Sales Performance

Sales Contest That Keep The Whole Team Motivated

In a world where revenue is king, it’s natural to design your sales incentives programs to reward those with the highest sales. While this method make sense, it’s flawed. It keeps top performers motivated but doesn’t engage the rest of the team who can’t see themselves in that top spot.

Sales contests are a great way to motivate the whole team. Beyond rewarding sales and revenue, they offer the ability to reward many different types of increased action that align with your organization’s Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). Rewarding different types of KPIs will increase rep confidence in their ability to compete and will allow them to reassess their potential impact on the outcome of the game.

This positive setting will lead to greater results in the contest and healthier competition that boosts the morale of the whole team and not just the usual top reps and reminds the team that there are many ways to make an impact. This is important because while sales reps are typically tracked and rewarded for their individual sales, the main goal of the sales team is to improve the sales for the entire organization.

Benefits of Sales Contests

By nature, humans are very competitive beings. It has come from millennia of competing for resources and status. For those two reasons we compete with each other on almost every level and in almost every way possible whether it has to do with school, sports, work, or even the greenness of your lawn. Competition gives people a sense of pride and purpose.

With that in mind, sales managers and leadership can capitalize on human tendency through sales competitions. The main goals of sales competitions should be to increase individual performance, elevate team activity, and boost overall morale.

Tips for Planning Sales Contests

The best way to get everyone excited about a new sales contest is to ensure that no individual has an upper hand from the start. In order for a sales competition to guarantee a level the playing field between top and bottom performing reps, implement rules or mechanisms of:

1. Chance

2. Measurement of activity

With mechanisms of chance, the winners of the sales games are less likely to always be dominated by top reps because their normal strategies of making sales become irrelevant. Along those same lines, the outcomes based on measurable amounts of activity also inhibits the top sellers from dominating the games if they are unwilling to put in the effort that the bottom reps are able and willing to do.

The reason for applying these two characteristics to the sales games is that it makes every rep equal from the start and encourages healthy competition. Let’s face it, nobody is thrilled to compete in or win a game when the outcome is practically predetermined.

25 Sales Contest Ideas to Motivate Your Team

Below you will find a list of 25 sales contest ideas managers can use to motivate reps and increase performance. You’ll see the goal for each one, as well as how they work.

1 | Daily Prize

It may seem that holding a daily contest makes the competition trivial because many of the prizes are small and not of great value. The key to this strategy is that it keeps the reps constantly engaged.

Since the prizes are given daily, the lead or sales tracker is reset each day so that there will be a wider range of possible winners.

Raffle tickets

2 | Raffle

A raffle is a good way to incentivize reps to achieve short-term goals while being able to win a larger and more lucrative prize. Raffle tickets are given to reps when they reach specific sales goals and the prize is generally only drawn after a long-term sales period has passed.

The secret to holding a good raffle is ensuring that every participant has a measurable and achievable goal that can earn them a chance to get a raffle ticket and enter the drawing.

3 | Customer Reviews

A customer review contest requires a little bit of front-end work from the standpoint that there needs to be an easy way for the reps to obtain a review whether it is good or bad. The easiest way to go about this is to set up a customer survey or take advantage of an already existing survey process.

A customer review contest requires a little bit of front-end work from the standpoint that there needs to be an easy way for the reps to obtain a review whether it is good or bad. The easiest way to go about this is to set up a customer survey or take advantage of an already existing survey process.

Besides receiving the always nice pat-on-the-back from a satisfied customer and the public recognition from upper management, this contest encourages reps to not just be good at selling a product but also be ready to get a review of their service for better or for worse.

4 | Salesperson of the Month

This one is a classic and is often ran as one. The winner is generally the sales rep with the most revenue in sales. But just because this contest carries the classic title doesn’t mean the item being measured has to be classic as well.

Get creative and aim for something unique such as the most individual sales, the most “Nos”, the most reviews good or bad, or the most helpful with coaching other sales reps. Either way you measure it and reward it, the winning sales rep will always enjoy having everyone else see their name and photo on the office wall for an entire month.

5 | Winner’s Choice

A winner’s choice is where the winner gets to decide what the prize will be for either themselves or the next month’s winner, with obvious monetary limits or choices set by management beforehand. It’s a simple way to not have to get too creative and the benefit is you’re less likely to have someone complain about the prize.

6 | I OWE U! (from the boss)

An I OWE U from a superior is always a fun sales contest and cause for excitement on the sales team. It’s best to set a structured timeline and goal well in advance. Since it will most likely be you or someone near you fulfilling the debt, it is best to make clear the prize or selection of prizes.

If you want to get a solid gauge as to what type of debt your sales reps are looking for, then have them submit their requests ahead of the contest and you can select one of the prizes as long as they are not too outrageous.

Common prizes for the winner may include eating/cooking lunch together, giving professional coaching sessions, washing and cleaning their car, or even more humorous things such as performing karaoke to their favorite song in front of the whole team.

7 | On a Boat (Boss for the day)

It is a pretty simple prize for whatever the contest may be. The winner gets to be boss for a day or some variation of it. You could let them take your position for the day, sit at your desk, pick the location for the next company lunch, or run a meeting. Either way the winner will be happy to hear all day long those two sweet words come out of your mouth, “Yes Boss!”.

8 | Sales Poker

This is another fun sales contest that requires each participant to acquire 5 cards out of a 52-card deck. Each card is earned by achieving an established goal. At the end of the sales period, the sales rep with the best hand wins the prize. It is an easy game that allows all participating sales reps a chance to win, even if they weren’t necessarily the best performing sales rep for that period.

9 | Lead Conversion

The premise of this sales competition is that leads are handed out randomly and evenly to the sales reps and the one person or group to convert the most leads into sales during a specific timeframe wins the prize. This sales game allows for a winner by chance since some reps might get more quality leads than others.

10 | The Whopper (or Top This)

What’s a whopper without its lettuce and tomato? The trick to winning this contest is to be the one to upsell the customer the most. The length of the sales period can vary and the prize along with it.

11 | Most Wanted

This is similar to the “Whopper” contest but differs in what types of leads are handed out. In this sales competition the manager identifies and hands out leads of the biggest leaders in the industry. No small fish here nor any random ones either. These leads are highly desirable targets and the sales rep or team that lands the biggest single sale wins.

12 | Upsell Contest

This sales game is designed to reward sales reps for upselling and increasing revenue from existing partners. Some options for measuring the upsell progress and determining a winner is to select either the largest upsell dollar amount earned, the largest upsell percentage earned relative to the client’s prior account history, or the highest amount of client’s that are upsold.

13 | Sales Bingo

Bingo is always a good time. Turn it into a sales contest by making the squares represent different sales goals. What makes this sales game fun is that it requires skill and luck. The skill to make the goal on each square and the luck to get them in the correct sequence.

14 | Most No’s (in a single week)

The Most No’s game is a fun and creative sales contest idea used to stir the sales team pot. The reason is because it seems so counterintuitive to be wanting more rejection. In reality, it drives an increase in sales activity and the likelihood of a rep getting a “Yes”.

The goal of the game is to see who can get the most No’s/rejections within a sales period whether it is a day, a week, or a month. Generally, the game shouldn’t last longer than a week since the longer the game continues, the less competitive it becomes. The gap between the lowest and the highest “No’s” counts gets wider.

15 | The Loser

It never pays to be the loser but sometimes the loser does pay. Simply put, the loser of the sales contest pays an amount towards a company party or something fun that in the end everyone will get to enjoy.

Be sure to make the amount somewhat insignificant, like $20, so that the loser won’t be too upset when they have to pay up. Some good ideas for where the money go are holiday parties, company picnics, team lunches, happy hour events, or even have a charity chosen by the team.

16 | Retention-Based Sales Contest

In most industries, the companies that are the most profitable aren’t usually making one-time sales but are instead focused on creating repeat sales with the same clients. Sales reps will often get focused on landing new clients instead of catering to the known clients that have already given them their business.

To create a more loyal client base, it’s recommended to have some sales contest ideas fixated on encouraging sales reps to garner loyal and repeat business. One way to do this is to hang up in the office a repeat business whiteboard. The goal of displaying their individual progress is to help them visualize their individual contribution to the company’s loyal client base.

17 | Enterprise-Level Sales Contests

Keep your team motivated and take away the focus on individual sales. Create a fun sales contest where offices compete against other offices or managers against managers. This is all about boosting team morale, creating a greater team cohesion and losing the emphasis on the individual.

A satisfying reward for the winning team or manager is often just bragging rights.

18 | Time-Reward Sales Contests

A high motivator and fun sales contest idea that gets the competitive juices flowing is a reward of time off. It suggested to use this reward near the end of a sales cycle because sales reps will sometimes hold off on making certain deals so when the next sales period starts, they have a deal ready to go in their pocket.

The rewards can range from leaving early on a Friday, arriving late on a low volume day, or even a paid time off (PTO) day.

19 | Buddy Up

Use the buddy system. Pair your top sales reps with the lower performers and reward the top sales team at the end of the month. The main result of this exercise will be greater team collaboration and the lower performers will have a chance to learn what makes their highly productive counterpart so effective.

20 | Pitch Contest

In this contest, top producers anonymously submit their sales pitch and the team tries to guess who’s each one is. At the end of all the submissions the whole team can vote on whose pitch they liked the most. All participants get to keep a copy of the pitches which they can learn from and use moving forward.

21 | Sales Team Scavenger Hunt

Frequently, a sales team has members that have become specialists in selling specific products or targeting certain clients. The scavenger hunt sales contest encourages your sales reps to team up and utilize their special talents to accomplish an objective.

