The Very Best Salespeople... Hire and promote carefully! The best salespeople are more like consultants or business people who can sell than salespeople. In addition, they are the ones who: Listen much more than they talk. Are problem-solvers. Understand their customers’ industry/business/needs (key to both building trust with customers as well as understanding how to help solve their problems). Believe in their product and company. Demonstrate unquestionable integrity. Can get things done in their own company (via internal networks). Are you hiring these kinds of people? Have you written out an “Ideal Employee” profile for your interviewers to help them know who to hire, and how to interview? How are you training and developing the people you’ve already hired? If you don’t have some kind of training or development program in place, it’s probably not happening as much as it should. Even having a one-hour team training session once a week (Tuesday or Wednesday afternoons) can make a big difference in your team’s sales skills.