There is no time like the present to prepare and educate your sales team for current or future sales deals. Knowledge is power and when salespeople are equipped with information, it provides better customer service. So how do you approach upskilling sales teams to improve channel opportunities for the organization?
Knowledge is Power
Organizations need to stay responsive to changing market trends and their sales teams need to be adaptable to any new strategies or tactical campaigns required to be implemented, to maximize sales for the goods and services that are likely to be in higher demand.
This means, the business needs to ensure sales teams are educated with product knowledge and skilled on how to sell specific products based on specifications and benefits or services, in order to reap the opportunities available.
Knowledge is power. To be successful, it is imperative for organizations to provide the team with all the relevant resources and information they need. This will ensure that the information is absorbed, understood, and most importantly maintains a high level of motivation to learn.. Businesses need to educate and galvanize employees in the same way they do when releasing a new product or service.
Incentivize Learning
Online learning can be particularly engaging for salespeople, improving knowledge retention by 25-60%, making it an incredibly valuable tool in upskilling sales teams. Incentivizing learning provides the opportunity to “learn and earn”, combining education through fun formats like quizzes, with the chance to gain rewards for successful completion; whilst adding a sense of novelty to an incentive.
It is fast and easy for companies to implement, ensuring that the benefits can be seen rapidly. e-learning can also strengthen success by ensuring employees are fully aware of all product offerings. Certain industries like Technology and IT can take advantage of current sales opportunities by introducing incentivizing sales convergence of targeted SKUs to boost deals and revenue. Sales employees could complete the appropriate online courses on which products complement each other the best and learn which ‘add-on’ products would be best to promote for different scenarios. Thus, creating upsell opportunities that drive incremental sales. It’s important that sales teams not only understand their company, but also their products and incentivized learning is perfect for this.
Building Brand Ambassadors
In addition to looking for ways to maximize sales, learning capabilities are particularly useful to broaden and deepen the team’s understanding of the brand, and create fully engaged brand ambassadors. Brand ambassadors help to:
- Bolster brand awareness
- Promote positive conversations on a brands product and services
- Strengthen a business’s credibility
- Drive loyalty of a brand
- Encourage their peers to promote favored organizations
When building skills and brand knowledge of a sales channel team, improves how they sell to customers from engaging them to upselling and converting, leading to better performance and stronger achievement of sales targets.
Immersing and educating sales teams to understand the organizations plans to focus on in the future, as well as broader knowledge of the company’s offerings, new product launches or asking for feedback on initiatives, will result in the channel teams working harder for the brand and succeeding in wider opportunities.
Focus on the Future
Focusing on the future is particularly important, so a business can thrive. Adapting to changes in the environment, staying proactive, being ready and prepped when approaching new opportunities, will encourage company success. To stay ahead of the game, companies should ensure staff have the most up-to-date skill set possible, ready to face any new challenge.
Incentivized learning upskills and educates employees, making them more effective sellers, develops a culture of long-term learning, and also helps to boost morale and loyalty. Plus, online learning encourages upskilling sales team no matter where they are working (remote or office-based), to keep the motivation and strength of commitment to the brand strong.
To discover how 360insights The Channel Success Platform can help upskill sales teams to improve channel opportunities, simply get in touch and request a demonstration.