The objectives can range from reaching a set revenue goal to selling a specific product to accomplishing a certain number of upsells. As the team members work together to fulfill their scavenger hunt objectives, they will naturally increase collaboration, boost morale, and drive sales.

22 | Surprise Salesperson Appreciation

Don’t let a team member go unnoticed even if they aren’t at the top of the charts. Choose a day when the entire team brings in a little gift or letter showing their appreciation for a chosen team member. Sales reps are notorious for being hyper-competitive and will often lose sight of keeping the overall morale high. Show every team member they are important to the success of the business and each other.

23 | Brackets

Much like college basketball’s March Madness, this sales game breaks the team into brackets. Each team member competes against a fellow sales rep and the one that out-sales the other during that week advances in the ranks.

As the weeks go on the competition gets more intense as the winning reps advance. At the end, the winning team member (and potentially the runner-up) gets a prize.

24 | Fantasy Sales Teams

Fantasy football teams have infiltrated the office water cooler, so why not take some of that competitive talk and let it infiltrate the sales team? Break your sales team up and simulate a random draft pick. Points are then awarded to each team’s “player”’ for their sales. The manager or team that earns the most fantasy points in the end wins the competition.

25 | Traveling Trophy (Floating Prize)

Each sales period the sales rep with the highest sales gets awarded a trophy to display on their desk. As long as they stay on top of their game, the trophy stays in their hands. When they are knocked off their highest sales pedestal, the winning rep takes the trophy and displays it at their desk.

As silly as it may seem, the flaunting of a decently sized gleaming trophy at a fellow team member’s desk can spark the competitive edge a manager is looking for in their team. Add a little more emphasis to the sales games and post pictures of each week’s winners in the breakroom.

Common sales contest mistakes to avoid when setting up your contest:

While running sales contests can definitely boost morale, they do come with a risk. Be sure to avoid these common mistakes which can cause the opposite of the intended effect.

1 | Your contest only motivates top salespeople and fails to reach your team as a whole.
2 | It fails to hold your employees’ interest after the first few days.
3 | Improvements in performance do not last once the contest is over.
4 | It creates a competitive environment that hurts collaboration and employee spirit.
5 | Scores are tedious and time-consuming to track.

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com or comment below.

SPOTIO is the #1 field sales automation and performance management software that will increase revenue, maximize profitability, and boost sales productivity.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

Sales Technology: Cost or Investment?

Sales technology is vital to understanding the way that your company communicates with its customers and the areas where your teams perform their best. Without the metrics, projections and all-inclusive data-capturing from a good sales platform, every stage of business suffers. From lead nurturing to cold calling, information and communication statistics are critical to making data-driven decisions.

Implementing a SaaS platform to support sales can make or break a business, carrying benefits which far outweigh the cost of software and services. Here’s a closer look at how sales technology should be seen as an investment in the future of your business rather than an expense.

Tech Stack’s Many Financial Benefits

Every growing enterprise needs a flexible sales platform which empowers reps and managers with all the information that they need to optimize marketing and conversions. Integrating a trusted solution such as SPOTIO improves service delivery and internal organization within an enterprise on numerous levels.

One could summarize the key savings benefits of an investment in sales technology as:

Unified Communications – Lower Communications Costs
Enhanced Productivity – Increased Profitability
More Profitable Marketing Campaigns
Lowered Cost of Outside Sales
Zero Data Backup Expenditure
Reduced Training Expenses
Faster Onboarding
Lower Labor Costs

Yet, good sales technology brings so much more than a basic increase in revenues and these eight rewards. Let us take you through a concise but comprehensive look at exactly what you can expect in features and value when taking on the cost of new sales technology.

Free and Cheap Software vs Dedicated Sales Technology

Many enterprises start off from meagre roots and end up adopting sales and marketing software gradually. Resorting to freeware packages and low-cost sales solutions may appear to be enough to start with but businesses quickly learn that more powerful software is needed.

What begins as a few customizations perhaps with the help of a technically-minded colleague soon turns into countless support calls, more hours billed and a configuration which involves so many apps that staff struggle to navigate the system. Yet the frustration is but a hallmark of much larger problems that can occur.

Running multiple databases devoted to different departments of sales and marketing can lead to everything from accounting errors to outright corruption of your valuable data.

Implementing dedicated sales technology will let you manage your leads, opportunities, customers and staff from a singular interface and unified database. Offsite data backups alone cost a fortune. When you resort to a SaaS provider, you’re not only reaping the benefits of a comprehensive customer relationship management platform with sales assistance, but you’re also investing in a secure backup for your critical data at no extra cost.

Automation and Your Enterprise

Cutting-edge sales technology supplies a business with expansive automation technology which can handle everything from document management and service queues to email marketing and up-sales.

Investing in sales technology can be seen as an investment in automation rather than an expense. When one looks at automated emails alone, open rates at 70.5% higher and click-throughs are 152% more likely. The dedicated templates, marketing, and email automation delivered by good sales technology gives proven results which are hard to match by any other expenditure.

The best part is that the benefits are forever increasing as you and your staff learn to harness the full scope of your sales system. The best sales software will have a learning curve which makes it easy for staff to adapt.

For example, SPOTIO is so user friendly that your sales reps are up and running and fully familiar within just one to three days after implementation. Within the first week of implementation, your sales technology will be used for everything from accessing prospect data on the move to sharing a collaborative calendar with the rest of the workforce. Real-time chat with managers and other staff ensures that everyone is in the loop while workflow automation and advanced queue management keep all processes as efficient as possible. Even field agents will be able to fit more in their day with optimized route planning and time tracking.

The benefits of sales automation are all-encompassing and vastly offset the cost of software.

Sales Tech and Lead Nurturing

Another key benefit of sales technology is the way that it supports your sales and marketing teams at every step of the sales process. Lead nurturing is integral to increasing your sales and conversions. After all, nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than prospects which have not undergone lead nurturing.

Lead nurturing is so much more than just a string of emails, transferring a clear idea of the buyer intent in an attempt to secure their business.

Good sales technology will give you intelligent reports which reveal the interests of prospective buyers and their behaviors, as well as logical groupings. With this leverage, your sales teams will begin to truly customize communication with leads and prospects. Managers are given a clear overview of the prospect as well as their place within the buying cycle. Good lead management is critical to success. Without this vantage, customizing emails and other marketing efforts is limited while estimations of any sales probability are nothing more than blind speculation.

Any lead nurturing campaign which hasn’t clearly identified a perspective to educate, individualize, and inform your prospect will most likely be time and money wasted.

Sales technology may require an initial expenditure, but complete profiles with a full buyer history and crystal-clear reports covering the whole sales cycle is invaluable.

HR, Team Optimization and Performance Metrics

When one compares the cost of sales technology to the cost of incorrectly placed sales reps, teams or managers, one will soon see just how valuable platform insights truly are.

Sales technology lets you keep track of individuals and sales teams.

With metrics and reporting available for activities and goals, you’ll always be able to shift your staff to the most productive place within the sales cycle. Certain reps will always be better at handling a particular demographic or a specific stage of your sales campaign. Businesses that forgo the cost of dedicated sales technology have no accurate way of assessing the performance of their teams, reps, and campaigns. One could see the minimal savings of going without sales software as money wasted rather than money saved.

Productivity is at the heart of profitability and without refining your management and internal optimization, a business is pouring valuable time and money into wasteful prospects and inefficient strategies. Efficient staff management which relies upon hard performance data brings improvement to the productivity of the entire workforce. With staff spending less time putting together information and formulating an approach, studies show that customer service labor costs drop by up to 40%.  

Enriching Online Content

Regardless of whether you’re utilizing field or outside sales, inside sales, or a combination of both, sales technology enables strategic management decisions and effective internal communication. The cost of sales technology is minimal when you consider that it supports remote sales, in-store sales, and it helps you enrich your online content. Sales is a segment of business which requires devoted resources in every industry. But the truth of the matter is that almost 80% of all buyers research your product and read reviews online creating a firm bias for their purchase before they interact with any member of your sales team.

The enriched reporting and data available concerning your buyer’s habits, preferences and the way that they interact with your website and online services is invaluable to any enterprise. Good software will give you the information needed to shape the best experience for your customers while delivering key insights as to how you need to improve your brand presence and marketing automation.

Website upgrades, feature improvements and extended functionality is wasted expenditure unless you have factual data indicating the efficacy of the upgrade. Leading platforms let you know exactly what needs to change to meet the needs of your customer. Field CRM software and current sales technology like SPOTIO makes your business more accessible online. It gives you the information that you need to customize the user-experience in the most lucrative ways to lead viable prospects to your sales teams.

Invest in Sales Software & Invest in Sales Prospects

Sales prospecting and the identification of potential new leads is the most challenging part of the sales process. Most salespeople find closing the next most difficult, followed by lead qualification itself. The sheer difficulty of assessing the viability of a new prospect has lowered over the years thanks to SaaS solutions.

When you give your staff the tools they need to successfully prospect a new sale or sales demographic, the challenge is transformed from a painstaking process into a profitable, exciting chase to exceed quota. Reaching out to leads in an effort to spark a conversation inspiring a sale is made much easier when you have access to a database which incorporates a full history of all prior customer communications, preferences and habits.

Profiling the most viable socio-economic demographic becomes a matter of analyzing hard facts, easy to read graphs, and in-depth comparative reports. 96% of all buyers will schedule a meeting5 with your staff if you focus exclusively upon the value delivered to them.

Sales technology lets you see where your customers perceive value in your product or service so that your teams know exactly how to formulate their approach.

