While our recent research on the state of sales training and continuous learning highlighted the clear benefits of highly effective sales training, it also revealed that many organizations struggle to achieve these results. As part of our survey of 242 sales professionals across various industries and regions, we asked respondents to identify the biggest challenges their organizations face in providing effective sales training and development for people in sales roles.

The ROI of Effective Sales Training: Making the Business Case

Mary Flaherty
March 5, 2025

As a sales enablement or learning & development (L&D) professional, you know that sales training is critical. But securing executive buy-in and budget for training requires more than just intuition—it demands a compelling business case backed by data.

The 3 Key Drivers of Effective Sales Training

Mary Flaherty
January 29, 2025

Most sales training disappoints. That's not just an opinion—it's a sobering finding from our latest research. In fact, 67% of respondents rate their organization’s sales training and development as only moderately, slightly, or not at all effective at achieving strong sales performance and productivity.

Top 10 Sales Resources of 2024

Mary Flaherty
December 30, 2024

We saw three pivotal themes shape the sales landscape in 2024: the growing integration of AI, the ongoing drive to deliver measurable value, and the central role of continuous learning. These elements define how organizations adapt and thrive in today’s evolving market.

114 Essential Sales Statistics to Improve Performance

Mary Flaherty
December 18, 2024

Gain valuable insights into successful sales practices with RAIN Group's collection of 114 sales statistics. The sales world is in constant flux. With longer buying cycles, the rise of AI, and the shift to virtual selling, it’s tougher than ever to know what’s working. As decision-making teams grow more complex, staying on top of these changes is crucial.

How to Build Your Sales Playbook

Mary Flaherty
November 20, 2024

TL;DR? Download the complimentary guide and take it to read later. In today's competitive sales landscape, having a well-structured sales playbook can be the difference between good and great performance. Research underscores the critical importance of effective sales enablement including sales training, and, by extension, sales playbooks, in setting the stage for transforming your sales organization.

The State of Sales Training and Continuous Learning: Key Findings From New Research

Mary Flaherty
November 13, 2024

Effective sales training is widely acknowledged as a critical success factor for sales organizations. But how many companies are truly excelling in this area? And what distinguishes those with highly effective sales training and development from the rest? The answers may surprise you.

How to Build an Effective Sales Meeting Agenda

Mary Flaherty
October 23, 2024

Ask your sellers if they enjoy attending sales team meetings and you may hear things like, “They’re a waste of time,” “The meetings are monotonous,” “I’m sick of being talked at,” and “I don’t understand why I have to attend.” Most sales team meetings miss the mark.

Driving Sales Enablement Strategy Through Change Management

Mary Flaherty
August 7, 2024

Sales enablement isn't just a nice-to-have—it's a strategic imperative for driving sales success in today's dynamic business environment. Yet, many organizations struggle to implement and sustain effective sales enablement initiatives. This article explores how leveraging change management principles can transform your sales enablement strategy, leading to lasting improvements in sales performance. We'll discuss:

Sales Skills Assessments: Building Better Training

Mary Flaherty
June 21, 2024

In today's competitive environment of complex sales, an organization's success is heavily dependent on the skills and performance of its sales team. Sales training is a critical component in equipping sales professionals with the knowledge, skills, and strategies necessary to effectively engage with buyers, understand their needs, and close deals.

How to Run a Successful Sales Discovery Call

Mary Flaherty
May 8, 2024

For consultative sellers, having successful sales discovery calls is essential because they underpin the entire sales process. These calls provide sellers with an opportunity to deeply understand their buyers' challenges, objectives, and operating environment. In turn, this in-depth knowledge of the buyers’ needs allows sellers to design solutions that are tailored to fit the unique circumstances of each buyer.

[Infographic] 11 Best Practices for Sales Onboarding

Mary Flaherty
April 17, 2024

When it comes to sales performance, getting the most out of your team starts with strong onboarding. Organizations with effective onboarding are 6.3x more likely to prepare their new sales hires to succeed.

