Beginner Sales Training eCourse: Back to Basics Part 1

welcome to back to basics part 1 this program has been created to help sales people who are either not performing to the level of their or their managers expectations or salespeople that are relatively new and may not have active sales management or standardized company training within their company because maybe it's too small this training is intended to give you an understanding of the basics on sales how to be a successful salesperson by applying methodologies processes approaches that winning salespeople apply I have been in the business of training and coaching salespeople since 2008 prior to that I was the owner of a business at the age of 15 I used to be a bicycle rider at that age I rode bicycles with my friends and we all used to use the local bike store in Sierra Vista Arizona to buy bike parts well I had the idea one day that I could become a distributor of bike parts and actually resell parts to my friends and by doing so I would be able to get profit from their purchases of bike parts and take those profits and invest in parts for my bike purchase at wholesale well you can understand the leverage there and so I understood at a young age the opportunity of entrepreneurship as well as the advantage of understanding how to sell to other people and ever since I've sold many things I've sold mainly machines cash register tape to gas stations fundraising books artwork vacuum cleaners solar units I've also sold in high-tech I work for Oracle for 10 years prior to starting this business in 2008 and I used to work in the events department within the marketing division now the events department would actually have to sell even though we were technically marketing people we would sell booth space and we would sell sponsorships and some of the sponsorships that I sold went right on up to 1 million dollars that's right therefore I have sold items very inexpensively right on up to very expensive items in high-tech which typically have a longer sales cycle and much more relationship building necessary in order to make the sale so I have a lot of experience in sales and I have a lot of experience coaching and training salespeople so that's what qualifies me to be here with you so why are you here well as I said in the opening I believe that you're here because you know that you can do better or someone above you believes that you can do better and is parked you in front of this video hoping that I will instill some new knowledge in you that helps you to improve your performance what are you going to get out of this well I hope that you will be inspired and motivated to try something different or something new if you are relatively new to sales then this is all going to be brand new to you and it will help you to get off to a much stronger start then you might have without this material so I hope to hear from you that this material is helpful that is helping you to improve your sales and getting you off on the right foot so let's take a look at the agenda for this part one course we're first going to look at some elements of sales people's behaviors their traits that help them to thrive quarter after quarter and year after year so we'll take a look at that and then we're going to go into some some specific activities that you would follow in order to succeed in selling such as setting goals and then having KPIs to measure the effectiveness of your goals and then we will also talk about a weekly plan because without a weekly plan then it's fairly unlikely that you're going to be to effective throughout the week so winning salespeople have weekly plans so we'll take a look at that and I'll share with you some of my best practices for how to make a strong weekly plan so let's begin by taking a look at why salespeople thrive it is a combination of these things action clarity confidence determination a growth mindset knowledge leverage perseverance planning and responsibility don't worry if you're writing these things down and you're worried that I'm going to skip to the next slide because we're going to go through these one by one on these next slides so let's start with action I like this quote because really it says it all there are two types of salespeople there are sales people who love to talk about selling and there are sales people who are too busy selling to spend much time talking about it what type are you giving you a moment to think about that because chances are that if you're not as successful as you'd like to be you're spending too much time thinking about selling talking about selling planning to sell then actually selling action replaces thinking about selling and talking about selling it's actually picking up the phone it's actually going out and looking for prospects is actually sitting down in front of a qualified customer and looking for the resale or the upsell it is selling so when you think about why aren't you succeeding to the level that you like you really have to look at your actions how are your actions supporting your results because if you're taking massive action and you're still not getting the results that you would like then you have to wonder if you have the next trait which is clarity clarity is what points a person in the right direction with the action right because it's great to have massive action but if you're going in the wrong direction because you don't really know you're not super clear about where you should be going well then that can be a problem so clarity for a salesperson is knowing what is it that you're seeking to achieve and obviously that those are your goals and we're going to talk about goals in a little bit but apart from that it's knowing who your target is who is your ideal client its knowing where to spend your time you could waste a lot of time sending email to unqualified prospects and thinking that you're selling but if you're really clear about how to achieve results you wouldn't be doing that instead you would be figuring out who is a qualified prospect and you'd be going after them and them alone you could spend a little bit of time going after some super big fish because sometimes it's nice when you can land a big fish and it makes a big difference in your quarter however you need to spend most of your time going after solid qualified prospects and dealing with existing customers it's knowing what your priorities are and it's knowing your company the products that your company has this is all clarity and it supports strong selling next is confidence just by looking at this picture you can get the feeling of confidence right there looking you in the eye