How SMEI can help to create Sales Excellence
What’s different in SMEI’s approach?
Sales & Marketing Executives International, as world’s largest and leading sales & marketing
certification body, is assisting individuals and companies of all sizes all over the world to establish sales
excellence since 1935. For 79 years, SMEI has developed a wealth of knowledge and best practices in
the area of leadership development for sales and marketing. Our approach can be compared to how
other professionals in critical professions like pilots, physicians, accountants and others achieve and
maintain excellence. These professions are required to have this approach by law, while a sales
professional has a choice.
If you and your company really strive to establish sales excellence and avoid that after 120 days after
you finished your sales training program, 85% to 90% of all required skills and knowledge are wasted*,
we recommend that you have a closer look at our approach.
What we believe and stand for
We believe that a sales professional can be very much be compared with a physician. A physician’s task
is to first diagnose and then subscribe solutions that will help an individual to strengthen and maintain
its health. A sales professional’s task is to first diagnose and then subscribe solutions that will
strengthen and maintain its client’s business health. We believe, like Peter F. Drucker stated in 1954,
that the true business of every company is to get and keep more customers. Sales professionals are the
ones to make this happen.
We believe that sales professionals should be knowledgeable about universal sales principles, strategies
and tactics and that this should be verifiable. That they should submit themselves to a code of ethics.
We believe that universal standards in sales – just like in the medical world - should not be adjusted to
people’s abilities to perform them. We also believe that knowledge comes before skills. And that true
professionals always keep on developing through continuing education and training.
We believe that sales training can be helpful but that it’s not of much worth when individuals who are
being trained are not being tested on the fundamental competencies. “If you don’t know it, how can
you act on it?” We also believe that there is not one superior sales methodology but that there are
many which can be used in combination with each other depending on market situations. Last but not
least we believe that it is the sales manager’s job to coach his or her team to put things into practice
being assisted by a trainer if needed and not the other way around.
How?
Since 1980 SMEI completes a global survey in which we ask SME and big enterprises what the sales
competences are that sales professionals need to excel in their work field. Based on this knowledge
SMEI asks the best educational professionals developers in the world to create learning materials.
Learning materials that are suitable to be absorbed and tested in almost any situation.
SMEI works with professional sales optimization providers and contracted licensees all over the world
who share SMEI’s beliefs and are able to deliver and serve companies and individuals accordingly and
can guarantee quality.
* According to the research of Dave Stein (Sales Training: The 120-day curse. ES Research Group, 2011)
www.SMEI.org
SMEI helps universities all over the world to adjust their educational programs to have a better fit to
what the workplace needs today.
SMEI facilitates sales professionals and companies all over the world to keep their professional
knowledge current and in line with global trends.
What SMEI has to offer the workplace at this moment?
SMEI has developed a Sales Excellence Development Program the same way that physicians are
educated and trained. A program that is current and covers the principles and knowledge that can be
expected in the sales work field of today’s global economy. It consists out-of:
1. Two sales certifications. SCPS™ for true sales professionals and CSE® for sales managers and
sales executives who want to lead. Certifications that are respected and valued by many
Fortune 500 companies. Thousands of individuals have been certified by these standards in the
last 29 years and have benefited by what certification means for themselves and their
employers. Leading business universities in the world like the University of British Columbia in
Vancouver (ranking #42 on the world ranking list) and others have had their sales leadership
programs accredited by SMEI’s standards or had their program(s) aligned.
2. An online learning platform of world’s leading educational higher education provider, Pearson,
to give individuals all over the world the ability to acquire the knowledge and do their
certification exam. A platform that gives our certified partners and companies the ability to
deliver SMEI’s content in ways of blended learning or any other way that is suitable including
detailed process reports.
3. A global network of certified sales optimization partners that share our beliefs, and can deliver
certification programs in ways that can be customized to company needs. Partners who are
able to deliver additional content as needed, can offer consulting and individual coaching.
Partners who can execute train-the-trainer programs to make companies and their academies
independent.
4. Facilitation in the permanent certification requirements that individuals need to maintain their
certification. This is done directly or through our partners.
5. Consulting in how companies can create true Sales Excellence Development Programs
6. An unbiased, and vendor neutral certification governing body that is financially independent of
training and administration.
What SMEI can offer your company?
When your company shares SMEI’s beliefs in what a true Sales Excellence Development Program means
in the global economy of today we can support you in different ways. We can do this directly as SMEI
and/or through our educational partners. SMEI can advise you which parties can help you, we can take
control or work together with third parties. Our main objective as a not-for-profit is to help you to
build excellence, become more productive, effective and act as an example to the workplace.
We invite you to watch what one of our clients say: http://bit.ly/goforsalesexcellence
We will soon contact you to discuss in what way we can be of service to you.
* According to the research of Dave Stein (Sales Training: The 120-day curse. ES Research Group, 2011)
www.SMEI.org