5 Killer Ways to Coach Your Sales Team to Success

They are your A-Team, a fantastic group of salespeople who were hired for their skills, knowledge, experience and ability to seal deals.  But no matter their brilliance, there is always room for growth.

Here are five tips to keep your salespeople at the top of their game, winning more sales and realising their true potential:

– Set your salespeople free

You don’t want a sales team of automatons who all look and sound like each other.  Each one of your employees has their own innate smarts, talents and abilities.  Coach them to tap into these to realise your sales goals.  Think of it like this.  Football managers don’t tell their players exactly how to score.  They provide strategies, tactics and a playbook, and the players use their natural capabilities to work with these to deliver a winning result.

– Coach individuals

In addition to coaching meetings, smart managers provide one-to-one coaching, recognising that a one-size-fits-all approach is not sufficient.  Each salesperson has unique qualities that must be drawn out, coached and nurtured.  Understanding their talents inside out is imperative, because it allows you to play to their strengths and thereby maximise their potential.

– Offer advice and ask questions

Some sales managers reach their lofty positions because they were outstanding salespeople back in the day.  They may not be natural coaches or have had sufficient training in being a coach/manager.  Therefore, they think that the way to improve their team’s performance is to tell them what needs to be done.  Typically, this is based on how they used to do it.  Yet, as I’ve already mentioned, everyone is unique.  Brilliant managers address problems and issues by asking their sellers questions that allow them to work through scenarios and find their own answers.

Direct guidance is needed sometimes, perhaps to take advantage of a specific opportunity.  But a generic do this, do that approach at all times may end up being counterproductive.  It doesn’t allow each salesperson to make the most of their natural resourcefulness.

– Coach often

Make coaching a regular part of your manager’s portfolio.  Provide your team and each individual with training on a regular basis.  Ongoing support in this way can nip any potential problems in the bud before they become critical.  It also provides your team with a supportive and nurturing environment that says they’re valued.  Saving courses and training exercises for putting out fires could be too late.

– Reward achievements

Everybody likes a little pat on the back, so celebrate wins.  Being in sales can be demoralising and frustrating at times when decision makes won’t return your calls and doors are slammed in your face.  Rewarding achievements is a magnificent way to motivate your team and boost flagging morale.  Make the recognition public so your salespeople can feel really appreciated.  Some sales managers only reward the big achievements such as when the quarterly numbers are up.  But there are lots of other wins that can be celebrated.  For example, when someone has a brilliant idea, opens a new account or brings back old customers.

A Motivation and Revenue Booster

A high performance sales team needs consistent support, coaching and training.  Provide this and watch how they thrive, producing stronger sales figures and healthier growth!

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