How do we ensure our employees apply what they’ve just learned?
How do we make them implement the tools we’ve provided?
How do we make effective SELLING top of mind, every day?
Essentially, how you can make sales training stick in your store once and for all?!
Here are a few ideas to help ensure your Sales Training Program is maximized in every way, everyone on your team keeps their selling skills sharp and training is sustained over the long term.
Be committed through weekly reinforcement
You will achieve much better results by staying on top of your sales training. Once your people are on board, do not let up.
- Talk it up! Ask for and give feedback after observing your staff put what they’ve learned into action.
- Incorporate impromptu quizzes out on the sales floor and in one-on-one coaching sessions.
- Make sales training a part of every staff meeting and encourage staff to talk about what they’ve learned.
- Have a weekly training focus to keep staff engaged and on track. Post the weekly focus in the backroom to build awareness and commit to talking up the topic of the week with every staff member.
Bottom line, sales associates need to see, hear and feel the commitment of their sales leaders to make successful selling top of mind!
Don’t forget the FUN factor!
- Run sales contests. Base contests on your weekly training focus to help reinforce learning.
- Post a “Weekly Challenge”. Ensure stores/staff are taking the Weekly Challenge out on the sales floor. Ask…how they succeeded, what they learned and what challenges they experienced. Once staff gets more experience, start to turn the Weekly Challenges into mini staff contests and add an incentive to make it more exciting!
- Take it to another level and have some friendly competition with other stores in your region. Challenge them on skills learned in your Selling Program.
- Create a sales board. It proves you are interested in seeing how the team is doing. Share and recognize successes and post certificates of training completion.
In essence, make things fun to help create the desire to learn!
Follow up, follow up and follow up some more!
- Managers need to coach, consistently. Remember, what Managers talk about, sales staff do…so, get them talking about selling! Managers should observe if staff is applying the learned skills on the sales floor. Have staff develop and commit to their own action plans and be sure to follow up.
- Build your Selling Program into District Manager follow ups; they must continually work with the stores in their region to ensure that everyone is getting the most out of the program.
- Evaluate success on a regular basis. Don’t wait for an annual performance review to give someone feedback on their performance…every interaction with someone is a coaching opportunity.
All in all, sales leaders need to set the direction and create and maintain the momentum! In doing so, you’ll be well on your way to making sales training ‘stick’!
Don’t have a Sales Training Program in place? Or the one you’re using isn’t working for you? We can help!
Just contact us at solutions@graffretail.com or 905-842-1275.
