---
title: "How to Turn Sales Stars into Qualified Sales Managers?"
description: "After a sales star is promoted to sales manager, sales performance declines. The company's assistant general manager, Li Ning, uses targeted training and support to help the manager improve team management skills and restore performance, emphasizing that managing oneself and managing a team are two different things."
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published: "2015-11-04"
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# How to Turn Sales Stars into Qualified Sales Managers?

> After a sales star is promoted to sales manager, sales performance declines. The company's assistant general manager, Li Ning, uses targeted training and support to help the manager improve team management skills and restore performance, emphasizing that managing oneself and managing a team are two different things.

Performance Decline: The Distress of a Sales Star After Promotion
Hou Ming is a salesperson at Mingzhu Foods, responsible for the southern Sichuan region. His sales revenue has exceeded 40% of Sichuan's total revenue for three consecutive years, making him a sales star the company relies on. After the Sichuan regional manager left, Hou Ming was promoted.
However, since Hou Ming was promoted to sales manager, the sales performance of the entire Sichuan region has begun to decline. According to Hou Ming, he has to spend half of his time managing subordinates, so he cannot fully take care of his original region. Moreover, the sales staff always have this or that problem, make mistakes, and some resign every few days. Hou Ming is already stretched thin with recruitment, training, and daily management. He knows the company's performance has problems, but he is willing but unable to do more...
Mingzhu Foods has experienced this many times, not just in Sichuan. In Yunnan and Guizhou, Guangdong and Guangxi, almost more than half of the regions have had such situations. Every sales star seems inherently unable to be entrusted with important tasks, and the employee turnover rate in each region is quite high. In fact, before Hou Ming became a manager, or in other regions, sales managers also had to spend considerable time maintaining their teams. The fatal problem is that most of them can only fight fires but do not know how to prevent them.
Company Representative: Sales General Manager's Support Strategy
A sales star being promoted to sales manager but causing a decline in sales performance is the first task for Li Ning, the newly appointed assistant general manager. Li Ning has seen many such companies. When they lament the scarcity of talent, the employees they let go perform brilliantly in other companies. Or they think they have poached a golden manager from a well-known brand, only to find that they have given away a gold mine and received a halo in return.
Finding the Root of the Problem
Li Ning spent a month visiting the main sales centers across the country. The company's situation made him both relieved and worried. He was relieved that the office staff had good quality, perhaps due to Mingzhu Foods' industry reputation and relatively high average compensation. He was worried that the entire company lacked a system to improve employees' comprehensive abilities. According to feedback from sales personnel at various centers, the company had not provided decent training courses in the past three years. Sales managers were either promoted sales stars or salespeople who jumped from other companies in the industry. The company's main assessment was sales volume. Many new employees would leave after one or two months if they could not complete tasks in the initial period.
Li Ning recalled when he first joined BBC Foods. The first three months were nothing but training and more training. The first week was classroom training and demonstrations, the second week was field visits with salespeople, the third week was review and training, and then repeated training, visits, and reviews. Therefore, BBC's employee quality is recognized as excellent in the FMCG industry, and BBC is also recognized as the industry's Whampoa Military Academy.
But can Mingzhu Foods learn from BBC?
"Definitely not!" This is a mistake Li Ning has always felt sorry for many professional managers. "A company's culture cannot be easily imitated or changed. DELL's direct sales model cannot be learned by any other company, even giants like IBM and HP. WAL-MART's low-price strategy can only be superficially imitated by many companies. If BBC's model could be easily imitated and learned, it would not dominate the industry." Li Ning's decision was based on this reasoning: "Since Mingzhu Foods can achieve results with its existing system, we should follow and improve it, not change it. For the sales team's improvement, it should be Reinforcement (support and enhancement)."
So, how to improve? How to demonstrate the effect of improvement?
Targeted Solutions
The boss cares most about sales. No company would be interested in management discussions that ignore sales and profits. Therefore, Li Ning focused on how to increase sales performance. Sales managers like Hou Ming need to improve, and so do the salespeople under them, but not through a comprehensive rollout. As Li Ning said, no matter what internal problems Mingzhu has now, its sales performance is quite outstanding. A comprehensive rollout would make salespeople, especially sales managers, resistant, thinking the company wants to deny their past achievements.
