Last week, I soapboxed about how videos aren’t training sellers anything (read that post here).
So today, I’ll share a learning strategy that ACTUALLY works if you really want to use a new skill (or want your team to try it)…
“Associative Learning” – wait! Don’t go to sleep!
This theory is why everyone says, “Oh, you’re like Sandler” to me about my training company.
It’s also the reason your college lectures were SO BORING:
Adults learn by relating new knowledge to older knowledge and to experiences.
That’s it. The whole magic.
We’ve got to talk about it. We’ve got to know where to “file it” in our brains.
Early call rapport-building is like when you met your freshman roommate
Late call bridging to the next call is when you asked her out again before the first date was over
Getting a decision-maker on the phone is like getting to first base 😉
Your amazing new software with zero competitors – “OH, so it’s like Ambition had a baby with Gong.” Don’t be offended, at least they’ll remember what you do.
Here’s why it works (for my fellow training nerds):
The “Associative Learning Rule” is the theory behind the phrase “Synapses that fire together, wire together.” It explains that brain cells grow stronger by sending off impulses at the same time, therefore, connecting them and overall growing stronger. When connections grow stronger, learning has taken place.
It’s why your video-based “learning library” is a waste of money. I get it, they’re easy, cheap, repeatable, and scalable – but nearly worthless when it comes to helping your team retain knowledge – let alone use it on the job to pick up the phone and sell something.
Big takeaways:
Don’t think that telling or showing a video will result in behavior change
Create opportunities for your team to talk about what they’re learning and tell their stories
Use your LinkedIn Learning budget to hire a trainer or a training company that can interact, workshop, and actually help sellers apply new skills on the job
(Now, if only I knew a great sales training company… Seriously, if you’re looking for sales training techniques that actually work, contact us here.)
Want to learn more sales training techniques?
Contact us today to request information on our customizable virtual sales training programs available for reps (and managers).
There’s something wild happening in the sales training industry right under our noses, and it’s severely impacting the skill level of your front-line sellers. Truth: Sometimes I’m part of the problem.
Why do we expect sales reps to try a new skill after watching one video?
Video learning is as passive as it gets (not that anyone ever checked email while playing a training video) and yet we’re “training” sellers with this single touch (not even eight touches like SFDC says we need. Video alone should take hundreds, right?)
Getting a seller to try a new skill = getting a buyer to make a purchase.
And a 30-minute training video = a single commercial.
In other words, sales training videos alone don’t work – they’re not effective in teaching skills. In fact, I’m going to climb up a little higher on my soapbox and say…
Video-based sales training is NOT ACTUALLY TRAINING.
It’s entertainment. “Edu-tainment” at best. In our marketing vs. sales analogy, training videos would be the equivalent of content marketing. Its purpose is to brand, to “passive touch”, and to warm a prospect.
Unfortunately, not a lot of leads convert from content alone. Especially from a single blog or ad. This is where marketers share the stat that it takes eight “meaningful interactions” before someone will take action. And sales leaders get that “meaningful interactions” are best driven by the sales team – things like asking the right questions, qualifying, customizing the pitch, applying the solution to their world, showing value, etc.
Training works the same way. What we’re selling is a behavior change – the breaking of one habit and the installation of another. Let’s say the goal is to stop sellers from prematurely pitching as an example. We want to replace the habit with a new one like asking prospects 5 questions before delivering a custom pitch.
A great webinar or video on the subject will at best introduce this concept or maybe passively gain some attention or buy-in to the idea. Great first step!
But as leaders, it is irresponsible of us to leave it there. We left off the entire rest of the learning cycle! If your training is only (or primarily) video-based, then your learners are missing:
If and how the idea applies to them
When in the sales cycle it’s happening
Which behaviors they do today that they need to stop
How to write better questions
When to ask new questions
What to do when they get the answer
How to ask the questions confidently
How to bring up the pitch
When to bring up the pitch
Practice and support doing this over and over until it’s a habit
The most important parts of training to gain behavior change are missing. Don’t even get me started on maintaining that behavior (heard of the forgetting curve?)
Here’s the hard truth: If your training does not include an opportunity to try the skill, customize the application of the skill, share examples of the skill being done in different situations, practice using the skill, or feedback on the execution of the practice, then I’m sorry to tell you that you’re not training. You’re entertaining.
