8 Major Warning Signs Your Sales Team Needs Training & How To FIX Them!

There’s a good chance you’re here because your sales team isn’t quite fulfilling your expectations, and you’ve got a nagging suspicion that they need training. In this article, we share eight major warning signs that your sales team needs training and what you can do to fix it.

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1. Pricing is their competitive strategy

In today’s world, customers have a wealth of information about you and your competitors at their fingertips.

Because there’s a good chance the customer has done extensive research and come across some of your cheaper competitors, sales professionals must be prepared to demonstrate why they’re worth what they charge instead of solely dropping their price.

When sales teams compete on price, prospective customers view your solution as a commodity that can easily be overlooked in favor of a cheaper and less effective solution.

Furthermore, when your sales team only focuses on pricing, they’re missing out on a valuable opportunity to ask the right questions to reveal what’s most important to the customer, and this often has nothing to do with pricing.

To prevent sales professionals from competing solely on price, they need to understand how to differentiate from the competition effectively and how to overcome price objections. Our Differentiation and Objection Handling courses would benefit these sales reps.

2. They consistently lose business to the competition

Is your sales team consistently losing deals to competitors?

In a world where buyers face overwhelming choices, your sales team must rise above the noise. It boils down to strategic positioning. Sales reps must analyze the competition, pinpoint their unique strengths, AND convey them effectively. Our Differentiation Dominance certification course guides you through this process, ensuring your differentiators resonate with your buyers. After all, if your prospects don’t see the value, your team risks falling into the price-based competition trap.

Also read:

• How To Build A Sales Team From The Ground Up In 11 Steps
• How To Create An Effective Sales Playbook For Your Sales Team
• 3 Ways To Use Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Sales Training

3. They’re doing more talking than the customer

The third major sign that your sales team needs training is that they’re doing all the talking. We get it—you want to sell your solution, but nothing should ever be pitched until the sales rep fully understands the customer’s needs. Without this valuable information, they risk pitching the wrong product and talking themselves out of a deal. 

To overcome this, sales professionals need to be prepared with a list of needs analysis questions and understand how to incorporate the prospect into their presentation instead of purely focusing on pitching. If your team’s doing all the talking, it’s time for a change. They need to weave persuasive stories into their pitch—stories that show your solution solves real problems for real people.

To help sales professionals uncover the needs of their prospects, we recommend a needs analysis activity to help the team come up with their own questions. We then follow this up with sales presentation training so they know how to present with the customer in mind.

4. They’re still prospecting like it’s 1985

Prospecting is vital for getting leads to the top of the sales funnel. However, the world has evolved, and old ways of prospecting aren’t as effective anymore. For this reason, sales reps need to learn modern prospecting activities incorporating an omnichannel approach to reach out to their prospects using multiple platforms, tools, and touchpoints. 

Our Prospecting training program trains reps to be creative, persistent, and, most importantly, adopt an effective strategy that generates real results.

Also read:

• E-Learning and Its Role in Today’s Sales Teams
• How to get the best ROI from Training
• 5 Ways to Implement Blended Learning with Online and In-Person Training
• Creating and Implementing an Effective Training Program
• 5 Most Common Mistakes Companies Make When Implementing Sales Training

5. They don’t up-sell or cross-sell

If you find that your sales team is only selling what the prospect asks for, it’s time to invest in training. While average sales reps act as order takers, high-performers know how to take what the prospect asks for and uncover needs for products or services they haven’t considered.

When sales teams don’t upsell or cross-sell, they must be taught how to dig deeper, uncover problems, and present more solutions. This naturally leads to upselling, cross-selling, and more repeat business.

6. Referrals are scarce

Whether you’re a small business or a sales professional, referrals are vital to your company and sales growth. Referrals result from exceptional experiences with your company and a process for requesting and maximizing referrals.

7. Complaints are rife

You know you’ve got an issue when complaints are constantly coming in. Whether it’s that your sales team is overselling your solution and leaving it to the customer service team to deal with their mess or there’s a lack of communication between the 2 teams, efforts need to be made to fine-tune processes and have separate teams work more closely together. Sometimes it’s just a matter of scheduling more joint meetings between the 2 teams or having the customer service team explain the issues they’re having to the sales team or vice versa. Still, communication and meeting expectations are often at the core of this issue.

8. Managers micromanage

We get it; as a manager, you’re on the hook for results, whether that’s goal attainment or sales performance. Sometimes you must take the matter into your own hands to ensure the job is complete. However, Micromanaging is awful for several reasons; most notably, its position indicates a lack of trust, experience, or even insecurity. Therefore, we can all agree that this isn’t a recipe for collaborative success.

Instead, sales managers must tap into strengths and address weaknesses to build strong teams. A high-performing team is highly motivated. They take on challenges eagerly to exceed expectations; they don’t blindly follow orders but look to improve upon them.

Does this sound like a dream? Our Management Mastery course teaches the essential management skills every leader needs to possess to bring out the best in their team.

Remember—leading a team to new heights requires understanding your team’s unique strengths, navigating uncharted territory, and inspiring them to reach their maximum potential. It takes a talented leader to do that.

Also read:

• 7 Effective Sales Training Techniques All Managers Should Be Using
• How to Onboard New Sales Reps | Training New Hires Fast

Smash targets faster with SOCO/

SOCO/ is an expert-led, award-winning sales training company. We’ve spent decades working with some of the most innovative and forward-thinking companies across Asia and the world.

Have SOCO train your team in the top sales skills needed to take on the year through either Virtual Instructor Led Training or letting your team learn new skills in their spare time using our popular e-learning platform, SOCO Academy.

Not sure which of the top sales training programs is right for you? Book an appointment with one of our program advisors, who will be happy to build the right training plan for you.

Don’t just take our word – see what others are saying!

“We recently had Tom conduct a virtual external Sales Training Program for our entire commercial organization at Carousell Group for our different brands in 5 countries.

Tom shared great insights on consultative selling and needs analysis to win new customers. He energized and fuelled our sales & trade marketing teams to apply the concepts they learned into their day to day interactions with customers. Throughout the session, all 200+ attendees were fully engaged and inspired to apply the concepts shared into their interactions with clients.

At the core of Carousell, we constantly raise the bar, growing and inspiring one another. Thank you Tom for helping us raise the bar. “

– Vishal Salunkhe | Head of Sales Operations & Enablement Carousell

“I had the pleasure of working with Tom to deliver a live webinar to our customers across 3 continents! From the discovery and planning meetings right down to customizing content to meet our objectives and engage our audience, Tom is a pro. He is energetic and has the ability to cut through – so it feels as though you are right there in the room with him. If you are hesitating, don’t; we already booked him for a keynote at our next virtual event!”

– Kiera Kramer | Brand and Experiences Marketing for QuickBooks

“I had a great sales training with Tom! I have learned so much especially on the prospecting part. He gave me more motivation in making cold calls and building better relationships with my clients.”

–Mathilde Ramoisy | SaaS Enterprise Business Development at Perx Technologies

Hone Essential Management Skills & Build High-Performance Sales Teams