Does Your Sales Team Deliver? A Quantitative Look

As we approach the end of 2019, it’s time to look forward to the year ahead—starting with an assessment of your sales team’s performance over the past year. How did they do? Where do the need to improve?

More importantly, how do you measure their performance so you can answer those questions?

To remove the subjectivity and help you take a quantitative approach in evaluating your team, we’ve developed a list of questions that get at the answers. Use the questions to distinguish the producers from the laggards. And use these questions to determine which skills your salespeople need to improve on in order to meet and exceed goals.

Also see if you can match the question posed with the corresponding sales skill. (You’ll find the answers at the end of this article.)

Questions for quantitatively measuring sales performance:

  1. How many of the qualified opportunities in your current sales pipeline were initiated by the seller?
  2. What title(s) most commonly appears in the field for primary point of contact? Is that a decision maker’s title?
  3. How well matched are your company’s product or service capabilities with the prospect’s business objectives?
  4. What value (outside of product/price) will the prospect’s organization be able to identify while working with your company?
  5. How much research does a prospect do before engaging with a salesperson?
  6. Who on your sales team held the margin line in the negotiations, and who caved to the buyer’s pressure?

In addition to answering these questions, also evaluate your team individually. How well can the individuals on your teams execute each skill? By using the questions above, managers can identify who has which skills and where improvement is needed. This is how your qualitative analysis of skills can be analyzed in relation to the quantitative assessment.

Here’s an example of the kind of insight you can gain: We worked with a company that calculated the cost of every sales call to be $400.00. They discovered that many of the calls were to prospects who would never produce enough revenue to cover the cost of the calls made. The managers were then tasked to analyze how well the reps could execute each step, and then identify where coaching was needed. As a result, the reps’ overall skills improved, the amount of time spent on the wrong prospects was reduced, and revenue results increased with fewer overall calls being made. In essence, the focus is on the quality of the calls versus the quantity of calls conducted. All because they took a quantitative approach using these questions.

And as promised, here are the skills that match each question above: 1) New Business Development 2) Accessing Key Players 3) Qualification and Positioning 4) Establishing Value 5) Opportunity Management/Forecasting 6) Negotiation.

As we approach the end of 2019, it’s time to look forward to the year ahead—starting with an assessment of your sales team’s performance over the past year. How did they do? Where do the need to improve?

More importantly, how do you measure their performance so you can answer those questions?

To remove the subjectivity and help you take a quantitative approach in evaluating your team, we’ve developed a list of questions that get at the answers. Use the questions to distinguish the producers from the laggards. And use these questions to determine which skills your salespeople need to improve on in order to meet and exceed goals.

Also see if you can match the question posed with the corresponding sales skill. (You’ll find the answers at the end of this article.)

Questions for quantitatively measuring sales performance:

  1. How many of the qualified opportunities in your current sales pipeline were initiated by the seller?
  2. What title(s) most commonly appears in the field for primary point of contact? Is that a decision maker’s title?
  3. How well matched are your company’s product or service capabilities with the prospect’s business objectives?
  4. What value (outside of product/price) will the prospect’s organization be able to identify while working with your company?
  5. How much research does a prospect do before engaging with a salesperson?
  6. Who on your sales team held the margin line in the negotiations, and who caved to the buyer’s pressure?

In addition to answering these questions, also evaluate your team individually. How well can the individuals on your teams execute each skill? By using the questions above, managers can identify who has which skills and where improvement is needed. This is how your qualitative analysis of skills can be analyzed in relation to the quantitative assessment.

Here’s an example of the kind of insight you can gain: We worked with a company that calculated the cost of every sales call to be $400.00. They discovered that many of the calls were to prospects who would never produce enough revenue to cover the cost of the calls made. The managers were then tasked to analyze how well the reps could execute each step, and then identify where coaching was needed. As a result, the reps’ overall skills improved, the amount of time spent on the wrong prospects was reduced, and revenue results increased with fewer overall calls being made. In essence, the focus is on the quality of the calls versus the quantity of calls conducted. All because they took a quantitative approach using these questions.

And as promised, here are the skills that match each question above: 1) New Business Development 2) Accessing Key Players 3) Qualification and Positioning 4) Establishing Value 5) Opportunity Management/Forecasting 6) Negotiation.

