How to Change Behavior in Salespeople

Same Side Selling Podcast

Ian Altman emphasizes the importance of identifying and addressing the top obstacles to sales performance, prioritizing opportunities for growth. He advocates for a tailored approach, focusing on specific problems and scenarios, building muscle memory, and developing targeted skills that can be applied broadly across the organization.

Biggest Mistakes

• Trying to do too much, too quickly, which is like trying to boil the ocean.
• Attempting to change every behavior, focus on every nuance, and change the entire process from beginning to end.
• Taking a generalist approach and casting a wide net, which captures a lot of junk along the way.
• Overwhelming salespeople by asking them to apply new approaches in every scenario and situation.

Best Practices

• Focus narrowly on specific areas that will move the needle the most, rather than trying to change everything at once.
• Identify the three biggest areas where the team is getting stuck and focus on fixing those.
• Determine which specific types of opportunities will drive the most growth.
• Ask each salesperson to identify two opportunities per week that fit into the target category and practice the new approach before contacting clients.
• Start with a hyper-specific approach and then gradually expand its application to other scenarios.
• Focus on the problems that you solve for specific types of clients or industries.
• Practice and refine the new approach regularly to build confidence and muscle memory.