Salespeople and their managers must be able to communicate with one another so that everyone in a sales team knows what is working and not working. Once something works, the company should template it so that everyone can repeat the actions or behaviors that have been determined to be effective.
Let’s say that a salesperson is 20% above her sales goals, while nobody else is even close to theirs. When they ask her what she’s doing differently, how is she going to respond? How will she explain what she is doing so that the other members of her team knows what is different? In the end, most salespeople are just going to want the quick fix. They just want to know what she is saying in meetings with prospects, not the full process.
We have all experienced this with new hires. They come into the company and want to
know how everyone sells things but end up just parroting the other salespeople by saying the same phrases and asking the same questions. They do it without context or an understanding of why they are doing it, which makes it much less useful. They won’t be able to respond to a new situation or to adversity with anything other than the same few phrases they’ve been given.
Most salespeople, especially very successful ones, are what we call “wing-it stars.” They have long since forgotten what they do and why they do it, so they can’t explain it to anyone. When they sell, they just go on autopilot. That’s nice for them – but it doesn’t help the company. Salespeople must use a selling system so that they have a common sales language and can learn the right way to sell from the ones who excel at it.
It really doesn’t matter what selling system you choose or what your sales language ends up being. Most are effective. But, you absolutely must have one for your sales team, and make sure salespeople are implementing it.