It’s gotten harder to influence buyers to take action with all the “noise” out there, right? Your sales teams are right in the middle of all that noise, and the younger generation is accepting video training as complete. It’s up to us to do it better. It will be a competitive differentiator for those who do.
Please do yourself, your managers, and your salesforce the favor of checking. Here are some questions to ask your training/new hire/enablement team:
What percent of our new hire (or ongoing/career path) training lessons are video-based?
What do we do after the video?
When do they customize and practice the skill?
Who gives feedback on the execution of the skill?
What actions are being done to keep it alive?
Sales enablement leaders and trainers, I know you feel me. You’ve been preaching this for years, and you could chart out where video lands on Bloom’s taxonomy and how much real estate is between a video and the confident application of the skill. Need some buy-in? Send this blog, and then go ask your sales leaders these five questions:
What are you doing to teach new hires basic selling skills?
How much of their training is video or webinar/zoom-based (aka a “talking head”?)
What percent of their time in training is spent listening to live calls or practicing the skill?
What tools do the managers use to reinforce the training?
Have you taught managers how to coach and reinforce the skills?
Let’s all do this better. There are too many young salespeople failing out of sales. Very few get to sit next to a rockstar to soak in how it’s done. It’s up to the sales and enablement leaders to demand better skills training! I’d LOVE to share how we built 10-15 interactive touches into our training at Factor 8. If you have teams of front-line digital sellers or managers, please let us show you our methodology and our results.
Want more information on why sales training videos don’t work?
Contact us today to request information on our customizable virtual sales training programs available for reps (and managers).
10 Actionable Tips for Creating Your Sales Team Development Plan + Budget
[“Sales Shot” Workshop]
HOW TO BUILD YOUR SALES TEAM DEVELOPMENT PLAN + BUDGET
Smart leaders know that ongoing training and development is the #1 way to keep employees happy and engaged. It’s also the top thing that Millennials and Gen Z seek when job hunting. With attrition at an all-time high and the talent pool shrinking, companies need to shift their focus to retention strategies.
Watch our 30-minute, tip-rich session to learn everything you need to know when creating your sales team development plan. We’re covering the mistakes to avoid, how to budget for sales training, tips on executing development with low bandwidth, and much more!
Bonus: You\’ll also gain access to our Sales Training Budget Cheat Sheet!
Watch the video replay!
HOW TO BUILD YOUR SALES TEAM DEVELOPMENT PLAN + BUDGET
Smart leaders know that ongoing training and development is the #1 way to keep employees happy and engaged. It’s also the top thing that Millennials and Gen Z seek when job hunting. With attrition at an all-time high and the talent pool shrinking, companies need to shift their focus to retention strategies.
Watch our 30-minute, tip-rich session to learn everything you need to know when creating your sales team development plan. We’re covering the mistakes to avoid, how to budget for sales training, tips on executing development with low bandwidth, and much more!
Bonus: You\’ll also gain access to our Sales Training Budget Cheat Sheet!
Whether you’re shopping around for external inside sales training vendors or working with your internal training department, knowing what good inside sales training looks like is the first step to making sure your training is checking all the key boxes.
We’ve outlined a few of the most important considerations to keep in mind when deciding on your inside sales training.
First Thing’s First: Decide What Success Looks Like
This shouldn’t be a surprise to any sales leaders out there — but what makes a good inside sales training is results. You’ll be able to know whether or not sales training worked simply because it moved the needle.
These “results” look different depending on your company, team, and goals. It’s important to go into the sales training deciding on what those goals are to you — whether it’s sales units sold or market share gained.
This is even more important when partnering with an external sales training vendor. The vendor should understand your goals as well as your sales process, product, customers, industry, and competitors. There is so much specialization in the market today, don’t let a vendor bring SDR training to your team of AE’s.
In order for sales training to be considered “good”, it must achieve your goals. Outlining what these goals are, and what success looks like, beforehand is a surefire way to get what your team needs out of their training.
We recommend identifying metrics, behaviors, KPI’s and overall results that you expect to shift during and after the training. Metrics and behaviors should lift immediately showing you’re on the right track, and KPI’s are early indicators that the results are on the way. Identifying metrics or results only can lead to a miss.
