Sales training & e-learning: how to train better salespeople?

What is e-learning? 

Training technologies, and the way we deliver training, have changed (a lot). E-learning means using technology to design the training program you want to roll out, and making it accessible across multiple devices: computer, Mac, mobile, tablet. 

There are several possibilities: 

• 100% digital: an e-learning course can be made up of several modules, completed independently and at each learner’s own pace. 
• 50% digital, 50% in-person: also known as blended learning or multimodal training. In this format, an e-learning journey can combine digital modules with live sessions such as virtual classrooms, in-person training, or role-plays. 

E-learning has long been used in sales training. 

Discover the 8 benefits of immersive e-learning for training your sales teams.

Anyone who has tried to gather all their sales reps in the same place at the same time knows it’s nearly impossible. Salespeople are busy, constantly on the move, and often geographically dispersed. Blocking one or more full training days is simply unrealistic: not only do they miss client meetings, but they also lose responsiveness with prospects and customers, which can directly impact sales performance. 

That’s why more and more sales leaders are turning to short, impactful, and personalized e-learning programs. Online training makes it possible to learn independently while guaranteeing the flexibility so critical for sales teams: training anywhere, anytime, even between two appointments, and on any device (especially mobile).

Choosing e-learning means giving sales teams real-time access to information. For example, when a product or service catalog is updated, e-learning makes it easy to share and accelerate distribution: saving time for learners and reducing the workload for training designers. 

More generally, sales information is constantly updated: pricing, promotions, offers, new launches. With e-learning, you ensure both consistency and quality of the information shared: content is continuously updated and always relevant. 

With an online journey or an e-learning module, there’s no risk of missing a new document, attachments, presentations, videos, podcasts, everything is centralized in one place, accessible anytime to everyone. 

In today’s connected marketplace, where customers are more informed and competition is stronger, it’s critical to understand and anticipate constraints and opportunities by having, and sharing, the right information with sales reps. 

E-learning also meets today’s needs for knowledge sharing and retention within the company. In addition to standardizing sales processes, creating training modules to capture existing expertise remains the best way to prevent knowledge loss when employees leave the organization.

A training program is only relevant if it truly teaches something new. A generic course on sales techniques is far less effective than training your team on issues specific to your products and industry. Improving sales performance by addressing industry-specific challenges and reinforcing your company’s unique value proposition is possible with e-learning. 

The most innovative e-learning platforms are powered by Adaptive Learning technology: an AI-driven learning engine that creates the best training experience by adapting to each salesperson’s pace and knowledge level. 

It’s simple: if you already master a topic, there’s no point in being shown the same content again, scrolling endlessly through slides or videos. Instead, your focus is directed toward what really matters: new knowledge that will significantly improve sales performance. 

No more generic, lengthy, and impractical training sessions. Adaptive Learning makes it possible to create personalized, concrete, and relevant training programs, adapted to the company, the business, the roles, and the products or services.

It’s not just the content that’s more relevant and personalized, the format itself is revolutionizing the way we learn. 

Backed by the latest research in pedagogy and cognitive science, some e-learning platforms now offer varied, engaging, and interactive learning methods. 

No more dull PowerPoint animations. In addition to Adaptive Learning, you can now rely on: 

• Gamification: we learn better when we’re having fun. That’s why putting play at the service of learning improves both acquisition and retention. Gamification is a powerful way to energize your sales force and increase motivation. 
• Social Learning: we learn a lot from others. This is especially true for sales teams, who can greatly benefit from a stronger culture of collaboration in competitive environments. Encouraging peer-to-peer sharing fosters a company culture of openness and transparency. 

Not only do these innovations make sales training more effective, they also transform distance learning into an enjoyable, memorable, and motivating experience. 

More flexible, more relevant, more personalized, more motivating, quickly, e-learning makes the salesperson an active participant in their own training and development. 

And that matters for sales reps. According to a HubSpot survey, individualized training is in high demand among junior salespeople. 47% of reps with less than 2 years’ experience ask their managers for training, versus 31% for reps with more than 10 years of experience. Offering personalized, motivating training is no longer just a business challenge, it’s also about attracting, motivating, and retaining sales talent.

Some training sessions can be transformed into knowledge-based e-learning modules instead of half-day workshops led by a trainer. By adopting, for example, the flipped classroom format (learn first online, then exchange in live sessions), in-person discussions become more qualitative and higher value. 

That’s exactly what JUJUS Animations and McCormick did to boost sales performance and motivation among their in-store sales teams. By offering e-learning modules on upcoming product launches, follow-up face-to-face discussions became more meaningful and impactful.

The impact of microlearning is proven: not only do short e-learning modules (e.g. 5 minutes) fit perfectly into sales reps’ busy schedules, but they also improve knowledge retention by maximizing attention. This format also enables immediate application of learning, one of the most effective ways to learn and retain. 

Learning about a new product innovation, deepening negotiation skills, mastering social selling, e-learning makes training shorter, more frequent, and more continuous compared to a once-a-year training week. 

This provides a real competitive advantage, especially as salespeople increasingly act as advisors and experts for highly informed, demanding customers. 

A reminder: 2 out of 5 prospects do not trust salespeople because they don’t believe reps truly understand their situations and needs (Forrester, 2018). E-learning quickly raises the level of service and consultative skills, qualities now critical for sales success.

With online training, companies eliminate costs related to in-person sessions (travel, room rental, etc.) and, above all, the productivity loss and customer responsiveness gap. 

With fewer barriers to attendance, more employees can take part in training. That means training more salespeople, better, and at a lower cost. 

The investment is smaller and lower-risk, the impact is greater, and ROI comes faster. The ROI of online or blended sales training is far higher than 100% in-person training.

For a long time, it was difficult to measure training impact, even in sales roles, where KPIs and metrics are more quantifiable than in support functions. 

E-learning changes that. With personalized dashboards, you can track each salesperson’s progress, identify sticking points, and compare mastery levels. Managers can easily re-engage those who haven’t advanced enough. 

E-learning also enables data-driven content evolution. Training can be adapted in real time based on statistics and field feedback. For example, if a product isn’t being promoted or sold effectively, it may be due to insufficient mastery, and training modules can be updated immediately. 

This creates more efficient training, leading to greater overall sales efficiency. By freeing up time, e-learning opens opportunities for new commercial strategies, like cross-selling and upselling. 

Improving new hire onboarding, raising customer conversion rates, reducing risks and errors, developing sales excellence and flexibility, anticipating peaks in activity, boosting customer retention, reducing turnover… by delivering the right information to the right person at the right time (and in the right format), e-learning drives both individual and collective sales performance. 

E-learning: one of the best approaches to train salespeople 

E-learning is among the most effective approaches for training sales teams. Of course, success depends heavily on the e-learning platform used. Essential factors include: interactivity, a seamless user experience, and easy, rapid creation for trainers. 

This is exactly what Teach Up provides. Teach Up is the all-in-one platform for creating training modules that boost sales team performance. Easy to use, it has already supported many clients in their sales training projects, such as food industry giant McCormick.