Sales Performance: Yesterday's News or Tomorrow's Predictors?

You’ve no doubt seen it when considering an investment vehicle such as stocks or bonds: “Past performance is no guarantee of future results.” That may be true for financial instruments. But when it comes to sales performance, the opposite is true. Past performance is typically a very good indicator of the road ahead for any salesperson. The key to success though lies in how, and how often, sales management reviews past performance.

If you ate at a restaurant every day for a year, would you wait the entire year before evaluating how good the meals and service were? Not likely. Would you consider their cuisine just twice a year? Of course not. Sales performance measurement isn’t—or at least it shouldn’t be—that much different.

Last year is so… last year

Annual reviews, even semi-annual reviews, are insufficient, a waste of time some say. To provide effective sales coaching, sales performance should be measured in time for salespeople to do something about the results before the year, the quarter, even the month is up.

Smart companies have made the shift to proactive sales performance management where they can understand the strengths and weaknesses of their people individually and as a team in the here-and-now.

With more sales organizations focusing on short-term, critical objectives, regular high-frequency feedback becomes of paramount importance. Employees want to know how they’re doing, if they’re on track, where there are issues and what else needs to be done in time to impact their results this month, this quarter, even this week.

Performance management software systems should provide a mechanism for frequent feedback on a monthly if not weekly basis.

This high level of feedback ensures that the organization stays focused, deals with issues before they become major problems and work toward achievement of its strategy. Imagine the impact the company can have on their people if they had meaningful discussions on performance 50 times a year.

Leverage technology to optimize resources

As economies shrink and corporate belts tighten, resources to achieve objectives shrink too. But more than ever, managers have to ensure their employees are focused on sales goals. Technology can be a key enabler in this regard. If employees are given clear, focused feedback on a regular basis, it’s more likely strategies will be followed and sales goals achieved.

Sales performance applications help managers track the behaviors and leading indicators that allow them to effectively sales coach their teams using information that’s relevant because it’s as timely as last week or the week before, not just data that can be 10, 11, or even 12 months old.

You can control the outcome of the results if you’re working on the leading indicators and engaging in progressive performance management. However, if you wait until the year is over, you will have to live with whatever the end result is and that can’t be changed.

About the Author:  Patrick Stakenas is founder and CEO of ForceLogix Technologies Inc. (TSXV:FLT), provider of leading Sales Performance Management Solutions. Patrick has more than 25 years experience with Fortune 1000 companies and through leveraging core resources and technology he has lead companies to achieve record revenue and profit growth. Throughout his career, his focus has been on driving revenue organically and relying on his management groups to gain the most out of their sales teams.  Patrick is active in charitable organizations and is on the Board for The Depaul, Sales and Management Business School, in addition to being a frequent guest lecturer on sales performance, CRM, and enterprise technology. He has an Executive Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business and a BA in Business Management.

Welcome Aboard. Now, Go Sell!

Sales Coaching New Hires to Improve Sales Performance from the Start

Often overlooked in the quest to optimize sales performance is the process of bringing new members of the sales team up to speed on all the things they need to know—products, policies, customer characteristics—to succeed. With as much as 25 percent of the average sales force turning over from year to year, the need to have salespeople informed and trained early in the hiring process is critical to reaching sales goals.

The first three to six months are perhaps the most important time in a salesperson’s career at your company. This is the time to set the tone, discipline, and expectations you have of them. It’s your best opportunity to convey your desire for their success and how you plan to use process, methodology, coaching, and technology to help them be the best salespeople they can be.

While the first few months of a new-hire’s career with your company are important, the time period before staff are hired are equally important. Begin by integrating and coordinating the on-boarding efforts before staff are hired. Integrate the traditionally independent activities of multiple departments in your company and agree on the processes you will use to guide new salespeople into the fold.

Create a plan with specific objectives and milestones that can be tracked and expect productivity from the first day of employment. At first, productivity most likely will not be measured in financial results but rather in terms of activity that must be, and can be, tracked, measured, monitored, and coached. Sales performance and sales measurement should begin the day someone is added to your payroll.

If it takes nine to 12 months, on average, to get salespeople up to speed and you only get one year of productivity out of that salesperson, that’s an expensive proposition as the opportunity cost of this process is significant. If an annual quota for a sales representative is $1 million and in the first year he or she can only attain 40 percent to 60 percent of that quota, the lost revenue represents overwhelming costs often not factored into your sales plan.