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What Makes a Team Great? Torrey Pines High School Girls Nat’l Champions

great teaamAbout 45 minutes after the Torrey Pines High School (TPHS, San Diego, CA) Girls Volleyball team beat Marin Catholic for the California State Title (CIF), the squad walked back into the lobby of the college gym where the match was held. The families of the players, including my wife and me, were waiting there to greet the girls following their straight sets victory on November 23. Shortly after their entrance, the tears of joy began to flow from players, Coaches and parents, as the energy in that foyer was so positive, loving, fulfilling and FUN! 

The hugs, high fives, pictures with the CIF State Champs trophy went on for a while. And then, the dancing began:    LINK  

As a Sophomore on the Varsity team, our daughter Hannah was treated well by everyone (see #3 below), got court time in some matches and played against the best in the country during their team practices. She, as did the other underclasswomen, learned a lot about the sport, but most importantly about what it means to be on a TEAM. A life lesson for being a part of a school, family, community, sports team and while giving back. 

TPHS Girls Volleyball TEAM is, as the father of an opponent said who we beat a week earlier, a “well-oiled machine”. And there is no coincidence/luck around how the girls did it. They did what great TEAMS do, to include the following: 

  1. Worked Hard: yes, they do have 7 girls who will play Division One College volleyball, but that didn’t stop them from laying it all out in practice and in matches. Yes, we all have to practice.
  2. Skills Focused: Hannah said her Coach told them whoever serves, passes and plays the best defense will win. They did, and they did. Never mentioned hitting or setting? 
  3. Leader Led without Egos: 5 Seniors in the starting 6, and 2 others on roster set the tone. It is about TEAM, not individuals. 3 Ivy League bound players were treated the same as the Sophomores…. no hierarchy. 
  4. Mindset & Belief: they knew they were excellent, took nothing for granted (as written on the back of their practice jerseys) and believed in themselves 
  5. Stick Together: high or low, on a hot streak or fighting to come back, they never wavered in their unity 
  6. Have Fun: they danced before and after matches, went to lunches together without Coaches, and spent time off the court hanging out. They like and trust each other, and it shows. 

As the cherry on top to a great season, a few days after the State Championship, three (out of four) of the top volleyball ranking organizations named them the Number One team in the country. Wow, it just was so wonderful, and has been a source of pride in their school and our community. 

In the end, it’s not necessarily about volleyball, or any sport. It is how we behave in the organizations that are part of our life. And this shining example is one that Hannah and her teammates will carry for the rest of their lives, on and off the court. Congratulations girls, we love you! 

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10.5 Tips for a Successful Conference

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This article is written by Dennis Hoeft, an experienced Sales & Marketing Executive with 30+ years experience leading, selling, managing and merchandising in highly competitive product and sales environments.  

Attending an industry conference is a costly endeavor: various factors such as transportation, lodging & meals can add up quickly. Add to that your time and effort, and well, that’s quite an investment! If you are planning to attend a conference this year such as PITTCON, it’s important to get the most out of these events in order to maximize the return on your investment. Here are 10 ½ tips to help you do just that:  

1) Plan well in advance; most conferences provide an exhibitor list as well as a list of attendees, so prepare a list of key people you want to meet. 

2) Several weeks prior to the conference, set up meetings with the key people you identified on your list; if you try to approach someone during the conference without an appointment, you might be out of luck if their calendar is already full. 

3) A few days before the conference, confirm the meetings that you have previously scheduled. 

4) Plan to spend some time ‘walking the floor’; attendees should spend this time looking for new and innovative exhibitors. Exhibitors should use this time to stay on top of their industry and find out what the competition is doing. 

5) Network; this is a great opportunity to make new contacts and expand your professional circle. 

6) Sit in on different seminars; try to learn something new about your industry or profession. 

7) Attend the various social events: dinners, cocktail hours, etc . . . meet new people, network, now is not the time to sit back & relax! 

8) Bring plenty of business cards to hand out; and, when you receive someone’s card, write pertinent notes about that individual on the back of their card immediately after you meet them. 

9) At the end of each day, do a quick re-cap to see if you accomplished what you set out to accomplish; adjust the next day’s schedule if you missed something important. 

10) When the conference is over, review your action items to make sure that you have captured & summarized all of them. 

And finally….  

10.5) When you get back to your office, FOLLOW UP, FOLLOW UP, FOLLOW UP! Address all of your actions items. Connect with new contacts on LinkedIn. Reach out by email and phone to build these relationships. Do what you said you were going to do.

You’ll be glad that you did!

