Tips for Contact Centre Sales Agents
Far too many businesses are missing a key link in their sales funnels by not coaching contact centre team members on where they sit in the sales chain and the importance of their role.
And because of this, sales quality and targets can really suffer!
Whether your team members are making outbound calls to generate leads or make sales, or taking inbound sales calls, they need to understand your sales funnel so they can best help you hit your sales targets.
So how do you do it?
Read on to learn some coaching tips for contact centre sales agents that will help paint the ‘big picture’ and provide your agents with a sense of purpose (which research shows plays a huge part in employee engagement).
Why understanding the sales funnel is so important
The first thing contact centre sales agents need to be coached on is who you’re targeting so they’ll better understand the people they’ll be speaking with and be better prepared to engage with them.
Team members need to know basic demographic and psychographic information of customers you’re targeting, and especially what problems these people are trying to solve and how your products or services can help them solve their problems.
You should also cover what happens in your sales funnel just prior to your team member’s engagement with your target audience.
Making outbound calls
For example, if your team is generating leads for the sales team to follow up or making outbound sales, they should know relevant information about the lists they’re calling, specifically how the list was generated.
Quite often in the beginning of outbound calls, team members hear: Where’d you get my number or something along those lines.
How your team members handle this question is very critical.
If they don’t know or seem unsure when they respond to that question, it comes across in their voice and creates uncertainty in the prospect’s mind about whether they can trust them or not.
And, without trust there is no way you can develop rapport to generate a good lead or make a sale!
Taking inbound calls
If they’re handling inbound sales calls, obviously they need to see any ads or offers prospects have seen that motivated them to call.
They also need to understand the strategy behind the ad to be clear about the key elements they need to be aware of and cover with callers.
The last thing you should coach team members about is what happens in the sales funnel immediately after their part.
In the case of lead generation, team members need to understand how the lead will be used and how best to position the lead up for a sale.
Maybe, the lead will be sent an email or sales letter, or receive a sales call.
Regardless of what happens to the lead next, they need to set things up properly for that activity to get the best sales outcomes.
This can be done really simply by briefing them on any emails or letters that will be sent, or by listening to a few sales calls on the leads they generate.
Now, obviously, when you do this you will need to be careful to make sure team members are very clear not to pre-empt any follow up activity by using any ‘bullets’ the sales team need in their engagement with the lead.
Team members are only human and when they feel under pressure often can jump ahead in the sales chain sharing information they shouldn’t because they’re afraid they’ll lose the lead.
Why what happens next is so important
If team members are making outbound calls or taking inbound sales calls, they need to know what happens after they’ve made a sale, so they can properly manage customers’ expectations.
This might involve product delivery timelines or follow up calls from other departments.
Regardless of what happens after the sale has been made, the sales process isn’t finished until the customer is happy with what they bought.
If the product or service was delivered when it was supposed to be and helps them the way they thought it should, you’ll have a happy customer who will be open to buying from you again and referring you to their family and friends.
That’s what you really want, right?
More handy tips for contact centre sales teams:
- Read: 10 Words and Phrases to avoid on a sales call >
- Read: 3 Contact Centre games to boost performance >
- Watch: 8 Ways to create fun and upbeat shifts in the contact centre >
- Find: Contact centre outsourcers who specialise in sales >
- Search: All the upcoming industry training courses, conferences, webinars and more >