Sales Technology and Effective Collaboration

The cost of sales technology can be equated to an investment in smart selling. There’s no better way to improve synergy between different sales teams. Cross-collaboration is up to 25% more productive on average while 73% of all sales teams find sales technology essential to collaboration across different departments of an enterprise.

Good sales software will not only streamline internal processes and personalize marketing and sales, but it will also facilitate clear communication across all channels and all departments. The vast majority of sales reps recognize that their capabilities to gain a single overview of all-important aspects of a customer is severely hindered without the aid of proven sales technology. Only 17% of all teams are happy with their unified customer profiles. The importance of aggregated data should never be underestimated.

Without efficiently integrated data from departments like marketing or service deployment, sales have a hard time delivering the best customer experience across the most effective channels. Inter-department communication puts the customer in the most capable hands at any point of your sales pipeline. Critical information arrives immediately which improves the favorable image of your company and frees up pressure on internal workflows. Siloed departmental systems are simply not efficient enough to give sales the edge that they need to stay competitive in today’s markets.

Forgo sales technology and you could be throwing away valuable customers, conversions, and sales.

The Importance of Proper Territory Management

Opting for a dedicated outside sales solution such as SPOTIO enables sales reps to optimize every area of business. From route optimization to territory management, SPOTIO B2B sales technology delivers an average efficiency increase of 46%. Territory and route management software supplies the insights needed to make informed decisions concerning your sales structure. It will increase sales within enterprises of all sizes and is near essential to large, complex organizations.

There are simply so many variables available to sales leaders when asked to improve performance and conversions that attempting to maximize returns without the help of dedicated software accrues a massive cost in time and manpower. Sales responsibilities need to be balanced across your enterprise. The correct customers need to be targeted by the right sales teams based on sales potential, geography, socio-demographic factors, performance history and current relevant statistics.

Sales technology gives your business the highest potential for securing a new opportunity by giving you all the tools you need to implement intelligent territory management. Mapping territories with the help of a dedicated platform is quick and easy. This means that your reps and managers will be equipped detailed profiles and maps filled with qualified prospects in just minutes.

What’s time worth to your business?

Saving Your Company Onboarding Costs

When you know your workload and the balance which your employees are currently maintaining, then you can onboard new reps more efficiently, skyrocketing the process of reaching full productivity.

Onboarding normally comes with a definite period of adjustment whereby new sales reps are learning customers and company protocol. Businesses which resort to a complex arrangement of individual software packages and pen-and-paper management solutions end up costing the company a significant tally of resources to get new staff up to speed. The simpler your sales system and the more diverse your SaaS platform, the more momentum onboarding gains. Instead of wasting hours on the road coming to know your customers and prospects, reps are allowed the full value of their most powerful asset – time.

The Sales Management Association carried out a study and found that 62% of all businesses feel that they are ineffective at onboarding despite it being a prime area of focus for sales leaders. The only way to increase the efficacy of training programs and the adoption of existing customers and leads without excessive HR staffing costs is to invest in proven sales technology.

Projections, Estimates & Quotas

Sales quotas are assigned on-the-fly far too often.

This leads to a massive productivity loss, unnecessary traveling expenses, and can even ruin your chances with a customer forever if your rep’s timing is terrible. Managers and upper level staff assign responsibilities based on quotas and projections which cannot carry any acceptable degree of accuracy without sales technology being used. Even onboarding and training costs scale sky-high in many businesses due to nothing other than a lack of information and comparative insight. Reps get assigned unrealistic goals and quotas which, other than sucking resources from your business, also drain motivation and enthusiasm. This in turn causes a long-term negative effect on your rep and his or her performance.

Poor customer placement due to speculation rather than reporting and analytics is another cause of collapsing conversions. Good sales software removes all the guesswork allowing every department of your business to strategize with minimal risk. As each decision, delegation and organizational change in your enterpriser is set in place, growth can be relied on rather than a blind-chase towards an earnest estimated goal.

Massive ROI from Sales Technology

No less than 50% of all sales teams report improved productivity after implementing sales technology. Despite the many benefits and numerous ways that you can see sales technology as an asset to your business, many enterprises bring decisions down to a basic deciding factor of return on investment.

Those eager to adopt new sales software and systems will be happy to know that this $36 billion industry delivers a whopping ROI of 245% on average. Over and above this sizable sum, your sales technology will also grow your revenues by 24% per-over-year as your database scales in size and detail.

The more data your software or field sales enablement platform amasses, the greater the scope of its capabilities, accuracy, and benefit to sales. With more information comes efficiency and efficacy improvements, better sales insights, and stronger bonds with existing customers.

From supporting canvassing and customer retention to expanding your marketing reach and even directly boosting revenues, sales technology comes at a fractional cost when you compare it to the massive value added to your ever-expanding enterprise.

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com or comment below.

SPOTIO is the #1 field sales automation and performance management software that will increase revenue, maximize profitability, and boost sales productivity.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

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References:

1 – https://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/email-marketing/2018/12/70-email-marketing-stats-you-need-to-know/
2 – https://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/3421285/Bbdboom%20Oct2017/BBD%20Boom%20Blog/BOOM-How-to-manage-leads.pdf
3 – https://blog.capterra.com/easy-and-affordable-crms-for-small-business/
4 – https://www.outerboxdesign.com/web-design-articles/mobile-ecommerce-statistics
5 – https://blog.hubspot.com/sales/prospecting-stats
6 – https://www.salesforce.com/au/blog/2017/07/is-collaborative-selling-the-answer-to-increased-productivity-an
7 – https://spotio.com/solutions/business-to-business/
8 – https://www.brainshark.com/ideas-blog/2018/september/sales-enablement-statistics?language=pt-br
9 – https://learn.g2crowd.com/sales-statistics
10 – https://www.readycloud.com/info/21-CRM-Facts-Your-Business-Needs-to-Know-Now

Ask the Right Questions, Close More Deals

You’re there to sell something, but how can you come across as not selling and why is this important? It’s important because no one wants to feel like they’re being sold to. As soon as a person realizes they’re the subject of a sales pitch, human nature kicks in and they will instinctively shut you out. However, this relationship can be salvaged. If you know how to ask the right questions, at the right time, and in the correct tone, your prospects won’ feel like they’re being sold to. The result: more closed deals. 

Being able to connect with a potential client by asking the right questions is the key to becoming a  success sales rep.

Here are some persuasive words that a sales rep can use to get more deals to close…

Amazing. This word pulls on emotion and causes people to take action. It’s best to use it sparingly in describing things that merit excitement.  

Example: Try this amazing new, faster, updated version of [fill in the blank].

Avoid. Help your customer better achieve their goals while protecting against a loss.

Example: Avoid a larger bill with your current hosting provider and save $500 a month with us.

Because. If a reason of why something needs to be done, they are more likely to respond the way you want them to.

Example: Excuse me, I have 5 pages. May I use the Xerox machine, because I’m in a rush?

First. Denotes exclusivity and grabs the potential clients attention. It introduces the element of surprise.

Example: I’d like to show you the latest product updates.

Fix. If you show your potential client you can fix the issues they face, you earn a their business and repeat business.

Free. Using zero decreases the price and increases the value.  

I don’t know. Never mislead your potential client! They will know and won’t do business with you. By admitting you don’t know something builds trust with your potential client. The best way to admit, “I don’t know” is by directly saying it, then using the client’s unanswered question as a follow-up item.

Imagine. Customers who have a firm understanding of how they would implement your offer are more likely to buy. Paint a picture or draw out your proposal compared to what they have.

Now. Demonstrate the benefits prospects may receive if they buy your product or lease your software NOW. Be clear about the benefit now.

Example: How would this product help you or your business now?

Save. Frame an opportunity as a clear win for prospects and existing users.

Example: Sign up for your first month and get 10% off.

Simple. Depicts there’s a small (or non-existent) learning curve and low switching costs.

Unusual. Customers want to try something different and feel they have something that no one else is doing. Customers will also feel like innovating.

We. It’s important to get the customer to feel you both are on the same team. “We” puts the potential client/client in a team mindset.

10 closing phrases to help you close the deal:

#1.  The assumptive close. Assumes the potential client has decided.

“When should we get started on implementation?”
“What delivery date would you like?”
“Which [package, tier, bundle] are you going with?”

#2. Ask for the sale.

“Is there any reason if I’m improving your overall health insurance (or whatever your selling) coverage, and keeping the price competitive, you wouldn’t want to get started now?”

“If I can (overcome objection), would you like to move forward?”

#3. Ask how they heard about your product/service. Reminds them of why they’re interested and why they’re meeting with you.

“How did you hear about us (product, brand)?”

#4. What are your must haves, could haves you require. This qualifies the prospect so you know what you need to do to close the deal.

“In order for you to move forward, what specs/features/services do you require”

#5. Find out who all the decision makers are and if they can join the meeting.  This seems obvious. Granted, it’s NOT always possible but if you can, you will have a better chance of closing the deal if everyone is on the same page with the same information.

“Are you the only one that makes these decisions or do I need to also speak with someone else?”

#6. Find out which other services they’re evaluating. This allows you to find out the pros and cons of the other competitors to do a comparison of what you’re offering, what the benefits are and why your option is better. Sometimes they won’t offer the information but if you can get it, that’s great!

“What other services/products are you comparing us with?”

#7. Find out what the timeline is for making a decision. This will give you an idea of how long it may take to close the deal.

“When do you plan to (buy, change, etc.)? Is it in a couple of days, weeks, months or years?”

#8. What’s your budget:. You have a bigger chance of closing the deal if you can give them what they want and keep it in their budget.

