 Practice makes perfect
R.A. Mueller receives Progressive Distributor Sales Training Excellence Award
The Cincinnati fluid handling and pump distributor is recognized for its ongoing emphasis on sales training.
by Richard Vurva
When Kevin Delaney first become a pump distributor salesman, he had experience in inside sales, factory sales support, and some course work in marketing.
This background helped greatly, but did not at all prepare me for the rigors of field sales, Delaney says. Marketing is taught in schools, but salesmanship is given scant attention.
An engineer by training, most of what he learned early as a sales engineer came from the school of hard knocks and by voraciously reading whatever material he could find on the subject of salesmanship.
Today, as sales manager at fluid handling and pump distributor R. A. Mueller in Cincinnati, he oversees 10 outside account managers, eight inside sales engineers, two inside repair coordinators and four inside parts technicians.
When I became a sales manager, I made up my mind not to put my people through what I went through, he says. I could help them get there a lot faster by giving them some sales training.
Delaneys dedication to providing ongoing sales training earned R. A. Mueller Progressive Distributor magazines annual Sales Training Excellence Award.
Find the right mix
Delaney has been sales manager at R.A. Mueller for 10 years. For the first five years, mostly because of budget limitations, he conducted training in-house. It included role-playing, seminars on how to work the sales process and how to respond to different market and competitive conditions based on cycles in the economy. Some of it was directed toward helping account managers analyze their customer base.
As we became more successful and more profitable, I got busier and people got tired of listening to me, he says. Thats when I started to bring in outside people.
He has utilized sales trainers including Jim Pancero Inc., Carl Henry of Henry Associates and Landy Chase of Rainmaker Associates.
It helps going outside because most companies dont have someone with the interest or ability to gather materials and conduct in-house instruction, he says. Secondly, theres a lot more credibility bringing in an outside trainer.
Because there is so much sales training material with different points of view, Delaney screens the content of speakers or trainers to make sure it coincides with his own sales philosophy.
Many sales programs are based on hard-sell approaches that focus on overcoming objections and closing the orders, he says. Our business is based on long-term relationships. You cannot have a long-term relationship where the customer feels he has been strong-armed into buying your product. The training I subscribe to emphasizes planning, problem solving and excellent questioning and listening skills.
Today, he utilizes a combination of professional training provided by Butler Learning Systems of Dayton, Ohio, and in-house programs.
Something for everyone
New hires attend Butler Learnings Habit of Selling course that covers the nuts and bolts of sales and territory planning. Theyre taught time and territory management, how to get appointments, how to conduct a sales interview, how to make a sales presentation and how to follow up and network. Inside sales engineers attend a similar program aimed at inside salespeople.
The Butler programs include two to three days of intensive training, workbooks and videotaped role- playing opportunities.
More experienced salespeople attend Butlers Habit of Sales Negotiation Selling and Managing the Account for Win-Win Partnership that teach them skills needed to sell at higher levels in a customers organization.
Many salespeople are uncomfortable with the whole negotiations arena. They dont know how to handle negotiation situations that customers pull them into, he says.
Often, salespeople wait until the end of the sales process and then the transaction boils down to a haggle over price. This is because the buyer does not perceive any difference other than price. Delaney teaches his salespeople to structure their proposals to solve problems, and to sell the value of doing business with them right from the beginning.
You have to be selling the customer on how hes going to benefit by buying this particular product or service from us, he says. We offer a lot in terms of technical support, stocking and service. If we get to the end and its just a haggle over price, in my view, we havent really done our job.
Selling to plant management isnt about selling products, Delaney says. Its selling an array of products and services and the value provided to the customer. In order to sell to higher-level managers, salespeople must become proficient at problem solving, dealing with operations and logistics issues, asset management issues such as storeroom rationalization, and helping customers cut their costs or improve equipment reliability.
The value of what we do has to be sold to the management of these companies in a financial and plant operations context, he says. You cant talk to them about product features and benefits, because they dont care about product details.
Be consistent
In addition to the Butler training, Delaney continues to conduct workshops of his own. Some training consists of informal coaching sessions or group meetings where salespeople swap ideas.
We always share stories with one another, says account manager Jim Baker. We talk about why we lost this order or why we got that order. What did we do wrong? What did we do right?
Often, they utilize books about sales as a launching point for training and discussion. About once a year, they devote a sales meeting to discussions about current sales and marketing books. In recent sessions, each salesperson received a copy of a sales-related book, such as Co-opetition by Adam Brandenburger and Barry Nalebuff or Enterprise: One to One by Don Peppers and Martha Rogers.
Delaney prepares a list of questions and topics for discussion pertaining to the reading material.
I randomly call on salespeople to present their answers and analysis of the different topics, he says. Then, we get a discussion going on different points of view.
Delaney says distributors dont have to spend a lot of money on sales training. To help reduce training costs, he convinced a key supplier, Goulds Pumps, to host many of the Butler Learning programs, enabling R.A. Mueller to share the cost with Goulds and other Goulds distributors.
The key to effective training is to offer it consistently, so salespeople have the opportunity to seek continual improvement. An added benefit: salespeople demonstrate greater loyalty and exhibit more pride if they know their company is willing to invest in their career development.
If you do it consistently, after about four or five years, its remarkable what kind of change and improvement you see in peoples skills and their ability to do the job, he says.
It also reflects on the bottom line. R.A. Muellers growth rate for the past five years has averaged 10 to 11 percent annually.
Baker says he has benefited from Delaneys approach to sales training.
Kevin Delaney is a teacher, Baker says. He doesnt rule with an iron fist. If you make a mistake, he gently picks you up and dusts you off and says lets see what you did wrong. Thats the kind of direction and teaching that makes people successful.
This article originally appeared in the January/February 2001 issue of Progressive Distributor. Copyright 2001.
back to top back to Sales Training archives
|
