CSO Insights Blog Posts
Heard a Good One Lately? - 3 Steps to Improved Retention/Results
Before we all had friends flooding our email boxes with jokes and funny videos, "Heard a good one lately?" used to be asked frequently. And even with all the great jokes and stories being sent around today, folks often can't remember them. Ever been to a comedy club and laughed yourself sick for two hours and the next day not been able to repeat a single joke?
You're not alone. And in an email thread last week, Dave Stein of ES Research (ESR) suggested something that's even less a laughing matter:
ESR estimates that 85% of sales training has no lasting impact longer than 90-120 days, and U.S. corporations spend between $4 and $7 billion on sales training.
Whoa...that's a whole lot of forgetting!
Our own research shows that while training investment in sales reps was down 13% in 2009, 44% of companies were still investing more than $1500/rep/year. How much of that is sticking and being used? Roughly 3:10 (29%) reps consistently use the adopted methodology (>75% of the time), while better than 4:10 (42%) use it less than half the time (see chart).
Even so, consistent usage doesn't necessarily mean concepts and definitions from your training are being remembered and applied for maximum leverage. Precise definitions often devolve into less helpful jargon without regular coaching, inspection and feedback. For example, one buying influencer might be defined as being your Coach, Champion or Internal Supporter. Typically this is defined as: someone with whom you have credibility and this person, in turn, having credibility and influence with the other players in the decision-making process.
Without regular reinforcement the label will often remain in use (e.g., Coach, Champion, etc.), but the reality will have been covertly redefined as "anyone who'll talk to me." Not helpful.
Regular readers will remember that higher levels of sales process implementation (see blog on the SRP Matrix) translate to higher levels of quota attainment, greater forecast accuracy and lower rep turnover. Heck , if you're going to invest significant time, money and resource in training your reps, why not go the extra distance and ensure they consistently use it?
3 Steps to Improved Retention/Results:
- It's not sufficient for sales management to throw money at training; sales management from the first-line manager to senior sales execs should be exemplars and stewards of your sales process. Consistently (and correctly) using the adopted methodology's terminology, practicing the skills and reinforcing/enforcing their use in day-to-day calls/meetings/reports ensures that the process becomes how you sell.
- Periodically schedule review sessions of a specific topic. Don't call your training supplier (on in-house trainer) to schedule a one-day refresher. Instead, assign one or two reps a topic to present at a regular sales meeting. They'll learn a lot more when they have to teach a topic and you can share the load (and the retention) by spreading assignments around this way.
- The old saw "practice makes perfect" is wrong. Practice makes permanent: if you're doing something poorly and repeat this over and over, you can definitely groove doing it poorly all the time! Perfect practice makes perfect: receiving feedback/coaching on a consistent basis and continuously improving is how things get perfected.
Sell Well,
Barry Trailer
Sell Well,
Barry Trailer
Reinforcement is key... I could not agree more
Wednesday June 23, 2010
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Re: Heard a Good One Lately? - 3 Steps to Improved Retention/Results
Thursday July 08, 2010