5 Soft Skills Every Salesperson Needs

Soft skills are a set of interpersonal and intrapersonal competencies that help a salesperson relate to and communicate with others. These skills can also help the salesperson work more efficiently and achieve their full potential in a sales role.

Let’s look at the seven soft skills every rep needs to get ahead and more importantly, how to develop them.

1. Growth Mindset

Let’s say that you’re fantastic at building rapport. Do you believe rapport-building is one of your innate skills or do you believe you developed it through hard work, practice, and external feedback?

If you choose the second answer, you possess a growth mindset. People with growth mindsets believe they can strengthen their natural talents and develop new abilities over time. People with fixed mindsets, on the other hand, view their skills as fixed. They have the hand that they’ve been dealt, and that’s that.

2. Adaptability

When a salesperson is good at listening to and implementing feedback, their name typically skyrockets to the top of the leaderboard and stays there. After all, they’re combining the strengths of a great rep with the insights, wisdom, and experience of their manager. That’s a winning combo.

Plus, the expectations of sales reps are constantly evolving. Buyers are much more sophisticated than they used to be and what worked in 2001 definitely won’t fly in 2021. To keep processes and strategies up-to-date, great salespeople need to be able to adapt and be coachable.

3. Empathy

The ability to imagine themselves in their prospect’s situation can turn an average sales rep into a star performer. When you’ve got a good idea of what your prospect is thinking and feeling, you can target your messaging to their specific pain points and motivations. You’ll also know exactly when to push and when to hold back.

Plus, showing the buyer you’re on their side helps you overcome the stereotype of the aggressive rep who’s only interested in their quota.

4. Communication

Between talking on the phone, sending emails, giving demos, and speaking in meetings, most sales reps spend at least 90% of their day communicating. Having solid communication skills is essential. You must be able to clearly and persuasively get your ideas across without going off on tangents or using buzzwords and meaningless phrases.

You should also keep your audience in mind at all times. If you speak the same way to your sales manager as to your prospects, something’s wrong: After all, they have vastly different goals, desires, and background information.

5. Humility

Finish this sentence: “Bread” is to “butter” as “humility” is to. Okay, “sales” probably wasn’t your first answer. But reps who can identify the right time and place for humility consistently knock their deals out of the park.

When you’re humble enough to reveal a vulnerability or admit you don’t know something, your prospects will immediately trust and respect you more. As a result, they’ll view you as a trusted advisor, or even a partner in their success (this is ideal).