Sales careers always start with a bang. First, there's the training, usually stuffed into a meager few days. Then follows the personal attention, where a top salesperson or sales manager rides with the new swab. Excitement and enthusiasm are stressed on top of the stress of just being new. Hectic preparations, long meetings, longer hours -- it's no wonder a new salesperson is so uptight during his or her first few months. However, once the routine sets in, the excitement wanes. Unless the salesperson is an exceptional self-motivator, his or her initial sales gains fizzle. The salesperson has contracted the salesperson slump.

Veteran salespeople are at even greater risk of catching the salesperson slump, if they haven't already gotten it a dozen times over. Blame it on the repetition, the big routine, the daily grind. Blame it on familiarity. Blame it on whatever, but get rid of it before sales really decline!

 The funny thing about salesperson slump is that it can easily be predicted. Here's how: plot your salesperson's monthly sales totals on a graph and look for several periods where the totals remain nearly the same or are on the decline. Plateaus and declines that last for a few months show salesperson slump! In Figure 1, the first sign of salesperson slump occurs during the months of July and August. By October there is no doubt! The salesperson has caught the disease.

Don't confuse salesperson slump with laziness. Most salespeople are salespeople because they have an outgoing nature, not a slovenly one. It is very likely that the motivation that got them started is gone. Now it's up to you, the manager, to help them recognize their problem with salesperson slump, and feed them the medicine needed to cure it.

Here is a checklist to help improve your salesperson's condition:

•  Plot the salesperson's sales curve to show in black-and-white exactly where they (and you) stand.
•  Plant the seed of need to improve.
•  Review all sales records to discover new areas for the salesperson to improve in.
•  Help the salesperson set new goals.
•  Re-evaluate the salesperson's old schedule, contacts, leads, and revise as necessary to streamline and help them become more efficient.
•  Emphasize the need to use self-motivation as a sales tool.
•  Remove as much stress from the salesperson’s job as possible. Selling is stressful enough without the office adding to it.
•  Try to resolve any attitude problems between the salesperson and his/her job, other employees, or even clients.
•  Show the salesperson how to create enthusiasm at will by listening to motivational tapes, nurturing a positive attitude, using role models, and reading exciting stories of success during the lunch hour.
•  Remind your salesperson that a customer only cares about professional service. Never allow anything less than the most enthusiastic approach to rub off on them. Enthusiasm is a far better disease to catch than the salesperson slump.
•  The salesperson should learn to be a professional sounding board for his/her customers. Help them develop a skill known as listening. Customers will buy more if they know their salesperson empathizes with them.
•  A happy salesperson creates happy customers! Develop a quick smile.

Only one hitch stands in the way of a cure for the salesperson slump – the salesperson. Only he or she can prescribe the proper medicine to heal the condition. You must act as the catalyst. Nurture them as if they were still newly hired. Help them into a self-examination mode. Walk them through the symptoms they already feel, and guide them through the checklist of treatments. Most will survive the condition to reach greater plateaus of sales, and grow as a professional along the way.