An internationally renowned consulting firm did a good job at servicing existing clients, but had not met sales growth targets for new business development. Due to a maturing client base, overall sales had stagnated.
Sales Training Needs Assessment
The consultants were experts within their various specialties. Consequently, current clients were extremely satisfied with the results of the consulting engagements. However, due to a maturation of the existing client base, there were fewer and fewer opportunities to sell more to existing clients. Overall sales and profits had declined, and the firm hired a new COO to help turnaround the situation. He decided to re-assign one of the consultants to be in charge of business development, but no substantial sales improvement occurred within the next few months. This consultant performed as the "super seller” for the firm but was unable to get the other consultants onboard to support the overall business development effort.
Sales Training Solution
The COO and Business Development consultant used Peak Selling to coach and consult with them on business development. We worked with them in several different ways. First, we evaluated their existing business development and sales process, and recommended several changes. As one notable example, we helped them to articulate the criteria for "best new clients” and to then focus the efforts of the organization to win these types of business. Second, we coached the BD consultant on what he could do to get more commitment from the other consultants to spend more time on new business development. Lastly, we taught him many elements from our Sales Prospecting and Business Development Workshop in order that he could then work individually to upgrade the skills of the other consultants in the firm.