretching with almost unlimited and extremely valuable resources.

Having been (and still am) a successful sales person myself and having had the benefit of developing a clear understanding of what it is that makes some people stand out, I have created an approach to sales excellence that is used by:

amongst others

When you study salespeople it is easy to establish that their success is defined by their FOCUS. While average and poor sales people are focused on what they think they can sell (and therefore what they think they will get out of it for themselves), the top performers are focused on how they can add value to their Customers.

This sounds so simple, and it is simple but remember that most sales people's FOCUS is being driven by:

• Targets (some of them daily)
• Cross sales (some of them daily)
• Time pressures - "I only have an hour for the meeting"
• Peer pressure - open viewing of results to encourage a competitive environment
• Ambition - their own and that of their Sales Managers
• Cash flow - the need to earn a certain amount on a consistent basis
• Past perceptions of what sales is (bad habits)

What is interesting is that these "pressures" needn't necessarily force the salesperson to maintain the wrong FOCUS, but they do. I see it all of the time.

So what is the alternative? That's a good question.

There are three key strands:

1. Create the correct belief about the sales person's role (to add value) and align the sales leadership/management strategy to this belief

2. Provide the sales person with the skills they need in order that they will be able to add value

3. Provide the sales leaders with the ability to coach their people effectively

In essence, this is at the heart of having a successful and effective sales team.

So what do you do next?