they're smiling they look confident that's the way that you want to look and you want to feel when you're dealing with a prospect or a customer because confidence makes the other person want to buy this is a little-known secret of sales to new people or unsuccessful people that confidence makes a huge difference as to whether the other person is going to buy or not it's confidence not only in you and your ability to solve their problems but it's also confidence in the understanding that your company can deliver on its promises that it backs up its products that sort of confidence really just naturally comes out when you meet with people it's not something that you could fake it's something that you feel down inside and it just resonates throughout your conversations and meetings so if this is an area that you have weakness in well it will affect your sales and you'll want to work on it by better understanding your industry improving your knowledge about your company your products etc to the point where it starts to become something that you can count on after that determination so determination is the the rock-solid belief that you will just stick with it until you win you will not miss your goals you are determined to make your number no matter what doesn't matter if you have an old computer an old car you have old literature your company has an old website it doesn't matter what's in your way you are determined to meet your number and you will win have you ever seen this in top salespeople they just don't give up because they are determined for this is the growth mindset the growth mindset is something that I learned about in a book called mindset by Carol Dweck in that book Carol talks about the difference between two types of people fixed mindset people and growth mindset people fixed mindset people have a belief that it is what it is it can't be changed they believe that the world is the way it is and it can't be changed and I'm the way I am and I can't be changed generally fixed mindset people don't like a big challenge they actually like everything to come easy to them so for example if they have a very good quarter well then they believe that it's all because of them and their natural talents and skills and they don't have to learn any more because they're already perfect but then they have a challenging quarter and guess what it's not about my inability it's about someone else's problem it's because of that or it's because of that person that's why I didn't make my numbers this quarter because they're fixed mindset growth mindset people on the other hand are always looking for new solutions to tough problems they love a challenge so for example a growth mindset person would take a new quota that's much higher than their old quota as a challenge to grow a fixed mindset person would say what that's too much that's too high a number I can't make that number they would just immediately shut down on something that they felt negative about whereas a growth mindset person they might initially feel some anxiety and a little bit of negativity but they would figure it out and work towards it because they love a good challenge so are you fixed mindset or are you growth mindset because it really does make a big difference and if you're not sure based on my explanation that I highly recommend that you check out that book called mindset and even if you are sure and you feel like you have a fixed mindset you want to change it it can be changed in the book it goes through a process to help you to start to understand how to become a growth mindset person because it will make a big difference not just in your sales career but in your life after that is knowledge right we talked about this a little bit in clarity in clarity you need to be clear about your company the company's history etc about what products you sell well knowledge goes a little bit deeper you're gaining knowledge by attending this class right now people that win are always hungry for new knowledge they read books they watch programs they listen to audios they listen to podcasts whatever it is they're hungry for knowledge about their industry their company the products they sell what winning sales people do that they don't do they're looking for Mentors they're always trying to figure things out to improve their knowledge because they know that increased knowledge directly affects their bottom-line results so I want you to always be hungry for knowledge know your customers and your prospects you know spend more time studying them so you get smarter about them we've never had more access to information than now so be knowledgeable there's no excuse not to be after that is leverage I love leverage because what this is is figuring out how to put 16 hours of productivity into an eight-hour day winning salespeople are always looking for leverage they don't like to waste time and they don't like to waste their valuable resources they would rather leverage another person or a tool so for example with people you may have staff around you that can help support you use those staff you may have access to online resources such as a CRM system or zoom info which gives you information on people like never before you may have access to LinkedIn there are many tools out there that salespeople can use to create leverage leverage can be gained by going through other people that are in your network so for example existing customers who might be able to refer you to new prospects that's leveraging your network or people that don't by asking them if they know someone who might actually be a better fit that's leveraging even people that didn't buy did you ever think about selling through the people who didn't buy to other people that they know that's leverage so whatever it takes for you to gain more leverage in your day figure it out perseverance this is similar to determination but it's a little bit different because perseverance is staying in the game right determination is I won't quit until I make my goal perseverance goes right alongside determination and continue supporting and providing energy so that determination gets the job done you will persevere you will stay in the game until you talk to enough people to meet your number or you will continue to call qualified prospects how many times should you call a qualified prospect when they say no if your answer was once or twice being completely honest now then that would put you in the average pack of salespeople there are many salespeople in the middle that's the average pack and then there there's a small amount of salespeople at the top generally the 80/20 real 8020 rule is