Sales Scenarios
Storyline
An interactive eLearning that follows a day in the life of a sales agent, immersing learners in real-world challenges while focusing on the key steps of discovery, positioning, handling objections, and closing the sale. All while practicing empathy as a crucial component for effective customer interactions.
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Audience
New hire sales representatives who need more practice with sale conversations.
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Responsibilities
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Instructional design
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Graphic and multimedia design
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Scripting
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Action mapping
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Prototyping
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eLearning development
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Tools
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Articulate Storyline
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Adobe Illustrator
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Azure Speech Studio
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Adobe Photoshop
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Miro
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Problem
During the redesign of the new hire onboarding journey, I identified a critical gap: the high turnover rate among new hires, particularly in the sales teams. Research revealed that sales representatives lacked sufficient training and experience with customer use cases, hindering their ability to feel confident in their role. Additionally, previous training efforts faced DEI issues, which raised further concerns.
Solution
To bridge this gap, I developed three use cases that provide a safe space for practicing sales skills with real-time feedback. This approach engages offering realistic scenarios they will encounter in customer sales discussions. By simulating real-world challenges, the use cases foster critical thinking, reinforce key concepts, and prepare learners for their day to day role.
My Process
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Define the objectives
Through research and action mapping, I identify learner's needs. Identify key performance indicators and address high priority actions within the design.
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Design the solution
After identifying key actions, I created a proposal that highlights real-world challenges and outcomes, then develop a high-level prototype for them to experience interactions.
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Develop the experience
Once I receive feedback and have prototype sign off, I use authoring tools to develop the experience with a focus on immersing the learner. This step includes extensive testing, iterations, and QA.
define the objectives
Action Mapping
Through extensive research, I identified the pain points learners were having within the new hire journey. This was extensive interviewing across multiple channels to see why turn over rate was so high. Learners described not being able to do their job because lack of experience. By interviewing and collaborating with SMEs, portfolio owners, and learners, I narrowed down actionable solutions to the most practical scenarios learners needed more assistance in which was the discovery, positioning, overcoming objections, and closing the sale. ​
design the solution
Proposal
To introduce the interactive approach to the business, I developed a high-level proposal that outlined the project concept, using a prototype that illustrated a typical day in the life of a sales agent. This visual representation helped stakeholders envision the enhanced, interactive experience I aimed to create. The proposal effectively highlighted how the design would engage learners and meet their specific needs.
Storyboarding
Building on the proposal, I created a text-based storyboard that developed scenario scripts incorporating choices for the learner. By leveraging video game-style interactions—where participants select objects in their environment to complete daily tasks—I crafted a compelling storyline that drives engagement. These interactions introduce a gamified element to the learning experience, fostering learner curiosity and empowering them to make meaningful choices. The storyboard follows three businesses, each with distinct needs, allowing new hires to practice their sales skills in various contexts.
Visual Mockups
I began the visual design process by curating a set of mockups inspired by a wide range of visual sources.
I took inspiration from video game dialogue and interacting with your surroundings to create an every day scenario. I really focused in on the DEI initiatives that are set, involved diverse business owners including a non-binary individual. A mix of illustrative styles defined the overall aesthetic.
To enhance the interactive experience, I drew inspiration from role-play video games, incorporating first-person perspectives and dialogue-driven scenes, adding a layer of gamification to engage the learner through character interactions and immersive storytelling.
Style Guide
I created a comprehensive style guide adhering to brand standards, ensuring consistency across all visual elements. From typography to color schemes and iconography, the guide outlines a cohesive and recognizable brand identity throughout the customer journey.​
Prototype
To gather feedback on functionality and interactivity, I developed a prototype that showcased key elements such as audio clips, videos, and a detailed diagram of the customer journey to provide a foundational experience for testing. While the testing group was already familiar with Rise courses, this prototype helped them experience a fresh approach to storytelling, blending interactive elements with a more immersive narrative.​
Incorporating Feedback
By evaluating feedback on these early-stage designs, I was able to identify areas for enhancing the story to be inclusive of all learners within the dialogue. I shifted the focus from a single sales role to incorporate various functions such as inside sales, loyalty sales, and small-medium sales. This change allows for a more comprehensive representation of other roles that contribute to the overall success of the sales process.
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This streamlining the development process and significantly reducing costs by eliminating the need to create multiple channel-specific eLearning modules.
Feedback
"Let's adjust the first line of each interaction to make these learnings usable across portfolios."
Feedback
"The dialogue is really fast, can we slow it down? or let the user advance each dialogue?
Implementation
I changed the language throughout the module to enable multiple sales channels to take the eLearning.
Implementation
I knew it would not be a good learning experience to tap for every dialogue bubble, so I slowed the audio down and added natural gaps in between the conversation.
develop the experience
Full Development
Now that I had collected feedback from the prototype, it was time to go into Articulate Storyline and Azure text to speech studio (AI) in to piece together the content. the entire experience. To ensure optimal functionality and user experience, I tested the product with users extensively before delivery.
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Based on the feedback, this scenario-based eLearning experience provides an effective and practical experience for new hires to try using discovery questions, positioning, overcoming objections, and closing the sale. ​
results and takeaways
Testimonials
The learner and business feedback was overwhelmingly positive, highlighting the effectiveness of the training in demonstrating how well-informed choices lead to better customer interactions and outcomes. Participants reported feeling more confident in their sales skills and appreciated the clear connections between their decisions and the positive impacts on customer satisfaction.
​"The 'day in the life' prototype was a game-changer. It transformed complex sales scenarios into an engaging, interactive experience that our team could easily follow and apply in real-world situations."
"Very good conversations with the potential clients. The agent asked excellent questions to get the information needed."
"The learning gave us a fresh perspective. It provided lots of choices, easy to understand, and most importantly, it aligned perfectly with our sales strategies. We saw immediate improvements in how our team handled customer interactions."
Takeaways
I loved focusing on creating three diverse sales scenarios and customer's that a new to sales hire could understand. It gave them a safe space to practice without losing a sale. In the future I would love to add more branches to the scenarios. New hires will be able to navigate various customer reactions, including negative responses, which will teach them the consequences of their actions.
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These enhancements will create a richer learning experience that empowers new hires to approach sales with confidence. By continue using critical thinking and decision-making skills, they will develop essential problem-solving skills that directly contribute to their success.
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