Planning Your Field Sales Approach

Overview/Description
 What factors mark the difference between mediocre and great field sales performance? One characteristic of highly effective field sales representatives is their ability to efficiently plan their sales approach for both existing customers and prospects, as well as managing their time and territories effectively. Planning Your Field Sales Approach provides practical tools for determining call and meeting objectives and developing appropriate openings for face-to-face selling situations. Included in the course are detailed descriptions of the six customer buying roles a field salesperson typically encounters and tips for working effectively with each. This course demonstrates how to generate effective account profiles, emphasizing the information needed for effective field sales pre-call planning. Finally, the course offers tips for managing time, territory, and paperwork in ways that will enhance performance and the bottom line.

Target Audience
 Field sales representatives engaged in face-to-face selling to large numbers of accounts located in assigned territories

Expected Duration
4.5 hours

Lesson Objectives:

Determining Call Objectives and Call Openings

  • recognize the benefits of planning call objectives and openings prior to making face-to-face sales calls.
  • match common types of sales calls with appropriate examples.
  • identify good examples of sales call objectives.
  • match the three elements of an effective sales call opening to examples of each.
  • determine the best purpose statement, benefits statement, and follow-up request for a given situation.

    • Identifying Customer Buying Roles

  • recognize the benefits of identifying customer buying roles.
  • identify key buying roles of contacts, coaches, and users in a given situation.
  • identify the buying roles of evaluators, gatekeepers, and decision makers in a given situation.

    • Organizing Customer Information

  • understand the benefits of using the account profile when planning field sales calls.
  • match the types of account profiles with appropriate profiling questions.
  • analyze a situation to determine what profiling questions haven't been asked.

    • Managing Paperwork, Travel, and Time

  • recognize the benefits of using good organizational skills in the field sales approach.
  • recommend methods for managing paperwork effectively in a given scenario.
  • match the five travel plans with their corresponding maps.
  • apply the field sales approach strategies for managing time in a given scenario.

    • Course Number: SALE0102