“What’s your budget?”
“What can you afford?”
“What are you planning on spending?”

#9. When was the last time you made a purchasing decision for a solution like ours?

“When was the last time you purchased a solution like this?”
“Have you purchased a concept like this and if so, when?”

#10. What’s the reason you reached out to us.  Asking this question you will get a few reasons on what you need to focus on to close the deal. It will also give you insight into what your best sources of Marketing are and where to put Marketing dollars in the future.

“I’m curious, what made you reach out to us/me?”

In summation, don’t be afraid to ask the right questions to get the deal. Figure out a road map of how and where you want to take the potential client/client. Ask the right questions to eliminate any red flags along the way. Guide your prospect and paint a picture or draw out what you’re trying to communicate. Uncover if they’re serious buyers and ask the question, “Have I met all of your needs, and is there any reason we can’t move forward?”

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com or comment below.

SPOTIO is the #1 field sales automation and performance management software that will increase revenue, maximize profitability, and boost sales productivity.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

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Cite Sources:
Close.IO 
Hubspot 

 

Shifting Your Sales Team Bell Curve

A bell curve is a performance management technique that is used to assess and measure the performance and hold people accountable. This technique can be applied to many facets of life and business, and a sales team is no exception.

A bell curve is an important business tool for sales reps and their companies, something that determines where leaks exist in the sales funnel and where improvements can be made; helping companies define how many of their sales representatives are high-performing, middle-of-the-road, or low-performing. All of which can help management to redefine training and improve sales quota attainment.

How Companies Benefit from Implementing a Bell Curve

By implementing a bell curve, companies can easily identify the performance level of every employee. This provides a straightforward system for ranking employees; something which is critical in the evaluation of employee performance including improvements, declines, and regular maintenance.

How Companies are Disadvantaged by a Bell Curve

With a bell curve, the biggest disadvantage is the fact that managers are forced to segment their employees by performance. This could unfairly place employees in a lower-tier simply because they have to distribute a specific percentage of employer performances into each range. Sometimes using this scale to rate salespeople is simply too rigid and it can cause negative competition among employees which could in turn impact morale.

Levels of a Bell Curve

When organizations rank their sales teams along a bell curve, employees are divided into different levels based on their performance:

High Performing Organization

Those who fall under the high performer category are employees that a company wants to keep happy, they want to retain them because high performers don’t require any coaching and are very effective when working independently.

Companies that achieve high performer levels for the majority of their employees tend to focus more heavily on consistently achieving high performance across their sales team. Within the high performer category, many employees on the opposite end of the spectrum might leave the company simply because they know they can’t keep up with the level of talent that surrounds them.

Average Performing Organization

Average performers are employees, with coaching, could rise up to the high-performance tier.  Conversely, without coaching, they may drop to the low/non-performer tier. It’s best for organizations to be in this situation because it paves the way for serious potential and optimizes growth with the right tools.

Low/Non-Performer Organization

An organization with many low/non-performers is usually the result of making bad hires. These are probably people who aren’t a good fit for sales so even if you do train them it’s not going to result in a lot of improvement.

Situations like this mean that management should take a step back and recognize that sales issues are caused by the sales staff specifically but rather by bad hiring tactics by the management. Most of the time poor management is a critical problem here and these problems compound with time. The bell curve continues to shift to the left because top performers will leave the company and work with a better organization. Obviously, this is something that should be avoided and rectified.

An Ideal Sales Performance Bell Curve

Ideally, it is best for a sales performance bell curve to be heavily situated around the mid-performance level; or a 20, 70, 10 ratio or a 10, 70, 20 distribution ratio.

The difference between low-performing and average performing reps is minimal, but the difference between top performers and average performers is very significant. Achieving a 5% performance improvement from your middle 60-70% of employees equates to over 70% more revenue than you would get if you achieved a 5% performance improvement from your top representatives.

This is why bell curve adjustments are so important. Focusing resources on your mid-tier is going to get you the greatest return on your investment.

A Good Bell Curve Optimizes Productivity

To optimize productivity with an optimal bell curve, you can use software like SPOTIO. SPOTIO makes your sales team 46% more productive.  It does this by shifting the bell curve forward toward improved productivity for everyone. Software like this helps to improve your bell curve on a general level which has been correlated to increased productivity.

There are key features that you want to look for in the software you select. You want to be able to track trends and establish your bell curve.  You also want the data that can be applied to your sales staff to help establish, define and refine the perfect sales bell curve.

How is this achieved?

Productivity is defined by three important things:

1. Shorter Sales Cycles
2. Increased Conversion Rate
3. Increased Revenue

How sales software (like SPOTIO) helps achieve the ideal bell curve

When you use sales software it engages your entire sales team and provides reliable information to help sales reps achieve performance goals. The ideal bell curve can only be achieved when sales reps have clear visibility into the needs of their customers alongside the analytics that helped them to get the appropriate products to those customers.

The KPI’s from software like SPOTIO  show managers what percentage of sales reps are making their plans, what the composition of the pipeline is. For sales representatives this might not be something that affects their job today but it can enhance their career long-term by providing them with a sales strategy and sales execution that work in tandem. When everyone in an office works toward the same goal, revenue and profitability increase for years to come.

In the end, using sale software as a manager will give you the ability to improve the performance of your middle-tier sales reps. Tools can be provided, reliable data can be viewed, and everyone in your sales funnel can work together toward the same goals.

By improving the performance of your mid-tier employee you can yield the highest ROI for your organization.

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com or comment below.

SPOTIO is the #1 field sales automation and performance management software that will increase revenue, maximize profitability, and boost sales productivity.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

Weekly Reports Sales Manager Should Run [with Template]

KPI reporting can be time consuming, but good KPI reports are essential to data-driven business. Key performance indicators and metrics must be delivered as accessible, interactive reporting documents which give other staff and management key performance insights.

KPI’s are very important in helping a business achieve strategic goals while allowing management to gauge the actions of sales reps within the broader scope of your enterprise. If you take the time to consider what a good KPI report needs to contain before creating your report, you can deliver meaningful results in under 10 minutes every time. The reports that you generate help managers realize where skill sets are best utilized.

Here we’ll be taking you through a look at essential daily KPI’s to request from your sales reps. We’ll also show you which KPI’s work best for weekly reports and exactly how to put together a clear-clear report for your directors, presidents, or partners.

Daily KPI’s from Your Reps

There are many key performance indicators which are essential to understanding how your staff body is functioning as a team. Project management metrics empower management with the information that they need to run a business optimally. Without the hard numbers behind budgets and performance data, communication and delegation within your enterprise are simply ineffective.

Every target-driven sales environment needs daily KPI reports aligned to the strategic goals of your company. Use all or any of the following daily KPI’s to help optimize your enterprise management.

Daily Sales Revenues

Price Per Unit Sold X Total Number of Units Sold for the Week / 7 = Daily Sales Revenue

This simple calculation lets you see which reps are pushing the most gross sales on a day to day basis. Graphing your daily sales revenue KPI over a weekly or monthly time-period gives a clear overview of underperforming and top achievers. Revenues don’t reveal as much insight as profit figures, however, they will allow you to perform certain types of analysis better. Daily sales revenues allow you to gauge the effect of additional funding and resources on potential profitability and growth.

Daily Sales Commissions

Request a daily sales commissions report from all of your reps to ensure that both parties are up-to-date and informed concerning progress towards goals, and possible incentives. Staying aware of the incoming commissions motivates reps and management while delivering key employee insights.

Daily Wages

Depending on the payment structure of your reps, you may need to include a daily wages KPI. By staying current with wages on a day-to-day basis, everyone knows what they are earning and you always know that you have the fees due to your reps factored into your budget. Some businesses use both wages and commissions. In this case, cite both KPI’s on a daily basis.

Daily ROI

Daily Sales Revenues / Total Daily Expenses, Wage & Commissions * 100 = Daily ROI

Return on investment for sales is a calculation which needs to factor in all costs in order to display any degree of accuracy. You need to include fuel, the cost of communications, and any external fees which may be involved in delivering sales, service and support to your customers. One should, however, keep in mind that certain sales pipelines only present a positive return on investment after a significant period of time.

Don’t always accept the daily ROI of your reps as a determining factor of their performance, but rather as a gauge of the efficiency of your funnels.

Opportunity Win Rate

Total Number of Sales Closed / Total Amount of Opportunities = Opportunity Win Rate

This metric will show you which reps have the best closing rate. Sales hinges upon being able to seal the deal, making this KPI integral to finding out who is amassing leads and who is actually selling. Most successful sales managers see the opportunity win rate as one of the most important sales metrics. It allows for a clear overview of which reps are better at closing, which are better suited to each type of pipeline, and presents one with a world of new optimization possibilities when allocating resources to reps.

Weekly KPI’s

The close of every week must be followed by a comprehensive report of the key performance indicators reflecting immediate progress. Include any of these weekly KPI’s to help data-driven decision making by gaining a concise but highly-relevant overview of your business’ performance. Many of these weekly KPI’s could / should be included on your weekly report to upper management which we will cover shortly.

Lead-to-Sale Percentage

Conversion Rate = Total Number of Sales / Number of Leads * 100

Comparing the lead-to-sale percentage across your reps is a great way to assess individual performance.

For example, if you made 30 sales for the month out of 100 potential leads then your sales to lead conversion rate is 30%. A lead-to-sale conversion rate will show managers which reps need additional training or replacement to a different department. Any reps falling below the company-wide sales average need individual attention in some way.

