Does Your Sales Training Program Fail or Pass the Simple Rope Test?
Does Your Sales Training Program Fail or Pass the Simple Rope Test?
So what is the rope test? Take a three to five foot piece of rope and give it to someone near you. Then you hold the other end. Walk away from each other until the rope is right. Next push on your end of the rope.
What happened? Probably nothing other than a couple of smiles! Sales Coaching Tip: The other person can be your potential new customer, strategic partner or center of influence
The goal of sales training is to improve the sales skills of sales professionals so that the goal to increase sales is achieved. Using the rope test, when you push on the rope, no matter how hard you push, nothing changes, nothing improves.
Failing the rope test suggests that the current sales training is far closer aligned to product based marketing. The focus using this marketing approach is all on the selling professionals as illustrated by the rope test. Sales Coaching Tip: When the greater the focus is on you, the lesser dollars you will earn.
To pass the rope test requires the qualified potential customer or client (a.k.a. prospect) to literally pull the sales professional closer and closer to her or him. For this action to happen requires a different marketing approach that being education based marketing. When this approach is adopted, everything focuses on the potential qualified customer. Hence the sales skills within the sales training need to extend beyond the traditional learning objectives of:
And incorporate:
If you want your training dollars to deliver a positive return on investment, then make sure your sales training program passes the rope test. This paradigm shifts the focus away from the technical sales skills where the selling team is pushing the rope to more self-leadership talents that encourage the potential customers to pull the rope.
Does Your Sales Training Program Fail or Pass the Simple Rope Test - To learn more about this author, visit Leanne Hoagland-Smith's Website.
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Many sales training program fail the simple rope test. Maybe this is because the simple rope test is just so simple that it continues to be ignored.
So what is the rope test? Take a three to five foot piece of rope and give it to someone near you. Then you hold the other end. Walk away from each other until the rope is right. Next push on your end of the rope.
What happened? Probably nothing other than a couple of smiles! Sales Coaching Tip: The other person can be your potential new customer, strategic partner or center of influence
The goal of sales training is to improve the sales skills of sales professionals so that the goal to increase sales is achieved. Using the rope test, when you push on the rope, no matter how hard you push, nothing changes, nothing improves.
Failing the rope test suggests that the current sales training is far closer aligned to product based marketing. The focus using this marketing approach is all on the selling professionals as illustrated by the rope test. Sales Coaching Tip: When the greater the focus is on you, the lesser dollars you will earn.
To pass the rope test requires the qualified potential customer or client (a.k.a. prospect) to literally pull the sales professional closer and closer to her or him. For this action to happen requires a different marketing approach that being education based marketing. When this approach is adopted, everything focuses on the potential qualified customer. Hence the sales skills within the sales training need to extend beyond the traditional learning objectives of:
- Overcoming stalls and objections
- Negotiating
- Presenting the case
And incorporate:
- Being the active listener
- Understanding emotional intelligence
If you want your training dollars to deliver a positive return on investment, then make sure your sales training program passes the rope test. This paradigm shifts the focus away from the technical sales skills where the selling team is pushing the rope to more self-leadership talents that encourage the potential customers to pull the rope.
Does Your Sales Training Program Fail or Pass the Simple Rope Test - To learn more about this author, visit Leanne Hoagland-Smith's Website.
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John BrennanJohn Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website |
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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David AchesonDavid Acheson is the founder of DCJA Consultancy. DCJA Consultancy is a management consultancy business specialising in B2B sales consultancy. They offer bespoke and packaged sales consultancy including Sales Optimisation Review, Interim Sales Management, Sales & Marketing Review, 1:1 Sales & Management Staff Analysis, Management Training, Solution Sales Training, Creation of New Pay Plan, KPI's, run Customer Feedback Campaigns, assist with Recruitment, Coaching, Appraisals and set up Strategic Marketing Campaigns. David spent his early career in accountancy and then moved into sales in 1982, working in Office Equipment, IT, Advertising, Training, Outsourcing and Consultancy. He has held many Senior Positions in SMBs and Global Organisations including Head of Sales Operations & Head of Business Development. His knowledge, skills and great experience of the Sales Industry has led to David making keynote speeches and running educational sessions to key businesses through organisations including The Chamber of Commerce and Business Link. - Visit David Acheson's Website |
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Leanne Hoagland-SmithAre your sales where you want them to be? Will you be one of the few who achieves sales or business success or one of the many who have failed to change? Are you tired of being told you are like everyone else? Then you may find my first book on sales of interest. Be the Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray Suits, The Keys to Unlocking Sales available at Amazon or at http://www.processspecialist.com/red-jacket.htm. This book is a reflection of my no-nonsense approach to improving sales to overall business results. If you are truly committed to making sustainable changes, then I can help you secure a positive return on your investment because I focus on executable solutions not telling you the problems you already know you have. From training to corporate (group) coaching to executive one on one coaching, my approach is to assess, create awareness, build a goal driven action plan and then execute. The bottom line question is "Not do you or your employees know it, but do you or they want to do it?" Please call for a free strategy session at 219.759.5601. - Visit Leanne Hoagland-Smith's Website |
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Staging DivaDebra Gould, aka The Staging Diva®, is President of Six Elements Inc., an internationally recognized home staging company. Inspired by many requests from aspiring home stagers wanting to start similar businesses, Gould created the Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program. Gould has trained over 1000 Staging Diva Graduates worldwide to start staging businesses. Buying decorating and selling six of her own homes in four years lead to an interest in real estate staging which she turned into a career with the launch of sixelements.com in 2002. Since then she has staged hundreds of homes in addition to teaching home staging training. Gould is the author of several home staging resources including a series of popular ebooks made up of a Design Guide, Color Guide and Portfolio Guide. For more information about Debra Gould visit stagingdiva.com. - Visit Staging Diva's Website |
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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John PowerJohn Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website |
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Cheryl MatthynssensCheryl is a life skills coach, licensed Chemical Dependency Counselor and a 20 year entrepreneur. Cheryl's dedication to achieving a life of balance led to her expanding her teaching from the simple managing of life's daily challenges to adding financial well being as well. A direct marketer with DrinkACT, she is gaining ground in the online community with her concepts of making sure business owners, entreprenuers and employees have well rounded life styles. She opened up a small affiliate site - The Balance Guide- to help others find resources for mental and emotional well being. Visit Cheryl's blog to see more of the diversity beyond business she has began offering online at www.thebalanceguide.blogspot.com - Visit Cheryl Matthynssens's Website |
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