evident here in that 20% of sales people sell 80% of the revenue then there are the bottom people these are the bottom feeders and these are the ones that are either looking for a new job or they're waiting to get fired bottom feeders they don't persevere they generally give up after just one projection but studies have shown that by making more calls to qualified prospects you will make more sales after rejection you continue to go back you persevere because you know this customer is qualified and here's something magical that happens when you continue to go after a qualified prospect they start to gain respect for you that they didn't have initially because perseverance is a respectable attribute it's not a dirty word it's not something to feel bad about it's something to feel good about so you should start thriving on rejection because you know that your competition is giving up while you're not because they probably getting rejected also and if they give up and you stay in the game you're the one that's going to make the sale planning salespeople that win plan their annual schedule their quarterly schedule their monthly schedule their weekly and daily schedules they're always planners people that are too busy say I don't have time to plan but it's actually the reverse the more you plan the more time you'll have in your schedule because you'll have clarity about what's the right thing to do spending an hour planning could gain you two three four hours in your week spend the time planning and we will talk about the ideal weekly schedule later in this part to help you to understand the importance of a plan because if you don't plan then you're hoping to be successful just by random coincidence as opposed to having a plan that makes you successful deliberately and the last one here responsibility responsibility is all about not playing the blame game not making excuses for why I didn't make my number why I didn't get that sale why I couldn't get that meeting if you really think about it you can find an excuse and that excuse might even sound pretty good to someone else other than you but is that the way to the top it's not the way to the top is to stop playing the blame game stop making excuses and take a hundred percent responsibility if you spend time interviewing and talking with highly successful people you'll see that most of them take 100% responsibility for their results even when a setback could be blamed on someone else they look to see what was their part what was their role in that setback what can they learn from that and how can they grow from that because of the growth mindset right growth mindset people take 100% responsibility all right so that's the section on some behaviors and traits that you'll find in sales people that thrive salespeople that are total winners I want you to think about these and understand if you're manifesting these behaviors or beliefs if you're not then you really want to spend time thinking about how could you work on this and how could you improve this because it will directly affect your results so now let's talk about goals success in life depends on having worthy goals and there is a lot of material on goals out there for you to read and understand so I'm going to get specific with you on goals and not explain their importance or exactly how to goal set I'm going to expect that you already have goals because if you don't have goals you're in trouble because if you don't know the target that you're shooting for then how are you going to hit it it's just not possible so what I want you to do is take a look at the handout that's been provided to you as part of this course take a look at the handout and start filling in the blanks for annual monthly as well as quarterly goals break down your goals by different categories so that you understand exactly what you're shooting for and if you don't know this information that I'm telling you you need to get it you need to get this information and write it down figure it out up here or work with your sales manager to understand what your goal should be because sometimes your goals are assigned to you however if you really want to win why not set your goals higher than those that were set for you don't just decide to go with what someone else thinks you can do why don't you see if you can rise above what someone else thinks you can do top people generally challenge themselves to achieve more and go further than anyone else expects them to do so take this time now to fill out the goal sheet okay great so you've filled out your goal sheet and now I'm going to show you another specific process in order to achieve those goals because just having the numbers alone in writing will help you that's positive but you also need to have more to give you the support necessary to hit those goals and for sales people those are called KPIs or keeper formants indicators key performance indicators are those items that when you measure them they help you to reach your goals so I have a handout for you on KPIs and I want you to take a look at that handout and decide is this a good list of KPIs for you or not you really only want to settle on three to five KPIs that are meaningful to you and also should be meaningful to your manager so that you're both on the same page in terms of measuring the right things right because if your manager wants you to measure this and you're over here measuring this well there could be a mismatch and that could create problems so be clear about one unified set of KPIs and it might even be best if your whole team is measured against the same KPIs of course you can add your own to the lists that are meaningful to you so take a look at the handout and go down the list and decide what are your KPIs that you would shoot for in a week the handout is designed to measure in one week of activity number of meetings number of calls that you would make number of follow-ups number of references that you have established or number of referrals that you might get these are some meaningful KPIs that I've put down for you but you can add to your own list also so take a look and do that now all right so now we have time to look at a weekly plan a weekly plan is hugely important I can tell you that people that have a weekly plan gets so much more done because that creates leverage it creates clarity it creates determination because when you know what you're supposed to do at different times of the day and the week you're much more likely to do it so a weekly plan is very important and one that I insist on for anyone who is not already doing it so if you're going to be coached by me then you need to