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7 Core Concepts for Sales Success

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Sales is a profession where so many variables come into play. The emotion of buyers and sellers, competing loyalties as to which is the “best” direction to go, and how to close the “big opportunity”. In his thematic song “Many Rivers to Cross”, Jimmy Cliff cites the trials and tribulations in life. How do we help sellers manage through this maze, and be consistent in orchestrating the outcomes?

We stick to The Core Concepts. Over the past 15 years, our customers and prospects have helped to validate the themes that they use to win. And we have consolidated this into the curriculum provided at our sales training sessions.

Have a look at the list we compiled here, and let us know your thoughts. Do you have any to add? Or would you edit what we embrace? Reply here to share.  

  1. Differentiate yourself by the way that you sell
  2. Focus on the customer’s business objective, not on your product/service
  3. Diagnose before you prescribe
  4. You gain credibility from the insights you provide & the questions you ask, not from the information you present
  5. People are best convinced by reasons they themselves discover
  6. Only the customer can validate your progress in the sales cycle
  7. Never make a concession without asking for one in return
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How You Sell Is The Differentiator

If you ask just about anybody, “What makes a good salesperson?,” you’ll probably get similar answers across the board. People will usually tell you a good salesperson is energetic and driven with good communication skills. But they will rarely mention that how one sells matters too. And it does.

Here’s a story to illustrate our point…

A salesperson was in the lobby with other salespeople from competing companies, waiting for her first meeting with a buyer who represented a very large piece of revenue. This was the biggest “fish” our salesperson had ever tried to catch and her meeting was scheduled for only 30 minutes. Time was short. Nerves were high. You could feel the tension in the room among the salespeople.

Finally, it was our salesperson’s turn to meet with the buyer.

When she got into her 30-miute meeting, she began to ask questions. She didn’t start with a sales pitch. She didn’t start out by pointing out how her company differed from those represented by the other salespeople who were waiting. Instead, she started out by asking questions. She asked business questions and questions about how the buyer operated and ran his business. Her questions engaged the buyer, but they were also strategic: She knew the questions to ask to position her product properly.

However, the buyer was surprised by her approach. After answering the first few questions, he stopped her and said, “Why are you asking me these questions? No salesperson has ever asked me these questions.” Our salesperson was standing out. The way she was selling was differentiating her not just from the other salespeople in the lobby, but also from all the salespeople this buyer was used to.

When she explained why the answers to her questions were important for them to discuss, his whole demeanor towards her changed. He settled into his chair and started taking her questions seriously, giving them thoughtful answers. He spent an hour and 15 minutes with her, going well over the allotted 30 minutes.

When our salesperson walked out at the end of the meeting, some of her competitors who had been waiting were rescheduling their appointments because the buyer had spent so much time with her. And because she had the extra time with the buyer and therefore extra insight, she had a definite competitive edge over her competition.

When it comes to sales, it’s about how you sell too.

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The 4 Most Important Hours of Your Business Week

Workers in the developed nations of the world spend anywhere from 35 to 60 hours per week at their jobs. Of the time spent, there are many different components that comprise the total work week. For the companies that we work with, the 4 most important hours in each week are the sacred hours spent developing new customers (four is a minimum; startup companies and new reps will need more).

Many organizations do not have the correct structure, process or tools in place to facilitate new business development efforts. And while almost all companies will commit extensive resources to attract and keep new customers, some fail to get their customer facing representatives to commit to a set standard of time, with procedures and tools, for new business development every week. Call reluctance, or the fear of making contact with prospects is one of the many reasons that some shy away. In reality, that fear can be mitigated with the tools and skills to maximize the time spent.

We have helped hundreds of salespeople to develop and execute new business development campaigns. The key tool that we build with our clients is designed to conduct targeted conversations. This allows the seller to pinpoint goals and relevant business issues of a specific title in a prospect organization through diagnostic questions in a conversational format. The skills needed to execute the tool are also honed in our engagements, and first line managers are given coaching sessions to reinforce and correct selling behavior.

The American Marketing Association stated that “The conversations field salespeople have with prospects and customers may be the last bastion of competitive differentiation in today’s rapidly commoditizing markets.” To get your organization in the right environment to grow requires that customer facing representatives commit to new business development activities, and have a platform to work from that helps them to get into a relevant conversation as quickly as possible.

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The CEO’s Top 4 Concerns About Sales

Today’s CEO has a lot to keep him or her up at night: regulations, compliance, automation, globalization, trade wars and talent management are only a handful of the pressing issues CEOs must contend with, although the highest priorities change with the times. One issue is always present on a CEO’s mind, however: sales.

