Introduction to Sales - Part 3: Research

A friend of mine is starting a commission only sales job and he asked me to help him with getting started. So I thought I would share my insights to him and ask for any feedback from the people out there. This series of posts will focus on an introduction to selling and how to get started from a zero base with no previous experience.

So you've started in sales and you know nothing. Nothing about your product, nothing about your customers, nothing about your prospects, nothing about your competitors and nothing about your market. If you're lucky your one-week induction course covered some of this.

Unfortunately while many companies teach people how to sell and a bit about what their products they don't give them a guide to or an option for 'research'. This is quite common - "the best way to learn about your market is to make some calls". And that's true - that is literally the best way to learn about your market. But there is a good way to get a head start and make your first few calls effective - research your product, competitors, market, industry and target clients. There is such a thing as being over-prepared, and you can spend so much time researching that you never get around to making a call. But whilst your employer might throw you in the deep end, you can do some research on your own time.

First of all find out how big your competitor base is and how your industry sector is split up. Find your top 4-5 competitors on a large scale and your top 4-5 competitors in your market niche. What are their "USPs" (Unique Selling Points)? How do they separate themselves? If your biggest competitor is market ignorance what solutions are people using now that yours could compliment or replace?

Now learn about your target market. Who is the best person to speak to in each of your target companies? Is it a C-Level Exec? Is it a manager? A director? Are there external 3rd party suppliers they might use that could use your services? When you know who the target person is find out where they go to get information about your product? Are there conferences they attend? What are their biggest pain points? Where could they generate more revenue or use cost savings? Is there a list somewhere or a director of companies in your target market? Can you visit business parks or office buildings and write down details of what companies are there?

Speak to your product and services teams and find out more about your product. While you're at it speak to marketing. And then search your product online and see what people have to say about it. Find out what the best and worst features of your product are. Can you frame negative features in a good way? E.g. because it's known to fail mention how you have an outstanding technical support team. Now how do these features benefit the customer?

List the key benefits of your product as an expression of what is important to your prospect. If you are speaking to managers they need to look good to directors. If you're speaking to directors they need to look good to the C-Suite. If you're speaking to the C-Suite they need to look good to shareholders. If you're speaking to shareholders they want the business to be profitable. How does your benefit help your target person achieve their goals?

Now that you've done this research you can be prepared to answer a lot of questions from potential clients and hopefully highlight the benefits of your product to the point where they will meet with you and eventually buy from you.

Read Part 2 (Go-to-Market Strategy)

Read Part 4 (Making the Sales Call)