Dotting the 'i's and crossing the 't's for interviews for sales jobs

Here's some top tips when preparing for sales jobs interviews.

1) Try to enjoy the interview for what it is, meeting people.

If you enjoy meeting people, your half way there for sales jobs. People want to buy of happy people who are interested in them, and both of these are quite easy to spot on the receiving end. Conversely it's pretty easy to see if someone is unhappy or disinterested. Enjoy you're interview for what it is, an opportunity to meet new people.

2) To close, or not to close

Many are convinced that as it's an interview for sales jobs, you need to close them down and ask if you've got the job. Well perhaps not, as with a sales call, any close should be realistic in accordance with the call itself. If a customer has said he won't buy without further information, your close is to book your next appointment, it would be pointless to go ahead and ask him to buy 'just because the manual says always close'. An interview is the same. In most cases, it's unrealistic to expect an offer on the spot, so asking 'have I got the job' will just look silly. A more general close like 'is there anything you haven't seen which you would like to see', or even, 'how have I done' will get oyu an answer (even non verbally) which will give you a clue.

3) Take evidence of your sales track record

Being sales people and being asked the question 'are you any good', the answer is normally consistent. However, when faced with the subsequent question of 'can you prove it', many find this more difficult. Recruiting sales managers want to see evidence that you really are good. Evidence that you met sales targets, evidence that you won awards, that your appraisals were very positive. Simply saying you don't have it with you won't wash. If you really were top in sales jobs with awards to show for it, it's unlikely you didn't keep the evidence, so the assumption is that if you don't have evidence, it's not real. Build a brag file with your evidence and take it to interview.

4) Get your CV proof read by more than one person.

It may seem glaringly obvious but it's amazing how many times I come up against spelling mistakes in Cvs or missing words. The root cause is often the fact that a CV is often a document created years ago and updated many many times. Whilst it may have been proof read originally, it hasn't since, and adjustments can often result in words being unintentionally altered or deleted, or even whole paragraphs being deleted or pasted in by mistake. Every time to make an update, egt someone else to proof read it.

5) Always prepare questions in advance

There's several reasons for this. Firstly, in the heat of an interview it's easy to forget a question that may be essential to your final decision about the job. More importantly, having pre-prepared questions looks professional and organised. Have a spare sheet of paper ready so that you can write down the answers when they come, this will confirm to your interview that you are organised but also that the questions were genuine and matter for later reference.

Every time you take a new sales jobs you take significant turn in your life's direction, these are highly important affairs. Even though attention to detail may not come naturally to you, this may be the time to give matters a little extra thought. Good luck.