What are the qualities of a successful sales manager? What personal qualities are important for B2B sales managers and how to develop them? Stress resistance - the ability to navigate in a non-standard, sometimes "emergency" situation
The sales manager plays a significant role in society because he is the person who represents the company and its products in its entirety. Through the manager, we learn about new companies and products. The sales performance of the company's products will depend on what impression the manager will make on us. The manager must also have the qualities of a good leader.
1. Neat appearance
Last but not least quality actually plays a very important role. Neat appearance is very important, as it reflects the individuality of a person, which also affects sales. Therefore, the manager should be well dressed, have a good physique - this will help to influence customers.
A manager must have good habits. Speech should be soft and pleasant. Facial expressions should reflect the enthusiasm on the face well. All this has a very big impact, so the sales manager should focus on these things.
2. Market knowledge
Each professional worker must have a maximum of knowledge about the business, if, of course, he wants to succeed in it. Similarly, a manager must have a healthy knowledge of the market. He must understand current market trends, customer needs and future market aspects in order for the company to succeed. The manager must know competitors and rivals and find effective methods fight them.
3. Planning and organization
Planning actions before doing something is a necessary quality. Organization and planning will make the work more efficient and the result more fruitful. The sales manager must always have a plan for finding a prospect, and once found, he must organize it.
He has to plan everything before going to meet clients. If he is going to make a call to a client, he must have good plan and be ready to answer any question of the customer. The manager must be able to cope with any task.
4. Opportunity to build new relationships
Relationships and connections are very important in this world. Connecting with people and contacts can be very useful in many areas of life. The manager must be polite, speak in such a way that when selling a product, he builds a new relationship with the client. Sometimes these relationships can lead him to look for more contacts around the world to benefit the company.
5. Good communication skills
Communication skills are important for every person working in the market. Globalization rules the world today. Each country has its roots spread all over the world. Any company is not located in the country itself, but has branches and clients around the world.
Employees of firms must convey ideas to their clients, so it is obvious that communication qualities must be at the highest level. They contribute greatly to the development of relationships and attraction a large number clients.
6. Feedback
All those who are focused on improving previous results are more successful and stable. A manager's earnings and career largely depend on clients, so their opinion is very important. Everyone knows that consumer demand changes over time in accordance with growing needs.
If the manager continues to supply old trend products, they will not be bought. It is very important for a sales manager to understand the needs of the client, to listen to feedback about the product. He must constantly revise existing trends, make them compatible with the current ones, and then success will be achieved.
7. Persistence
In order to become successful person you have to try the same thing over and over again. Until we gain knowledge through our own mistakes, we will not succeed. We should not lose hope in the face of setbacks, but keep trying and stay resilient. Managers face rejection many times.
Often their appeals and letters do not receive a positive response even after a huge number of attempts. Therefore, in such a situation, the manager should not loosen his grip or stop trying, but instead should be ready for such failures and only then can he succeed.
8. Consistent absorption
Every person on earth is not perfect. People learn throughout their lives. Every day we learn something new and if we apply it in life, then we will continue to move towards success and excellence in work. This process is sequential.
A manager must be willing to learn something new from every sale made in a career.. He should try to always expand his network of knowledge, update it and look for new ways to improve. With the increase in knowledge, he will gain more experience and be able to develop a career.
9. Persuasiveness
This is the kind of ability a manager must acquire with every sale, big or small, in order to be successful. The manager must satisfy the customers with the product. This is really good business. The people he meets will ask the same questions about the product a thousand times, but he must patiently answer them in full detail.
This is also part of the persuasive character. When customers find the answer to each question, then they will be completely satisfied and buy the product.
10. Confidence
The sales manager must have confidence in his own products, because by his confidence, customers form an opinion about the products they are going to buy. If they are very confident in themselves, they create a good impression in the eyes of customers, and sometimes for this confidence, buyers are ready to purchase a product without hesitation.
