Communicating your Sales Training Programs for Success

Communicating your sales training programs for success sounds a little contrived, after all, who on earth would want to communicate for failure? But as we saw in the article ‘Failing to Communicate a Sales Training Program’ there are plenty of ways that we can potentially alienate sales people when communicating our sales programs. Nobody sets out to actually do these things, so there is a level of unconscious incompetence surrounding this whole topic. With this in mind, this article looks at how you can move from away from inadvertently alienating your sale force, to communicating your sales programs for success.

Communication Fundamentals

When we communicate a concept, the recipient has two lenses that they use to filter the communication. The first lens is, “Does this feel right?” This is often carried out below the level of consciousness and can be described as a ‘gut feeling’. The second lens is, “Do I intellectually understand or agree with this?” This is less about feeling and more about logic. For the former, think Captain Kirk. For the latter think Mr. Spock.

The Hearts and Heads Communication Model

Let’s apply this model to communicating your sales training programmes. Firstly how do the audience feel about what you’re communicating? Put another way do they feel they actually need sales training, or not? There are two responses to that ‘closed’ question. There can be a “Yes”, or a “No”. The second lens they use to filter the communication is, “Do they intellectually agree with the solution that you’re providing?” There are again two responses to this second question, either “Yes” or “No”.

Mathematical scholars amongst you will have noted that there are four outcomes from this filtering process, which we display in the image, ‘Capturing the heads and hearts of your audience.’

Level One: Hearts and Heads

These people feel that they need sales training. They also intellectually agree with the prescribed intervention. So communicating with these guys is easy. The real key is how do you capitalise on this segment? We cover this below.

Level Two: Hearts

We call these people ‘Hearts’ because their heart is in it. They feel that they actually need sales training. But they do not intellectually agree with the prescribed intervention. That could be because they don’t understand what you’re doing. Or it could be because they think your sales training sucks. Either way, your communications should be around filling the intellectual gap that exists. More on that later.

Level Three: Heads

These people feel that they don’t need sales training. But they do intellectually agree with the prescribed intervention. You hear these people saying things like, “The sales training programme is a great idea, but can I just have a quick overview? The new people will really benefit from this.” Your communications here should be around challenging the belief about their own capability. More on that later.

Level Four: Review

These people believe that they do not need sales training and even if they did, your sales training programme would be as useful as a bicycle to a fish. Any sort of general training is not going to work here, so you need to have a more fundamental review with these people.

99% of Sales Training Communications Do This

When we consult with companies around sales training programs, we use this framework to filter their communications. 99 times out 100 their communications are targeted at the level 1 audience. They believe that the sales audience want and understand the sales training program. Life is easy in the level 1 box. I can see why everyone wants to communicate with these guys. It’s easy to do so.

But when we confidentially interview their audience, we get a good healthy mix of all four audience types. Of course we do, why should communicating a sales training program be any different to communicating anything else? The impact of communicating only to a Level 1 audience is that you can further alienate the other audiences. So let’s look at how we can use this framework to ensure we are communicating your sales programs for success.

Level One Communications – Hearts and Heads

Typically these guys are going to be your early adopters. So use them to your mutual advantage. Get them on board early by giving them advanced access to materials. They will become your spokespeople pulling your Level Two and Level Three people on board. They will be good people to ask for sales success stories after the training. They will also be good coaches for the other levels, and particularly for on-boarding new sales people.

Level Two Communications – Hearts

These people feel that they need sales training, but they do not intellectually agree with the sales training. Before you communicate with this audience segment, you need to understand the source of the misalignment as there could be a number of different issues that require different fixes. It could be that they just don’t understand what you’re trying to do. This is a simple communication fix. You should give time and resource to explaining about the programme. How it was designed, and how it fits into their world.

However, also in the level two box are the ones who don’t intellectually agree with your programme. We see this often in sales training programs where audience members have been trained in an alternative methodology. Some people can be trained in multiple sales methodologies and take the best of all of them, a bit like using a toolkit. Some can be less open minded and think that the methodology that they are familiar with is the best way to do everything. When you have this latter segment, you need to tackle the situation in the design phase by consulting with them. If you don’t, they will either agree with you so that they can later continue in their old ways. Or they will soak up valuable class time debating with the trainers. Either way you need to get these people on board and working through the methodology before the sales training starts. What they will soon see is that most methodologies are pretty similar and what you’re actually asking them to do is change the sales language that they use.

Level Three Communications: Heads

These people feel that they don’t need sales training. But they do intellectually agree with the prescribed intervention. There is a possibility that they could be right! In which case putting them through the same sales training as everyone else could be de-motivating and counterproductive. Try to find them a leadership role, perhaps to coach others or support the trainers with real world examples.

With those whose capabilities are a little lower than they may think, your communications should contain an element of challenging their beliefs about their capabilities. This can be done by coaching sessions with managers before the training, helping them to see the gaps, perhaps by tying back to KPIs and competencies. They can also be challenged by the trainers in the training sessions themselves. A good sales trainer will be able to turn up the volume on ‘challenge exercises’ to exactly the point where the audience can see their gaps, but are not alienated.

Level Four Communications: Review

These people believe that they do not need sales training and do not intellectually agree with your sales training program. This is an uphill struggle and you need to decide if these guys are worth the effort. Any sort of general training is not going to work here and they could potentially spoil it for others. The opposite to the Level 1 audience, they could be turning people against your sales training program, so you need to act quickly. Think about having a more fundamental review with these people and then use some of the elements we used for both levels two and three. Setting a barrier to entry, such as KPI’s, for your sales training program is a great way to filter these out.

Modeling the Sales Behaviours You Want

By looking at your communication plans through the eyes of the audience, you can start to see that you need to sell your sales training programme to the audience. Just as you’re training them to do, you have to work to understand the needs of the audience, and then show how you can satisfy their needs. Modeling this consultative behaviour will help to embed the sales behaviours you’re looking to promote. Failing to model these sales behaviours can be harmful for the very obvious reasons.