In Sales, Natural Talent Isn't The End Of The Conversation.

In Sales, Natural Talent Isn't The End Of The Conversation.

Companies spend no small fortune training their employees for selling success. In the sales training industry alone companies spent an excess of 20 billion dollars. The numbers are staggering, but does training actually contribute to the financial success of a company’s sales people?

There are typically two (and often staunchly), opposing sides. On one side, there are people who believe that great sellers have an innate tendency towards success. This, to some extent, has merit. According to a study by Adam Grant, a social psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania found that extroverts made a small amount more than introverts. Ambiverts (between extrovert and introvert) earned a significantly larger income than even extroverts. We attribute these qualities found in extroverts and ambiverts like ambition, persuasion, and empathy to some sort of genetic gift. Should we stop there and assume all these traits were given, not acquired through experience, training, or upbringing?

According to the Harvard Business Review ('Great Sales People Are Born, but Great Sales Forces Are Made') that’s an extremely short sided view of not only individual success but that of an entire sales team. “Talent on its own is not enough. Even the best natural sellers need a strategy around target products and markets and defined a role, along with systems and processes to enable their success and align their efforts around common goals of customer and company success.”(Zoltners, Sinha)

"Talent on its own is not enough. Even the best natural sellers need a strategy around target products and markets and defined a role, along with systems and processes to enable their success and align their efforts around common goals of customer and company success.”

Maybe there are a few talented sales people you’ll come across in your lifetime. However, to even capitalize fully off the most ‘naturally’ gifted, you need to create a sales process that will ensure full communication of your product and services as a company. A sales process begins with the initial contact with the potential client and ends with the close. Any activities in between are subject to variation in quality and consistency. Without consistency, every pitch is a gamble ‘”…and even the best people may gravitate towards easy work (calling on friends and family) over hard work (e.g., selling complex products against competition”(Zoltners, Sinha). As Zoltners states, collectively: strategy, organization, talent and execution are crucial to not only the individual sales person but to the overarching success of the sales team.

Strategy gives a concrete direction with which to go forward. Sales people should be trained on how to execute their sales process with what the company offers. Knowing how to sequence and select certain behaviors and steps in the sales process creates consistent results. For example, events such as cold calling should have a script or questions to qualify a client, for presentations you should already know how to block common objections and how your product is differentiated against your competitor.

"Without consistency, every pitch is a gamble"

Allowing yourself or your team to proceed without a sales process is a set up for erratic success, “good salespeople will develop their own local strategies for which customers and products/ services to focus on, and their own processes for selling. Without the benefit of a broader perspective, it is questionable whether these independently developed local strategies and processes will combine to align aggregate sales effort”(Zoltners, Sinha). Creating a sales strategy proven to be effective on the basis of research, and experience will always be more profitable than trial and error. 

With the correct content and mindset for strategy, training can be immensely effective. Training can eliminate ineffective behaviors and anecdotal advice while optimizing every single step of a sales process.


Create a Sales Process backed not only by experience but, countless hours of research.

Victor Antonio has a B.S. Electrical Engineering, an MBA and built a 20-year career as a top sales executive, then President of Global Sales and Marketing for a $420M company before becoming a sales trainer, author, and keynote speaker. He has shared the stage with top business speakers: Rudy Giuliani, Paul Otellini (CEO of Intel), and John May (CEO of FedEx Kinkos). He's the author of 12 books on sales and motivation and 200+ sales training videos. More info at www.VictorAntonio.com

Article Referenced by Harvard Business Review.

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Ruben Melo

Sales Consultant at Lowe's Companies, Inc.

6y

Great topic Victor, yes a good salesperson should have some natural talent, but the training, processes and experience are the skills and the tools that make the best salesperson.

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Chris Colbert

Customer Loyalty Specialist | Add Value wherever you go!

6y

At one time I believed great salespeople were born. Over the years I have found that one must possess the desire to succeed along with the ability to communicate effectively.

Darrin L. Haug

Director of Business Development

6y

You either can sell or you can not! You can not learn in school. Sales people are born not made.

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