5 Characteristics of Good Inside Sales Rep Training
After the goals are set, here are a few more tips to ensure you’re maximizing your investment:
It’s Customized
Really great sales training is customized to your industry and product/service.
This ensures your reps aren’t left trying to figure out how to take a broad theory and apply it to their job, customer, or service.
While it’s true that customized sales training is more expensive, the ROI is up to twenty-fold when you consider how much your reps are actually retaining, and how much they can apply immediately to their practices.
Use public seminars and events to help someone get a tip or two. Use custom live training to move the needle on results.
Get a Pro
Aberdeen reported that 85% of the sales teams that are considered “best-in-class” utilize professional sales trainers or resources.
Don’t try and turn your managers or reps into trainers. Let’s face it, they’ve got enough on their plates. Plus, even really good managers and reps have no idea how to train — it’s just not their job! They might be excellent at sales, but they have no expertise in training.
Even worse, don’t let your HR department teach sales. They’re great at training and professional facilitation in many areas of your business, but their bailiwick is in company orientation and sexual harassment training — not sales and selling. They may be excellent at training but have no expertise in sales.
See where we’re going with this?
Make sure to bring in someone who is an expert at both training and sales. That’s the secret to good inside sales training, and it’s what the best in class are doing.
Make Sure the Training Has the Right Focus
If you’re training your inside sales reps, make sure they’re attending an inside sales training. It sounds simple, but oftentimes well-meaning sales team leaders are duped into thinking “sales training” is enough. Shoe-horning your company’s existing field training for your inside team may actually do more damage than good.
Most popular sales books and training curricula deal with a very narrow view of selling: The conversation between Person A and Person B. Anyone who has been working in inside sales for a while can agree that the true issue lies in getting that interaction in the first place.
If your reps are struggling to connect with decision-makers, get callbacks, find the right people, figure out who to call, and capture attention at the top of the funnel, then conversation selling and overcoming objections will miss the mark.
Make sure that your inside sales reps are being coached on topics like:
Leaving compelling voicemails that will be returned
Capturing a prospect’s attention in the first 30 seconds
Leading with value
Creating engaging conversations vs. script reading
How to get a callback or bridge to the next call
Finding more decision-makers in the company
Dealing with gatekeepers
It’s important to make sure other aspects of the strategy are covered as well, so the reps can rely on their managers less for questions such as:
Who should I call first?
How often should I call?
Should I leave a voicemail message?
How often?
Now, what do I do?
The Training NEEDS to Be Hands-On
Theory stinks.
During the training, make sure reps are getting on the phones. There’s no reason that training shouldn’t be stopped so that the reps can go try out the skills they’re learning, and role-plays don’t really tell the whole story, do they?
Live calls to live customers using the training guarantees that these training methods are going to get applied. Live calling in a safe space leads to more rep buy-in and builds confidence. When reps see the tactics work in real-time they adopt, apply, and try more often. Training fall-off (the forgetting curve) has the odds stacked against it now!
Make the training stick by actually making calls and building pipeline during training.
Make Sure Your Managers Get Involved
Put managers in the reps’ training, and when possible make sure they have their own version of the training class tailored for their needs. Managers need to learn how to recognize the new skills in action, when to coach, how to coach the new skill, when to celebrate it working, and how to keep the momentum alive when the trainers leave. Behavior change lives and dies with the management team, and their buy-in, involvement, and use of the new skills are critical to success.
Ask your vendor how the managers will be involved in retaining the new skills.
Good Training is Ongoing Training
You got it, training is a process, not an event. Reps reported a “Lack of Development” as a top 5 challenge every year for the past five years as reported by the American Association of Inside Sales Professionals. Aberdeen also reported missing development opportunities as the number one rep-reported reason for leaving companies.
Deciding to invest in rep development is a smart choice, but be sure you don’t assume that it is “one and done.” Your teams want ongoing opportunities to learn, grow, and advance their careers.
Training Magazine reported an average number of development hours/year/employee at about 48 hours – or four hours/month. Is your internal training team ready to provide this? Most corporate training teams get quickly maxed by providing new hire orientation and onboarding. Manager coaching can fill some of the gaps, but if you’re talking with learning vendors, check their ongoing offerings as well.
