For most companies, achieving predictable sales results is an obvious and crucial part of the execution strategy. It impacts just about everything the company does and how it performs its tasks. Or what it can or cannot do. It has impact on cash flow, profits, shareholder value, employee compensation, product development, Marketing activities, competitive positioning, just to name a few.
With the recent economic recovery in mind, it is time to look at one of the most critical parts of your organization: Sales!
During the recent economic downturn, many – if not most – companies were faced with the daunting task of reorganizing and redesigning their companies and budgets, mainly because of stagnant sales. ‘Survival of the fittest’ and ability to transform organizations to cope with sluggish sales became the prime management focus. And many companies have been able to survive, much to the credit of their management teams and the tremendous efforts, long hours and flexibility of the employees.
As we are slowly seeing a revamp of sales and overall confidence in the economy, it is time to (again) take a look at our current Sales organization. A number of questions to ask:
– Is the ‘lean’ sales model that is now in place capable of capturing a bigger market?
– Or are we still in survival mode and are we afraid the step up to a bigger play?
– Is our coverage model (‘who sells where’) scalable in a growing market?
– Have the markets that the company serves changed in a way that it now has different expectations from its supplies and key players? In other words: is the way we sell still valid and does what we sell still make sense?
– Since sales training and development have been mostly under-funded in the last couple of years: what skills sets and capabilities need to be developed to capture a larger share of a growing market? What is the skills gap?
– Are sales quota’s and budgets still realistic?
There are more things to consider, but this a good starting point. Obviously these are important questions and the sooner you start looking for answers, the better off your organization will be.
Sales Factors
‘Sales’ is a complex thing with many attributes and a variety of answers to the above questions. Let us look as some of the factors that shape a successful sales organization:
– There are the usual 4P’s: (Product, Place, Promotion and Price) to consider. Old school, but still very valuable. But don’t just look at them in a traditional way. Look beyond what you already know or what you are used to. Look for fresh ideas, new markets and new businesses. Involve more or different people in this discussion than you used to. People who are knowledgeable and know how to execute
– Re-evaluate your existing sales process (that is: if you have one). Start at the end of the process: a satisfied, buying, customer – and then work your way backwards to the begining of the process: finding a qualified lead. What is the shortest and most effective route from Z to A? Make sure you involve a representative set of customers in your discussions to figure this out!
– Understand your customers’ typical buying processes and ALIGN your sales process with that. Did you know that each time the sales cycle is one step off (either forward or behind) with the customer buying cycle, it reduces the chance of winning by ~15%?
– Make sure that the checks and balances in the sales process are still valid for the ‘new economy’. What worked in the past may not necessarily be optimized for the current condition. Try to keep the steps (or phases) in the sales process limited, so that it is easy to measure and manage them.
– And more than ever: hold people accountable for progressing through the sales cycles. Define the ‘exit criteria’ to go from one phase in the sales cycle to the next. This has a great impact on forecasting accuracy! The rules of the (sales) game may have changed over the past couple of years. Holding on to what we knew worked in the past, may be misleading and may result in unrealistic (forecasting) expectations.
Core Competencies
Simply put: a core competency is something that makes you unique, something that is hard to imitate for someone else. The past challenging period of economic uncertainty has helped many companies to recognize what their core competencies are. You simply had to focus on less, given the reduction of available resources.
But remember: your competitors went though the same process and may have shifted their sales focus. Which could mean: 1) there are markets out there that no-one is addressing well, or 2) you may have lost your (cutting) edge in certain markets and need to rethink your (sales and go-to-market) strategies once more.
Along these lines a few questions to think about:
– Are you defending a market or are you creating one?
– Are you just worried about benchmarking, or are you looking to outpace your competitors?
– Are you merely looking to satisfy needs or are you anticipating needs?
– Are you just focused on your core business as you know it, or are you using your core competencies to diversify?
The sooner you take a fresh look at sales ‘after the bump’ (and what impacts it), the better it is. Let’s move away from the era downturn and doom to one of prosperity, excitement and yes: courage!
2004 Arnold Adriaanse
Arnold Adriaanse has more than 25 years of experience developing and
managing global Sales, Marketing, Professional Services and Product
teams for companies including Oracle Corporation, Aspect
Communications, Novell, and eGain Communications. Throughout Mr.
Adriaanse’s career he has consistently improved revenues, netting
improvements that range from 30 to 70%. Mr. Adriaanse has extensive
experience managing Global F-100 Global Account teams.