What do CEOs really think about the sales arm of their organization? Even when the economy is strong and sales are up year over year, the CEO will have concerns. Here are the top four sales issues CEOs worry about, whether sales are up or sales are down, and how you can address them:

  1. The sales team is too slow. When the sales team is lagging 12 to 18 months behind the corporate strategy, opportunities are lost and goals are not met. If this is the case at your organization, take a look at how your sales team is or isn’t using technology to streamline and speed up the sales process. Technology enables agility. Put it to use.
  1. The sales team is calling too low. When the sales team fails to get to the right level in customer-prospect organizations, the sales process is slowed (see concern #1) or stalled altogether. If this is the case at your organization, make sure the team is doing the research necessary to reach out to the right person or position from the start. And remember, you’re referred to whom you sound like. So talk the talk and walk the walk of your ideal prospects.
  1. The sales team can’t diagnose business problems. The inability to diagnose business problems may be the reason salespeople are calling too low (see concern #2). The answer to this is coaching, coaching and more coaching. Harvard Business Review says effective coaching can improve sales productivity by 19%.
  1. The sales team can’t tell the story. Only a handful of CEOs think a typical salesperson can demonstrate an understanding of a prospect’s business issues and articulate how to solve the problem. This ties directly into concern #3. If this is an issue at your organization, start training your team to know the story and tell the story.

Did you notice that three out of four of these concerns have to do with knowing what to talk about, and not just whom to talk to? That means sales training is needed and processes put in place. Having a defined and customized sales process within your organization will help alleviate many of your CEO’s concerns about the sales team.

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How (and Why) to Write a Meeting Summary

Ideally, when you’re involved in a sales call, you will get into conversations with buyers that allow you to discuss primary business objectives (PBOs), challenges and capabilities. However, in many circumstances, you won’t get to all parts of the Discovery Map in one call, as time may have been limited. And this can be an opening for you to keep the process moving forward even if you ran out of time during the first meeting.  

If after that initial call you think there’s an opportunity to go back at another time and deliver a capabilities presentation, speak to another key player, or in some other keep the prospect engaged and the sales process moving along, write and submit a meeting summary. Include only the parts covered in your initial meeting and leave the open items as next steps. 

Setting the Stage for the Summary 

Before you finish with the face-to-face meetings or telephone calls with any of the sales leaders you are engaging, let them know that you will send them a summary of your discussion, and that you want their feedback on the summary as well as a time to meet to discuss next steps. This not only lets them know to expect the summary, but also engages them by asking for their input and paves the way for a follow-up meeting.  

How to Write Your Meeting Summary 

A typical outline for a meeting summary includes the following core parts, although this is determined by how much information you learned during the first meeting:  

  • Salutation 
  • An expression of gratitude for their time 
  • Identification of Primary Business Objective(s) 
  • Challenges they are facing in reaching the objective and the impact of those challenges (financial and others) 
  • Capabilities that would address the challenges (meaning your solutions or offerings) and the value that the capabilities would provide 
  • The timeline for the implementation of a solution 
  • Other key players who would be involved 
  • The budget that has been established for the project 
  • A clear request to schedule the next meeting  
  • A request that the recipient respond in writing to the meeting summary 

Make it a habit to follow up after each important sales call or meeting with a meeting summary. It will let your prospects know that you clearly understand their needs—or clarify if you don’t—and it will keep the sales momentum going. If you’re concerned that writing these meeting summaries will be time-consuming, create several different templates that consist of a standard format and content that you could re-purpose and re-use for similar meeting summaries for other clients.   

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Three Tactics Top Sellers Use to Demonstrate Value

In his book To Sell is Human, Daniel H. Pink describes selling as “the ability to move others to exchange what they have for what we have.” A sales person can help to facilitate that exchange in ways that are based on value and not just on the product he or she sells.  

When a client engages me to help their sales staff, I interview their top performers. My purpose is to decode their selling DNA and identify the markers that make them so successful. What do they all have in common? These people help others to meet their objectives by selling business value.  