Ongoing training will often nurture and advance skills taught onsite – helping check the box of retaining new skills and providing the ongoing development reps crave.
The easiest way to accomplish this is with vendor-provided online skills training or inside sales training software after their session to brush up on their skills, hone in on their weak spots, and keep skills in practice.
When evaluating training software, look for interactive resources such as:
Recorded call libraries
Sample scripts/messaging starters
Interactive micro e-learning modules
Printable cheat sheets
Manager coaching
Team activities
Videos
Reps want skills on-demand. Learning should be easy, fun, interactive, and flexible. The old days of long-form narrated slides and videos are over. Anyone who has clicked their way through to the final test (or let it run in the background while doing email) can attest to the fact this isn’t engaging or effective.
Again, look for sales training software to engage your management team as well as the learners. New skills and a culture of development live and die on your front lines. Does the software provide manager resources?
How about fast-reference cheat sheets, coaching guides, or contest ideas? Is it nimble enough to allow quick reference before a big call or team meeting?
Get your sales managers involved in testing your top choices.
Are you looking for the best inside sales training programs?
Contact us today to learn about our customizable virtual sales training programs available for reps and managers.
We asked thousands of sales professionals (sales reps, sales managers, and sales leaders) to share the most critical pain points and challenges they are currently experiencing within their virtual and inside sales teams.
Our research has been compiled into an easily digestible visual to help give leaders a better understanding of their teams’ challenges with selling virtually.
Download our “Current State of Virtual and Inside Sales: Top Virtual Sales Challenges” infographic to glean insight into the areas that reps are struggling with most in virtual sales. You’ll learn:
Overall challenges reps are experiencing with selling virtually
The most difficult aspects of phone prospecting
Top challenges with running virtual sales meetings
Where reps are struggling when it comes to closing deals virtually
This is must-have information for ALL leaders to gain insight into the virtual sales challenges their teams are experiencing.
Download Infographic
WHAT ARE REPS’ TOP VIRTUAL SALES CHALLENGES?
We asked thousands of sales professionals (sales reps, sales managers, and sales leaders) to share the most critical pain points and challenges they are currently experiencing within their virtual and inside sales teams.
Our research has been compiled into an easily digestible visual to help give leaders a better understanding of their teams’ challenges with selling virtually.
Download our “Current State of Virtual and Inside Sales: Top Virtual Sales Challenges” infographic to glean insight into the areas that reps are struggling with most in virtual sales. You’ll learn:
Overall challenges reps are experiencing with selling virtually
The most difficult aspects of phone prospecting
Top challenges with running virtual sales meetings
Where reps are struggling when it comes to closing deals virtually
This is must-have information for ALL leaders to gain insight into the virtual sales challenges their teams are experiencing.
Sales enablement leaders are scrambling to take face-to-face employee training programs online. They need good virtual sales training, but the truth is that most training is focused on theory, not tactics.
So, what does good virtual sales training look like? Watch this session to find out!
Whether you’re hunting for virtual sales learning or just curious about what good training looks like, watch this session to learn:
Why you need ongoing training for your team
How to get started with virtual sales training
Why interaction is crucial to successful online learning
How to set achievable goals for your team
Why leaders need to be involved in training
You’re also receiving our Virtual Sales Training Survival Guide. If you’re assessing internal or external virtual sales training solutions, this guide will help you make an informed decision.
Watch the video replay!
LOOKING FOR GOOD VIRTUAL SALES TRAINING?
Sales enablement leaders are scrambling to take face-to-face employee training programs online. They need good virtual sales training, but the truth is that most training is focused on theory, not tactics.
So, what does good virtual sales training look like? Watch this session to find out!
Whether you’re hunting for virtual sales learning or just curious about what good training looks like, watch this session to learn:
Why you need ongoing training for your team
How to get started with virtual sales training
Why interaction is crucial to successful online learning
How to set achievable goals for your team
Why leaders need to be involved in training
You’re also receiving our Virtual Sales Training Survival Guide. If you’re assessing internal or external virtual sales training solutions, this guide will help you make an informed decision.
