Elite athletes and successful sales reps have something in common – they both have coaches. While playing sports and selling software are quite different, there are similarities between the two when it comes to the benefits of having a coach.
Athletes don’t have a problem getting a coach, but sales reps do. While the front line sales manager is expected to fill the role of a coach, unfortunately the exceptional sales performance which led to their promotion doesn’t necessarily translate to being a great coach. Industry reports show that sales managers only spend 20% of their time coaching and developing reps on their team. Whether it be due to a lack of time, expertise, or resources, sales managers are not coaching their reps enough. As a result, reps are missing quota, getting put on performance improvement plans, and churning out of their role on average every 1.5 years. This result has far reaching implications on the reps, managers, and of course, the businesses.
Sales Coaching is Now More Accessible and Affordable
Coaches who work with elite athletes are paid hundreds of thousands of dollars per year and as a result, those athletes win championships and make big money. While there are great sales coaches out there, it’s not something most reps can get access to. What if sales reps could get personalized coaching without having to rely on your sales manager? Oh, and it would cost less than a night out for dinner and drinks.
Sales reps are using AI powered coaching to get the immediate guidance they need to improve performance and win more deals. Whether it be during the live Zoom meeting with a prospect or immediately afterwards, real-time coaching helps reps become top performers. If you’re a sales rep looking for your next competitive advantage, here are ways AI sales coaching will support you:
Sales Plays
A great coach always prepares the plays before the game begins. Similarly, in sales, you need to have an effective meeting plan with best practices to follow. Meeting plans should be templatized so you can run them when you need them and show up prepared with the necessary information to win every call. The plan should consist of a structured call outline, essential discovery questions, and key talking points to use. If your organization hasn't provided meeting plan templates with sales best practices, or you haven't found a way to make them useful, OverQuota will help.
Game Time Leadership
Consider a scenario in sports where coaches are absent from the bench during the championship game, this wouldn’t be ideal. Winning the game would be difficult if the coach only showed up for practice and not the actual game. Similarly, sales calls require live coaching during the conversation when the stakes are high, and real-time objections and questions need to be handled effectively to keep the deal alive. However, sales managers rarely have the time to join their team's sales calls, leaving reps without a coach during the game. Moreover, even if managers could join all the sales calls, championship teams do not have player-coaches who enter the game off the bench. With OverQuota, sales managers can deploy a proven sales playbook across the team and use the power of AI to provide the coaching during the meeting. This enables reps to manage the clock, ask the right questions, address competitor-related questions, and quickly overcome objections.
Personalized Coaching
Athletes review game film to identify areas for improvement. Similarly, if you've been recording sales calls, you have been engaging in post-game review practices, but personalized coaching is a crucial missing piece. Typically, sales managers have multiple reps on their team, and with limited resources, their coaching is focused on the sales process rather than the individual skills of each rep. Offering a comment on a call recording to prompt a rep to set next steps is an example of coaching which focuses on the sales process and doesn't provide the personalized coaching that reps need. Unlike sales managers, AI-powered sales coaching overcomes time and resource limitations. With OverQuota software, personalized coaching is provided that considers a rep's individual performance and conversation data can be provided. The best part, this coaching is delivered within five minutes after the call ends, rather than waiting for the hit-or-miss 1:1 meeting the following week.
AI sales coaching isn’t going to replace the great sales managers out there who have the support of an enablement team and provide great sales coaching. However, it will provide the real-time support sales reps need during sales calls and the personalized coaching that will boost performance immediately afterward. Go to OverQuota.AI and request a demo to meet your new sales coach.