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Can they present and sell the company?

For most of you reading this, your firm has four to 10 outside salespeople. At one time or another, each of these salespeople must present your rep firm. How well do they do this?

My experience is that most salespeople would get a “C” grade or worse. Most salespeople regardless of industry are neither trained nor capable of making a high-quality presentation of their rep firm.

Why is this important? First of all, the salespeople are the product that the manufacturer is buying. In the rep business, the only product is the sales team.

So, if these salespeople, these assets of your firm, cannot provide a high-quality presentation of the firm, what is the result? Of course, the visitor from one of your manufacturers is less than impressed. The visitor is left with either poor impressions of your firm or none at all. Finally, a great backselling opportunity is lost.

What can be done to improve their presentation and help the firm to look much better?

Basics of Presenting the Rep Firm

• What are the key sales tools?
• The most important tool is your line card.
• Is your line card complete?
• Is the line card graphically professional looking?
• Is the line card organized to help the prospective buyer and your presenters understand your lines?
• Does the line card make it easy to explain the package of lines you represent?
• Why do you have the lines you have?
• How does the line card reflect the power of multiple-line selling?

When you look at the line card can you imagine a salesperson using the line card to present your firm to a prospective buyer, an existing customer, a factory executive or someone who has never heard of your firm?

Does the line card provide a solid foundation for selling your firm?

Your Profile

The second most powerful tool to sell the rep firm is the profile.

What does the profile look like? Is it a solid, graphically professional piece that says, “This is a very serious, professional company with outstanding skills and credentials”?

The profile should provide a very complete picture of all aspects of your firm. What is the territory? What are the market facts about the geographic area you sell in? How do you service that area? Who are your people who attack the market? What successes have you had with your lines?

Remember the only thing you have to sell is the sales team — its quality and effectiveness.

What do others have to say about the rep firm — do you have quotes /recommendations from others to include in your profile?

Finally, is the profile designed to make it easy for the salesperson to master the messages it contains?

Selling the System

Using both the line card and the profile, have you developed a concise professional “story,” “pitch” to present the rep firm?

The bottom line is that the individual salespeople are a vital arm of the rep firm not only to cover their territories and sell their customers but also to present the firm to prospective buyers, existing customers and visiting executives from the manufacturers represented by the firm.

Practice Makes Perfect

It is vital that each of the salespeople and others in management of the rep firm be coached and trained on how to use these tools to make a very strong presentation of the rep firm to a principal. Training for selling the rep firm is just as important as training to sell the products the firm represents.

Taking this message seriously will pay big dividends. Employing salespeople who are enthusiastic, effective presenters of the rep firm is a big deal. Your future hangs in the balance.

Good luck, good selling.

MANA welcomes your comments on this article. Write to us at [email protected].