Given this, Li Ning planned to take two steps. First, in the Sichuan region, take advantage of Hou Ming's difficulties to conduct sales training, letting sales managers across the country see the performance increase and morale stabilization brought by continuous training. Then, instill management skills so that sales managers are willing to grow for future benefits. Performance is not a stroke of genius. Excellent salespeople always have different techniques, but they are similar in general and differ in details. At BBC, sales skills are divided into several steps:
(1) Understand customer needs. Excellent salespeople always find the product's advantages to meet customer needs, not just repeat the same advantages to different customers and consumers. For Mingzhu Foods, taste is only one advantage to attract consumers. Packaging, display, brand image, consumer word-of-mouth, etc., can all be important factors influencing consumer purchase intention. When dealing with retailers or distributor customers, profit, market protection, sales volume, promotional tools, etc., become their concerns. Some distributors focus on short-term interests, while others have concepts. Therefore, being able to respond to different customers and meet their needs is the prerequisite for getting twice the result with half the effort.
(2) Personal knowledge and ability. Excellent salespeople never rely on luck. Mingzhu's sales stars are often old employees who have worked for more than two years. This knowledge and ability include industry and market knowledge, product knowledge, and sales knowledge. For example, the main competitors in the industry, distributors, sales volume of various brands, ingredients and production processes of own brands, steps to develop new regions, visit etiquette, etc.
(3) Communication skills. Salespeople are all eloquent, but excellent salespeople are good at communication. This mainly refers to the two-way communication process of encoding, receiving, decoding, analyzing, and feedback. How to use basic skills such as listening, repeating, and confirming to ensure smooth and correct communication.
(4) Retail skills. Unlike communication skills, retail skills focus on grasping customers' impulsive needs at different stages. The most common is the five-step process of consumer attraction, interest, information collection, analysis, and decision. This is not only the psychological reaction that promoters need to understand when facing consumers, but also what salespeople need to master when visiting distributors and retailers. For example, when facing an indifferent retail store manager, his questions or product tasting are signals of interest. Conversely, for a retailer good at seizing opportunities, even asking about profit margins is just understanding.
(5) Adaptability. This mainly refers to deliberate changes encountered when dealing with customers, such as being very enthusiastic on the first visit but giving a cold face on the second, or customers ignoring you, giving irrelevant answers, and other difficult actions.
These five techniques basically represent the main knowledge and skills that sales personnel need to master. Of course, they are further divided into many details, including questions and answers defined by different possibilities.
Li Ning did not train Sichuan salespeople like BBC did. They were all experienced salespeople and hoped to make substantial improvements in skills. Demonstrations and simulations made them feel more immersive. Li Ning had employees play roles as distributors, retailers, consumers, promoters, and sales representatives, constantly changing roles and difficulty. Then the next day, they went to visit unfamiliar customers, applying what they learned immediately.
Wuniu Supermarket Chain was a customer Mingzhu had been trying to enter for over half a year without success. Sales representative Xiao Tan always encountered new difficulties each time, such as profit margin issues, distribution requirements, or entry fees. Li Ning set up the following steps for him:
(1) Determine the scope of customer needs. Supermarkets need profit, sales volume, entry fees, payment terms, distribution quotas, promotional support, etc. Mingzhu does not provide distribution for customers, and payments are settled monthly by distributors. For a chain like Wuniu, Mingzhu would pay entry fees, but the amount varies. Mingzhu's biggest advantage is stable sales volume and slightly higher profit margins than competitors.
(2) Understand the market. Xiao Tan must understand the detailed information of several competitors and other brands in similar categories at Wuniu, including sales volume, profit, entry fees, distribution, and payment terms. This is crucial for Xiao Tan's negotiation with Wuniu. Simply put, Mingzhu should at least get conditions equal to competitors.
(3) Use retail and negotiation skills. In several negotiations with Wuniu, although difficulties arose each time, Li Ning noticed that Wuniu's interest was increasing. For example, in the third meeting, Wuniu asked about the monthly sales of nearby supermarkets and took more samples for retention, indicating they were concerned about product taste and future sales. In the sixth negotiation, Wuniu mentioned, "Other brands all pay this much entry fee. If you are unwilling to pay, how can we cooperate?" This implies that Wuniu is relatively accepting of the product's sales and profit. Analyzing many details, Xiao Tan realized that he was being trapped by Wuniu's difficult questions each time, not knowing how to avoid them or indirectly confirm other factors. For example, in the sixth negotiation, Xiao Tan should have immediately responded, "If we set aside the entry fee issue, based on our sales and profit in other supermarkets, your supermarket should be very willing to cooperate, right?" This would at least confirm in future negotiations that sales and profit are areas where Wuniu has confidence. Then he could say, "How much entry fee does XX Foods pay? According to our understanding, although they pay entry fees, their total sales are only half of ours..." This way, he could turn the difficult issue to his advantage, using the appeal of sales and profit to reduce the importance of entry fees.
