Designing the Best Sales Course

The training modules listed for each of our sales training courses on the website are the most popular modules for that particular course.  Indeed, many companies take our sales training courses as is, however, you are equally welcome to change the modules if you believe there is another module that is more suitable. 

In order to ensure that you are choosing the right modules you can follow our simple guide below:

Step 1: Diagnosing your Sales Training Needs

Think of your sales department as a high-performance engine. Before making any adjustments to increase performance, you need a thorough diagnostic. Here’s how you can do this:

• Data Dive: Analyze sales metrics, KPIs, customer feedback, and call recordings to identify common strengths and weaknesses. Areas like prospecting, objection handling, closing techniques or sales process might need to be a focus.
• Skill Gap Assessment: Use questionnaires or interviews to gauge individual skill levels and knowledge gaps. Are they comfortable navigating complex conversations? Can they effectively showcase your value proposition? What sales skills do they need to improve to get to the next level?
• Stakeholder Interviews: Talk to sales managers, marketing, and even customers to understand expectations, challenges, and desired outcomes. What specific behaviours would boost win rates?
• OKRs: If your sales team uses an OKR framework you can design the training in a way that supports the delivery of the OKRs.  What skills do they need to deliver their OKRs? Which OKRs are they struggling with? 
• Sales Strategy:  You may have a new sales strategy that requires the sales team to approach sales in a different way.  For example: can your sales reps open new markets in a different vertical?  Can your sales professionals reach and hold a conversation with senior level decision makers in Enterprise accounts? Is your strategy focussed on inbound sales from new accounts, or are your nurturing existing customer relationships.

Step 2: Architect the Curriculum

Imagine your training as a strategic roadmap, guiding your team from Point A (current state) to Point B (sales mastery).

• Define Learning Objectives: what would you like the sales team to be able to do that they currently cannot?  What would you like your sales teams to be better at, than they currently are?
• Training Modules: Break down the roadmap into logical modules addressing identified skill gaps. This could include prospecting strategies, value proposition development, negotiation tactics, or customer relationship management.
• Choose the Delivery Method: Will it be in-person / instructor led workshops, live online sales training, pre-recorded online sales training, blended learning, or a mix? Consider your team’s preferences, learning styles, and geographical spread. As a guide currently our most popular delivery method is hybrid where we start the project with a one-day in-person workshop which is then reinforced by 90 days of remote sales coaching.  

Step 3: Inject Real-World Relevance

Textbook scenarios rarely capture the dynamic B2B reality. To make your training impactful, inject real-world relevance.  So where possible we recommend you include:

• Include senior people: Peer learning can be very powerful and by including senior people from your team they can help the participants connect the training to real world scenarios from their personal experience.  
• Role-Playing: Consider setting aside one of your modules for roleplay so we can simulate real-world sales interactions like prospecting calls, customer presentations, or objection handling. This allows your team to practice in a safe environment, fostering confidence and refining their skills.

 Step 4: Accountability

Learning is great, however, implementing what is learned is equally important.  It’s vital to consider how you plan to hold the sales representatives accountable to integrating what they have learned into their daily sales behaviours.  This should be carried out by the sales leaders in the organisation.

• Action Plans: All the courses include an “Action Plan” for participants to complete. 

It’s important that their line manager follows up on this after the training in order to hold participants accountable. 

Step 5: Measure and Monitor Success

Training isn’t a one-time event. To ensure sustained impact, you need to measure and monitor success:

• Pre- and Post-Training Assessments: Use the same assessments used in Step 1 to track individual and team skill development. Have they closed the identified skill gaps?
• Performance Metrics: Monitor sales data after the training. Did win rates increase? Average deal size? Time to close deals, Sales Process compliance. 
• Team Feedback: Conduct surveys or interviews to gather feedback on the training’s effectiveness, engagement, and areas for improvement.