070: Jill Konrath | Playing the Thinking Game and Becoming a Sales Sponge - a podcast by Jim Brown

from 2018-01-02T11:00

:: ::

Takeaways

Understand Time to Proficiency: Prior to joining a new sales team, find out the average time it takes a rep there to become proficient. This is usually talked about as time to fully-ramped quota, but whether it’s three, six, or nine months, you need to embrace this time to learn. I know sales people are competitive and typically think they know everything, but make sure you’re using all available resources during this time to map out the sales process.
Map Out the Sales Process: Sales is not magic. Obviously, you need to know and understand the product you’re selling, but more importantly, you need to master the buyer’s disposition. Who are they? What are they currently using? What are the issues and challenges they are facing? What are the business implications of those challenges. Mapping those considerations to your own training and content development prevents you from needing to pull a rabbit out of a hat.
Do More, Than Less: As a new rep at any company, you need to do more. You don’t have the experience of everyone else on the team and need those repetitions to get your feet under you. You need to make more calls to get appointments. You need to run more first appointments to figure out how to convert to the next step. Once you’ve established these baselines for yourself, then you should make it a goal to do less activities while maintaining the same or better results.