Transforming Sales Enablement: Focus on Seller Behavior Change and Strategic Sales Alignment

Mary Flaherty
February 21, 2024

In the competitive arena of sales, the true game-changer is having a well-trained sales team whose behaviors result in the desired outcomes. Consider the case of a technology firm that revamps its sales strategy to focus on consultative selling. During training, a conversation planning tool is shared that helps reps prepare for needs discovery meetings.

The Nuts and Bolts of Running a Successful Sales Training Program

Mary Flaherty
January 24, 2024

If you're part of a sales enablement team, you know the pressure that comes with shaping a sales force into a team of top performers. To facilitate this transformation, a well-thought-out sales training program is essential. And when it comes to the logistics of running a successful program, there are a lot of moving pieces you must attend to. Here's a helpful summary (and checklist) to ensure you launch a training program that isn't just good, but exceptional.

Top 10 Sales Resources of 2023

Mary Flaherty
December 20, 2023

2023 has seen sellers and sales organizations adapting to longer sales cycles and more deals lost to no decision. More than ever, sellers were challenged to be resilient while maintaining a tight focus on value, building relationships, and being responsive to buyers’ changing needs. Sales managers had to be proactive in supporting and coaching their teams. And sales enablement was tasked with ramping up new hires and boosting sales force productivity.

[Infographic] AI in the Sales Process: New Research Findings and Definition

Mary Flaherty
December 18, 2023

As AI technologies advance, becoming more sophisticated and intuitive, they’re reshaping the sales landscape: from AI-driven chatbots providing real-time support to predictive analytics revolutionizing lead generation. According to Gartner, within four years, 60% of the B2B seller’s work will be done using generative AI sales technologies. And McKinsey predicts that a fifth of the sales teams’ functions could be automated with AI. While estimates vary, the view shared is similar: AI sales technologies will have a revolutionary impact on sales.

How to Build a Sales Onboarding Process for New Hires

Mary Flaherty
November 28, 2023

Recruiting and hiring strong sales talent isn't for the faint of heart. It is, in fact, the top challenge facing sales and enablement leaders (cited as “very challenging” by 52%). It's not only challenging, but also takes a significant investment of resources to find, hire, and retain talent.

Sales Interview Questions To Elevate Your Recruiting

Mary Flaherty
October 25, 2023

TL;DR? Download a PDF of these questions to use in your sales interviews. As a sales leader or sales enablement executive, you know just how important it is to hire the right sales reps for your team. The key to raising your hiring success rate, as we’ve written elsewhere, is to follow a process built on strategy, sourcing, screening, scoring, and selling. But how do you conduct engaging recruiting interviews that help you assess candidates’ skills, personality, and fit for your company culture? What questions should you ask? How can you gauge candidates’ actual abilities?

Rethinking Self-Study for Sales Enablement

Mary Flaherty
October 11, 2023

Sales enablement teams regularly struggle to provide sellers with the skills and tools needed to get results like building pipelines, closing sales, growing accounts, and increasing win rates. It's a challenge to ensure sales training achieves desired outcomes, whether sales enablement is a team of one or many. Training programs must be developed, facilitators prepped, and programs delivered. Ongoing reinforcement and support must be supplied so learning sticks and sellers apply what they’ve learned to get results. And all this upskilling needs to be repeated when new sellers join the team.

Should You Focus On Short- or Long-Term Sales Training Outcomes?

Mary Flaherty
September 6, 2023

Sales training is an essential part of any successful sales enablement program. However, not all sales training initiatives are created equal. While some programs may produce short-term results, they often fail to deliver long-term success.

What Is Sales Management? Skills, Roles, and Best Practices

Mary Flaherty
July 19, 2023

If you’re a sales or enablement leader charged with training sales managers, you’ve likely been asked, or asked yourself, “What are the core skills and competencies our sales managers need to effectively coach and develop our sellers?” As you dig into this question, developing effective sales managers can seem like a daunting challenge.