Now more than ever the world needs good virtual employee development. Enablement leaders are scrambling to take face-to-face employee training programs online and sales leaders are stretching themselves thin plugging holes to engage their people, coach, and level up. But we’re all circling around a central problem:
Most e-learning sucks.
If you’ve ever let a recorded PowerPoint play in the background while doing email…
If you’ve ever clicked forward ten times to get to the quiz…
If you’ve wished that the “Fluff Narrator” could be set to 1.5x speed…
You get me.
For ten years I resisted moving Factor 8 curriculum online for these very reasons. It’s boring. It isn’t interactive. It doesn’t pertain to me and my job. And here’s why:
It isn’t how adults learn.
Even if you aren’t a training geek, you’ve probably heard of adult learning principles. In short, it means that as grown-ups we want to participate in our learning. We need to relate new information to past information and share our experiences. We want the Subway model (“more lettuce, no mayo”), not the Burger King model (“#1 please”).
If you are hunting for great virtual learning or building it yourself, allow me to share best practices I learned while converting our sales and sales leadership curriculum from face-to-face workshops to our virtual offering The Sales Bar.
#1 – Go Micro. “Microlearning” is a training geek term that means small bites or, “If I can’t participate in the learning, for God’s sake, keep it short.” Fifteen minutes should be the maximum time for any module (or learning chunk).
#2 – Vary the Modalities. The modality is the learning format. We use interactive e-learning (more below), video, activities, reading, cheat sheets, and actual skill demonstrations using audio or video. There are different types of learners out there and recorded PowerPoint and video don’t address them all. Kinesthetic learners need to touch it, type it, write it, sort it, and more. This is where most training fails. (BTW, everyone’s favorite feature is the real calls that show the good, bad, and ugly in real (redacted) sales calls.) Here’s a screenshot example of all the different modalities in just one module:
#3 – Make E-Learning Interactive. The reason we can let bad training play in the background is that it doesn’t require us to be present. Interactive training means the learner is choosing his own adventure and touching the content. At Factor 8 we never go more than five pages without interaction. For example, learners click to see more or hear a sample, drag and drop, slide the scale, make a choice, or type in an answer. Interactivity not only keeps learners present and engaged, it is the only way to achieve higher-level learning objectives (read on dear friend…).
#4 – Go Higher with Objectives. Bear with me and my training hat for a moment, but there’s a taxonomy or ranking of learning objectives called Bloom’s taxonomy. If you want learning to be applied on the job, you must get past “remembering and understanding” and get into analyzing, evaluating, and creating. This starts with good learning objectives/training goals and is achieved by getting learners to interact with the data. Don’t just recall it, roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty with it. (that last part may not be a technical term as much as my term). This is why a company selling you a series of videos as e-learning misses the mark.
#5 – Layer in Live Interaction. The interactive e-learning goes to the next level when you layer in live interaction. Here is where you customize, apply, practice, and role-play. We do this after every 1-2 online modules with a live virtual instructor course. We also do it by assigning activities before and after this live session. It might be to write their own sales messaging, record a good call, or count successful outcomes trying a new skill. It bridges the gap between theory and reality and it’s the only way to get learners to own applying and using the new skills – giving actual behavior change a real shot. Bonus note for trainers: this is how you can make your “generic” virtual training customized for different internal clients.
#6 – Involve Leaders. A Training Magazine study a few years ago researched deeply into what makes training stick or not. Answers #1 and #2 had nothing to do with the quality of the training and everything to do with what the learner’s boss said before the training (#1) and after the training (#2). “Forget what you learned, here’s how it really works…” is an example of this not going well. Involve the leaders not just by making them attend, but try having them partner to kick off the training, give input in the needs analysis to build the training, and by assigning them work after the training. We built Leader Toolkits to accompany every module that includes call coaching forms to grade the skill in real calls, a coaching cheat sheet to help them ask the right questions during call coaching, and even activities and an implementation guide to help them roll it out and keep skills alive afterward. Here’s a sample:
Ok, my top 3 tips turned into six, and I still feel like I’m just getting started. In the end, I’m enormously proud of what we built in The Sales Bar and I hope it’s helped you picture a new level of good for virtual instruction. If you’ve seen something here you like and you need virtual sales training for sales reps, sales managers, or sales leaders, click here to learn more about The Sales Bar for your team. It took us two years to build this and we’re not done yet. If you’re just starting, you can save time by outsourcing the sales curriculum to us and focus instead on getting your product, process, and new hire orientation curriculum online internally.
