The number of organizations using a learning management system to create and deliver online sales and compliance training to employees is on the rise. Why?
LMS online tools allow leaders of training programs discuss and demonstrate sales principles in an efficient and simple way.
Another great benefit of learning management system-delivered training is the interaction that is made possible between learners and the insrtuctor. Learners can contribute to discussions started by workshop leaders, role-playing and receiving coaching on telemarketing processes and skills. Because learners are given the self-paced convenience inherent to online learning, such online interactions are often a effective means of practicing skills than in-person ones.
Why is powerful, effective and up-to-date sales training a must? Sales strategies, and therefore sales training programs, are undergoing sweeping changes in recent years and even months. New sales strategies are a response to different factors including the economy (tough economy = difficult clients) and the different ways in which customers and potential customers are using the internet.
More and more organizations are tapping into social networks to reach potential customers, understanding that to understand clients, you have to first go where they are going, and see how they are interacting.
Harvard Business School professor Mikolai Jan Piskorski has dedicated years to studying online social networks and how people use them. A recent post on the Harvard Business School blog discusses how Piskorski helps organizations develop strategies for leveraging social networks for profit.
According to Piskorski, corporate marketers struggle with how to use social networking to reach customers. The main problem is that execs think of online social networks as social media, and treat them as simply another channel to get people to click through to a website. However, Piskorski notes, it doesn’t work out that way. His studies show that people don’t generally click through on ads posted on social networking sites.
“A good analogy is to imagine sitting at a table with friends when a stranger pulls up a chair, sits down, and tries to sell you something while you are talking with your friends. You will not get far with a strategy like this,” Piskorski says.
“To be successful,” he continues, “you need to shift your mindset from social media to social strategy.”
Then there is the shift from pitching to engaging a potential customer in a conversation. The ability to listen and respond to a client’s needs, ask the right questions, and overcome objections by listening rather than pitching are increasingly taught as effective sales techniques.
Conversation-building and tapping into online social networks are just two examples of how traditional sales methods are being edged out, as better sales strategies are able to respond to factors such as new forms of media and new economic circumstances.
Online sales training for an organization’s sales professionals and managers can be organized and delivered internationally, linking a company’s LMS to its various human resources departments and ERP systems, to perform multi-locational, cost-effective and efficient training. An LMS serves an important role in keeping track of tasks, goals, and learners’ training activities and achievements, in order to ensure that successful sales strategies are executed down the line.
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