Use ENTER (return) on the keyboard to continue!
This section should take less than 30 mins to complete.In Section 6, we'll help you anticipate the role specific questions you may be asked in a sales interview. Role specific knowledge and skills (also referred to as the 'technical' part of an interview) are going to differ slightly based on role and company, but are largely similar across these functions.
Role specific questions are important because they directly speak to your competency in the role. Each job will require a highly specific skillset, and role specific questions are an opportunity to test whether or not you possess this essential combination of knowledge and skill.
For a sales role, the job specific or "technical" component would be to understand the nuts and bolts of how to sell a product, how specifically to hunt for new leads, how to deliver a pitch, how to negotiate, and how to close deals. Again, things that are highly specific to the actual role and function.
Perfect. Now, let's examine the technical aspects of this sales role in more detail, starting with some of the key skills you will need to possess.
The important skills for this role will differ slightly based on your role. For an Account Executive, you'll need to be comfortable with prospecting, crafting relevant messaging, leading strong discovery calls, becoming an expert on your product, and being able to hold prospects accountable to a close date. Ultimately, the most important skill is to hit your quota and set up customers for success.
For other roles, the key skills might be slightly different. SDR's will have more emphasis on prospecting skills, ability to grind through activities in an efficient way, and craft messaging that gets responses.CSM's will have to demonstrate strong product expertise, ability to make customers successful, and ability to drive upsells. Sales managers on the other hand will have to demonstrate ability to coach their team tactically, manage a team to a quota, and develop their team's skills.
Next, let's expand on these skills with EXAMPLES from your past, which will be key in a technical or role specific interview. Because we're late in the exercise, feel free to re-use a past example if you can't think of a new one.
Next, regarding the skills you just listed, let's think about the key terms, definitions, or concepts you may need to know in this type of sales interview. Let's try to brainstorm any key topics or terms that come to mind.
Some examples for sales roles could include: SaaS, territory development, prospecting, cold call & cold email metrics, Salesforce, discovery calls, product demo, upsells, ACV, ARR, etc.
Moving on, a key part of a role specific or technical interview could be a detailed series of questions around a major project or initiative you worked on. Asking questions around your major projects helps an interviewer understand exactly how you would approach this role.
Fantastic! Listed below are a few other commonly used scenarios to assess your sales specific skillset...
First, a mock discovery call (and presentation) is a nearly universal step of any sales interviews. Sales managers will want to do a mock discovery call to get a sense for your style, and how skilled/experienced you are in the role.We have a BONUS section at the end dedicated to mock discovery calls, and mock presentations- these simulated sales situations are probably the most heavily weighted pieces of the sales interview.
You may also be asked to help an interviewer understand the way you attack a sales cycle. How do you prospect? How do you do territory planning? How do you leverage your manager in your sales cycle? Do you leverage mutual plans? If so, how do you keep your customers on target, and accountable to the close dates you lay out?
Your Sales Process & Approach
A strong sales approach will typically involve a mutual plan, which helps you keep customers accountable to goals and timelines. As far as a prospecting approach, it can differ from industry to industry, but social selling and strong customized emails and cold calls are tried and true approaches. As far as the most important part of the sales cycle, it can depend on your style, but the answer is typically the "discovery" phase.
As far as demanding customers are concerned, interviewers want to see that you can set strong boundaries as a salesperson. That you play by your own system (and not the system of your customers)- that you have self respect, that you'll push back on a demanding customer, and that you'll be strong (but customer centric) when the going gets tough.
Interviewers want to see that you understand the concept of PRIORITIZING leads- the notion that some leads are actually not worth your time.Signs that may lead you to deprioritize a lead: the deal size is too small, the customer doesn't fit in with the company's typical customers, or that the lead doesn't have the decision making power to get anything done.
Similarly, you'd want to prioritize a lead when the size of the deal is significant, when the lead you're working with seems to have the authority to make a decision, and more importantly, that they have the desire to make a decision.
Sales questions to consider
Most role specific questions are relatively simple/straightforward once you break them down, and will require you to rely on logical thinking and common sense.When you answer these questions, remain calm, break the problem down into manageable pieces. Solve those pieces in a straightforward, logical progression. The best answers will be thoughtful and measured, and reveal strong analytical thinking.
We've mentioned this before, but remember: in nearly all aspects of your interview, an interviewer may care more about how your mind works and the logic you use to get to your answer than the actual nuts and bolts of the answer you provide.
Sales Strategy
This response will differ based on your point of view, but hopefully your philosophy is one that is consultative, emphasizes the importance of the discovery process, and centers listening to the customer's pains and finding value for the customer.
Congratulations, Section 6 is now complete!Next is Section 7, Mock Selling Scenarios.