The new-hire, on-boarding levers must be understood as well. These need to be tracked, measured, monitored and coached. Understanding these levers and providing managers with the proper content and tools reduces the time needed for new-hires to become fully productive and reduce support costs for that representative as time goes on.

Another component of on-boarding is the involvement of sales managers. Too often, companies don’t allow sales managers to be part of the on-boarding process. Even worse, sales managers think they are too busy and leave the on-boarding process to the training or HR departments.  Make manager expectations clear and provide them with tools to track, manage, and even rank the progress of new hires compared to others.

The on-boarding process should be designed to provide a clear and continuous message to the new salesperson that the company and the manager care about their success. Setting this expectation early and moving them from activity- and learning-based productivity to revenue productivity can become seamless and cements a success culture in your organization.

If you define the success measures, time frames and expectations, and coach from the first day of employment, the on-boarding process becomes the foundation for the company’s future sales success.

About the Author:  Patrick Stakenas is founder and CEO of ForceLogix Technologies Inc. (TSXV:FLT), provider of leading Sales Performance Management Solutions. Patrick has more than 25 years experience with Fortune 1000 companies and through leveraging core resources and technology he has lead companies to achieve record revenue and profit growth. Throughout his career, his focus has been on driving revenue organically and relying on his management groups to gain the most out of their sales teams.  Patrick is active in charitable organizations and is on the Board for The Depaul, Sales and Management Business School, in addition to being a frequent guest lecturer on sales performance, CRM, and enterprise technology. He has an Executive Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business and a BA in Business Management.

Focus on Facts: 5 Sales Performance Fallacies to Avoid

You might say sales is a faith-based discipline: Faith that every sales opportunity can be closed, faith that your sales goals will be met, faith that every quarter will be better than the one before.

While faith has it place, facts are where it’s at in any business. Separate fact from fallacy and your sales will soar. Here are five common fallacies many sales organizations fall prey to and how to overcome them:

Fallacy No. 1: The Most Effective Place a Salesperson Can be is in the Field

Top sales performers put in more time preparing for sales calls than any other group. They spend more time identifying leads, cold-calling, researching competitors and industry trends, developing sales plans, and creating call strategies. When they’re with customers, they focus on deal development.

Focus On: Developing a consistent sales plan companywide that requires reps to devote more time on pre-sales activities.

Fallacy No. 2 Sales Reps Naturally Go for the Low-Hanging Fruit

Sales reps tend to chase all deals with the same commitment and effort. They often don’t think beyond closing the deal and what it costs to service any particular customer.

Focus On: Customers that are best for your bottom line; customers that cost less to service, have the highest potential over the longest term, and fit your strategic goals.

Fallacy No. 3 Concentrate on the Cream of the Crop

It’s true, on an individual basis, top performers sell more. But as a group, average performers, those who form the majority of your sales team, drive the most revenue overall. Studies show that improving the average salesperson’s performance by just 5 percent can increase revenues by as much as 60 percent, considerably more than a 5 percent improvement in top performers’ performance will do.

Focus On: Developing a strategy that teaches your average performers to adopt the same tactics and tools your top performers use to achieve their superior results.

Fallacy No. 4 Only Senior Management Relationships Count

The person who signs on the dotted line is always the hardest to convince… at least for you. Lower-level, front line personnel who like what you have to offer and prefer your products are in a better position to convince senior management yours is the product they want and need. Their approach to management comes across as is what’s best for the company, not what’s best for you, the salesperson.

Focus On: Creating a diagram of the top influencers (usually the internal advocates) for your product or service and what is important to them. Then, target those stakeholders with your best efforts.

Fallacy No. 5 It’s All About the Relationship

Take ‘em out to lunch, get ‘em tickets to the ball game, remember their birthdays. Most people think the buddy-buddy relationship is the key to a long-term sales relationship. It is important, but studies show that only a small fraction of top performers classify themselves as relationship-builders. Instead, they challenge their clients to find deficiencies in their operations and use their product and service offerings to help customers solve their problems.

Focus On: Coaching sales reps how to effectively and aggressively overcome objections by demonstrating your product’s superiority over the competition and how it helps customers achieve their own goals.

So keep the faith, but keep focused on the facts; faith will keep you going, facts will close the sale.