Ready to partner with a top virtual sales training provider?
Contact us today to request information on our customizable virtual sales training programs available for reps (and managers).
If you haven’t heard yet, we’re telling you now! We at Factor 8 have officially launched a brand new e-learning platform where your reps and managers can practice and refresh those skills they learned in our Factor 8 onsite advisor training sessions! And, we couldn’t be more pumped to share it with you.
“Okay,” you’re thinking, “But why do I care? My teams are already receiving Factor 8’s training.” We’re glad you asked.
Here’s why The Sales Bar could be a big deal for you.
1. Effective and Convenient
Our learners are seeing immediate results. Tom, an SDR leader, says: “Historically, our team gets almost zero callbacks on voicemails. After taking the Factor 8 online course on effective voicemails, we received 25 call backs last week alone!”. Plus, there\’s no complicated scheduling. Reps train at their pace whenever they\’re free – at home, at lunch, in a box, with a fox…you get the idea. Our anonymous testers are calling it “Easy Online Flexible Training\”, and that’s the goal – to make it easier to learn more!
“Historically, our team gets almost zero callbacks on voicemails. After taking the Factor 8 online course on effective voicemails, we received 25 call backs last week alone!”
2. Boosts Engagement andRretention
Our testers think it’s “Friendly and Fun!” Learners are exposed to multiple styles of learning and have more fun completing training. Because we think learning only one way is boring (and so do your reps and managers!).
3. Measurable Comprehension
Because everything\’s recorded digitally, leaders and managers can see exactly which reps are excelling and which need support and where. It’s like your own secret spy cam!
4. Refreshes Skills (Forgotten or Underdeveloped!)
Sales Bar supports the learning that goes on in our onsite training sessions by breaking down the same skills and offering diversified practice activities to keep them up to snuff long after the session has ended. Studies show that regular reinforcement of training is critically important to protecting your training investment.
5. Provides Ongoing Development
You can\’t just do training once and expect your reps to continuously improve forever. They need practice and repetition so they can actually see daily improvement at their desks and on the phone. Diane Abraham, Sales Director at RedVector says, \”…To me this is what it takes to coach up a team. Not just 4 days in a room but ongoing courses/content with a mix of self guided and manager assigned tasks. We call that blended learning in our world.”
6. Offers Real Results
You don’t want to waste time and budget on a product that doesn’t work! The Sales Bar ensures you experience more growth at end of month. For example, Mike, Director of Telesales, tells us, \”We had a significant lift, +19% across the entire team on topline growth for the month of May [1st month using the Sales Bar]\” And we like those numbers!
\”We had a significant lift, +19% across the entire team on topline growth for the month of May [1st month using the Sales Bar]\”
7. Developed by Factor 8
The same award-winning company you trust for all your inside sales training can also provide support when they aren’t there! (Hey, that’s us!) The Sales Bar is designed to supplement our onsite sessions, not work against them. You know us. We know you. You’ll get the best ROI because of it.
8. Easily Updated to Keep with Best Practices
You know as well as anyone how quickly the inside sales industry is changing (Overnight, it feels like). Newer, more effective techniques are being developed all the time, while others simply fall out of fashion. The Sales Bar ensures your employees are always on the cutting-edge. So, your teams are always given accurate information.
9. Offers Dozens of Reference Materials
Psst…it’s okay to cheat sometimes! We know those 3-second, handwritten notes won’t get your reps very far past the onsite training session. So, we’ve decked out The Sales Bar with great cheat sheets, guides, and script samples your teams can use everyday while on the floor!
10. Provides Consistent Information Delivery
Once the onsite training has passed, your sales reps are often on their own to practice and seek out feedback. And the quality of that feedback can vary manager to manager. With The Sales Bar, your entire sales team will receive consistent feedback and reinforcement, so everyone is best equipped to succeed.
The best part? You can try it out for free to see the difference for yourself!
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