The 5 Biggest Reasons Why Sales Training Fails (and How to Fix It)

Every year, companies invest millions of dollars on sales training, trying to boost the performance of their sales teams. Unfortunately most of this money doesn’t lead to any significant improvements in sales results.

If you’re trying to get your sales team to do a better job at any stage of the sales process, you need to take a look at some of the reasons why sales training fails – so you can avoid experiencing these same mistakes the next time you hire a sales trainer.

Here are a few of the biggest reasons why sales training fails:

Lack of specific target: “Sales” is such a broad topic that it’s hard to create an effective sales training program unless you have a strong idea of exactly which part of the sales process or which sales activities need to be targeted as part of the training. Before your sales organization embarks on a sales training program, you need to have a clear objective of what you’re hoping to accomplish. What does your sales team already do very well, and which areas do they need to improve? Do you need to improve your initial lead generation efforts, strengthen your appointment setting capabilities, or improve your deal closing ratios? Whatever stage of the sales cycle is most important to your team’s success, that is where you should focus your sales training. Sales training cannot be a “catchall” activity – just like sales people need targets for sales quotas, you need to focus and have a specific target for what you want to accomplish with the sales training program.

Too much focus on “selling:” Perhaps it sounds counter-intuitive, but it’s true – most sales training focuses on “selling skills,” when what most sales people need is better skills at building relationships, listening to customer needs, and developing their product knowledge so they can dig deeper into conversations with customers to recommend the right solutions. Instead of old-school notions of “overcoming objections” and overcoming the customer’s resistance, your sales training will work better if it teaches your sales team how to become problem solves who focus on the customer’s immediate needs – and then build deeper relationships to uncover the customer’s unstated needs.

Boredom: Sales training doesn’t have to be boring. In fact, it should be energizing, engaging, and even exciting! After all, your sales training program is being put on for dedicated professionals who love to sell and who are eager to learn – so instead of a boring lecture or a boring Power Point presentation, make sure your sales training program is based on active learning where your sales team can contribute their ideas and real-life examples of the sales challenges they’re seeing every day. Build on the expertise and experience of your team. There is no excuse for a boring sales training presentation. Make sure your sales training respects the intelligence and capabilities of your sales people – learn and grow along with them.

Lack of reinforcement: When sales training fails, it’s often because there was no follow-up. New ideas get presented, and then the next day everyone forgets about it. Successful sales training finds a way to reinforce the learning that has already taken place – whether it’s by interactive quizzes and games, or a follow-up session, or personalized follow-up challenges for each individual sales person to focus on specific activities discussed in the training. There’s an old saying in public speaking, that first you need to “tell ‘em,” and then “tell ‘em what you told ‘em.” It’s the same with sales training. It’s not enough to just introduce great new ideas and techniques; you also need to build in a solid framework of reinforcement and recitation of the new concepts.

Lack of evaluation and analysis: What is your ROI on sales training? How do you know? Most sales organizations are flying blind with sales training, by spending money without connecting the training to any real-life results. There are many ways to track the success of a sales training program, such as follow-up surveys, tracking results on certain sales activities or stages of the sales process, and customer surveys to see how customers are responding to the new tactics and approaches of the sales team. Measuring ROI on sales training doesn’t have to be complicated. It all goes back to your overall strategic goals for what you are hoping to accomplish with sales training in the first place: find out which sales activities you are trying to increase, see which sales metrics you’re trying to move the needle on, and then choose a simple way to check for the desired effects.

If sales training fails so often, should companies just give up? No. Sales training can still be hugely valuable to your company, but it has to be done right. If you plan ahead, figure out specific objectives, keep the training engaging and energizing, reinforce your team’s learning, and follow up on the training with some statistical analysis and evaluation of how well it worked, you’ll be ready to take your sales team to the next level of excellence.