Like a lot of people, I took a sales skills course in college as an elective. Many colleges and universities at the time offered these sorts of classes as electives. Things have progressed quite a bit in academia as it relates to the sales function. According to memoryblue.com over 120 colleges/universities across the U.S offer formally recognized sales programs within their business curriculum. And that got me thinking: What would you learn about sales in a college level program that may not ring true when you get in the field and start running your own territory? After some thought, I settled on these four “sales truths” that you may not learn in college.
Sales Truth #1: Not every buyer appreciates a good value proposition.
You’d like to think that if the perceived value of your offering is higher than the price of your offering, that a buyer will be more likely to gravitate towards purchasing from you. Although that is true in many cases, there are certain people that just don’t care about anything other than the price of the product. I’ve seen a study that indicates 25% of the population buy with price being the only consideration. You know the kind of people I’m talking about; they’ll drive 15 miles out of their way to save $1.00, without even considering that they are burning through $2.50 in gas on the trip. With this person, you’re better standing your ground on price and letting them buy from your competitor…unprofitably I may add. This person changes suppliers like underwear and you may even do business with them again in the future.
Sales Truth #2: A lack of time and territory management skills will sink your sales career.
In a college sales course, you’ll cover topics like data management, sales strategy, utilizing adaptive selling approaches, and behavioral influence techniques in a research-based selling model. Yep, this last one was pulled directly from a college syllabus. However, when you leave academia and enter your first sales role, you better figure out who you need to call on, how often you need to call on them, how to manage all the customers so nobody falls through the cracks, and manage your time effectively to allow as much time as possible for selling activities. If you don’t get a handle on that, you will struggle to reach a level of success you expect of yourself.
Sales Truth #3: Your attitude is one of the primary drivers of your success.
Things will go wrong…sometimes it will be your fault, and other times it won’t have anything to do with you. How you react in these instances is reflective of your attitude, and a positive attitude is key to a lot of successes in your life. An attitude adjusted in the proper way is also key to a sales career built on self-improvement and being able to take constructive feedback and turn into positive results. The day you think begin thinking you know everything is the day your spark and drive start dying.
Sales Truth #4: You will start every month at $0.
If you have a sales budget that you are responsible for meeting, then you know exactly what I mean here. The scoreboard gets wiped clean at the end of every month and you start over again. That can either be good or bad. If your last month was great but you start the next month a little behind, nobody seems to care about the great month you just had. If last month’s result were sub-par, then you have an opportunity to start fresh and put that in the rearview mirror. This is all done with an eye on the big picture, the annual sales number. You’re always striving, working, and building towards something. That’s one of the things I like best about working in sales.
Although I am a college educated sales professional, I believe many of the more valuable sales lessons are best learned in the field, by trial and error, slugging it out with your competition. For the newer salespeople, I believe working in a sales role, especially in the building materials industry is a great path to be on. You have autonomy, compensation commiserate with the effort you put into it, and the opportunity to meet and work with a variety of people. Happy selling!