We can also easily observe this in real life. Trust is actually very necessary in any field. Confidence comes with a person's knowledge and sincere belief in their abilities.. Confidence brings perfection in everything we do and it makes us happy and satisfied.
Most successful sales managers have the qualities that we list below. Each of us has most of these qualities (and some of them all!).
It is clear that depending on our personality and our experience, all these qualities are expressed differently for each of us. Now take a paper and a pen and rate the qualities listed below on a scale of 1 to 10.
1. The ability to set goals, purposefulness
As soon as you decide what you want to achieve, what is worth striving for, for self-development of the personality, mentally imagine that you have already achieved all this and think about what “you did to achieve the result.” I repeat, if you clearly see the goal, then it will be easier for you to motivate yourself, to force yourself to take actions on the way to the goal. The more important your goal is to you, the more you want it, the greater your success will be as a result of the path.
2. Great desire to work, self-discipline
The desire to get what you want has great power. It can replace the lack of experience and training, it drives us and makes us work. If you have a goal and you notice that your activity is decreasing, mentally kindle desire in yourself, think about your goal, think about how you want it, how to become successful, think about how your life will change when you achieve your goal!
3. Labor enthusiasm, self confidence
Remember, your luck depends on your ability to nurture in yourself enthusiasm! Enthusiasm can be compared to the calm self-confidence that arises from knowledge and is confirmed by experience based on confronting life's difficulties.
4. Ability to use knowledge
If you have a wealth of knowledge, then you definitely need to use it, otherwise this knowledge will burden you like an extra burden. Therefore, try to perceive only the information that you will use in the future, make friends with people from whom you can learn a lot.
5. Good looks
Tell me, is it more pleasant for you to talk with a friendly and smiling person who readily answers your questions? In sales, as nowhere else, it is very important to be able to make a good impression on the interlocutor, be open to communication, smile, and show your interest in the needs of the buyer. These qualities will be priority during.
6. Faith in the best, positive attitude
In itself, the work of a sales manager is comparable to a swing: sometimes there are no sales, sometimes there are a lot of them. Therefore, when selling, you must always believe in your lucky star, in God, in luck, whatever you want, most importantly, believe in the best!
7. Willingness to give
Based on my experience in sales, I can say that in order to get a loyal customer and win his trust, you need to give him something (give away). It can be your time that you spent on solving the client’s issues, it can be competent professional advice, phone calls, searching for the information the client needs ... Do not be afraid to spend your time, because only if you solve the client’s problem, he will fully imbue trust you and will be ready to work with you (often work with you as a responsible and reliable person).
8. Perseverance
If your business is not going well, never give up, always go forward, always fight, fight to the very end, so that in the end you do not regret the lost chance, but you can confidently say that you did everything you could!!!
9. Initiative
Initiative is best shown in relation to your results, looking and comparing what your actions really work. And whether or not to tell management or colleagues about your success is up to you, but before making a decision, think carefully, since not all people favorably accept the success of others.
10. Creative imagination
Yes, yes, you will definitely need creative imagination in order to “invent” a problem based on the buyer’s story and offer a tool (your product) to solve it.
11. Ability to learn from failures
Think about the reasons for unsuccessful transactions, analyze your mistakes without unnecessary emotions, as if from the outside, as described in our course "". If you repeat one or more mistakes frequently, then you need to start self-study immediately.
12.
It is very important for sales managers to be able to understand the point of view of another person, to be able to imagine themselves in his place. Thus, a professional sales manager will be able to understand what the client feels and, based on the identified emotions of the client, lead the sale.
And most importantly, the sales manager must please the client. You will learn how to do this from a short interesting training by Evgeny Kolotilov:
Well, how? How many points did you get? The most important thing is that all the listed qualities are present in you, and their development is a matter of practice and time!
Since the sales manager is not only involved in the sale of the product itself, but also acts as a significant person of the company, it is therefore worthwhile to study in more detail what they are.
