Have you wondered what differentiated a sales top performer from the rest?
It’s neither their ability to send multiple prospecting emails or mastery of sales tools like CRM. It is how they engage with customers, build relationships and encourage productive conversation from prospects; or in short their sales soft skills that set them apart from their competition.
With infinite competition and an abundance of technological solutions, cracking even a single deal or bursting the quota month on month can become a little more difficult. Now sales are not about just selling but it is about building long-term relationships and providing the best customer experience.
Fortunately, there is no hard way of developing these skills set or tracking how they are impacting a seller’s ability to sell. But just relying on old techniques and learning programs won’t get you far.
With the advancement of technologies like AI-powered conversational intelligence solutions, organizations have already started analyzing and exploring ways to provide the best of the best training for their sales army.
But what exactly are these skills that every seller needs to learn and practice to stay ahead?
If you don’t know the answer don’t worry. In this article, we will explore the soft skills that are required for being a stellar sales representative and how conversational intelligence can help you with it.
What are Sales Soft Skills?
Soft Skills for sales can be defined as personal attributes that would help a seller engage effectively and efficiently with prospects. These skills aid a salesperson to engage harmoniously with the prospect and achieve his goals.
You guys must have heard the story of Grinch from the classic novel How the Grinch stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss.
If Grinch was a sales representative, we all know how the company would epically fail. No offense!
Let's see what skills he lacked for building relationships with others?
- Lack talking skills
- No participation in any occasion
- Talk rudely
- Not dress up for major occasions
And why exactly is that he never communicated with others and chose to stay stuck in his mountain. In sales, the mountain is sticking to the sales script and not innovating, not practicing enough. You don’t want to become the Grinch of sales, do you?
Let’s look at the skills that our sales rep need for building customer relations and providing the best customer experience
8 Soft Skills for Sales
- Active Listening:
There is a popular saying that sometimes it is better to SHUT UP AND LISTEN. You don’t have to always talk about your product and its features. Customers are smart, before even approaching a brand they do their due diligence online. A recent study states that 81% of shoppers research products online before purchasing.
So, how can a seller convince a customer to buy their product? Simple, by listening and understanding their pain points and then suggesting a product.
- Tech Savvy:
In this automation world, even cleaning our house can be automated. A sales rep cannot ignore the new technologies that hit the market every day. Being up to date and learning the operations of new technology can help sales reps stay ahead of their teammates. - Storytelling:
One of the biggest art of selling is storytelling. Articulate your product messaging in a storyline, to help your customers resonate with the situation and product. Creds recent Rahul Dravid ads come to mind. It was the perfect combination of humor and storytelling to showcase the customer’s pain point and Cred’s solution.
- Relationship Building:
The ability to build customer and team relationships and forming mutually beneficial networks can help in the long run for any salesperson. But forming relationships involves not just connecting with your customers or team members regularly but working on empathy, building trust and rapport with them.
- Time Management
Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon - one of the world’s largest selling platforms goes to bed by 10 pm and wakes up by 5 am. He plans and assigns time for even spending time with his family. If you have heard since childhood time management is the key to success, it is true.
Assign time for prospecting, reaching out, and qualifying the lead. Even set up reminders on the calendar for follow-up meetings and other tasks, to help manage your time effectively.
- Problem Solving:
A critical thinker processes information, analyses data, and dives through the sea of information to provide the most effective solution for any problem. This skill set not just comes in handy in those tough prospect meetings but also helps the team in finding and solving internal problems.
- Adaptability:
The expectations from a sales representative are constantly evolving along with the buyer journey. To keep up to date, sales reps need to adapt to new trends constantly and implement any feedback they get.
- Growth Mindset:
Even if a seller is a great talker, friendly, and has all the other skill sets it takes to be great at sales. Without having a growth mindset, he cannot become a great seller. Anyone with a growth mindset can strengthen their natural talent and learn new skills to always stay ahead of the crowd. To develop a growth mindset, sales reps should not be afraid to make mistakes or fail. As every failure is a learning opportunity.
Results first, payment later
Conversational Intelligence for Soft Skill training
Conversational Intelligence solution easily integrates with your customer engagement platform like email, Google Meet, zoom, phone to record, transcribe and analyze the conversation. Convin also seamlessly integrates with your sales stack like Slack, ZohoCRM, Freshsales, so that sales leaders can view the call analytics and review it in the platform they prefer and avoid wasting time in switching applications.
But how exactly does it help in soft skill building?
- Call Analysis
Convin can analyze long calls and displays the analytics in an easy to glance format in a few minutes. So, the Sales leader can review and provide feedback to the sales reps. Sales reps themselves can review their long calls in a few minutes and work on building their skill sets.
- Highlighting Important Moments in the call
Convin highlights important moments in a call like missed opportunities, important talk points covered, stammering or hesitation shown in either end, and much more. With these data available for a glance view, Sales leaders can analyze the call and provide training as required.
- Soft Skill Review
Convin analyses the call based on soft skills as well. And informs the sales rep about the skill they should improve on for a smooth engagement with the customer.
- Call Ratings
Post analyzing the call based on soft skills missed opportunities, and keyword analysis, Convin rates the call. Based on this rating, sales leaders can understand how every sales rep is performing and what training they require.
Sales Soft Skills are defined as the personal attributes that help a seller engage efficiently and effectively with the customer.
How does Conversation Intelligence help in soft skill building?
Conversational Intelligent solution records transcribe, and analyses the call for you and your sales leaders to review and give feedback. It also rates the calls based on soft skills, keywords, and missed opportunities. Convin also highlights the soft skills training opportunities that a sales rep might require.
To sum up
Soft skills like empathy, articulate communication, and resilience help in sales and building long-term relationships with customers. Working hard and continuous personal upskilling by evaluating where you stand by using conversational intelligence tools can help you and your team in achieving every goal you set for yourself faster.
