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Sales Success Begins with Defining What You Value

Written by: Leanne Hoagland-Smith

Article Overview: What does sales success mean to you? How does your success relate to what you value?

Sales Success Begins with Defining What You Value

Most sales professionals desire success. Thousands of hours are invested or wasted depending upon your perspective and the specific actions such as examining numerous target markets, demographics, psychograhics, market trends and existing bottom line numbers. Given the investments of these limited resources of time, energy, emotions and dollars, a logical person would be hard press to explain why only 40% to 80% of all sales targets continue to allude businesses.

In working with my clients I have come to realize the following 2 consistent performance obstacles:

#1 – The inability to clearly define success

#2 – The inability to understand what motivates each individuals

The first obstacle is fairly easy to overcome. During the first session, I have the sales person define what success means to herself or himself. Then I ask what does success mean for this company? Many cannot provide a clear answer. This lack of knowledge is the first gap that needs to be closed. Individuals do not need to share the same definition, but collectively they need to agree so that everyone is working towards the same target.

Now the second obstacle takes more time. To overcome this obstacle begins with integrating several proven assessments within the sales department.

The first assessment should identify what each sales person values. For what we value is what motivates us to take action. When we understand what motivates us, we can take corrective actions if necessary.

Next, learning how each sales person makes decisions is critical. Additionally, this instrument needs to evaluate the existing talents of each individual. In many cases, human beings have a tendency to turn non-talents into weaknesses and then focus on those weaknesses. This becomes a negative drain when the non-talents have none to little bearing on that person’s current sales role. Finally, the last instrument looks at individual behavior.

When we understand what success means to us as selling professionals as well as the Why, the How and the What of our behaviors (sales skills), we can begin to construct an action plan that will allows us to increase sales and truly enjoy selling.

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Article Tags: br 2, consistent performance, corrective actions, current sales, demographics, first gap, gap, human beings, lack of knowledge, limited resources, line numbers, logical person, market trends, obstacle, obstacles, sales person, sales professionals, sales targets, target markets, time energy



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