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Coursera

Sales - First 90 Days in a New Sales Job

via Coursera

Overview

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Chris Croft is an international speaker, and widely published author, who's been teaching practical sales skills for over 20 years. He's taught all over the world, as well as over a million students online, and has an entertaining and practical teaching style. This course is guaranteed to keep you engaged and amused, and teach you life-changing skills for home and work. Starting a new sales role is a pivotal moment that can define your future success. This course guides you step by step through your first 90 days, from onboarding and understanding your company’s sales process to building productive relationships with colleagues, managers, and internal partners. You’ll learn how to quickly gain product, company, and competitor knowledge, project confidence and credibility, and get comfortable using CRM systems, sales metrics, and reporting to manage your pipeline and demonstrate impact. You’ll also build the practical, day-to-day skills needed to generate and convert opportunities. The course covers lead generation, networking, social selling, and referral-based selling, as well as how to structure outbound prospecting, calls, and cold emails that secure meetings. You will learn to prepare and run effective customer conversations: from discovery questions and benefit-focused presentations through handling objections and closing in a confident, ethical way. Throughout, you’ll apply time management, prioritization, and activity tracking techniques to keep your pipeline healthy. Finally, the course helps you think beyond the first few weeks so you can sustain momentum. You will analyze your pipeline for risks and gaps, set realistic expectations with yourself and your manager, and build a personal learning plan for ongoing growth. By the end, you’ll have a clear, actionable roadmap of habits and actions for your first 90 days and beyond—designed to build trust with customers, hit your targets, and grow a successful long-term sales career.

Syllabus

  • Introduction - First 90 Days in a New Sales Job
    • In this introduction, you'll learn how to make a strong start in your new sales role by building trust, credibility, and momentum from day one. You'll explore how to listen before judging, quickly learn about your product and company, build productive relationships with teammates and partner departments, and spot early lead-generation opportunities. These practical actions will help you settle in faster and contribute confidently during your first 90 days.
  • Sales Process Overview: What You Need To Know
    • This module gives you a practical map of how selling works inside an organization. Instead of treating sales as a vague talent, you'll break the work into clear stages, systems, reporting habits, and improvement loops that shape your day-to-day performance. By learning how opportunities move through the process and how CRM and reporting support better decisions, you'll build the discipline needed to become coachable, organized, and effective in your new role.
  • Understanding Your Customers: Key To Closing More Deals
    • Strong sales performance depends on understanding your customers deeply, not just delivering polished pitches. In this module, you'll explore how successful salespeople uncover customer needs through observation, questions, and direct contact. You'll also see how referrals and market awareness create warmer conversations and stronger positioning. By adopting a consultative approach, you can build trust, improve relevance, and increase your chances of closing the right deals.
  • What Skills You Need Before Starting A Sales Job
    • This module focuses on the practical capabilities that help beginners move from enthusiasm to effectiveness. You'll examine the core skill set that shapes real sales performance, including selling, presenting, influencing, negotiating, and managing time well. These skills affect trust, value communication, profitability, and consistency. By identifying and developing them early, you can close gaps faster and build habits that support long-term success in sales.
  • How To Analyze The Health Of Your Sales Pipeline
    • A healthy sales pipeline gives you focus, confidence, and realistic visibility into future results. In this module, you'll examine how to assess pipeline condition, prioritize the best opportunities, keep deal flow moving, and use metrics to judge whether progress is real. Instead of relying on volume alone, you'll develop a disciplined approach to pipeline quality, movement, and sustainability that supports better decisions and stronger forecasting.
  • Practical Steps To Start Generating Quality Leads
    • This module turns lead generation into a practical, repeatable discipline. You'll explore how to generate leads through relationship-based and digital methods, including networking, social media, content, lead nurturing, conferences, call-list development, and cold outreach. The emphasis is on quality as well as quantity, helping you build a system that creates opportunities consistently and supports organized follow-up across multiple channels.
  • Proven Strategies To Prepare For Effective Sales Meetings
    • Sales meetings are where preparation becomes visible. In this module, you'll build the communication habits and planning tools that lead to stronger customer conversations, from securing meetings through calls and email to asking discovery questions, translating features into benefits, using visuals effectively, handling objections, and preparing a confident close. With role play and rehearsal, you can turn preparation into smoother delivery and more effective conversations that move buyers toward commitment.
  • Long-Term Focus: Building Trust In Sales
    • Early sales success is rarely immediate, so long-term growth depends on patience, trust, and steady improvement. This module helps you build a productive relationship with your manager, create an intentional learning plan, and manage expectations while a pipeline develops. By focusing on communication, self-development, and realistic progress measures, you can reduce stress, build credibility, and create a stronger foundation for sustainable sales success.

Taught by

Chris Croft

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