(4) Listen and repeatedly confirm. Customers like Wuniu, who are willing to express but like to create difficulties, will inevitably contradict themselves. Therefore, listening can help understand their true thoughts. Wuniu once said that sales and profit were most important to them, but when Xiao Tan mentioned Mingzhu's profit margin, they said that such a small difference is not important, and many brands pay entry fees and distribution, which allows them to operate at low cost. Therefore, Xiao Tan should say, "Because Mr. XX just said that sales and profit are most important to your supermarket, I want to confirm: does your supermarket consider entry fees more important than profit?" Generally, Wuniu would say both are important. This technique is to make Wuniu less likely to mention entry fees as important in future negotiations, and Xiao Tan can easily highlight the advantages of profit and sales, saying, "What Mr. XX said is very concise and correct. As a retailer, profit and sales are the most critical. Entry fees should be a consideration factor, not a decisive factor, right?"
(5) Leverage third-party influence, i.e., the influence of other supermarkets. Many of Wuniu's competitors are already selling Mingzhu products, and their benefits can serve as a reference for Wuniu. Therefore, in many conversations, he should mention, "Like XX Supermarket, they reached an average of 10,000 yuan per store in the second month of carrying our products. Most of Wuniu's stores are in better locations, so Mingzhu's sales should exceed this number." Or, "We do not need to pay entry fees to XX Supermarket because our profit margin satisfies them. Their scale is larger than Wuniu's."
This crash training had a greater effect than Li Ning expected. Xiao Tan was able to grasp Wuniu's key concerns in subsequent visits, and when the other party created difficulties, he knew how to avoid them or steer the conversation to Mingzhu's advantages. Once, he even remembered a key point the other party had mentioned before and used it to counter. Xiao Tan found that Wuniu was actually interested in carrying Mingzhu products; the main issues were entry fees and distribution quotas. This result was more obvious than previous visits.
After just one week of initial demonstrations, employees mastered the skills for first and multiple visits, and achieved obvious results in practice. For example, the rate of achieving or exceeding goals on first visits increased, they could extract basic data from difficult customers, and they knew how to avoid customer difficulties. The entire training took less than two months. In Hou Ming's words, he had been doing this for half a year without performing as well as these new employees did in two months.
Another clear point was that when salespeople experienced daily growth and goal achievement, their sense of belonging to the company strengthened. Li Ning spent considerable time communicating privately with each salesperson, and they were very receptive to the company's environment of continuous improvement and employee support.
Supporting Stars: Give a Man a Fish vs. Teach Him to Fish
Since results were achieved, the next step was to let Hou Ming learn to manage employees himself. Li Ning needed to help Hou Ming manage his team members, with Li Ning himself only playing a supporting role. Starting with sales management, Li Ning suggested Hou Ming purposefully improve the following abilities:
(1) Basic practical ability. For example, the comprehensive ability to develop new customers and manage existing markets. This is something that is frequently repeated or gradually accumulated in daily operations. Grassroots salespeople often focus most on this ability, and it is also Hou Ming's strength, but it is not yet systematic. Only when he can transform his experience into a training system can he be considered a qualified sales manager.
(2) Planning and control ability. This refers to the ability to predict the future, make plans, and control based on past experience. This is one of the basic qualities that managers must possess. Because managers lead a team and are responsible for the team's goals, planning, arranging, and controlling the roles and workflows of different members become the most important tasks for managers.
(3) Adaptability. This usually refers to the ability to respond to unexpected events, such as cross-region sales, distributor disappearance, and other unconventional situations. This adaptability is particularly important for managers. Although salespeople face changes, the complexity of changes is relatively limited, such as customers going back on their word. The higher the management level, the more factors that can change.
Among these, planning and control ability is the most basic and important ability for sales managers. Hou Ming's case is obvious: he used personal performance to prove his value as a salesperson, but a good soldier does not necessarily become a good commander. In terms of managing a team, he clearly did not know how to plan and divide work in advance, nor did he understand how to deal with frequent employee resignations.
To Hou Ming's delight, when Li Ning trained employees and himself in Sichuan, he did not weaken his power. Li Ning understood his role as a supporter, emphasizing the importance of the team and Hou Ming's role as team leader.
Hou Ming was very nervous about training employees. He felt he had a lot to say but did not know how to express it. Li Ning had him learn to list various techniques as steps, then use a problem tree to list all possibilities, and then find solutions for each possibility. For initial visits or routine issues, Li Ning even made them formulaic. Salespeople just needed to follow each step to respond. For example, when learning about competitor sales, if the other party said, "It's okay, similar to other supermarkets," the salesperson could say, "XX Supermarket usually does 5,000 yuan per month. This one should be higher, right?" If the other party said, "Not sure, it fluctuates a lot each month," the salesperson could say, "Mr. XX is the manager; you must know their sales. It shouldn't be less than 5,000 yuan per month, right?" and so on.
