Being good at sales is an important requirement for being successful in literally everything you do. This is because sales is a life survival skill, not just something you do to sell physical products.

Everything you do in life involves selling. From communicating your idea to a colleague, partner or employer, to getting people to vote for you in an election or getting people to buy the physical or digital products you sell. Sales is what you do to win people over to your line of thought and get them to do your bidding.

This article discusses five uncommon exercises that can help you boost your sales skills. These exercises might be things you know but have taken for granted, as you never thought they could have any impact on your sales skills.

Why do you need exercises to boost your sales skills?

Just like every other skill, you need to consistently improve your sales skills to achieve the desired result. Sales goes beyond being able to talk to someone or a group of people and having a product to sell. There are certain exercises that can improve your confidence, communication, storytelling, and ability to subtly persuade a prospective customer.

With these exercises, you can take your sales a notch higher and yield better results for yourself and your team as a whole. Being able to sell anything confidently is an important habit everyone who desires to be rich should cultivate. 

Uncommon exercises to boost your sales skills

These five exercises, when mastered, can have an immediate impact on your sales output:

1. Read/research everyday

Many salespeople know they need to read to boost their sales skills. But the problem is, they do not know what to read. Reading is to sales what food is to the body. Though it’s common knowledge in sales, it’s in this list because people see it from another perspective. To most sales people, it’s about reading sales strategies, guidelines, etc. But is that all there is to it?

To improve your sales skills by reading, you need to read about your product, prospects and competitors. Firstly, you need to read to become an authority in the products you sell and the industry you play in. If you don’t stay up to date, a simple conversation with a curious prospect can leave you looking empty and shallow. At that moment, closing the sale becomes an issue. I mean, how can you sell something you have no in-depth knowledge about?

Secondly, you need to read about your prospects. What do they need? What question do they ask repeatedly? And what is their income class? Can they afford your products? Reading about your prospects prepares you for every question they might have at the point of sale.

Lastly, read about your competitors. What are they currently doing? How are they marketing their products? What kind of content do they upload on the internet? Reading about your competitors gives you an edge in knowing how best to serve your customers. You’ll also get to know how to push your competitors out of the market.

2. Record yourself

This is an uncommon exercise that most successful salespeople have used to boost their skills and produce better results. Recording yourself is like doing a mock pitch in front of your superiors. However, if constructive criticism affects you negatively, recording yourself might be a better alternative. It gives you the opportunity to see your strengths and flaws.

When you record yourself, you get to analyze your gestures, facial expressions, and tone. With this, you’ll know what areas you need to work on to become a better salesperson. Consistently doing this exercise doesn’t just help boost your sales skills; it also helps build your confidence. This is because you already know how you gesture, sound, and appear to your audience. So there won’t be any nervousness that will emerge from imagining how you will appear to your prospects.

3. Learn to speak to your buyer persona

Creating a buyer persona is a common concept in marketing. It helps marketing units of organizations figure out who their ideal customer is and how they can create marketing messages that appeal to him. But how does having a buyer persona improve your skills as a salesperson?

 A buyer persona gives you an insight into how your ideal prospects talk and like to be talked to. You’ll also get to understand the aspects of your product that satisfy your prospects’ needs. What does this mean for you as a salesperson? It helps you prepare properly for how to address your prospective customers.

So, what exercise do you do with your buyer persona that helps boost your sales skills? Paint a picture of your ideal customer, print it and paste it on a board, and talk to it every day. Address your buyer persona with the same terms, tones and strategies you’d use to address your real customer. This exercise boosts your confidence, improves your communication and helps you become better in your general sales game.

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4. Practice your elevator pitch

Mastering your elevator pitch is important to your career as a salesperson. It helps you learn the best way to present the most captivating details about your business in the shortest possible time. The elevator pitch also boosts your confidence, thereby making you an excellent salesperson.

How do you use the elevator pitch to boost your sales skills? Prepare a very short pitch that captures all your product or business does, then practice by presenting to as many people as possible. Start by presenting it to your family members, then move on to your friends and other random people you know. With that, you’d build the confidence to present to strangers. So, go ahead and practice your pitch on as many strangers as you can.

The more you practice your elevator pitch, the more it becomes a part of you. It becomes easier and more natural to bring it into conversations without feeling like you’re selling something.

5. Play with numbers

A salesman without a head for numbers is like a giant tree without a tap root. A good grasp of numbers makes it easier for you to talk to your prospects convincingly. Ultimately, it earns you the trust of your prospects. Numbers here don’t just refer to the cost of your products or services; they also refer to how much and how often your prospective customers make certain purchases. It gives you an insight into your prospects’ buying behavior and how you can win them over.

Practice and play around with numbers. Think about the numbers behind everything you do, even the ones that seem difficult to capture in numerical terms. The more you do this, the more confident you become with numbers. Confidence in the use of numbers would ultimately boost your sales skills.

Conclusion

There are numerous sales exercises out there. Some of them can even help you automate the sales of your side hustle. However, only very few of them have the practical ingredients that make you a master of the game. The exercises listed here are not among the top sales training exercises your regular sales trainer can give you. However, they have everything you need to boost your skills and achieve better sales results.

Hopefully, the information shared in this article helps improve your sales skills and gives you record-breaking sales results.