tel:+61417332720 jerrod@attitudecoach.com
Select Page

How to become a Top Sales Person

Once upon a time when I started in sales I was the bottom level sales person with over 900 people in my division – and I was one of the worst sales people they had.

Over time I saw that I could achieve more by watching the top sales people, asking them questions and learning and studying from them. By the end of that year I was one of the top sales people.

My life at this point was in the Eat Sleep Sell Repeat cycle.

I discovered the company needed to have three things in order for anyone to become successful:

  • Pay
  • Recognition
  • Promotion

Not having these three things right in a company are the three main reasons sales people look for a new job. To get them right there are a lot of complex issues to analyse and adjust. But for starters, can your company answer these basic questions?

  • Can a sales person see how they can get paid for the work they do?
  • Can a sales person see the recognition for their efforts?
  • And can a sales person see the clear promotion path that rewards their good results?

You must be able to clearly articulate your company’s targets for sales people and sales people must know what the company’s ideal of a good sales person is.

While not every sales person will get into the Eat Sleep Sell Repeat mode those who do will benefit both themselves and the company. Helping sales people learn how to be selling machines while at work, but of course retaining balance in the rest of their life, will reap mutual benefits to both parties.

Some further questions to review and that we delve into when helping companies retain and grow their sales team include:

  • What processes are in place to train a mentor a sales person to become a good sales person?
  • What help does the company provide to sales people to help them meet targets and quotas and ratios?
  • What motivational and attitude check processes are in place to help with failure and growth?
  • What regular rewards and recognition results do you have in place?
  • Do you Keep Calm and Eat Sleep Sell Repeat?

How to become an Excellent Sales Manager

As a result of my sales successes the company turned around and said “Hey you are one of the top sales people – why don’t you run a sales team?” I thought that was a great idea. But immediately I failed as I didn’t have the leadership and communication skills to run a sales team as an effective manager.

A big part of this was just not being able to create cohesion amongst the team. However I learned in this as well and eventually became one of the top sales managers in the company.

Unfortunately the company didn’t have any processes in place that I needed to help me transition from a good sales person to a good sales manager. I learned from both the good and bad sales managers and these are some of the things I learned that are imperative to help people transition.

  • Have daily sales meetings – either you need the meeting or the meeting needs you
  • Create belief in the product
  • Help sales people get belief in themselves
  • Teach product knowledge – answers to objections and questions
  • Show them that others are achieving
  • Have quotas and ratios for success
  • Transition training to the field and then critically evaluate, tweak and repeat
  • Help people keep their personal lives out of their sales environment
  • Use the Eat Sleep Sell Repeat concept to switch on while at work

From my experiences I have developed a training package that can be implemented in any businesses to help sales people transition to sales managers, and along the way help the company meet and exceed its sales targets.

How to become a great Sales Division Manager

Once again the company said to me – “Hey why don’t you run a division?”

Once again I failed miserably as I did not have the skills to run a division. From recruiting to training to procurement, to dealing with staff, service and after sales service etc. I now had 5 different departments to be managed. It took me 12 months to learn how to do this. However eventually I became successful at this and then the company asked me to go and set up multiple division offices.

Once again I had to learn a whole new skill set and for the start I was once again a total failure. Eventually I learned the skills to run multiple divisions and juggle all the management tasks to make this happen successfully. I ended up setting up 10 of these divisional offices over 15 years.

There are two parts to my success in this area.

The first was a company that was prepared to take a risk on me. It would have been nice if they actually had a processes for me to follow, but no I had to learn that as I went. Fortunately my initial failures were not grounds for dismissal, or cause to endanger the company’s cash flow.

The second was my ability to learn and adapt my sales manager experience into the skillsets needed to manage a whole division with numerous departments, staff and personnel issues, business contracts and procurement, and so on.

When Attitude Coach engages with companies who are preparing to expand into new territories or regions we develop customised plans for training, retaining and succeeding that drastically reduce the chance of failure due to poor or missing processes.

We teach you to plan to succeed on purpose, as opposed to managing by trial and error.

Questions to ask yourself

  • Do your sales people forget to close?
  • Do your sales people forget the first name of the customer?
  • Are your sales people positive all day?
  • Do you have a process to keep your sales people positive all day?
  • Do customers thank your sales people for their service?
  • Do your sales people bring their personal lives to work?
  • Are external forces polluting your sales processes?
  • Do your sales people consistently meet their daily targets?
  • Do you even have daily targets for your sales people?
  • Do you have a check list for your sales people to keep them on track?
  • Are your older sales people helping or hindering your new people?
  • How do you transition your sales people into sales managers?

Eat Sleep Sell Repeat

We love to help companies maximise the capability and potential in their sales teams and grow and succeed as human beings. Use the contact form below if you want to improve your staff retention and sales abilities.

Eat Sleep Sell Repeat!

[contact-form-7 id=”4″ title=”Contact form 1″]