Average Cost Per Lead

Total Lead Acquisition Cost / Total Number of Leads = Average Cost Per Lead

Obtaining an average cost per lead lets you know which reps are under-utilizing their budget, time, and resources. Many issues could be at the root of poor average cost per lead performance ranging from logistics dilemmas to understaffing issues.

Get a weekly report covering the average cost of your reps’ lead acquisition, and you’ll soon discover where your sales teams and pipelines need work.

Quote to Close Ratio

Weekly Quote Total / Closed Weekly Sales * 100 = Closing Ratio Percentage

The quote to close ratio KPI gives you a great indication of how quickly to follow up on prospects within your sales funnel. Sales reps often fail to perform due to quoting too early or too late. Once you find the right balance within your funnel, your reps will all be closing more sales thanks to attentive quoting at precisely when it’s wanted.

Sales Lead to Close Ratio

Weekly Sales Leads Total / Closed Weekly Sales Total * 100 = Sales Leads to Close Ratio Percentage

This KPI shows overall sales efficiency. Depending on your organizational structure, you may want to run this metric for both raw leads and qualified leads independently. You can run the sales leads to close ratio KPI on specific geographical areas in order to get a better feel for where you need to devote your time and resources.

Prospecting Activity

Your sales teams need to capture as much data as possible concerning the resources devoted to seeking and obtaining new leads. Let management and sales staff keep track of calls, emails, meetings, time spent traveling, service or product demos, and any other marketing activities applicable to your sales funnel.

Successful sales prospecting relies on information. Any substantial changes in statistics are usually a key indicator of growth and decline, marking areas that you can improve, replicate, or expand upon as you now know the connection. Capture and include as many prospecting activity metrics as KPI’s as possible to truly understand your potential customers.

Free Download:

Average Purchase Value

Total Value of Weekly Sales / Total Number of Weekly Sales = Average Purchase Value

The average purchase value KPI gives you a measure of the average sales value of each transaction. Average purchase values need to be segmented according to specific demographics in order to reach an accurate comparison of your marketing efforts. This KPI also allows you to identify which reps are best at selling high and low-end products and services. Certain staff may be far more productive when assigned a particular demographic.

Sales by Product Line

Sales by product line will let you identify the most lucrative products and services in your range, while also uncovering which sales pipelines need better sales prospecting and lead nurturing.

Sales by Channel

This strategic KPI works on both short-term and long-term scales. It shows you exactly which areas of customer acquisition are netting you the most revenue.

Client Meetings Attended

The metrics for meetings attended is fantastic for weekly sales reports. Managers are awarded insights into which staff is making the most of their time, and which would be more productive with less out-of-office time.

Weekly Reporting to Upper-Management

Sales managers will need to deliver a selection of KPI’s and performance metrics to their directors, vice presidents, boards of staff, and other superiors. Weekly sales reports can also be shared between departmental heads to ensure that inter-company collaboration is functioning optimally with communications clear throughout.

A weekly sales report needs to present a comprehensive but concise overview of current sales, your team’s progress towards existing goals, revenues and costs, as well as growth. Additionally, recommendations for organizational and staffing changes which need to be passed by upper-management can be suggested along-side the data to back up the decision.

Putting Together a Winning Weekly Reports

When deciding which key performance indicators to include on your weekly reporting, take the time to compare possible metrics against the goals of your enterprise.

If the KPI you wish to cite doesn’t directly correspond to a strategic insight matched to the vision and operation of your business, then no one but you will be able to find any value in it without a lengthy explanation. Simply put, not all metrics are KPI’s and not all KPI’s should be on every weekly report.

There are, however, basic components which must be on every report. Regardless of the type of business, you do or the product/service supplied, good sales reports will carry these following components at a minimum.

Components of a Weekly Report

The sales and performance information of your reps need to be compiled as a weekly report. Make sure that your report contains all of the necessary relevant information such as the branch name, team, and contact details.

Every good report will start off with the date and the time period that the report will be covering. In this case, it’s a weekly duration. Next, it should list the current sales revenue against the year-end target, also displayed in a clear to read manner.

Progress towards your sales target for the month is handy, while a color-coded key and/or structured formatting always helps to keep everything readable. List the KPI’s which you’ll be reporting with a breakdown for each employee, product, or project that you’re reporting on. Keep every week’s report standardized and accompany each report with a short memorandum.

Crafting a Data-Driven Memorandum

Your memorandum should begin with the week’s main accomplishments.

For example, exceeding performance goals by meeting a sales quota early should be an opening statement which is best backed up by a useful metric or projection for next week’s growth based on this week’s numbers. In addition, be sure to provide a meaningful reason for any shortfalls in sales. If a public holiday resulted in you being shut for a day, or an IT-failure interrupted trading for hours, cite the disturbance. This will help the reader understand the full context of the report without needing to be there.

A good basic set of KPI’s to begin with are:

– Weekly Sales Wages
– Weekly Sales Commissions
– Weekly Sales Revenues
– ROI
– Weekly ROI

Feel free to include any other metric which is directly relevant to the organizational structure, strategic vision, and goals of your enterprise. Just keep in mind that directors don’t want to see hoards of raw data. Rather, provide meaningful results which are supported by rich visuals and explanations in clear-speech. Avoid ambiguity and share all results relevant to the profitability and management of your business.

Ideas, tactical advancements, staffing issues, infrastructure suggestions, and any other motivations for change should be discussed openly but supported by the numbers needed to make your reasoning understood.

Growth, Analysis & Your Own Basic Weekly Sales Template

Not all enterprises and business owners will want extensive reports with lengthy memorandums. Smaller businesses will get by and function better with a small selection of meaningful KPI’s reporting the basics.

In the early stages of growth, staying simple and focused is often better than getting lost along a progression of endless optimization. Once established, there are endless ways to analyze information, using key performance indicators as a cornerstone of actionable reporting and data segmentation.

Take a look at our weekly sales report template if you need a spreadsheet to begin crafting insightful daily and weekly reports.

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com or comment below.

SPOTIO is the #1 sales enablement and territory management app to increase your revenue, maximize your profitability, and increase your team’s productivity in just 2 weeks.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

Weekly Sales KPI Report Template

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Reports Sales Managers Should Run [with Templates]

Download our weekly sales report templates if you need a spreadsheet to begin crafting insightful daily and weekly reports for your team.

 

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Expert Series: How to Evaluate Your Sales Pipeline with Jeff Johnson

Our interview with sales guru Jeff Johnson discusses how you should evaluate your sales pipeline. In this video, we discuss:

What must your pipeline contain in order to be most fruitful?
How often should you review and refresh your pipeline?
Is there a magic number you should always have in your pipeline?
How do you ensure success of your pipeline just across the board? 

 

[beginning of recording]

Speaker:  Okay, we are back with our sales guru, Jeff Johnson. Welcome.

Jeff: Well, thanks, I like to be referred to as a “guru.”

Speaker: You did it yourself.

Jeff: Okay.

Speaker: This is the second edition of our radio expert series. The last time, we discussed selecting your “A” players. Today we’re going to discuss how to evaluate your sales pipeline. So, enter Jeff, if you wouldn’t mind giving us a brief introduction, and we’ll get started.

Jeff: So, about myself. I’m a sales consultant. I work with small-to-medium sized companies, and we’re all about building sales teams to be more effective and really being the leaders in our space and enjoying what we do, and being very successful. So, that’s what our mission and goals are.

Speaker: Perfect. We will get started. Okay, first question. So, we’re going to talk about sales pipelines: how to keep them full, how to keep them fruitful, and keep everyone selling better. What must your pipeline contain in order to be most fruitful?

Jeff: Okay. That’s a very good question. I wish it was a simple answer; there’s a lot to it. So, I’m going to start with the foundation. When you start with the pipeline, you really need to have very well-defined milestones, and these milestones really should define the key things that the prospect must experience to be a qualified opportunity. And, typically, to give a quick review, initially, it’s pain and power, and it really depends upon how complex your sales cycle is, but the baseline is pain and power. Pain means that there’s some kind of powerful consequence that the prospect is experiencing that they want to get rid of, because every prospect loves to look at demos, hear sales pitches – sometimes, but it doesn’t mean that they’re always going to buy.

The foundation is: is there a consequence that they need to resolve? The second piece to that, if you have a larger, more sophisticated sale, you need to make sure you’re the decision maker. So, negotiating the power is always a very important piece of that. So, I would say your first milestone is pain and power. The second piece is it’s the investment. It’s not just the money. Depending on the solution that they’re buying, it’s really the investment in dollars and effort. Are they really willing to invest the effort that they need to invest to get the results that they’re looking for? So, that’s the second milestone, and the third one is assuming that all of that lines up, is what is the decision-making process from here to get to close, that we kind of have a go, no-go steps, a demo, a technical review, whatever that might be, and then we have an agreement that we’re going to go through that together, for the end purpose of making a purchase.

The final one is a verbal “yes” that you are the chosen vendor. Now, I think that there’s one piece to that that is very important, and that is this is all about what the prospect is experiencing and what the prospect is doing. It has nothing to do with how we feel about this sales cycle or any emotions.

The one thing that we want to keep out of a pipeline to make it fruitful is that we want to make sure that there’s no bloat, and that essentially means that we’re working on opportunities that have little or no merit that are going to drive these opportunities to closure, because if you have salespeople that are working on opportunities that you know early are not going to close, that salesperson is heading for disaster, essentially, and it’s our job, as leaders and managers, to guide them away from that. So, I call that “happy ears.” We want a sale, we have a quota, and Walmart calls and says, “Oh my gosh, we need X, Y, and Z,” and you’re hearing from somebody who’s got no power to buy, who really is just getting your information to negotiate with someone else. These are the kinds of things that you need to stay away from if you’re going to make sure you have a meaningful, fruitful pipeline.

