How sales training and onboarding influence your company’s success

The first few days on the job are critical for a new hire. Sales training programs, company policies, acclimating to a new environment—there’s just so much to learn. It’s also a critical time for you as a leader to ensure employee retention and a return on investment down the road.

Studies show that 20% of staff turnover happens in the first 45 days of employment. Plus, negative onboarding experiences can double the chances that someone will leave their new job.

When it comes to sales team onboarding, the stakes are high.

For sales reps, the average turnover cost is about $97,000. That cost, plus the time and energy spent recruiting, hiring, training, and keeping morale high for the remaining team, all add up. So if you’re thinking about how to maximize your resources with sales training, onboarding should be at the top of the list.

In this article, we’re here to help you learn how to onboard a new sales rep so that you can build a team of effective and committed employees. We’ll cover what to include in your sales new hire training plan and the essentials of a strategic new hire training program.

What to include when onboarding new sales reps

Let’s start with the basic elements of a new hire training program. These can include a range of topics, including:

• Organization history, mission, and goals
• Working with teams and company culture
• Role clarity and performance expectations
• Policies and procedures, systems training
• Human resources and compliance

In addition to training your new team members on the essentials for their role, build in time for them to get to know their team members and the culture at your company. A sales team onboarding plan can include many initiatives, but there are some important points to keep in mind.

Here’s a general outline you can follow for what to include in your new employee training plan:

1. Introduce your company and culture.
2. Outline the sales onboarding schedule.
3. Task them with completing product knowledge training and sales enablement training.
4. Dedicate one-on-one coaching time to create opportunities for role play and practice simulations
5. Begin job shadowing for in-the-field learning and practical application.
6. Review and develop their power skills.
7. Collaborate and create a shared accountability plan for ongoing upskilling.

Every company will be different, so customize your sales onboarding schedule to fit your needs and goals. For every new hire, sales training programs are a must. You’ll want to have a plan in place ahead of time to make the most of this experience.

Benefits of strategic sales training and onboarding programs

When you prioritize quality onboarding, your organization will reap data-backed benefits.

Faster results

An efficient and effective onboarding process will help you minimize the time it takes for a new sales rep to gain the confidence needed to sell, meaning you’ll see results sooner. Studies show that training can improve an individual’s sales performance by 20%. So, if you want to produce high performers, you’ll want to get your new hire sales training program right the first time.

Stronger team collaboration

The onboarding process is the perfect time to set expectations amongst new hires. Collaboration is a key element of employee engagement and success. By emphasizing and incorporating collaboration on day one, your team will create trusting, synergetic relationships that propel them toward achieving business goals together.

Improve retention

69% of employees who have positive onboarding experiences will stay with your company for at least three years. Conversely, low-quality onboarding programs can increase turnover. Recruiting and hiring new employees is costly, so retention is crucial. A sales team onboarding program should reinforce a new employee’s decision to join your company, preventing them from experiencing “buyer’s remorse.”

Reduce time-to-productivity

It can take up to 8 months for a new hire to become fully productive, yet, only 37% of companies extend their onboarding process beyond one month. An effective onboarding program engages employees throughout their first year and accelerates their time-to-productivity. In fact, organizations with strong onboarding processes can increase productivity by up to 70%.

Increase revenue

Mark Van Buren, director of research for the American Society for Training & Development (ASTD), says, “A firm’s commitment to workplace learning is directly linked to its bottom line,” – and his statement is backed by research. According to a study by ASTD, organizations that invested an average of $1,595 per employee in training experienced 24% higher gross profit margins and up to 218% higher revenue per employee.

The benefits of knowing how to onboard a new sales rep are compelling. How you structure your sales team onboarding matters, and as the data shows, it’ll lead to huge wins for your company.

So, how do you put together the most effective new hire sales training program possible?

Launch your sales team onboarding training with Unboxed

In today’s competitive marketplace, you must create and implement a new hire sales training program that inspires your team to do their best and stick around. Hopefully, you’re feeling motivated to revamp your existing sales training and onboarding programs or implement new ones.

At Unboxed Training & Technology (Unboxed), we can help your new hires feel more confident in their roles and begin contributing sooner with a custom onboarding program. Here’s how our employee onboarding training enables your team to reach their A-game faster:

1. The right blend. We design training programs with the right mix of learning modalities.
2. Higher engagement. Our training hooks learners and keeps them coming back for more.
3. Better knowledge retention. Learners will retain information better and be able to apply their training easily.
4. More accessible. We craft content that’s available on-demand from any device.
5. You own it. Unlike off-the-shelf training providers, the onboarding program we develop is yours to keep. Forever.

Demo Unboxed’s onboarding solutions to see what’s possible for your company today.