All points very well taken. Maybe the sales person of the future will be more like a business development person. Invent new markets! Build the brand on the web and in networks!
Now that is a job that could attract the best and the brightest... and give a career path to everyone in the shop. As long as there were a real upside. Nobody is going to want to do that for a W-2. Doesn't have to be alot of money right now, but without the gold at the end of the rainbow...not so much.
I think the only thing that you are under estimating is the skill and tenacity to be able to understand what a customer needs, not just what they want. The customer has a communication problem, you have a plant that can produce all kinds of stuff. So how do you ticker with the stuff you already know how to do well and meet the customer's unsaid need. Now that strikes me as a really interesting job.
But consider that getting the conversation going, knowing how to manage the conversation, knowing what kind of information you are trying to pick up from body language and half spoken words, that needs training and discipline. It only looks easy because it comes naturally to a real pro. It's a little like the "newbie designers" who start sentences with "Couldn't you just......?" It looks easy if you've never done it.
Just one more thought. If a job can be clearly defined in specifications by a client - as in filling out a web form - it's a commodity. The lowest price wins. If you are the low price supplier, you get the job.
But as soon as the customer cannot fill the standard web form there is the real opportunity. Then you are not selling them what they think they want, you selling them what they need. And almost by definition you are not competing on price, you're competing on innovative product design.
If your shop is lucky enough to have lots of really smart, experienced people and some TOP NOTCH salespeople, it's a much better business than chopping wood.
Last edited by Michael Josefowicz; 09-12-2008 at 02:00 PM.
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