Speaker: Great. So, you have your pipeline established, a good one, so you go about reviewing it. How often should you review, refresh, kind of checks and balances to your pipeline? Or, should it be perfect from the get-go, and in order to make the pipeline, you’re good?

Jeff: Wouldn’t that be nice? I’ve been doing this for 15+ years. As a consultant, I’ve never met a perfect pipeline. So, we can wipe that one off the board. Frequency, I think is, I’ll call it “situational.” So, situational is, you’ve got a new rookie, right, and to me, a pipeline review, I know that a new person is not going to be successful unless they can get new, qualified opportunities consistently into the pipeline with the right velocity. So, a new person, I’m going to have a pipeline review more frequently, and really focus in on qualifying new opportunities, and do they understand the underlying messages and processes to be able to do that, because I know, number one, if they can’t do that, they’re not going to be successful. So, that’s a type of pipeline review.

The second one is, I want to look at key deals. Obviously, there are some that are more complex and more important than others, and your pipeline review on those should really not be time-bound, it should really be stage-bound. So, when they reach a certain stage, before someone goes forward, let’s get the best thinking and strategy together on this and make sure we do the right thing upfront before we do it, versus let’s have a pipeline when we’ve done the wrong thing, and it’s gone sideways. That’s the most important thing to do.

And then, the third one is, yeah, you need to figure out – there’s an accountability piece to this. We should have a weekly, or biweekly, and it should be a normal course of review for everyone. So, I would say those three types of pipeline reviews would be the ones I would recommend.

Speaker: Great, okay. Any key metrics you focus on? Is it just MRR, ARR, or potential deal sites down the road?

Jeff: Very good. That’s a good question. So, when you’re looking at a pipeline, what I want to be able to do is I want to see the real value of the pipeline, and when we talk about milestones – and, everyone’s different, but it’s pretty close. I want to place probabilities at each milestone, and if I hit the milestone correctly, like the first one, normally a standard would be it’s a 25% probability to close. I’ve got pain, meaningful consequence, there’s a good reason to buy from someone who actually has the power to buy. One out of four times, those are going to close. Now, actually, we do a lot better than that, but it’s a pretty conservative view.

So, from a metrics perspective, what I always look at is the weighted value of the pipeline – not the full value, and this goes to forecasting. So, what I’m going to do is essentially take my opportunities, and multiply them by the probabilities, if I were to look at what’s going to happen this quarter, I would multiply that out, and that would give me my weighted pipeline for the quarter. If you’re doing it correctly, you should have a pretty darn accurate forecast. I think there’s one little free extra piece that I want to put in here, because there’s one little “getcha” in the pipeline, is the close date, and a lot of times, salespeople will put a close date in the pipeline, and that close date is their close date. It’s not the prospect’s close date, it’s their close date, because they’ve got a quota. It’s their close date, because they really want it to close then, and, oh, by the way, I’m going to get a bonus there, if I accomplish that. The close date should always be the prospect’s close date, and the prospect should tell us not only what the date is, but why that date is important. So, that’s another piece, just to make sure that your probabilities are correct and you’re not getting bloat in those kinds of things.

Speaker: Is there a magic number in the pipeline you should always have a threshold, how many potential opportunities? Or, is it in a flow?

Jeff: Another very good question. So, there’s kind of two pieces to that. Let’s say you have a million-dollar opportunity. Of course, we’d all love to have one of those, but let’s say you have a salesperson with one million-dollar opportunity that’s at the 25% stage. That’s a problem. Even though their quota may be $250,000, the probability would say you have $250,000 of weighted value in the pipeline; unfortunately, you don’t have a critical mass. The critical mass there would be four, because 25% means one-fourth is going to close. So, if I want to have an accurate pipeline that meets the probabilities, I need to have that critical mass that meets those probability requirements. Does that help?

Speaker: Yes, definitely.

Jeff: Great.

Speaker: For people just starting off building pipelines, for people who want to improve their pipelines, any just kind of parting words? How do you ensure success of your pipeline just across the board? I know it’s more complex than that.

Jeff: Yeah. So, here’s a recommendation. Actually, I’ve just started to blog a series on this, and it’s called – it’s a really good title: “Managing the Chaos in Your Sales Organization,” and it’s the pipeline series. The first one came out, so you can go to www.jeffjohnsonsales.com and go to my blog and look for it, and there’s no give, you can just download it. It lists out all of the milestones and definitions. That’s where you really need to start, because you can put things in the pipeline, but you have to know what it means. You really need to start with those milestones, understand what they are, and everybody needs to know – and not generally, everybody needs to know them by heart, because it’s very, very important. So, that’s where you start, and then when you do a pipeline review, the next thing is, you need to look at the key things. There’s nine of them, I think that comes out in the second episode, but off the top of my head, I would say if I’m doing a pipeline review, the things that I look at are: weighted value against the milestone’s stage, so I want to look at the pain; I also want to look at the next step, because a sales cycle is not a sales cycle unless there is a clear next step defined and agreed to between you and the prospect. So, the next step becomes very important. And, I also want to look at the age. So, given a milestone, there should be a sales cycle. If it’s real and moving forward, it’s consistent, and it’s going to be within a reasonable time frame. So, if something gets stale, you can immediately say either, “We need to get an agreement to go forward,” or, “We need to pull it out of the pipeline so we don’t get bloat.” So, the pipeline report, the milestones, those really are your foundational pieces to start with, is what I would recommend.

Speaker: Yeah, and we’ll be sure to link you guys so you can get the milestones and pipeline report and get your situation situated.

Jeff: There you go.

Speaker: Great. Well, any parting words, things you haven’t covered that you feel are important?

Jeff: Well, if I’m growing and managing a sales team, you just can’t do it without a good, solid pipeline. That’s foundational. I mean, I would call it a playbook. Here’s a truth that I see happening over and over: you give someone a goal, so, here’s your goal: go out and get 25 stage one opportunities, and here’s the definition. All of the sudden, your sales people on your team have a goal, and they’re probably going to start asking questions: “Where do I do this?” Well, that’s where sales process comes in. What’s your messaging? Who am I calling on? All of these things, and then you start building a process underneath it, but it always starts with this pipeline, which defines your sales process and milestones. So, that’s where you being, and without it, I don’t know how in the world you do it. So, if you don’t have one, get one, and it doesn’t matter if it’s www.salesforce.com, or Pipe Drive, that’s a good simple one. Remember that all it is is a container, that’s all that is, and we need to put the right information in to really understand the reality of what’s going on in the field, and it gives us the ability to be able to say, “Hey, this person needs some coaching, and I need to help him before it’s too late.” There’s many things that it does for you. So, I guess that would be my parting advice.

Speaker: Well, thank you very much for your time.

Jeff: It’s always a pleasure Jennette, thank you.

Speaker: I appreciate it, and we will be back next time with a new important topic. Alright, thanks Jeff. See you guys.

Jeff: Bye everyone.

[END OF RECORDED AUDIO]

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com or comment below.

SPOTIO is the #1 field sales enablement platform designed specifically for outside sales managers and reps to squeeze every drop out of their field sales efforts.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

Sales Territory Management: A Thorough Guide for Reps & Managers

In most verticals, competition is at an all-time high and top sales organizations are looking to get the most value from their teams. With a focus on efficiency, sales territory management is a main driver for ensuring that the time and energy of each sales rep is focused on the activities that will have the most impact.

What is Sales Territory Management?

Sales territory management is the process of using data to segment customers and prospects to ensure the best use of company resources. In addition to cutting out the noise of low-return accounts, thoughtful sales territory management aligns salespeople with the most appropriate customer base – whether that’s by geography, vertical, expertise, or past relationship.

Many sales teams neglect to prioritize solid sales territory planning; even when they do, they often have trouble adapting and revising based off sales performance. In this post, we’ll introduce 6 steps to create a winning sales territory plan, best practices for managing sales territories, and finally, we’ll introduce six tools that are helpful for managing sales territories of any size.

6 Steps to Create a Winning Sales Territory Plan

# 1 | Analyze Your Customers

The first step in the process is analyzing your current and prospective customers. You should think about what characteristics your customers have in common.

Some key things to note about your customers are:
– Their locations
– The products or services they purchase from your business
– What types of problems your products or services solve for them
– What types of events lead customers to buy (or not buy) your products or services.

It is also important to seek out needs within the market that are not currently being fulfilled. This can help you to develop a unique plan that provides products or services in a way that your competition cannot or will not provide them.

# 2 | Analyze and Develop Your Team and Resources

The next step is to analyze your business’s resources and personnel. You should have an accurate picture of the type and volume of customer that your business is equipped to handle.

It is particularly important to note the strengths and weaknesses of your business team to ensure that you can further develop and utilize strengths while simultaneously working to improve any weak areas. You should also consider the resources currently available to your business, in addition to ways that you can best utilize or improve those resources.

# 3 | Set Measurable Goals

Using the data gathered from analyzing your customers, team, and resources, you should develop goals for your business. Some goals you might consider are:

1. Income generated per month
2. Number of sales attempts per week or month
3. Number of sales closed per week or month
4. Ratio of leads to sales closed per week or month

After identifying goals for your sales territory plan, you should create a measurable strategy for meeting each of these goals. Each goal strategy should include:

Goal statement: Putting a goal on paper transforms if from abstract to concrete. The goal statement should address what you’re planning to achieve and what is at stake.

Key milestones and deadline: The road to achieving a goal is much clearer when it can be broken into several smaller milestones. For example, if your goal is to attain $9k in revenue for the month for a given product, you can track progress by breaking it into smaller milestones, such as $3k by day ten, 6k by day 20, etc.  