Management ability was Hou Ming's biggest difficulty. Li Ning had a relatively simple method—the goal tree. First, write out the main goals of the branch. For example, sales volume is the primary goal, then sub-goals are sales network, average sales per store, and the average sales per store goal can be divided into brand awareness, consumer purchase intention, etc. Brand awareness can be further divided into sales network, advertising and promotion, personnel recommendation, etc. (Some goals may appear at different levels simultaneously). Ultimately, it can be broken down into very detailed, even quantifiable goals, which makes Hou Ming's control process very clear.
Sichuan's performance returned to the right track. As for how Hou Ming expanded the existing 30 city distributors to 50 or 80, Li Ning no longer needed to worry. Based on his experience at BBC, results are predictable after the process. The Sichuan team had learned to set visit goals, analyze customers, help distributors train promotional and sales personnel, collect competitor tactics, etc. Under Mingzhu's existing system, it was just a 20% or 30% difference. What Li Ning wanted to do was use Sichuan as a model to start improving sales centers across the country...
Expert Commentary: Managing Yourself and Managing a Team Are Two Different Things
Zhou Chunbing
For a company, the organizational hierarchy generally has three levels: grassroots sales representatives, sales managers, and senior management.
Grassroots sales personnel only need to be responsible for sales in their own region. Internally, their main job is to report to the sales manager and follow their instructions. Externally, they are responsible for customer development and management. It is a function of being managed, self-management, and customer coordination. Sales managers are responsible for the overall sales of the team they lead. Internally, their main job is "upward and downward communication," team management, and horizontal communication and coordination with departments (such as marketing, finance, and other functional departments). Externally, they are responsible for managing all customer affairs and external matters related to the sales team (such as government agencies, industry associations, advertising companies, etc.).
From this, it is not difficult to see the huge gap in roles, skills, and time allocation between sales representatives and sales managers. Mingzhu Company may not have considered these issues when promoting Hou Ming. Due to Hou Ming's excellent performance as a sales representative, promoting him solved the fairness issue, avoiding "discontent" among peers, and to some extent motivated other sales personnel (everyone works hard on performance, and if you do well, the company will value you).
But when a company selects a sales manager, considering only the above factors is far from enough. Generally, it will comprehensively evaluate the candidate's basic qualities, leadership and management ability, professional ethics, etc., especially leadership and management ability. A sales representative's good performance only shows that their "craft" is good. But if this "craft" cannot quickly become replicable and promotable theory and methods, and if their role cannot be quickly transformed, they are clearly not suitable to become a sales manager. Instead, the company should choose someone with management ability (sometimes a sales representative with management ability but not particularly outstanding performance is a better choice) or simply transfer someone from elsewhere. Of course, for Mingzhu Company, perhaps there was no better candidate at the time, so they had to choose Hou Ming.
Many people with experience in multinational companies know that the reason multinationals have many talents is that they have a systematic talent development plan. Screening begins with recruitment. If the company decides to recruit a department head or as a future development target, the candidate's leadership and management ability is a key consideration (including the size of the team they managed in previous roles, personality traits, future career plans, etc.). In actual work, systematic training plans are a key part of each employee's self-improvement, but practical management ability is often developed through informal administrative Project Teams. That is, a cross-departmental TEAM is formed for a specific project or task. The team leader is often not the highest administrative level, but usually a promising newcomer is chosen to exercise their project management and team management abilities through actual projects. (Of course, during project execution, senior project members will continuously give the "newcomer" leader kind reminders and help.) In this case, Mingzhu Company clearly does not have such a personnel training and development plan, so it is not surprising that performance declined after Hou Ming was promoted to sales manager.
Undoubtedly, for domestic companies, we cannot copy the multinationals' systematic talent development plan. Not to mention that most of our companies lack the financial resources, the key is that companies do not yet have such a complete cultural accumulation and systematic management platform. However, combining with their own actual situation, using external "intellectual" companies to help formulate a talent development plan suitable for domestic companies is a problem that every business owner must consider and solve. Otherwise, the Mingzhu phenomenon will repeat. Of course, Mingzhu Company is still lucky. If Hou Ming was fundamentally unsuitable for management or required greater support costs to recover Sichuan's market performance decline, the company would be the biggest loser.
**-END-**
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