Throughout all of the interviews I’ve conducted, I’ve learned there are three tactics these top sellers typically employ to do this, to achieve at a higher level than their peers. These tactics are: 

  1. Get to the cost of the problem today. Buyers face any number of problems. Great sales people help buyers define in totality all the costs those problems bring. The costs may be non-monetary, like low morale or frustration, and therefore are harder to quantify. But costs that strike at the bottom line are numbers that are understood and even felt by every person involved in making the buying decision. We once worked with a company whose industry was becoming saturated with competitive products, driving down the prices. When yours is the high-priced product in the market place, it seems every buyer asks about prices first. Great sellers can shape and frame conversations around the costs of the buyer’s problems, not on the price of their solution.    
  1. Tell stories. Stories help the buyers discover for themselves the problems they are facing or the solutions that are needed. Great sales people have several stories to draw from, stories that are personal experiences about past clients they’ve helped. The stories they choose to share depend on the situation or desired outcome. Sales people share their stories when the conversation lulls and the buyer is unable to articulate problems. Stories have structure. You begin them by framing who they are about, then you move on to describe their problem, a turning point, and a resolution. We worked with sales people from one company who were unable to clearly articulate the problems they were facing with buyers. Sales people began sharing what other buyers in their industry had problems with. They found that by sharing stories about successes and failures of their buyers’ peers, the buyers themselves found their voice and they were then able to begin sharing. Stories not only help sales people and prospects get to problems; they can also be used to describe how others use and derive business value from your products.   
  1. Summarize the conversation in writing. This is a follow-up that most sales people tell me they do, but few do it well. I sell my services to many companies in different industries. I am constantly referring to the meeting summary emails I’ve written as follow-up after our conversations. These emails summarize the problems they are facing, the costs these problems are causing, the solutions we talked about and value of those solutions, and, of course, the next steps we discussed. This helps both the customer and me to keep the focus on the problems we are trying to solve. Great sales people don’t rely on memory. They summarize the meeting conversation by writing it down, sharing it with the customer, and allowing the customer to give feedback on the summary. 

These are three techniques that great sales people use that help them sell on the business value their products will bring. And these techniques can easily be adapted by you and your sales team too.  

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Tips To Keep Your Sales Skills Sharp

Most of the companies that we call on, who are either a customer or a prospect, are experiencing solid results from this robust economy. Corporate earnings reports from Q2 showed higher than anticipated growth, unemployment is low, and new construction continues to flourish.

In this go-go economy, how can you tell if your sellers are making things happen or are simply on the receiving end of predisposed buying opportunities? Whether it is one or the other, or a combination of the two, NOW is the time to fine tune your sales organization’s selling skills. Waiting for the inevitable slowdown/downturn is risky business. 30 years ago, Harvey Mackay wrote a book called “Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty,” and that adage still holds true today.

Where to Start?  

Begin the process of selling skills improvement by giving your sales representatives a self-assessment of the Six Key Sales Skills needed to be successful. Next, grade the reps on your team with the same assessment and compare your results. The results will be a good starting point toward developing a coaching plan. If you’re looking for a good assessment, we will be happy to provide you with one—simply send a request to john@drive-revenue.com..

Proactive New Business Development, Needs Analysis, Solution Development, Access Key Players, Managing the Buying Process and Negotiation and Closing—those are the “Key Six”. Where does the team need help, and most importantly, where do individual reps need to improve? Once you complete your assessment, it’s time to establish a hard and fast—can’t be moved regardless of the excuse—coaching plan.

First Line Managers are Critical

Most First Line Sales Managers (FLMs) are “deal coaches”. By that, I mean they help sellers arrange the best product-service-price package for a new prospect or customer. While that is an important function, it is equally important to continuously develop the skills mentioned above. In many industries, professionals often practice their skills to carefully hone their craft, and sales should not be an exception.

FLMs are the window into a salesperson’s world, and once armed with the assessment output, can be a huge differentiator in the results a seller gets with a skills improvement coaching plan. The FLM should hone in on one or two skills at a time to help the seller improve. Trying to coach all skills all the time will only end up leaving the seller confused.

“In God We Trust, All Others bring Data”

This quote is from a German Vice President of Sales we worked with in the Frankfurt area. He wanted to see the information that a prospect or customer validated to show that his sales team was working on the right opportunities.

One of the sales process outputs he valued most was the deliverables that a seller shares with a prospect/customer as the buying process unfolds. Some are as simple as an email confirmation, while others involve more complex advancements. But once these communication pieces are in place, there is a direct correlation to the deliverables, sales process steps, and the corresponding selling skills that align with each. If certain pieces are missing, there is a high probability that the seller needs improvement in that skill.

Assess, Review Information and Coach the skills. Now is the time to put this platform in place to guide your sellers toward success.

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