Metrics for measuring success: Clearly defined KPIs will provide you with a highly specific way to ensure that your business’s goals are met expediently. Measurements such as leads created, leads contacted, and leads closed, available on the SPOTIO sales dashboard, give great insight into productivity and can give you insight into how your tracking against goals.

These goals will inform your sales territory plan by helping you determine which segmentations will best equip you to meet these goals. Your goals should be realistic and manageable to attain, but at the same time, they should push your business to expand and grow to competitively meet the needs of your customer base.

Need help hitting your goals? This free template will help:

# 4 | Define Sales Territories

Based on the work you perform in the sections above, you should have an idea of how to divide your sales territories. It’s important to document these clearly, outlining details of each territory including things like:

– Geographic Boundaries
– Industry or Segment Boundaries (including any overlap and how that is addressed)
– Revenue Boundaries
– Product Boundaries
– Anything else that may be applicable to your sales organization

Creating a plan that differentiates territories will help you to organize and separate areas and ensure that you can develop a plan for your sales reps to reach out to every potential customer.

# 5 | Territory Action Plan

Once you have outlined your sales territories, it’s time to create routes for your sales representatives. This will prevent any overlap between territories or sales representatives, which will save time, effort, and money. As you create routes, set a schedule that ensures that all parties along the route are visited in a timely and effective manner, determine how often to call on each account and whether the calls should be in person or by phone.

By investing in planning routes for your sales team, you’ll minimize time wasted by wandering sales reps.

# 6 | Field Data Entry – “Notes as you go”

As you implement your sales territory plan, keep an accurate and up-to-date record of its outcomes using your CRM. This record will help you to track successful aspects of your plan, in addition to what parts of the plan were not as effective. Using this information, you can adjust and optimize your sales territory plan as needed.

Entering meeting notes as you leave each appointment is extremely valuable, both from a time savings and organizational perspective. Often times you have multiple meeting blocks and forget valuable nuggets of information you learned from that meeting. With a sales enablement solution like SPOTIO, you can jot down your notes from your mobile device and sync them directly into Salesforce.

Now, not only are your client notes and meeting records full of fully recalled and valuable information, you just updated your CRM in real-time. As an added bonus, you don’t have to spend time after hours backtracking and manually entering notes from the days meetings.

Since no two territories and no two sales reps are alike, you can use a tool like the SPOTIO sales dashboard to track performance and adjust as required. Insights you may track include how the team is tracking against KPIs, the average number of attempts it is taking to establish contacts, or the number of leads closed.

8 Sales Territory Management Best Practices

1. How to handle territory conflict

This is a fickle subject. As a manager, how can you fairly assign territories? And once assigned,  how do you ensure reps are not poaching accounts from fellow reps? To be fair with territory assignments, being mindful in how you go about dividing them up is where you’ll win:

Size. The reps who perform better with smaller businesses need to be assigned more accounts, while those who excel with large accounts should be assigned less. Although the number of accounts varies, the total possible revenue goal for each rep is equal.

Zip Code. Make sure rep assignments are in close proximity to on another to avoid them spending more time selling and less time in the car getting from one to the next.

Vertical. Some people connected better with specific industries. Once you identify each reps strong suit, give them more accounts with the business types they excel.

By understanding their strengths you can assign territories to match strong suits. When your sales team is excelling and closing business, territory conflict seems to disappear.

2. Mileage and expense tracking

What’s the company’s policy in terms of mileage reimbursement? Reps with a lot of ground to cover should receive some degree of compensation for their travel expenses (gas, oil changes and basic maintenance). When reps are reimbursed for their travel, they will be less likely to avoid meeting with a prospect or checking in with a current account in an effort to save money on travel.

Not sure what reimbursement plan is best? We’ve got you covered:

Mileage as a Tax Deduction

Employed and independent salespeople can claim mileage as a tax deduction. The mileage works as an expense, and those with intensive sales routes can write off the standard rate for every mile they drive for work.

Standard Mileage Reimbursement

Mileage rates are subject to change in each tax year. The standard rates are determined based on market research that determines normal expense ranges for using a vehicle. The rate increased from 2017 to 2018. The 2018 IRS rate for normal business use is 54.5 cents per mile. Additionally, you can write off 18 cents per mile for vehicle use relating to medical purposes. The standard 2018 rate for any charitable use is 14 cents per mile.

Reimbursement Based on Sales Routes

Salespeople are often reimbursed for mileage using the standard rates or a rate increase based on individual company policies.

Tracking Mileage

Diligent mileage tracking is critical for reimbursement. The ability to prove every mile to your employer and/or the IRS is imperative for you to receive the reimbursement or deduction. A spreadsheet that lists the date, starting mileage, ending mileage, total miles and notes is easy to store on a clipboard and log each day. Mileage-tracking phone apps are also convenient; they track trips and allow you to make notes and log those miles. For dedicated sales routes, a physical log is convenient and will not fail to record when your phone dies or loses service. (Source)

3. Create a rotating schedule for contacting customers

This will help to ensure you regularly communicate with prospects in a timely manner. It is important that your sales representatives not contact prospects too often, as this can be an annoyance. However, your reps should contact customers on a regular basis to ensure that their needs are being met.

4. Meet needs of current accounts while finding new leads

Your sales territory management plan should have a dual focus on providing services to high value accounts, and developing relationships with potential new accounts.

High value accounts are those guaranteed to bring in higher volume sales in shorter amounts of time when compared to other accounts. While high value accounts are extremely valuable to the stability of your business, it is also important to cultivate new accounts, as these will bring about business growth. You plan should prioritize both of these customer types.

5. Consider the seasonal needs of customers

Depending on the type of products or services your business provides, your customer base may have needs of a more seasonal nature. You should take care to recognize these seasonal needs when determining when to contact customers and prospects. Understanding their seasonality also helps you ensure that you can meet their needs in a timely and effective manner.

6. Ensure data can be updated and accessed synchronously

Synchronous data updates allow your sales representatives to update and access customer data in real time. This means all reps will always be able to view the most current customer information. This allows them to further expedite the sales process.

7. Keep thorough and up-to-date notes on customers

Any communication with customers should be documented and accessible to sales representatives. This should include personal information such as the customer’s favorite food, in addition to more sales-specific information such as the customer’s budget.

8. Think big picture

It is important to think big picture when it comes to your sales territory plan. You should always be seeking out ways to foster the growth and development of your business. Thinking long-term will help to ensure that your business does not stagnate, but instead continues to flourish and grow.

6 SPOTIO Features to Manage Sales Territories of Any Size

Tool Name: Customer Mapping

What it does: Customer mapping software allows you to create a map of your territories. You can drop pins on specific locations, which allows you to track routes within territories.

Why it is important for a manager or rep: Customer mapping software can help you to optimize sales routes. With a tool like Spotio’s Precise Location Tool, you can drop pins on a map, creating a visual way to design the most logical sales routes. This saves valuable time and money so that you can introduce more customers to your product or service.

Tool Name: Outside Sales Tracking

What it does: Outside sales tracking enhances the sales process by providing real-time updates about the locations and activities of sales representatives.

Why it is important for a manager or rep: This feature saves time for managers by providing a quick and easy method to map out and assign territories to sales reps. It also helps managers to quickly recognize any areas where sales reps may be struggling and in need of additional coaching or training.

Tool Name: Territory Manager

What it does: The territory manager enables managers to create custom maps of different territories for assignment to sales reps.

Why it is important for a manager or rep: The ease with which territories can be created, assigned, and viewed means that managers will no longer have to spend hours reviewing physical maps and drawing out territories for assignment by hand.

Tool Name: Sales Dashboard

What it does: The sales dashboard provides data in real time related to the performance of your sales representatives.

Why it is important for a manager or rep: The sales dashboard promotes organization and allows managers to easily track their teams’ activities.

Tool Name: Lead Management

What it does: Lead management software organizes information related to leads and provides it to users in an organized and easy-to-understand format.

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Why it is important for a manager or rep: This software helps to generate more sales by ensuring that leads are organized and easily accessible for users.

Evaluating Sales Territory Performance

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are defined as, “a set of quantifiable measures that a company uses to gauge its performance over time. These metrics are used to determine a company’s progress in achieving its strategic and operational goals, and also to compare a company’s finances and performance against other businesses within its industry.”

KPIs are measured in different industry-specific ways. According to Steve Andersen, these measurements can include this such as the following:

Growth of current accounts
Development of new sales opportunities
Advancement of sales against a consistent set of criteria
Development and success of a high percentage of sales targeted
Ability to accurately predict sales within a given territory

Sales dashboards can help you to track KPIs to ensure that your business has a specific set of standards that can be used to measure its success. One such sales dashboard is Spotio.

Sales territory management can help your business to grow by collecting and organizing all information you need. This is beneficial to all team members at any level of your organization. Understanding and utilizing sales territory management software in an effective manner can ensure that your business will flourish in the modern sales market.

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com.

SPOTIO is the #1 sales enablement and territory management app to increase your revenue, maximize your profitability, and increase your team’s productivity in just 2 weeks.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

16 Sales Competencies That Define Winning Sales Teams

Employee turnover is expensive. Hiring the best sales professionals is crucial for organizations.

Excellent sales candidates will have a specific set of core sales competencies. It is the manager’s job to uncover these competencies in the interview process.

What makes a great sales candidate?

Sales competencies for sales professionals are shared across the sales team in order to produce the most successful reps. These core competencies span every role on the sales team, from rep to manager.

