How do you motivate a professional sales force?

What does Oracle teach its sales force in its ten week sales training program?

• What is taught in the sales program mentioned in this article? http://www.businessinsider.com/jill-rowley-is-charged-with-transforming-oracles-sales-force-2013-7

• Answer:

  I haven't found a comprehensive list of what's taught as part of the program. However, looking at a couple sources we might be able to find out what's being taught in there: https://twitter.com/jill_rowley https://twitter.com/search?q=%23OracleClassOf 's Twitter bio states this: "The ABCs of Social Selling = Always Be Connecting. Be an Information Concierge. Socially Surround." She actually expanded on what this means in an article on Eloqua's blog: http://blog.eloqua.com/abcssocialselling/, which has a full section about the "modern sales professional". The students are probably being taught how to become such a professional. We should also keep in mind that Jill was working at Eloqua, a marketing automation solutions provider that was bought by Oracle. A part of the program is thus likely to be about the good use of marketing automation tools. If we try to infer bits of the program from the sources and information listed above, taking into account the fact that the program aims at fresh graduates that have not worked in sales before, here's my best guess of what the program's big topics might be: Understanding you buyer's channels of choice Building your personal brand -> creating a "surrogate" sales rep Creating and nurturing a deep network of relationships -> becoming a social selling pro - http://blog.eloqua.com/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-real-social-selling-pro/ Sales intelligence -> find buyers where they are Social listening -> monitor what's going on Tips and tricks of marketing automation Using valuable content to close deals - http://kapost.com/jill-rowley-bootcampsf-session Using social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook...) for selling - here's one of the articles she recently referenced: http://t.co/qgfMZCe622. Mastering the customer relationship lifecycle - http://hireagreatsalesmanager.com/the-customer-relationship-sales-cycle/ Overall, this shouldn't be too far off the mark. Additional resources Jill's LinkedIn profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/jillrowley http://www.slideshare.net/jillrowley - the Grande Guide to social selling - " Social selling is the practice of leveraging social networks and associated tools in the overall sales function, from lead generation, to closed deal to account management." http://www.slideshare.net/jillrowley/from-content-tocustomereloqua - how to generate demand with content marketing Videos of Jill talking about social selling on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/user14854675 2-part interview of Jill Rowley: http://www.bootstrapb2bmarketing.com/store/2010/12/30/7-ways-marketing-automation-enhances-b2b-relationships/ and http://www.bootstrapb2bmarketing.com/store/2010/12/30/can-marketing-automation-be-the-great-humanizer/ Another video of Jill on social selling: http://thesalesblog.com/blog/2013/04/27/episode-12-on-success-and-social-selling-with-jill-rowley/ A presentation on social selling: http://marketeer.kapost.com/2013/02/jill-rowley-on-social-selling/ http://www.annuitas.com/2012/07/17/blog-questions-for-jill-rowley-of-eloqua/