Okay:: what sales skill would you pay MONEY to learn?

Earlier in my sales career, I was making good money (100k takehome) but *still* felt like there was this velvet rope in front of an iron curtain separating me from the best reps and their "secret Jedi techniques". The guys making 300k as enterprise AEs at Oracle and Salesforce, for example. WHAT specifically were they doing to move up in their careers, and what secret strategies/tactics were they using in their sales that made them so much better?


I realize now that there were a lot of reasons experienced reps made more than me, but a big part of it was sales skills. Stuff like mindset, NLP/persuasion, using deal desk and legal strategically, ABM tactics, demo techniques, ...


What sales skill would YOU pay money to learn from a proven sales mentor who had that skill?



๐Ÿ˜Ž Sales Skills
2
LordBusiness
Politicker
4
Chief Revenue Officer
The biggest anchors for sellers in my experience are mindset/mental game and time management.ย  Time management is just crippling to even the most talented sellers, and usually separates them from being "good" to being top 1% performers.ย  ย Same for mindset, some of it comes from experience, but some of it is consciously understanding how the mind/brain works and not letting it. Selling can cause reactions from the same chemicals as highly addictive drugs, which as I am sure most know have withdrawal symptoms when not taken.ย  For sellers, its important that we train our minds and bodies to not react to the chemical triggers, or the highs (which are way more uncommon than the lows) will cause havoc on you emotionally AND physically.ย 
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
0
Growth Consultant
FACTS
GlenRoss
Politicker
3
Account Executive
Discovery
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
1
Growth Consultant
love this.ย 
closed/won happens because of deep and effective discovery...usually. I mean: bluebirds come in, but reliably closing sales? discovery
Sgt_Trollingham
Valued Contributor
2
Business Development Director
The ability to deal with rejection and learn from it. Not necessarily something that can be taught, more like a mindset. It solves so many sales problems/challenges:
Cold calling: no fear of rejection, keep calling.
Objection handling: understand their reservation, learn, and counter.
Lose a deal: Learn what went wrong, on to the next one.
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
0
Growth Consultant
Mindset CAN be taught. It does come naturally with experience, but it can also be taught. I know because I essentially paid to join an org which taught me mindset in its ramping process (it was the first module covered in the sales training).

Objection handling is taught as a function of mindset and the sales process you're using.
Coffeesforclosers
Notable Contributor
1
Director Sales and Market Development
I've had and would continue to pay for negotiations training. It evolves and we need to too. I have been in 3 trainings and picked something up from each of them and still get into uncomfortable negotiations often.ย 
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
0
Growth Consultant
i love and endorse this
TheWolfofGlengarry
Opinionated
1
Global Account Manager
Finding the right customer at the right time.... everytime.
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
0
Growth Consultant
tell me more about what you mean by this?
HarryCaray
Notable Contributor
1
HMFIC
ROI.ย  Being able to have a real deep convo with a CFO about return on investment in our product.ย  Being about to build out pro forma models, etc.ย  Just something I'd like to be better at.
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
0
Growth Consultant
i like this
Ace
Arsonist
1
CEO
Retention
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
0
Growth Consultant
interesting... are you in sales or customer success?
Ace
Arsonist
2
CEO
Being a startup CEO, I kinda have to dabble into everything
bellaccione
Valued Contributor
0
Growth Consultant
got it. interesting!

without knowing anything other than what you've said here, I would bet that you haven't found product/market fit yet. (to a rough approximation, that's often something like ~20k MRR for a SaaS product). Product/market fit achievement largely solves retention
Ace
Arsonist
1
CEO
That does solve a lot of problem and yes we are in early stages
CuriousFox
WR Officer
1
๐ŸฆŠ
Ninja skills bc it would be badass.
4

If Sales is a meritocracy and we all have the same expectation to produce, why is the so much talk about pay equity/inequality in sales? Shouldn't the meritocracy part be an equalizer?

Question
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What sales skill do you most need to improve?

Question
25
What sales skill do you most need to improve?
73 people voted
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Members only

Opinion: no amount of "grit" will help you in sales if you're dumb

Discussion
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