Last year I wrote a blog post entitled, Come on, Dave. Which is the Best Sales Training Company? I really don’t expect everyone to have read that post, or to agree with my position, or to even understand what the problem is with that question, because providing direction to sales leaders in this regard is what I do.

But this week, the situation has become more than farcical. In my inbox I found this question from LinkedIn forwarded to me by someone I’ve worked with:

“Anyone know a good pre-packaged sales training program that maps well to SalesForce.com? Complex software sale in the 7 figure range with 9-month sales cycle to Fortune 500 companies. Sandler?”

We’ve got a perspective here that is significantly off target:

  1. In most B2B selling situations, pre-packaged sales training doesn’t offer any real value. Even those sales training companies who push a packaged solution still do some customization to meet the unique attributes of the client’s selling situation.
  2. It’s not the sales training that should map to Salesforce.com. That doesn’t make any sense at all. It’s the CRM or sales automation solution that should map to the sales process. That is built (or customized) to meet your specific selling requirements, which is driven from how your customers (generally) buy.
  3. In the case of a significant intervention, which this appears to be, training should only take place when a sales process is in place. That’s what most of the training should be focused on—how to employ the sales process, tools, resources, strategies, and tactics. Other than that, you’re training on tips and tricks and that won’t contribute to long term effectiveness.
  4. Consistently winning lengthy, complex, million-dollar software sales to Fortune 500 companies requires a significant effort in 1) completely understanding the customer and the selling environment, 2) building a methodology (including infrastructure, hiring, compensation, tools, performance measurement, processes, etc.), 3) designing a curriculum and determining appropriate learning delivery methods, 4) training/learning, 5) coaching and ongoing reinforcement, 5) measuring, and 6) process improvement. There are no shortcuts. Believe me.
  5. Sandler? Read my previous post and you’ll understand why I can’t even begin to respond to the suggestion that this is the right or wrong choice for a trainer.

Please tell me this whole thing was a joke.  Please.

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