The main qualities of a sales manager must necessarily allow him to be able to successfully present goods to customers, have them in a positive dialogue, and also demonstrate the main advantages of profitable cooperation with the company.
Personal qualities of a sales manager
If we consider the strength of a professional manager, then it lies in sociability. In this work it is very important to find contact with all clients. The concept of "communication" includes:
Ability to negotiate;
Mastery of various sales techniques;
Ability to maintain contact with the client during the entire period of cooperation;
Ability to quickly establish contact with clients;
Knowledge of all characteristics of the product, as well as the ability to communicate information about its main advantages in an accessible way.
Essential Qualities of a Sales Manager imply the presence of an inner core in him, which will allow him to assertively and delicately convince customers of the need to make a purchase.
You can get the necessary professional skills through training and specialized programs, and of course through experience. Success will come only to that person whom nature has endowed with all the necessary properties.
Personal qualities of a sales manager
Wherever a sales manager has to work, there is a certain set of personal qualities that he must possess without fail:
This includes literate speech;
Charm;
Presentable appearance;
Broad outlook;
Ability to find a personal approach to clients;
Ability to resolve possible conflicts;
Personal interest in sales volumes.
All of these are significant necessary condition for success.
The main qualities of a sales manager
Today, many companies spend a lot of effort looking for a good specialist in the person of a sales manager. It is even worth noting that this is a significant position in any organization, since without the presence of customers, any organization simply cannot exist. It is quite difficult to find a decent, competent specialist. There is a certain portrait of this specialist. Many aspiring managers should try their best to cultivate the main qualities of a sales manager in which many employers are interested.
Consider the main characteristics that many employers pay special attention to:
Work experience, preferably in a related field;
Excellent knowledge of sales theory;
Complex of personal qualities;
Knowledge of the market, own customer base, established contacts.
All these characteristics are quite rare to be found simultaneously among applicants. But any novice manager should definitely try to get closer to this ideal.
What is the best place to start?
If we talk about work experience, then you must initially agree to everything that is offered to you, and when there is an opportunity. To build a successful career, you need to get your primary work experience. Thanks to experience, you will have the opportunity to study the real conditions that are observed in a particular market, and you will be able to study the conjuncture and laws of this market, and develop your customer base. Any manager should burn with work.
Having studied Key qualities of a sales manager, and with maximum effort, you can become a successful and qualified specialist in your field.
What are the main qualities that sales managers should have and how to develop them as a leader. Why doesn't it always work. Examples are given by our expert, business coach Andrey Karpenko
- To understand all the components of the profession, it is important for a salesperson to draw up his own plan, evaluate professional capital, “acquire” useful tools in the right areas and move forward in professional development.
The task of the leader here is to help develop these qualities.
How to develop goal setting in a salesperson
Goal setting is a clear understanding by the seller of the goals of his sales and what he wants to get as a result.
You can give your salespeople the ability to set their own sales plan. And do not tell them the final figure - let them appoint it themselves. And you, as a leader, compare the results with your preliminary ones. If sales managers set a higher plan, great. If you put up less, you correct it together with them, trying to get out of the situation and increase the results.
I note that practice shows that with the development of this quality, it is not uncommon for a manager to tell an employee to complete the maximum possible plan for him and not set minimum goals. And this is already a gross mistake. By doing this, you yourself, as a leader, give the employee an escape route in case of unsatisfactory results.
It sounds like this: "Do as much as you can!" In this case, he can always say that he did everything possible, but he did not succeed: "As much as he could, he did so much." I have had one case. The sales manager very often came to one client in the store - in order for him to place an order for new products (she placed orders automatically for the usual assortment). But the store manager didn't want to listen to information about ordering a new product. This happened because the girl set herself the goal of selling goods, including new ones, for a certain amount.
