How to Nurture Channel Sales Champions

Are sales champions born, or are they created? This was the question Jeff Seeley, CEO of Carew International, set out to answer amidst a roomful of sales leaders all hoping to take their most successful sales reps and clone them. I mean, putting aside the dystopian nightmare that this would cause if taken literally, we all dream of this right? Now, if you’re wondering are sales champions born or created, of course you already know it’s a little bit of both. But the opportunity you have as a sales leader to take a stellar rep and make him or her a sales champion for your unique company offering – that does require some work. As Jeff was presenting his formula for cultivating a sales champion, he was implicitly speaking about direct sales reps – the salespeople that are on your company’s payroll and report to you internally. But the thing is, when you have a channel of partners, those internal salespeople are not the only folks selling for you. How much time have you spent thinking about the sales champions that are driving up to 70% of your company’s overall revenue but don’t appear on your company payroll? At one point in his presentation, Jeff shared four perspectives that he felt were critical for sales leaders to understand about their sales reps, and because your channel is jam-packed with sales reps, these perspectives are extremely applicable for the indirect sales force interacting with your common customers on a daily basis:…
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