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The Sales Trainer Debate

Written by: Niall Devitt

Article Overview: Skip Anderson has started somewhat of a debate about selling benefits in the forum on Salespractice.com about a video by Grant Leboff, author of Sales Therapy. This video titled “Sales Myth #1: “Sell The Benefits” is described as “pulling the plug on that age-old sales tactic - selling the benefits. “So what’s wrong with benefit selling? Well, firstly, we’ve heard it all before. We’re all sick of salespeople telling us how great their product is. And secondly, we’ve all been let down so much by these false promises that when we hear a list of benefits we just start looking for the catch. Watch Grant Leboff explode the myth and introduce the alternatives — you’ll never try and sell the benefits again”

The Sales Trainer Debate

Skip Anderson has started somewhat of a debate about selling benefits in the forum on Salespractice.com about a video by Grant Leboff, author of Sales Therapy.

This video titled “Sales Myth #1: “Sell The Benefits” is described as “pulling the plug on that age-old sales tactic - selling the benefits.


“So what’s wrong with benefit selling? Well, firstly, we’ve heard it all before. We’re all sick of salespeople telling us how great their product is. And secondly, we’ve all been let down so much by these false promises that when we hear a list of benefits we just start looking for the catch. Watch Grant Leboff explode the myth and introduce the alternatives — you’ll never try and sell the benefits again”

Watch the video and you will realise, and as Skip point outs it has nothing to do with benefit selling. In fact what Grant has presented in his video is a whole load of misinformation around selling benefits. I can only presume that this is another case of a so-called sales expert skewing the facts for his own benefit, pun intended.

Misinformation is ripe within the sales training community, one recent gimmick is to advertise sales training with believe it or not, the promise of a “No more selling” approach to sales. Could be the ultimate in misinformation? While the sales trainers involved may see this as some kind of clever marketing strategy, I believe it to extremely irresponsible and misleading because there are companies and people who will be taken by these water to wine promises.

Reading down through the debate on Salespractice, a sales trainer makes the argument that people don’t buy benefits they buy solutions to their problems to which Skip replies “isn’t it possible for a customer to buy a product’s benefits, and at the same time buy a “solution to a problem? Solving a problem” and “buying benefits” are not mutually exclusive concepts, are they? Can’t a customer (and salesperson) do both at the same time?

This trainer is trying to promote the excellent Sandler Sales System but what is not grasped is that the main reason this system works, is because is built on sound selling strategy much like correct benefit selling. A feature can only becomes a benefit after the salesperson is able to show that it addresses a client’s need or part of, it becomes beneficial.

In effect, all the trainer is left arguing is semantics yet persists in the opinion that a customer buying benefits of a solution and a customer buying a solution are entirely different things. If a trainer is prepared to do this publicly and to this extent, it raises the question, can the trainer in question fully grasp either the concepts of selling benefits or selling solutions?

This is by no means the first time I have come across sales trainers who struggle to understand basic sales principles. I have believe it or not, attended benefit selling based courses where it was quite obvious that the sales trainer didn’t quite understand the methodology.

Some may feel that I am been too hard, because many sales trainers might be well intentioned and maybe they are not setting out to mislead, but simply lack the knowledge and experience to know what they are talking about. I say tough! If you are going to promote yourself as an expert, it is on that basis that you should be judged.

Whether a sales trainer is intentional or not, the result remains the same. In my opinion they are fundamentally symptoms of the same problem. Because our industry is virtually unregulated, it has always been too easy to lack knowledge, it is always been too easy to not grasp what your talking about. It is in this environment that some sales trainers have set out to deceive, actively misleading clients for many years without fear of anything or anyone.

A recent more sinister turn of events has now brought the sales training community under the spotlight like never before. Jill Konrath and Dave Stein, among others have identified sales trainers who have brazenly stolen their content and then republished it as their own. I would like to add my congratulations to everyone who was involved in bringing this to the attention of all and it is my hope that a sales trainer will never stoop so low again.

Surely this now should serve to make us stop and think. Should we now be asking questions like:

How do we want to be perceived by the wider business community?

And what impact are the practices of some sales trainers having on the rest of us?

Some sales trainers may feel that this is only relevant if it directly affects their business, I would suggest that this has already happened. Maybe you have not had your content stolen but have you lost business to sales trainers who make promises they can’t possibly keep? I know I have, as I have encountered clients who were so very close to turning their back on sales training because they had previously hired a sales trainer who hadn’t a clue.

Perhaps now is the time for the rest of us to say “NO MORE BAD SALES TRAINERS”

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Article Tags: benefit, false promises, gimmick, leboff, marketing strategy, misinformation, myth, pun, salespeople, salesperson, tactic, water to wine



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