SALES OPERATIONS
How to Improve Your Sales Operation SELLING POWER EDITORS
Improving the design of the sales force can materially improve sales results, often starting with one simple question: What do our sales- people do all day?
That’s because good sales force de- sign involves promoting the selling be- haviors that will drive the right results. According to one expert at a leading sales consultancy, good sales force design is all about “structuring your sales force in such a way that you’re cost-effectively driving the right selling behaviors among the right salespeo- ple, in front of the right customers.” Here’s an example from a B2B servic- es company that redesigned its sales force. One of the first things the expert discovered? Field salespeople were doing too much of their own prospect- ing and lead qualification. Experts often refer to this as “role pollution.” “Sometimes the issue is that sales
reps are spending a lot of time on activities that someone else should be doing,” the expert says, “for example, troubleshooting problems with exist- ing customers, collecting overdue payments, initial lead generation or
30 | APRIL 2020 SELLING POWER © 2020 SELLING POWER. CALL 1-800-752-7355 FOR REPRINT PERMISSION.
qualification, or any number of other things that could take away valuable selling time.”
After helping the B2B services company design and create an inside sales team to help with generating or qualifying new leads, the field sales force gained about 30 percent extra selling time. “That enabled the organization to allocate resources to penetrate new industry verticals,” the expert says. This kind of organic sales growth is exactly what a good sales force design aims to facilitate. Of course, achieving good sales force design is easier said than done, but experts stress that almost all sales leaders can make immediate improvements. As with this client, scrutinizing how salespeople spend their time is a good fundamental step. In addition, they say answering the following three questions can help sales lead-
ers enhance the existing design of their sales force without starting from scratch.
1. WHAT SELLING OPPOR- TUNITIES ARE SALES REPS PURSUING?
“Salespeople should be pursuing the most attractive prospects and spend- ing time with customers who have high revenue potential,” says the expert. “Sometimes, the sales force is either undersized to handle certain segments, or salespeople are spending time on the wrong customer segments.” Sales leaders are often surprised to learn that the sales force is spending disproportionate amounts of time on low-opportunity customers or seg- ments. They’ll hear anecdotally about single successes or unhappy custom- ers, but they won’t realize they’re investing a lot of effort in pursuing a market segment or group of accounts that represents little opportunity for revenue, according to the expert. They need to see the big picture.
Tip: Examine how you assess account potential and how reps are currently pursuing that potential.
RAWPIXEL.COM /
SHUTTERSTOCK.COM
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33
