Sales Management
You’ve established your sales process and you have a structure in place to help your team achieve quota attainment.
But with any sales machine, you should consistently to check see if all the moving parts are working and repeatable.
How?
There are hundreds of ways to measure sales performance, so be sure to choose wisely.
But, under most circumstances, it comes down to a few things…
How Many Leads are You Receiving?
One of the first signs of a sales process that works is the number warm leads entering your pipeline. Because less than 2% of cold calls result in a meeting, it’s important that your reps are targeting leads and pursuing prospects based on their level of interest.
Lead scoring and activity monitoring is an easy way to identify which leads to pursue. Turn to your CRM to see when a prospect visits your site and opens your emails – this will let you know who is more likely to convert, and who is not.
Is Your Team Following Up?
At the same time, it’s important to make sure that these leads are being followed up with. Low follow-up rates are an indicator that your team is letting customers fall through the cracks.
Don’t let a poor response rate be the reason for deals not closing.
Deal Size, Win Rates, and Sales Cycle Length
Are your team’s average sales prices increasing? This is not only a strong indication that your quota structure is working, but also that it’s growing in a positive way.
Like deal size, win rates should improve in a measurable way. Your sales process is helping you beat the competition and grow the business, and your quota structure is keeping your reps motivated.
At the end of the day, a good sales process will drive opportunities through the pipeline faster. If deals are closing at an appropriately fast pace, you are able to see whether or not you’ve introduced friction and/or if there are too many cycles into the process.
More Tips for Success
Don’t leave your sales process open to interpretation.
Always define specific actions made by the prospect that caused them to be moved from one stage to the next. If you leave this up for interpretation, you will have a less accurate understanding of where things are and why you aren’t hitting your number.
Be ready to iterate
Sales quota attainment will never be a one and done project.
Along with watching performance metrics on a daily basis, get in the habit of taking a step back every 4-6 months. This allows you to review the steps you’re taking to hit your number with the reps who are following them every day.
