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When sales reps are engaged, they are more productive. They're focused, involved, and enthusiastic about their job, plus engaged sales reps are dedicated to company success. They are motivated to do their best for their own benefit and for the benefit of the organization. Motivation can sometimes be an obscure practice and difficult to achieve so we've come up the best practices for unlocking a 'social' sales enablement solution. 

Any top Sales exec knows that good sales reps are a rare commodity and outstanding sales reps are few and far between. So what can you do to ensure that your sales force is high performing? Thomas Edison once said, “Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.” Ask any successful Sales exec, and they will vouch for it.

Sales teams could be radically improved across any organization by putting in place a few straightforward principles. The following guiding principles aren’t easy to achieve and in no way do they substitute Edison’s formula, but if you use them consistently, you can reap substantial rewards.

In today’s environment, when buyers are inundated with thousands of offers, it can come as no surprise that buyers are reluctant to meet with potential sellers. One of the main reasons for their caution is that many salespeople fail to adequately research the buyer’s position and needs. With the right approach and with the help of sales analytics software, you can differentiate yourself from the pack. Here are three traps to watch out for—and three ways to defeat them.

The most effective salespeople behave differently than those who underperform. Their heightened sales numbers don’t come from luck, nor do they come from tightly structured sales calls. Top sales performers are fluid conversationalists. They are students of interpersonal relationships, and it pays.

1. They explain, not sell.

Sales managers often perform as drill sergeants who deliver impassioned speeches to ignite their troops of salespeople. The sales manager position implies duties of coaching, training, implementing and other one-way forms of communication.

The onboarding of salespeople has proved to be an elusive sport. Sales training best practices are always under construction. Ask a VP of Sales if he or she is totally confident with their company’s sales training process. Chances are, they’re looking for the next best thing to solve that sticky situation.  

It was not so long ago that the best tactic for onboarding was totally tactless. It was a “throw everything; see what sticks” sort of thing. A barrage of outdated loose-leaf papers, unreadable handwritten notes, insufferable 100-page PowerPoints, and other unworthy pursuits characterized onboarding. More often than not, none of that stuck. Salespeople compensated by making up their own rules. They came up with their own sales playbooks.  

Flurries of sales studies quantify a shift in the role of the salesperson of today. Data shows a steady decrease in the amount of time that on-the-clock salespeople spend actively selling. Now, representatives spend the majority of their workday concerned with other tasks, like planning sales calls and researching their prospects. Most studies suggest that less than 50% of salespeople’s time is spent delivering traditional sales presentations.

Sales enablement is about aligning the stars by hand so that sales representatives can deliver the right message to the right person, consistently. You’re certain that your sales people are delivering some message to some people, but how can you determine if it’s “right”? When a sales team has the proper sales enablement solutions at their disposal, they will exhibit the following indicators:

Speed.

Rep onboarding is a breeze. Sales rookies become engaged in quota-carrying activities and comfortably transition to sales rock stars, like clockwork. There is no “one size fits all” time limit for onboarding, but consider this: every day that a sales rep is not performing is a lost opportunity for revenue.

Effective salespeople aren’t spending time constantly entering data, browsing social media feeds of prospects or playing phone tag. They use those hours to actively sell. How much time do sales reps spend actually selling? If they are writing their own sales playbooks or Google stalking prospects, then the answer is: not enough.

Successful sales teams harness sales enablement strategies that shorten the sales cycle. That means adhering to playbooks that include: closed loop marketing with CLM platforms and highly communicative sales and marketing teams.

Accuracy.

Effective salespeople are knowledgeable about the product and up-to-date brand messaging. Successful sales teams don’t stop learning after training. No, they are continuously educating themselves about their company and product.

They’re also knowledgeable about the customer. Effective salespeople aren’t scouring Twitter because they have access to technologies that deliver valuable insight into customer accounts.

Delivery.

The best sales teams are able to deliver the right sales materials at the right time to the right person on any device. They meet their customer on the customer’s preferred platforms. That means utilizing digital sales aids to create a mobile sales force. Advanced mobile sales forces are able to recreate that synchronicity of message, timing and audience over and over again. That is the pinnacle of sales enablement success.

Is your sales team falling short in one, two or all three of these areas? The first step is recognizing that you have a problem. Do you need help finding the solution?

Google+ Kent Potts

We all know that people do business with people, not with businesses. And that is why it is so important for companies to place an importance on vetting their sales representatives before you hire them. Your sales team is only as good as how they are able to adapt and resonate with a customer. While you might have a need to make more sales now, waiting to find the right representatives can pay off a lot more later.

Here are the 3 defining attributes a good sales representative (and things to look for when hiring them):