After discussing the situation, a slightly different goal was set. In fact, the girl needed to make the client listen to her. And after a two-minute conversation, move on to discussing a new product. This is much more effective than starting to sell a new product from the threshold.
How to ask questions to a client
This quality refers to finding out the needs of the client. You need to ask the right effective questions so that the client provides additional information.
Make sure that the employee can immediately write 10-15 questions that he will ask the client. If an employee creates this list, he will be able to choose 2-3 suitable for a particular client.
How do managers destroy this quality in employees? It is extremely simple - the leaders themselves do not ask them any questions. Ask yourself: “How many questions do I ask employees? Do I show them by example what to do and how to do it? Do I know how to ask questions to the client, to clarify the situation?”
If you, as a leader, only set tasks without asking questions to employees, they will copy your behavior model and, with a calm soul, coming to customers, they will sell goods to them in the same way, using the “bulldozer” model. In such a situation, employees are not ready for customer objections. They believe that you need to push harder, give more examples and evidence in order to get your product accepted.
At the same time, keep in mind that many employees, after passing the trainings that companies conduct for staff, conclude for themselves that it is worth asking any questions you like, just to “fill up” the client with them. But no client will answer a bunch of questions. He will answer the first 2-4, and then ask his own, quite logical question: “What did you come with?”
How to develop the ability to influence the interlocutor
It is about working with arguments, resolving doubts and objections, closing the deal.
If you want to perform these actions well, scripts, scripts, the experience of colleagues within your company, effective sales training programs come to the rescue.
1. Just get together once with your team. Write down all speech models and then supplement them periodically. By doing this, you will create a useful knowledge base that contains answers to, for example, the 20 most common objections, arguments in favor of the product for various categories of customers, examples of what to say at the end of the transaction.
2. Call your employees and analyze work situations, isolate from them typical behaviors when dealing with objections.
3. Immediately begin to work out the solutions found. Ask the employee to repeat the necessary phrases 2, 3, 5 times until he becomes related to them.
4. Become a role model for employees. If the manager only set a goal for the employee, but never sold anything himself, then the employees will also perceive this as a kind of role model.
5. The second way to show how to act is to go with the employee “in the field” to the client, negotiate with him and make a successful deal.
You should not be too emotionally happy with your results, be smug and tell the employee something like “now you understand how this is done, next time you will repeat it.”
6. Debrief after meeting with the client. Discuss the positives and negatives as equals with the employee.
How to instill the ability to develop
In my experience, 2 out of 10 people are ready to develop themselves. The rest develop only under the coercion of the leader. Develop such a quality as self-learning in employees with care. So that they do not get tired of learning, but it is enough for professional growth. To do this, it is best to awaken in them a keen interest in personal development. For example:
- Create a corporate library
- Share useful films with employees
- Once a week, make it a rule to discuss something new that you have learned, heard, read or tried out in practice.
An example from life. When at the certification the manager noted the need for personal development, instructed employees to study materials, books and trainings, a logical question followed: “Have you studied this yourself?”. The leader replied, “Why? I do not need it!".
In this case, employees usually copy the behavior of the leader, and development becomes unnecessary for them too. At the very least, optional.
Another case from practice. The manager asked me after the management training: “I really want my employees to develop, where should I start? After all, they don’t do anything at all, they don’t develop in any way, they just sell the goods.
The answer is simple - start with yourself!
Professional trainer
16 years in sales, management, practical training.
Professional capital development expert
Experience in Philip Morris, Henkel, Danone, RTL-holding
Clients: Colgate&Palmolive, BelorDesign, Garsia, Oasis Group, Belorusneft software, Conte Trade and others.
Has evaluated over 1200 salespeople and 180 Executives.
The best result in the country in joint field trainings - more than 800 (sales, negotiations, management).
HotSalesDay training organizer
Founder of the project and community "Work Like a Hobby"
Author of books: "Resolution for the Manager", "I want a normal job", "Excellent Interview"
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