Canon helped me find my potential

Alex Thurgood wanted to broaden his experience in Canon so he left his marketing role to join the Canon Business Solutions sales force for a two month secondment.

Alex’s story is a good example of how Canon can help you try new things and develop your career in the way that you want to.

How did you get on?
Having completed and passed the Canon sales course, confirming I had the required competencies to go out and sell, I joined our London sales region and shadowed various members of the team. It wasn’t long before I jumped in at the deep end and started to apply my newly acquired sales training with some selling ideas of my own.

I decided to focus on PLP (Product Life Planning) customer data and targeted customers whose Canon printer/copier products were reaching the end of their lease period. I hoped this would give me some quick wins to get me off to a strong start and build my confidence and thankfully it worked.

I’m pleased to say that by the end of the two month period I had achieved eight multifunctional printer sales all with different customers from a mixture of property and financial service industries.

Any challenges?
It was certainly an education. Like all sales people I did my fair share of sales blitzing, although in my case it was less of a blitz and more of a foggy haze! By the end of my blitz I had made 85 calls with no returns which was a very soul-destroying experience and made me realise just how self-disciplined and motivated you have to be.

What key thing did you learn from the whole experience?
I now have a greater respect for salespeople, particularly in the London team, where their relentless pursuit of customers is carried out in an extremely professional and personable way, even when things get tough. This has a lot to do with the high standard of people we recruit as well as the training and support provided by Canon’s sales learning & development teams.

Would you have done anything differently?
No, I don’t think so, although I learned that you have to be as prepared as possible when presenting to a customer. If you’re not, then you can almost guarantee you will be asked a question that will catch you out.

Overall, I found the whole experience a challenge but a real confidence boost,
particularly when winning a sale! I enjoyed thinking on my feet and felt my marketing knowledge helped me to make stronger propositions, supported by
statistics and research.

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