READ TIME – 6 MINUTES

As a Sales Solution Specialist, we know how crucial soft skills training is for sales teams, from new starters all the way up to sales leaders. 

But what actually ARE soft skills?

Soft Skills Meaning

SOFE-SKILLS-AVA-V

“Soft” skills are just as important as hard skills.

In fact, in many circumstances they can be even more important than traditional skills. 

It is sales soft skills that keeps our businesses evolving, helps innovations, enhances customer experiences and closes deals!

So what are the most important sales soft skills?

Well, these are our top picks and what we make sure all of our clients have mastered by the end of our Sales Training Programmes.

  • 𝗔𝗰𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗹𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 
  • 𝗘𝗺𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 
  • 𝗖𝘂𝗿𝗶𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝘆 
  • 𝗥𝗲𝘀𝗶𝗹𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲
  • 𝗣𝗲𝗿𝘀𝘂𝗮𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 
  • 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 

Why is soft skills training so important?

Soft skills are vital to the growth of employees’ personal development and, consequently, the elevation of an organisation.

Sales soft skills teach individuals how to communicate effectively and work at their optimal level.

In particular, your sales team needs soft skills training because the industry is a fast-paced and ever-changing sector. 

Especially with the huge growth spurt of Inside Sales Teams, it’s necessary that salespeople are developing the sales soft skills to welcome in this new trend. 

So let’s get into the top 6 soft training elements that you should be introducing to your sales team!

Soft Sales Skills

Active Listening🌿

Active Listening involves listening with all senses.

As well as giving full attention to the speaker, it is important that the ‘active’ listener shows interest and signals that they are proactively engaging in the conversation.

This is because when the call has a buyer-focused dialogue, you’re more likely to discover the client’s pain points and uncover how your services can provide a solution. 

To support this consultative approach to selling, you must demonstrate active listening. 

You can do this by: repeating back what you heard to the prospect and asking a relevant follow-up question – to show that you understand what they’re saying.

Soft Sales Skills

Emotional Intelligence🌿

Emotional intelligence involves the ability to be aware of one’s own and others emotions and how to manage.

Without emotional intelligence, salespeople will struggle to build rapport with prospects and remain motivated. 

The five main components of Emotional Intelligence include : self-awareness, self-regulation, empathy, motivation and socialisation

We believe that Emotional Intelligence is crucial for Sales leaders and we even dedicate a whole training programme to it. 

From exploring what Transpersonal Leadership looks like to how to use Social Intelligence, our Emotional Leadership Programme’s provides you with the soft skills training to make a real change, both professionally and personally as a sales leader. 

soft skills training

Soft Skills Training

Curiosity🌿

Curiosity can be defined as having a strong desire to know or learn something. Demonstrating an inquisitive interest in other’s concerns. 

Curiosity can be in terms of demonstrating interest in your client’s needs but also with regards to keeping an interest with the latest sales trends.

The sales world is an ever-changing industry and by refreshing your commercial awareness, it demonstrates your curiosity and fascination with the sector.

It’s another way of gaining prospect’s trust. 

If you can illustrate what you’re talking about and show interest, you will gain more trust from a client. They will be more included to put trust in your service.

A great way of ‘staying in the now‘ is listening to sales podcasts and reading sales magazines.

Sales Soft Skills Training

Resilience🌿

Being resilient means facing difficulties head-on and the capacity to recover quickly and power on throughout difficulties. 

Teaching resilience as part of soft skills training is teaching your sales staff to bounce back from rejection. 

Unfortunately, 80% of buyers say ‘No’ four times before saying ‘Yes’. Perseverance is key if you want to get the answer you’re after. 

Our ‘Proactive Prospecting‘ module delves into the consistency required to onboard new clients and how to develop a ‘Winning Mindset’. 

Soft Sales Skills

Persuasion🌿

Persuasion is all about being able to convene someone into doing, believing or buying something. 

The art of persuasion is a sales soft skill training course which every salesperson should learn to master

It doesn’t matter how good your product/service is if you don’t know how to negotiate and close a deal.

It’s not about being ‘pushy’. It’s being able to influence people to do what’s in their own best interest, as well as your organisation’s interests. 

Our Sales Specialists teach the art of persuasion through soft skills training modules from “Negotiating With Style”  to “Seeking Agreement“.

Discover how your team can use soft sales skills to take it over the line here!

soft-skills-training-persuasion

Sales Soft Skills Training

Communication🌿

The art of communication is mastering how information is exchanges between individuals through a common system of symbols, signs or behaviours. 

Selling is all about knowing how to communicate.

The more focused and direct your communication is, the easier a prospect will understand what you can offer them. 

It’s likely that whoever you’re speaking to is a very busy individual, especially when it comes to negotiating with decision-makers. 

These individuals don’t always have the spare time to take your calls, which is why you need to know exactly what you’re talking about and be able to communicate your offerings effectively. 

To introduce you to communication as one of your essential sale’s soft skills, check out our blog which breaks down ‘8 Communication Skills That Will Make You Successful In Sales’.

As a Sales Solution Specialist we understand the importance of introducing sales soft skills training and have seen first hand the way it can revolutionise sale’s teams across multiple industries. 

We design and deliver unique and agile sales training programmes that drive behavioural change, leading to ongoing personal and organisational growth. 

Sales soft skills training possibilities with AvA-V are endless and we’re dedicated to ensuring that your team have the most up-to-date sales soft skills to achieve a magnitude of success.