In some form, if we work with others, we are all part of a sales team. We may write the content that is being sold or sell the space that the ads will go in. Either way, without the one, the other cannot survive. Without content, what can be sold? Without an ad to go in the content, how can money be made to pay the content writers? Every one in the office makes the sales department successful or horrible. Chemistry is a must.
Now, what about getting the sales team to work together and not be at each others’ throats trying to get the next commission. The office chemistry is so important that if the sales team is at odds within itself, the rest of the office might as well go home for the day.
I have talked with two sales managers about what has worked for them and what has not worked out to be profitable. Let’s look at two different situations that might be taking place in your office as we speak. The sales team that is divided up into sub-teams and each team given its own manager or the sales team that is every person for themselves and has one manager over them all. Which one will be the most profitable for your business and office chemistry?
Lets start with the sales team that is every body for themselves, each hunting down potential clients through e-mail contact or cold calling. This is successful at the smaller companies in the industry because it allows each salesperson to answer to no one but the boss. The CEO of the small company is also the sales manager or maybe there is one hired person to just be the sales manager. It is very easy to see how this methodology could be quickly outgrown by companies as the sales department grows, the demand for that sales manager’s time would grow. Everyone lobbying to be given permission for certain sales and authorization to do what may need to be done to make the sale, puts increased pressure on the manager.
Pressure would also be put onto the sales manager because they may have to be making sales as well if they are working for a small company. The company wouldn’t have the money to pay for an exclusive sales manager so if time were being spent helping and authorizing others, there would be no time to make sales for themselves. The sales manager, if over a large number of people, wouldn’t have time to create the background work for a client to optimize the sale. Small companies can really use this method very effectively to reach their profit goals. Again, the problem comes when they begin to grow. This leads us directly into our next sales situation.
The sales team that is broken up into a few different teams can now use its own individual leaders to help them. I recently interviewed two sales managers of a very successful online direct media corporation. Their names are Ray Deffry and Jack Hodgkin, Jr. and they had some great input on smaller groups within a sales team. They both agree that more than one team can provide an excellent friendly competition atmosphere especially when small incentives are involved. Mr. Deffry made an excellent point when he said, “Helping others on your team is very beneficial when incentives are involved both because of the incentive itself and because one sale often leads to others for the team.”
Another benefit of the multiple team method is that now a manager has more time to spend with each of their employees making them more successful. They have more time to motivate the team and test certain systems that may work better for the entire company. That is another benefit of having several teams; you can be testing several different selling techniques at the same time and finding the one that works for your company.
The main goal of any selling method should be to find which works best for your company so that profit capabilities can be maximized and proper sales goals can be set. Whether you have one large sales team or it is broken down into several smaller teams, Mr. Hodgkin made a great statement about sales managers when he said, “A manager’s number one goal should be to not make a sale for his or her employee, it should be to give them all the tools and training necessary to make that sale for themselves.”
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