How to use your sales training or sales experience to land your next job

The parallels between sales and getting a job cannot be denied. With sales, you need to sell a product or service while looking for a job requires you to sell yourself. Therefore you can see that landing a job and closing deals are very similar; you can use the same techniques you learn from reputable corporate sales training companies like Yusudi to gear yourself for both these scenarios.

Identify right contact

As with any Kenyan sales job, the key is always finding the right contact person, especially for B2B sales. If you are looking for a job, the first thing you need to do is find the right contact. If you are applying for a Kenyan job ad, then this part is already done for you as the application you send will go straight to the person who posted the job to review.

However, if you are cold calling companies looking for a job, getting the right contact is essential. You can use your sales training experience to weed out all the contact info from the company and narrow it down to the exact person who will be most helpful. This might be the HR department, the Marketing lead, or whichever department you are looking to get a job in. Many people make the mistake of emailing the managers, who are often too busy or not involved in the hiring process.

Do your homework

Like any sales pitch, you need to understand the company first. Nothing tunes off an interviewer more than a candidate who does not know anything about the company they want to join. It would be best if you understood the industry, the company, the competitors, and you can bring value to the company.

Use SPIN sales strategy

Sometimes knowing about the basics just doesn't get you over the finish line. To be on the safe side during the interview, it would be advisable to use a sales tactic like the SPIN sales strategy, this is; Situation, Problem, Implications, Needs. By breaking this down to a company, they can better see that you understand what you can deliver. Most importantly, you will provide helpful information that the company may already know they have a problem in and give them solutions that you think would best help them. Use this strategy as leverage during the interview, and it may give you an advantage.

How it works:

Situation: Point out a situation or scenario in the industry as a large or company and identify the process of the situation. This shows you have a clear understanding of what you are talking about. An example of such a “situation” would be acquiring new leads for the company is on a steady decline.

Problem: Through your research about the company or the industry, point out a problem in the situation you have provided that you feel you can tackle, and address it to the interviewer. Show them how, suffice the situation working, the problem is making the company run less efficiently. An example of such a problem for the situation above is "lack of enough conversion through online platforms."

Implications: This explains to the interviewer what the problem in the situation has led to and the implications. For example, if the conversion rate for new leads is on the decline, the company would need to spend more to gain more customers.

Needs: this is the most critical part of this process. This is where you identify what the company needs to change their fortunes in regards to the situation and problem you have identified. For example, you can suggest using better facebook targeting or better graphic designs for their online platforms, this may help keep costs down and increase its leads

The key in the SPIN sales technique is to identify the pain points of the company, similar to how you would locate the pain points of potential clients as a Kenyan salesperson.

Make a connection

Have you ever attended an interview, and immediately after, you feel that you did not do well. This feeling is often from the reception you got from the interviewer. If you did not feel any connections, the odds are that you did not feel confident about the interview. And many times, you will not expect a callback. However, you can do a few things to ensure you have a better connection with the interviewer.

1. Mirror your interviewer

This is a trick that most well-trained salespeople in Kenya use. You do not have to change your whole mannerism to that of the interviewer. However, being subtle is vital. Look at their hand gestures and common phrases they use during the interview and try to structure them in your response. Research shows that people feel like they can trust others more if they have similar mannerisms to them. The aim for mirroring your interview is to gain phycological trust with the interviewer.

2. Complement the company

Flattery will get you anything. As an experienced salesperson, you may have noticed that complimenting someone can change the whole dynamic of the conversation. Someone will be more friendly and ready to engage. However, as we have mentioned, be subtle. There is nothing as wrong in the sales process as a client knowing you are deliberately buttering them up for a sale. The best approach is to pick something that you already know is true about the company and bring it up in conversion naturally. I know this isn't easy; however, creating natural conversation becomes second nature with experience and proper corporate sales training.

3. Make a conversation

If you have attended an interview or made any sales, you may understand the power of creating a conversation. Try to make the interview a two-way engagement. This helps you create a connection with the interviewer, making your encounter more memorable. Second, you ensure that the interview is more relaxed and not a strict question-answer situation. As a result, sometimes the interviewer will go off-script, making the process easier for you. This will also allow you to learn more about the company in case the interviewer asks you about something later that you had not researched.

4. Share success stories

This will give you that wow factor. Again don't make your success story the main agenda of the meeting. Make sure it comes in as naturally as possible. This way, your answers do not look scripted. Again these are things you learn from sales experience or proper sales training.

The power of sales training

As you can see, sales is almost becoming a life skill no matter which industry you work in. Corporate sales training helps you navigate much more than just making sales and getting leads. Suffice this, not many Kenyans have sufficient sales training to have the edge over their competitors. Join Yusudi today, and we will teach you practical corporate sales techniques that you can use in any industry you choose to pursue.