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Xerox has what is called “client centered selling”. It is their self-developed sales training (more on exactly what that is below). When you start at Xerox you go through a 3 month training phase where every day you have to read and know these 3-ring binders of information. They soon become the bane of your existence. I stacked them up at one point and they were taller than I was (I’m 6’2″). You are on conference calls usually 3 times a week and a trainer is on the phone with your training team. The training team was made up of about 20 people from across the country.
After this training over the phone you take tests almost daily. These tests ask everything from “what type of a stapler does a Docucolor 240 have?” to “What is the difference between a Token ring network and a Microsoft Exchange server?” It is intense. They product train the crap out of you and your test results are stack ranked against your class. It is made completely public and is a great source of stress. Your managers see it, the other senior reps in the office see it, and t cooasionally a VP gets on the conference call and asks questions like “Who is the #1 trainee? They also ask “Who are the bottom two people, I want them to stay on after to call so we can talk.” They are not messing around and will expose you. It can be a very embarrassing time if you are not at the top of the class.
So, after the product training is over the sales training begins. Out fo the 20 that started only 18 of us made it to Dallas. Those bottom two were unfortunately not asked to continue. They flew the 18 that were left to Dallas, TX where I got off of my plane to a chauffeured black Lincoln limo was waiting next to a driver holding a large sign with my name on it. I literally uttered “Holy shit, I have arrived!” This was my type of business trip! I have traveled extensively across the US and internationally (see future blogs) with my family so I knew what to expect and I know exactly what travel is like. Believe me when I tell you Xerox takes care of their trainees. In the limo was a number of different beverages that I managed to enjoy in the 25 minute drive from Dallas Ft. Worth airport to Lewisville. It was awesome and made me love the company. But I digress…
Client Centered Selling
The next day sales training began. I wont go too much into detail but basically Xerox trains you to sell anything, not only copiers. They give you the tools, that they are continuously reinventing, to position your product better than anyone else. I left a week of sales training and I came in a piece of coal, and exited a diamond. It was intense, it was stressful, it was amazing. Of the 18 that entered only 16 were left. On the second to last day at lunch our trainer came to our table and said “Would Jeff and Angela please join me?” They never came back. In Client Centeres Selling we were tested twice daily. They are long and not easy. They had gotten below a 90% on two tests in a row. They were excused from sales training.
To give you an example of what the sales training is like compared to what you are used to: The OLD way of selling is using what I like to call the “word tricks”. We’ve all heard them, they are as overused like pick-up lines at a bar and include: Shall we use my pen or yours? Or If I could _____ would you _____? Or Wouldn’t it be worth the additional cost to allow you to do ______ faster/better/more accurately?
Xerox sales training basically can be summed in in a few words: Find your monopoly. This is my summarization, not theirs, but I think it speaks volumes. Every premium priced product has more options then a standard priced product. Think Lexus vs. Toyota or Sony vs. Sanyo. If you are sold those products in a way that makes you believe that you cannot live without one of the premium options, and that is emphasised in presentations again and again you start to really believe it. Soon, that option is more important to you than price. If this is all done correctly it actually becomes your(the customers’) idea that that option is 100% necessary. It is developing this Monopoly in your customers mind that is so powerful in sales. Without it you are only competing on price. Every product has a Monopoly, even commodities. If you cannot find it, you are simply not a good sales person. So I ask you: What is your product/companies monopoly