The human element of selling is the most overlooked and most powerful sales enablement tool available.
Leadership teams that can align a sales person’s personal needs and wants with the corporation’s needs and wants will do more for the top line than any marketing automation software, CRM or sales enablement software.
I feel silly for stating the obvious, sales people really don’t sell for the company, they sell for themselves.
Here is what makes sales people tick.
- Survive -Food, water, shelter
- Stuff – Resources, health, property
- Love – friendship, family
- Respect – respect from others and achievement
- Self actualization – the desire to be all one can be
Whenever the base needs are not met, the sales person will have a hard time performing. They will not seek out the higher level needs if there are any deficiencies in their lower level needs like food, water and shelter. This is why sales leaders need to go beyond assigning a quota, roll up their sleeves and dive into what actually makes their people tick.
The self actualized sales rep will be your most productive, creative sales rep.
5 Steps for helping sales people crush their sales goals:
- What are the sales reps individual goals within the current calendar year.
Professional
Financial
Physical
Intellectual
Spiritual - Articulate in a tangible way what the goal will look like when it’s reached. I.e. When I reach my financial goal I will have $10,000 in savings and have paid off my last student loan.
- Establish the dates each goal needs to be achieved by.
- Determine if they need any training to make these goals happen?
- Map out what it will take to reach these goals, daily, weekly and monthly. If the student loan id $10,000 they would need to pay off $27 dollars a day to reach their financial goal.
Now, picture leading a sales person when you have this information. The quota conversation would go more like this.
Tom, I was looking at your goal sheet and your sales pipeline trying to figure which deals we can close that would create enough commission to pay off your student loan this quarter. Would you be able to sit down and run through your pipeline with me and see if we can brainstorm on how to make that goal happen?
You should always invest in your people first and figure out what makes them tick. You will be far more successful with training, marketing automation software, CRM and sales enablement platform if you know what makes motivates your team.
