Case Study:
Motor Coach Industries
OEM Sees 20% Increase in Earnings Over Previous Year with Implementation of The Brooks Group’s Comprehensive Sales Training Solution
This case study captures key issues and results for Motor Coach Industries (MCI) and its implementation of the IMPACT Selling® process. MCI engaged The Brooks Group to deploy sales training, sales management training, and negotiation skills training. The results? MCI has enjoyed a gross profit increase of 6% vs the previous year, a 20% YOY increase in EBITDA, a 30% increase in orders booked and delivered, and a 50% increase in forecast accuracy.
Situation
Motor Coach Industries, the coach bus industry’s leading Original Equipment Manufacturer, was looking for a sales training solution that would allow their sales force to defeat price objections and increase margin while better forecasting future orders to improve predictability in their production schedule. Executive Vice President of Sales, Patrick Scully, needed a straightforward selling process that would be readily adopted by a seasoned sales team.
Motor Coach Industries was in search of a sales training program that would:
- Install a straightforward sales process to align the sales team and ensure everyone was working out of the same playbook
- Establish discipline and the ability to easily track the stages of the sales cycle in order to secure future orders sooner
- Enable sales reps to protect profit margin by building and selling value
- Equip sales managers with the skills and tools necessary to coach sales reps based on their individual learning and behavior styles
Solution
The Brooks Group provided MCI with the following solutions:
Discovery:
To understand the key challenges that MCI was faced with and to design a training curriculum that reflected the organization’s unique culture and selling environment, an in-depth discovery phase was conducted prior to training. Brooks Talent Index and IMPACT Selling Skills Index® Assessments were completed for all sales team members, and consultants from The Brooks Group spent time in the field, as well as on-site, interviewing sales managers and company stakeholders.
Sales Training:
A fully customized, 2-day IMPACT Selling® course was delivered to the entire sales team. The program incorporated industry-specific language and hands-on exercises designed to address the challenges MCI sellers were faced with. After the 2-day IMPACT course, The Brooks Group delivered a 9-week IMPACT Sales Coaching program in order to reinforce the skills learned and to emphasize that using the 6-step, IMPACT Selling® process on a daily basis was the “new normal.”
To address price objections and protect margins, the sales team later attended a customized 3-day Selling Against Lower-Priced Competition workshop, where they learned how to leverage price to their advantage and build value in the eyes of MCI customers.
Sales Management Training:
Following the IMPACT training, MCI sales managers attended a 2-day Sales Management training course that focused on coaching best practices, and included one-on-one reviews of their sales team members’ assessment results. These reports were used to identify individual strength and improvement areas, as well as the best coaching approach for each member of the sales team. An 8-week Coach the Coach program was delivered to reinforce coaching activity and establish a formal coaching cadence.
Results
The training was well received by the sales team, who continues to use a common language and process and can easily track where they are in the sales cycle. Learning IMPACT Selling® has created a definitively clear production schedule for ongoing and faster ordering.
MCI EBITDA is up 20% from the previous year, with gross profit up 6%. The sales team has just secured a significant $400 million order for over 750 motor coaches. While Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing, Patrick Scully, acknowledges a variety of factors contributing to the company’s increased sales effectiveness, he directly attributes a great deal of the success to the implementation of IMPACT.
Margin gains, especially, can be directly attributed to The Brooks Group’s training solutions, and Patrick stresses the importance of the fundamental message that was delivered to his sales team: “Don’t be ashamed of your price.” Sellers are now confidently selling value, and the average selling price of individual units has increased over the previous year. Pipelining is 50% better than it’s ever been in terms of opportunities, and reps are able to classify prospects with increased accuracy. Orders booked and delivered have improved 30% over last year.
Training solutions provided to Motor Coach Industries have received top-down sponsorship and buy-in from every level of the organization, as the return continues to securely justify the investment.
“The Brooks Group provides the highest degree of professionalism in every interaction I’ve had with them. More importantly, the strategies and tactics they teach work in the field to deliver results. The Brooks Group understands what it takes to deliver long-term behavioral change at the sales and sales management level, and I highly recommend their services.”