10 Tips for Selling in Economic Uncertainty

Mary Flaherty
May 31, 2023

Closing sales in today’s environment is a real challenge. If you’re in sales or sales leadership, I expect you’re nodding your head. Sales cycles are getting longer, more opportunities are being lost to no decision, and the economy is unpredictable at best.

How Sales Reps Can Adapt to the Hybrid Selling Environment

Mary Flaherty
May 3, 2023

Have you met Morgan? A terrific sales rep. Except recently, Morgan has slipped out of the top tier of the leaderboard and I think I know why: she struggles to adapt to the new selling environment.

Sales Competencies of Top Sellers

Mary Flaherty
April 5, 2023

You’d be hard-pressed to find an organization that didn’t want its sellers and sales teams to meet their goals in the face of challenging conditions and do so with high win rates and strong pricing. Sales training is one obvious way for organizations to build such teams. While sales training often fails to meet its promise, our research shows that highly effective sales training is correlated with higher win rates, sales goal attainment, and premium pricing.

The 9 Advanced Skills Missing from Your B2B Sales Process

Mary Flaherty
February 22, 2023

The world of B2B selling looks far different than it once did. Top sellers know they must go well beyond discussing features and benefits. They need to be closely tuned in to the buying process for each member of the buying committee while consistently meeting buyers where they are throughout the cycle. That’s a tall ask, as it turns out. According to Gartner, as many as ten decision makers might make up a B2B buying center. Additional data from CMO Council shows that B2B customers actively research and compare solutions, often completing 50% to 90% of the work before contacting a sales rep. Long story short: complexity is a hallmark of B2B sales.

15 Sales Training Techniques for Building Elite Sales Teams

Mary Flaherty
October 12, 2022

During a now-famous interview on the Pierre Berton Show in 1971, Bruce Lee shared a simple philosophy: “be like water.” As fitting as Lee’s advice is for sellers, “be like a sponge” works just as well. To stay ahead, sales teams must continuously absorb new information and develop skills. Ongoing training and coaching and sustained effort over time is crucial. Otherwise, sellers (and their managers) risk not reaching their potential. Fortunately, there are sales training techniques that even the most experienced teams will soak up.

30 Sales Training Ideas for Top-Performing Teams

Mary Flaherty
September 28, 2022

For sellers, routine can be a blessing and a curse. It’s true that doing the same things day in and day out provides structure. It requires discipline, too. But it can also turn into a comfort zone in which many sellers stagnate. This is what makes recurring sales training programs so valuable. Yet even after the most engaging, resonant sales training programs, sellers tend to revert back to what they’re accustomed to doing. Which puts a heavy onus on sales managers.

Sales Training Topics to Drive Results

Mary Flaherty
August 17, 2022

TL;DR? Download the PDF and save it for later. If you’re responsible for designing or implementing sales training for your organization, you know the effectiveness of training varies greatly. It might not be implemented properly, land well with participants, be relevant to sellers’ daily work, or it might be forgotten completely in the days and weeks following the training. Sales training fails more often than it succeeds. But, for those who get it right, the payoffs are substantial.

15 Ways to Get Referrals

Mary Flaherty
September 9, 2021

Wouldn’t it be great if every single new prospect trusted you and your organization? Referrals are among the top ways sellers get leads and new business, but many struggle with generating them consistently. Often, this is because they haven’t thought about why buyers should refer them. They don’t have a system in place for generating referrals. If you’re providing a quality experience for your buyers, you’re already halfway there. Word of mouth is bound to generate new business, but a deliberate referral marketing plan will drastically improve the frequency and quality of the referrals you receive.

10 Ways to Improve Your Networking Skills

Mary Flaherty
November 6, 2015

Much of sales is about making connections.

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