have a weekly plan there are best practices on how to execute a weekly plan so let's take a look at these best practices that I have for you okay the slides will busy but we're going to walk through it one by one first thing preview the week ahead on Sunday I know that many of you wait until Monday morning because you don't want to think about work over the weekend I can't blame you on that for a long time I was like that too but then I realized the value of being one step ahead of my competition and the way to get one step ahead is to dedicate just a small amount of time on Sunday whether it's Sunday morning afternoon or evening just figure that you're going to spend fifteen to thirty minutes reviewing the week ahead and thinking about the appointments that you have set and how you should prepare for those appointments so that you will give yourself appropriate time to do the research necessary to be fully prepared because you understand your prospect or what's happening with your customers company because even with existing customers you can do research to understand where's the company now what's happening with the company what's changed what's going on in the industry is that information that you could bring into this meeting coming up so research is very important and then prepare your plan of attack when you go in to meet with that prospect what's your game plan how are you going to start the conversation what is the result that you're driving for and how do you expect to get there very important so this is information that you start to process on Sunday as you're thinking about the week ahead and then what you would do is block the time necessary to do that preparation and research because I'm not saying that you do that on Sunday you're just thinking about it on Sunday and then you're blocking time in your calendar so that you have the appropriate time set aside you will also create blocks of time for prospecting and following up if you're not hitting your numbers you should be selling at least half the time you should not be spending time on administrative work administrative work is preparing orders or entering orders preparing proposals submitting paperwork following up on orders to find out if they've been delivered this is all important work I'm not saying that's not necessary but you don't want to do it during prime selling time which is usually early in the morning right through to almost the end of the afternoon now prime selling time is a lot of the day and that's when you should be selling now what I can tell you is if you're already blowing out your numbers then you may not need to sell half the day because you've got so much business coming in that you actually need to establish help getting follow-up and administrative support and that's great so you can spend your time doing some administrative work or working with your support staff if you have that much business coming in but if you don't you need to be setting aside nice big blocks of time power hours where you turn off the phone I'm talking about the cellphone notifications coming in from social media or email you turn off all those notifications and you just go after the calls that you need to make or you go out in the field and meet with people real selling time when you have those kinds of blocks in your schedule it's much easier to just go out and do it because a lot of salespeople they just go through their week randomly they talk about selling remember instead of actually taking action so what else what else is great for you well some people will write down a list of their daily tasks if you just want to rely on your calendar and block everything out and even put tasks in there that's fine if paper works for you that's great if you want to use a separate task manager that's fine too you know I use asana Asin a as my task manager so whatever is going to work for you you can instill that as the best practice in your weekly plan once the week is done there's one final best practice and this is just as important as the Sunday preview of the week is a look back so on Friday afternoon look back at the week just past and think about how well it went evaluate each and every meeting how did it go did I achieve my result what did I do that was really good for me what didn't I do that I should have done could you learn from some mistakes that you made and could you also either document best practices because there was something new that you establish and maybe you should document it so you could do it again or just reinforce in your own mind and your heart that I said the right thing or I did the right thing there my preparation really helped and I'll continue to do that going forward because that's a really good practice okay so the the look-back at the end of the week so that's the way to have a very solid week so that you know that you're doing the best that you can with the time that you have so that's it for today I hope that out of this class you have actually learned something that you have gone through this material and learn something new such as the traits of the top salespeople you realize that you actually aren't that clear about your goals and so you learn something from that or you establish that you don't really have good KPIs in place and you need to establish those KPIs or finally that you have a terrible weekly plan or no plan which is the worst but that's okay because remember this is part one and that's what back to basics is all about so there's no need to beat yourself up but be honest with yourself and be truthful as to what you got out of this what you can use to compare against what you're doing now and how it could help you to improve your results going forward all right so thank you very much for going through part one I hope this was very helpful to you please let me know by sending me an email or dropping me a line through social media and let me know how this part one has helped you to better organize and be prepared for sales success and I look forward to welcoming you to part two thank you

Channel: Build and Balance

Views: 128,028

Rating: 4.9208074 out of 5

Keywords: The Basics of selling, Sales basics, sales training, entry level sales training tips, Tips for starting a career in sales, tips to improve underperforming salespeople, learning how to sale basics, ecourse for learning how to sell, tips for just starting a career in sales, how to get more sales just starting out, how to master sales basics, basic fundamentals of sales, tips for setting sales goals

Id: MCpi7xZz8bg

Length: 28min 45sec (1725 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 12 2015