When opportunity knocks, grab it. And
to ensure that you don’t lose it, grab it with both hands. Such was the case
when I got an opportunity to be a member of the project team, a volunteer and a
participant for a seminar on ‘Career options & competencies required in
Sales and Marketing’ organized by Rotary Club of Secunderabad West at Bhartiya
Vidya Bhavan and I’d like to share my experience. Books tell us everything that
we need to know, knowledge has no boundaries and barriers. But when a fresher
like me is gearing up to enter that corporate warzone, I need to understand
what the industry expects from me and what are the skills/competencies that I
need to equip myself with to ensure that not only do I survive the battle, but
end up on top. This platform i.e. the seminar, helped me connect the dots and
gave a clear idea of the gaps that I had to fill in order to prepare myself.
The seminar helped me understand the importance of certain skills required in
Sales and Marketing, where you don’t sell a product, but you sell your
confidence.
A cricketer has a
set of skills, so does a technician, so does an analyst. But before they
acquired these skills they were passionate about entering that field. To
summarize everything and stick to the objective, what the speakers constantly
focused on was that your passion, attitude, willingness to learn, creativity
and interest matters a lot and that is what drives you to acquire those skills
and later on build your career. The competencies required (as mentioned by the speakers)
are good communication, social, problem solving and presentation skills. It is
important that you are well informed and have knowledge about the industry,
business and the product. Apart from these, your personality, ability to
negotiate and convince also come into the picture. As Steve Jobs had rightly
said that the consumer is confused, you can't just ask customers what they want and then try to give
that to them. By the time you get it built, they'll want something new. Now, how is it that you sell that product, how do you convince a
potential customer that your product is better than the rest? This is where we
need to fill the gap because a consumer is confused and does not know what to
buy.
The speakers, who
came from various sectors (IT, Pharmacy, FMCG, etc) gave their own perspective
of the opportunities available from an industry point of view and the
competencies required (as mentioned above). It was a complete package. Al Ries in his book “Positioning- The Battle
for your Mind” had explained the problems of communicating in an over
communicated society, referring to the umpteen number of brands in the market
trying to differentiate themselves from the rest. Peter Drucker had once said
that “The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well that
the product or service fits him or her and sells itself”. You cannot push
something where there isn’t a need.
