Sandler Sales Template Walkthrough
Who this template is for
Salespersons, sales reps, sales professionals, sales managers, and sales teams looking to implement the Sandler sales methodology. Best suited for high-touch B2B sales situations and complex deals with long sales cycles, especially virtual selling or enterprise sales situations that benefit from spending more time on qualified buyers.
What this template is for
Creating frictionless and easy-to-use digital sales room to keep salespeople and customers aligned, implementing each phase of the Sandler sales system.
How to use the template
Start by setting up contact information and giving an overview of why you’re working together. Proceed to explore and detail the customer’s pain points, establish their budget, and agree on a timeline and criteria for making a sales decision.
Finally, determine whether your product meets the client’s needs, develop a plan to complete the sales process and then continue to the post-sale relationship phase.
What’s in this template?
Overview
Use the overview section to introduce the project, give a rough estimate of implementation time, and provide your contact details for easy access.
Executive Summary
This section is for highlighting the customer’s pain points, budget, and both decision timeline and process—essential data points in the Sandler sales process.
Mutual Action Plan
The mutual action plan is a to-do list of shared next steps. Use this section to outline next steps in the sales process—for example, for product demonstration and procurement.
Demo Recordings & Slides
In this section, use a variety of media to convey your company’s value proposition in the most engaging and vivid way possible, making sure to address your client’s pain points.
Case Studies
As an extension of your value offering, case studies offer a powerful illustration of exactly how your product can address a customer’s specific use cases. This section can include links to detailed accounts from satisfied customers and information on well-known clients.
Pricing
Include detailed pricing information to make sure that you find the right product fit for the customer’s budget.
Why use this Sandler sales template?
Dock can help sales teams implement the Sandler sales process by providing a tangible digital sales room to keep salespeople and customers aligned. By creating a Dock space for your customer, you can share all the key information from the Sandler Selling System directly with your point of contact and key decision-makers to foster buyer enablement.
The added transparency of the Dock template fosters trust with the buyer, helping to make the process genuinely collaborative in a manner consistent with the Sandler system’s recommendation that you first build a rapport with any potential client as part of the qualification process. Adapting the process also shows the client that you’re active in listening to and responding to their needs, and can also make your value proposition more compelling.
Here’s what else the Sandler sales template can do for you:
Foster relationship-building between salespeople and customers
- Provide ease of communication through a single, shared sales space.
- Create a sense of trust and transparency.
- Keep open lines of contact to constantly communicate regarding the client’s needs.
- Assist the client in staying focused and moving forward through the process.
Provide information for efficient customer qualification
- Quickly collate customer challenges and pain points.
- Through pricing information, assess your client’s budget.
- Communicate and agree on a timeline for decision-making.
- Summarize how the client will make their decision.
Move the client towards closing
- Easily provide sales materials for internal decision-making
- Remind the client of their needs and your product’s value proposition
- Provide buyer-focused information to make their decision as smooth as possible
- Move the client towards post-sell steps including onboarding and implementation
How Dock customers use this template
- Relationship Building: Establish communication, summarize clients’ pain points and generate a timeline for agreement.
- Qualification: Provide information to establish whether you can solve the client’s problems, whether this falls within their budget, and work together on an up-front contract and decision criteria for moving forward with the deal.
- Closing: Use a mutual action plan to outline shared next steps, tasks, and follow-up. Embed demo recordings, your sales deck, meeting minutes, case studies, and anything else that will push the deal to close.
FAQ
What is the Sandler sales methodology?
The Sandler Selling System is an approach to selling that emphasizes consultation and collaboration, working from the assumption that people want to buy, but don’t like being sold to. The process aims to qualify potential clients by identifying their pain points, budget, and decision-making process.
Ultimately, the Sandler Selling System is about spending less time trying to sell to everyone and spending more time on building relationships and making it easier to buy through buyer enablement. The real sales challenge is identifying the right buyers rather than convincing people to buy.
What are the three phases of the Sandler system?
The three main phases in the Sandler selling process are:
- Build and sustain a relationship with the potential client
- Qualify the potential client by assessing their needs and budget
- Close the sale by offering to solve their problems with your service or product if appropriate
What are the three principles of the Sandler system?
The Sandler system also follows three guiding principles:
- Selling is about transparency, honesty, and respect.
- The buyer has to qualify for the seller’s time so that neither wastes the other’s time.
- Follow a consistent methodology and a clear plan.
How many steps are there in the Sandler selling methodology?
The full Sandler selling methodology includes 7 steps:
- Bonding and rapport
- Up-front contract
- Identifying pain points
- Budget
- Decision
- Fulfillment
- Post-sell.
