Role-based sales training starts from the actual selling job, not the generic title \u201csalesperson.\u201d In Dr. Mostafa Nawareg\u2019s SELLER-6 framework, the role is diagnosed through Setting, Economics, Lifecycle, Lead Flow, Engagement Complexity, and Responsibility. The shared sales core can remain consistent, but cases, practice, tools, and assessment should change when the channel, deal value, buying process, or level of responsibility changes.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
\u201cSales representative\u201d is an umbrella label, not a training diagnosis. A salesperson behind a pharmacy counter, a medical representative visiting physicians, a call-center seller, a chat agent, a showroom advisor, and an enterprise account manager all participate in selling\u2014but they do not perform the same job.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
The transferable core remains important: discovering needs, listening, communicating value, handling objections, adapting to the buyer, and asking for a next step. Yet the job-specific capabilities change with the channel, deal economics, product lifecycle, source of leads, decision complexity, and the seller\u2019s responsibility after the sale.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
The central case comes from Dr. Mostafa Nawareg\u2019s book Psychological Selling Arts<\/em>. A pharmacist applies to the pharmaceutical company Jamjoom and is asked whether he has pharmaceutical-company experience. He does not. Yet he does have customer-facing sales experience inside a pharmacy. The story exposes an important distinction: prior retail selling is not irrelevant, but it is not equivalent to field pharmaceutical selling. Some capabilities transfer; others must be developed for the new role.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Parallel cases deepen the point: a telesales conversation known in the book as \u201cSherine from Sheraton\u201d; a historical example from the Tadawi pharmacy chain; Ard Al Khaleej Perfumes in Iraq; an old Sharp air-conditioner objection example; and academic research on B2B chat, complex solutions, and inside versus outside sales.<\/p>\r\n\r\n The article proposes SELLER-6<\/strong>, an author-developed framework that diagnoses six dimensions of a sales role: Setting, Economics, Lifecycle, Lead Flow, Engagement Complexity, and Responsibility<\/strong>. It also proposes a practical 40\u201340\u201320<\/strong> design heuristic: 40% shared selling core, 40% role-specific modules, and 20% company application. That split is an implementation heuristic, not a research-derived percentage.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Companies often use one sales curriculum because everyone carries a sales title. That makes administration simple, but it can produce one of two failures: specialists sit through material they do not need, or critical role-specific capability is never taught because the program stays at the level of generic sales advice.<\/p>\r\n\r\n The right question is not \u201cWhat should every salesperson learn?\u201d It is \u201cWhich capabilities are common across selling, and which are created by the specific role?\u201d<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n This distinction is central to the work of a strong Sales Trainer<\/strong>. The trainer should not merely teach the same techniques to every seller; the role is to identify what is universal, what is conditional, and what must be practiced in the exact environment where the salesperson performs.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Meta-analytic evidence supports the broader idea that selling success is multidimensional rather than driven by one universal script. Ohiomah and colleagues reviewed 139 independent studies from 1980\u20132019<\/strong>, covering 31 determinants<\/strong> across salesperson, organization, customer, and environment dimensions; the authors also examined contextual moderators including inside versus outside sales. Ohiomah et al.<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n\r\n A company evaluating providers should therefore choose a trainer who understands different sales roles<\/a> rather than assume that one trainer and one curriculum fit every sales job.<\/p>\r\n\r\n In the original book story, a pharmacist applies for a sales role at Jamjoom. During the interview, he is asked whether he has worked for a pharmaceutical company before. He answers no. The question reflects a legitimate concern: selling inside a pharmacy and working as a pharmaceutical field representative are not the same job.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Inside the pharmacy, the seller already develops transferable skills. He sees customers directly, listens to symptoms or expressed needs within the legal and professional boundaries of the role, explains products, responds to questions, manages alternatives, and builds trust. Those capabilities do not disappear simply because the channel changes.<\/p>\r\n\r\n But the field role creates new demands: route and territory planning, professional calls, appointment discipline, communication with physicians or other healthcare professionals, longer follow-up cycles, documentation, CRM behavior, and greater autonomy away from a retail counter. The lesson is therefore not \u201cretail experience equals pharmaceutical field experience.\u201d The lesson is that experience must be decomposed into transferable and role-specific capability<\/strong>.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Inside sellers work in an environment where customers often come to them, visual cues may be rich, product access is immediate, and interaction cycles can be short. Outside sellers must create movement across territories, appointments, accounts, travel, and follow-up. Time management and account planning become part of selling itself.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Telesales lacks many visual cues but carries tone, pacing, hesitation, and interruption in real time. Chat removes most vocal information but creates a written record, parallel conversations, delayed replies, links, images, and greater pressure on concise writing.<\/p>\r\n\r\n High price usually increases perceived risk, qualification depth, stakeholder involvement, and the need for proof. Low-ticket selling often rewards speed and friction reduction. But price and product lifecycle are separate dimensions: an expensive perfume can be consumable, while a relatively modest appliance can be durable.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Consumables create repeat-purchase, occasion, preference, trial, usage, replenishment, and loyalty questions. Durable goods raise comparison, specifications, fit, installation, warranty, service, financing, and long-term risk.<\/p>\r\n\r\n Objection handling matters across roles, but the objection itself can mean different things. \u201cToo expensive\u201d in a fragrance store, an air-conditioning showroom, an enterprise solution, and a pharmaceutical account may arise from completely different buyer economics and risk perceptions.<\/p>\r\n\r\nThe Management Principle: \u201cSalesperson\u201d Is Too Broad to Be a Training Job Description<\/h2>\r\n\r\n
Company Background: From Pharmacy Retail to a Jamjoom Interview<\/h2>\r\n\r\n
Business Challenge: What Goes Wrong When Different Sellers Receive One Program?<\/h2>\r\n\r\n
Inside versus outside sales<\/h3>\r\n
Phone versus chat<\/h3>\r\n
High-ticket versus low-ticket<\/h3>\r\n
Consumable versus durable<\/h3>\r\n
The false shortcut: \u201cTrain everyone on objections and closing\u201d<\/h3>\r\n