In this article, we’ll define core sales competencies, discuss why they are critical to the sales and management process.

What Are Sales Competencies?

Sales competencies are the skills successful reps use to influence buying decisions.

These aptitudes are both inherent traits to their personality and skills or processes that can be trained and practiced. Understanding what these select proficiencies are, how they contribute to a sales professional’s success, and how to recognize them in a candidate will make a significant difference in your ability to hire the right people and reduce sales rep turnover.  

3 Core Competency Areas for Any Sales Professional

Whether they are converting inbound sales calls, fighting it out in the field or managing from behind the front-lines, sales professionals need a particular set of foundational skills.

Sales core competencies center around three areas:

1. Systems. How do you get a person from a prospect to a closed deal? Short answer: systems and processes. Systems encompass the ways your processes lead to sales. From prospecting to time management to uncovering new opportunities from established accounts, systems sales core competencies are ways sales reps achieve their goals. Per Rain Sales Training, sales reps should have skill areas that help them drive opportunities, account growth, and ultimately, success.

2. People. Sales is always about people, so reps and managers must have People skills – the ability to lead and manage a conversation, to create emotional engagement, and earn the trust of others.  

3. Sales. All reps need to effectively prospect, manage pipeline, uncover pain, capture benefits, demonstrate product-fit, and negotiate the close.

16 Competencies that Define High-Performing Sales Teams (By Category)

Systems: Competencies that Improve the Sales Process

1. Prospecting: Finding needs in the marketplace keeps the pipeline full of potential customers for new business. It’s essential to research industries, uncover the main friction points, and define the ideal customer profile

Essential attributes for this area would be the ability to comprehend various businesses and the related challenges of the sectors, a talent for asking the right questions, even the tough ones, and, as the sales training experts the Gulas Group says, a focus on getting prospects to “quantify the pain.”

2. Upselling: Reps need to be able to identify opportunities for expansion revenue. For sales managers, this area entails watching the team’s account management approach and training them to incorporate a way of “checking in” with accounts to stay on top of any changes or new opportunities.

Key attributes for this area would be active listening, attention to detail in account management, and knowing what questions to ask when.

3. Time Management: Self-management is a significant factor influencing success in sales because often there is little oversight and accountability for a sales rep’s activity day-to-day. It is incumbent upon the rep and manager alike to keep themselves on task and address each part of the sales process.

Necessary attributes of people accomplished at managing time are that they can communicate how they divide their time between the various stages of the sales cycle and what tools they use to measure their progress toward these goals.

4. Plan for Success: A talent for planning is essential because shows how sales professionals intend to accomplish their goals. Effective planners know the end goal and plan around achieving those goals. An effective planner has a day-to-day breakdown of their time and a way to record progress, as well as the ability to share why it works for them and examples of past successes as a result of their behavior.  

5. Accountable: When it comes to sales competency, the capacity to see how one’s actions create results is a huge predictor of success. People who understand how what they do creates reactions will be successful because they own their process and the results they get with it. Sales professionals who have an aptitude for taking responsibility tend to internalize the blame rather than accuse others. They also accept that it is impossible to control everything, and instead concentrate on managing their actions and reactions to situations. These individuals also recognize that it is okay to fail—even though they would rather succeed.

6. Ownership: Sales competency also includes the concept of owning one’s actions. A person who owns the sale asks tough questions at the appropriate times, knows when to push a deal that is dragging on, and isn’t afraid to get to a fast no. The Gulas Group says, when a sales rep owns the sale, he or she “doesn’t need approval” and gets the job done.

People: Competencies that Build Rapport and Trust

7. Build Rapport: It’s crucial that sales reps and managers know how to create emotional engagement with people and help buyers consider new ideas.

Key Attributes

– Understanding how to help people relax and get comfortable
– Communicate well
– Foster trust with others

In the case of the sales manager, you need to do what you say you will for your team always—a vital element for excellence in leadership—to build trust with your team.

8. Lead Conversations: An essential sales skill is taking control of the conversation when you need to, and knowing when to let the prospect speak.

Some important behaviors for this sales core competency are:

– The awareness to ascertain the comfort-level of the conversation participants and
– The ability to adapt and move forward, particularly when the unexpected occurs

9. Drive Buying Decisions: Sales is about getting people to buy, so knowing how to encourage people to make a purchase is essential. Key attributes in this area are fearlessness when it comes to asking for a yes and the ability to navigate back to an area of opportunity when the answer is no. Also, excellent listening skills are crucial as what a person says in a sales call long before the closing stages tell you what he or she wants to be included before saying “yes.”

10. Control emotions: A vital core competency of successful sales reps and managers is the emotional intelligence to manage one’s feelings and the feelings of other people.  Controlling emotions requires much self-awareness and self-confidence.

People with strong core competencies in this area show restraint, do not panic, and know what to say or do at the appropriate time.  

11. Maintain Positivity: Sales is a demanding job, and that staying upbeat and optimistic in slow periods is essential to keep hammering on doors and opening new opportunities.

Sales: Competencies to Crush Your Quota

12. Prospect Consistently: Prospecting is a numbers game that fills the sales pipeline with new potential buyers. Successful salespeople recognize that it is a priority to find new accounts, so they set aside time dedicated to discovering them. The behaviors associated with consistent prospecting include awareness of how many calls it takes to find a new prospect, a record of making those calls promptly, and a willingness to learn from mistakes or outcomes of unsuccessful calls.

Sales managers should be monitoring and coaching their teams to dedicate time, energy, and understanding to this vital area of sales competency.

13. Define Criteria: Knowing who will say yes and how much they will buy are critical bits of information to uncover during the discovery phase of the sale process.

Sales professionals effective at discovering the parameters of a sale will spend less time on accounts with the smallest potential and focus instead on the best opportunities. These sales professionals can get past the gatekeeper and speak to the decision maker. Then, they are efficient at finding out the available budget.

14. Build Solutions: Finding a mutually beneficial way to yes is crucial in sales. An essential skill for sales reps and managers is the ability to read a situation and fix any challenges that occur.

For sales reps, this aptitude exhibits in matching the buyer’s pain points to the product’s features and benefits.

For managers, this sales manager competency presents as a talent for uncovering weaknesses in the team’s systems, process, or skills and addressing them with training.

15. Sell Benefits/ Value: For reps, sales competency is shown in their ability to not only explain the feature of the product or service, but how it solve their pains. For managers, this manifests in the ability to convince salespeople to adopt their suggestions into their personal sales process.

16. Negotiating Prowess: While presenting value is critical to success, the ability for sales reps to customize the deal for the buyer leads to more sales.

Sales managers must also adjust their expectations to their team’s needs to get the best performance from their sales reps. People who are excellent at negotiation know it means getting mutual agreements in stages, knowing when to hold your ground, and having some wiggle room to get the deal approved ahead of time.

3 Competencies That Don’t Dictate Sales Success

We just covered seventeen sales competencies that are crucial to sales team success for both sales reps and managers. However, there are a few competencies that you should not worry about as much.

In other words, here are three areas you should stop emphasizing:

1. Education: It is natural to assume a person who has achieved many academic successes and a long list of degrees will be excellent at sales. While it is true that the best sales professional candidates should be smart and articulate, they do not have to have excellent grades or a slew of diplomas to be successful sales professionals.  

2. Geniality: Being friendly is a magnificent trait in a person and a co-worker. However, friendliness is not essential to sales success. Does that mean the best candidates are rude and unsociable? Of course not. While sales performance does not necessitate being the prospect’s best friend, it does need the rep to be likable and trustworthy.

3. Thoroughness: In nearly any other job, being a conscientious rule-follower is a plus for success, but not in sales. As we mentioned earlier, sales professionals should be hard workers that use systems, but they should also be flexible and adaptable to the situations as they present themselves.  

Let Sales Competencies Define the Hiring Process

Sales competencies are why salespeople can do what they do. Sales manager competencies are how sales managers get them to do it. Both are the skills and talents the sales professionals have for influencing the behavior of others.

There are core competencies for sales professionals that are critical to the members or potential members of any sales team. These sales core competencies fall within the three areas, which include Systems they use, People skills they have, and Sales mechanics they employ. From time management to leading conversations well to negotiating tactics, the sales competencies list is long and detailed.

However, while the list is long, some common competencies for success in other jobs are not on it. Education, geniality, and thoroughness seem like they would be vital, but experience shows they are not crucial for sales success. That said, having those competencies certainly would not hurt a candidate.

Understanding the key elements that fit within each of the core competencies will make defining job roles and expectations much easier, and ensure you are hiring the most qualified candidates. Perhaps most importantly, employing the most qualified candidates could also make you the least likely to be retaining their replacements in a few months.

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Questions or comments? Contact SPOTIO at info@spotio.com or comment below.

SPOTIO is the #1 sales enablement and territory management app to increase your revenue, maximize your profitability, and increase your team’s productivity in just 2 weeks.

Want to see a product demonstration? Click here to see how SPOTIO can take your sales game to the next level.

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Sources:

Schultz, Mike. “Core Competencies of Successful Sellers.” www.rainsalestraining.com Web 21 November 2018. https://www.rainsalestraining.com/blog/core-competencies-of-successful-sellers.

“21 Core Competencies of Successful Salespeople.” www.gulasgroup.com. Web. 21 November 2018. http://www.gulasgroup.com/sales-competencies.shtml.

Lawrence, Ph.D., Amy. “5 Competencies to Focus on When Hiring Salespeople.” www.selectinternational.com. Web. 26 November 2018. http://www.selectinternational.com/blog/5-competencies-to-focus-on-when-hiring-salespeople.