Heading to National Sales Competition
Marketing
Pictured (L-R): Drew Holt, Melissa Hadley, and Abigail Mikkelsen. (Not pictured: Nathaniel Gross)
by Richard Tate
Each semester the Center for Professional Sales and the Sales Club host a sales competition. This semester’s competition was held on the afternoon and evening of February 13. We had 24 students compete and 26 corporate representative from 15 of our corporate partners. Ethos Group is one of our top tier partners and we used a business-to-business sales scenario based on one of Ethos’ services. Students prepared on their own, then sat down in front of Ethos executives to try and sell them during a 15-minute sales call role-play scenario. Students were video recorded and other corporate partners judged the students’ performances. Following the competition all competitors and supporting Sales Club and Sales Leadership class members sat down with the corporate participants for a networking event. These competitions highlight our sales students’ capabilities and they put our students directly in contact with interested corporate representatives who want to hire them. It is a great opportunity for our students and corporate partners alike.
This year the Center for Professional Sales provided cash awards for the top three finishers. The top two finishers will represent JMU at the National Collegiate Sales Competition which is held at Kennesaw State University in Atlanta during the last week of March.
Top finishers were:
- Nathaniel Gross $500
- Melissa Hadley $300
- Abigail Mikkelsen $200
- Drew Holt
The Center for Professional Sales and the Sales Club will host a similar event in the fall and all College of Business students are encouraged to sign up. The sales competitions have been held in conjunction with the university wide career fair each semester.
