Page 47 - DMGT507_SALES AND PROMOTIONS MANAGEMENT

Unit 2: Recruitment, Selection and Training of Sales Personnel

Identifying Initial Training Needs Notes

The initial training needs of sales training programme can be identified by the analysis of three
main factors.

Job Specification

The qualifications needed to perform the job are detailed in job specification. The set of job
specifications needs scrutinising for clues to the points on which new personnel are most likely
to need training.

Trainee's Background and Experience

The gap between the qualifications in the job specifications and those a trainee already has
represents the nature and amount of training needed. But it is not always practical to adjust
training precisely to individual differences and time and money are saved by putting all recruits
through identical programmes.
In all organisations' determination of the recruits real training needs is essential to developing
initial training programmes of optimum benefit to company and trainee alike.

Sales-related Marketing Policies

The analysis of sales related marketing policies is also necessary to determine initial sales
training needs because the differences in products, markets and their selling practices and policies
determines the differences in training programmes.

Example: Selling of highly technical goods involves training with lot of product
information while selling of non-technical goods involves only initial sales training programmes.

Identifying Continuing Sales Training Programmes

The identification of continuing sales training needs means to identify training needs of
experienced sales personnel which are felt due to changes in market, product, marketing policies,
procedures, organisation and even in the sales personnel itself.

2.3.2 Methods of Training

The selection of appropriate training method for a training programme depends on the content
of training. Few of the important and appropriate methods of sales training are: lecture,
conference, demonstration, replaying, case-discussion, impromptu discussion, gaming, on-the-
job training, programmed learning, correspondence courses.

The Lecture

Lecture is the method of learning through instructions from trainer to trainee. Trainees mainly
watch and listen, although some versions of lecturing permit questions.

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