Sales training accounts for less than one-third of what you should be doing to enable sales.
If your sales enablement initiative is not having a big enough impact, it could be because of the common mistake made by companies to confuse training with enablement.
Most sales training is focused on the basics of a company and its products. For example, if employees selling equipment leases in Massachusetts state with very different laws than most states they need to understand local rules.
Sales training is perfect for helping new hires get up to speed, but it cant help the company makes more sales.
Sales training is typically designed to help reps get better at their skills, but it’s not necessarily focused on new skills or behaviors.
Most sales training programs are not looking at the bigger picture of what is needed to be successful. They do not align with business goals, and usually only deal with one stakeholder’s needs.
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Sales Training vs Sales Enablement
Sales enablement is not just about onboarding, it’s also about providing ongoing support and tools for the sales team.
The role of a sales enablement leader is to provide the right amount and type of training for their team. It’s not just about event-based, one-and-done approaches.
The article says that event-based training is less effective for all parties. Its time consuming, expensive, and lacks analytics.
Related: What is Sales Enablement, and how do you incorporate it into your company?
What Sales Enablement Coaching Is
Sales enablement should be seen as strategic, not tactical. It can help to deliver on the goals of onboarding and sales training by reinforcing foundational knowledge reps learn in those processes.
The best way to train salespeople is by providing them with the tools they need to succeed.
1. A view of the representative’s knowledge, skills, and behavior.
How do you know if your training is actually working? Data.
The best way to answer that question is with a proper sales enablement program.
- What do my reps know?
- What are the things they say about our company and what we do?
- Whats the nature of their concerns, and how are they handling them?
- Can they create a workplace environment where good selling can happen?
Ultimately, you should be able to correlate the data from your sales enablement efforts with how well each rep is doing. You can then provide the training or coaching if they need it.
2. Good alignment with business goals.
Sales enablement is important for any company and it’s especially crucial when the goal of salespeople includes customer-facing roles. It helps to eliminate disconnects between operations, marketing, and sales.
You need to get a seat at the table for business strategy conversations because you should be able to articulate how sales enablement can support the company’s vision. It is important that when an organization invests in your sales enablement, it will see results.
Enablement needs to be constructed with the company’s goals in mind. It should not only provide support for sales strategies but also other aspects of the business.
Related to this article, I am going to share three sales enablement strategies that have helped me in the past.
3. Repeating the success of A players.
If a salesperson is enthusiastic about something they did, and you want to encourage that behavior for the whole team, it’s necessary to figure out what specifically made them successful. Was their success based on luck? Or was there some kind of strategy involved? Sales enablement can be used as an incentive for turning some average players into above-average performers.
Sales Enablement Dont’s
Sales training is not enough on its own. It doesn’t have the ability to support reps in skills and behaviors necessary for engagement or growth.
A sales enablement leader in one company cant do it alone. They need support from the executives and other departments, otherwise, they’ll never get buy-in for their programs.
Don’t mistake quantity for quality. More content doesn’t always translate to increased learning or retention of the material, and it can have the opposite effect. Instead, start with your end goal in mind when you develop a sales enablement strategy and think about what outcomes you want from this effort.
Sales Enablement Do’s
When you have a seat at the table, it means that your voice is being heard and respected during business meetings. It also means you are part of the decision-making process.
There are a lot of ways to test and enhance the performance of your reps. You can use platforms that enable split testing, gamification, microlearning, and assessments in order to improve their engagement with your content.
Even if you have a small team of people, it will be better to get help from other departments. Make sure that everyone is working together on this crucial initiative.
If your company wants to add all-hands meetings and other activities, you need to ask if they are the right team for this task. If it doesnt fit in with the sales enablement strategy or help close deals, then dont do it.
Once you understand that sales training is only one-third of what your team needs to be successful, you can use other tools like sales enablement so they have the skills and knowledge needed.
Need Help Automating Your Sales Prospecting Process?
LeadFuze gives you all the data you need to find ideal leads, including full contact information.
Go through a variety of filters to zero in on the leads you want to reach. This is crazy specific, but you could find all the people that match the following:Ā
- A company in the Financial Services or Banking industry
- Who have more than 10 employees
- That spend money on Adwords
- Who use Hubspot
- Who currently have job openings for marketing help
- With the role of HR Manager
- That has only been in this role for less than 1 year
Want to help contribute to future articles? Have data-backed and tactical advice to share? Iād love to hear from you!
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