About the Author:  Patrick Stakenas is founder and CEO of ForceLogix Technologies Inc. (TSXV:FLT), provider of leading Sales Performance Management Solutions. Patrick has more than 25 years experience with Fortune 1000 companies and through leveraging core resources and technology he has lead companies to achieve record revenue and profit growth. Throughout his career, his focus has been on driving revenue organically and relying on his management groups to gain the most out of their sales teams.  Patrick is active in charitable organizations and is on the Board for The Depaul, Sales and Management Business School, in addition to being a frequent guest lecturer on sales performance, CRM, and enterprise technology. He has an Executive Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business and a BA in Business Management.

Aligning the Sales Team, A Sales Manager's Guide

Use these 13 tips to help managers manage more effectively and sales people drive revenues higher and higher.

Everyone knows managers manage and salespeople sell.

So why doesn’t every sales organization manage themselves that way? To succeed consistently, sales organizations need a flexible, structured, repeatable process to help both halves of the equation do better.

Consider technologies that let you leverage key leading and lagging sales performance indicators for managers and salespeople, then, use them to modify behaviors and achieve the desired results more often.

Guide managers to manage better by:

1. Providing them with information on their salespeople that is systematic and both objective and subjective; give them actionable insights into what to do and how to do it
2. Providing direction on how to coach and on what areas to coach
3. Understanding their ability to coach, lead, and train
4. Tracking where they are spending their time; good managers let their top people operate more or less independently and instead, focus on turning their “B” players into “A” players, their “C” players into “B” players, or managing them out
5. Enhancing their ability to get results from the entire team rather than from just one person
6. Providing tools for them to make decisions and manage based on leading indicators and, making it possible for them to take action quickly with salespeople

Manage salespeople to sell more and better by:

1. Using performance management technology and tools to track the leading and trailing indicators of success
2. Understanding their strengths and weaknesses every day and managing both
3. Coaching them and providing guidance on skill improvement on an ongoing basis
4. Providing structure and measures of the right indicators so they can see where they rank
5. Training and managing activities that lead to results
6. Managing both objective and subjective data to build a successful skill-set
7. Increasing clarity of information and measurement and making it apparent that there’s only one version of the truth

By aligning the organization along its natural paths and using real-time information and feedback, you can guide each component of your sales team according to its needs.

About the Author:  Patrick Stakenas is founder and CEO of ForceLogix Technologies Inc. (TSXV:FLT), provider of leading Sales Performance Management Solutions. Patrick has more than 25 years experience with Fortune 1000 companies and through leveraging core resources and technology he has lead companies to achieve record revenue and profit growth. Throughout his career, his focus has been on driving revenue organically and relying on his management groups to gain the most out of their sales teams.  Patrick is active in charitable organizations and is on the Board for The Depaul, Sales and Management Business School, in addition to being a frequent guest lecturer on sales performance, CRM, and enterprise technology. He has an Executive Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business and a BA in Business Management.

Top 5 Questions Every Senior Sales Exec Should Be Asking (and the Answers too!)

This is not a trick question: Do you need to drive more revenue out of your sales team?

Of course, you do.

But do you know how to implement a successful sales effectiveness initiative with your managers? Do you know the right questions to ask? Do you know how to promote the behaviors that lead to success?

Asking these five questions can’t help but improve sales performance and drive revenues higher:

1. What’s holding back your “B” and “C” players from producing more revenue and meeting quota?

Pay close attention, and use automation, to track the critical leading indicators so you and your managers have a clear view of what’s really going on with every individual and every team.

Understanding these indicators and tracking, monitoring and measuring them provide insight on whether salespeople are doing the right things to get them to greater revenue.

2.    Will better coaching help improve performance?

By up to 17 percent for “B” and “C” players, according to the Center for Management & Organizational Effectiveness (CMOE).

A coaching process that tracks, manages, and monitors results provides significantly greater value. What if coaching only improved your “B” and “C” players by 10 percent or even just three percent? Chances are that would drive a huge increase in your numbers across the board.

As the subjective nature of coaching becomes objective and actionable, it becomes real. HR, marketing, senior management, supporting functions and everyone in the company will know that you are doing everything possible to drive more revenue to the company and that you care about your people..

3.    How much access to real-time, detailed representative information on skill level, selling ability, product knowledge, marketing messaging, or key leading sales indicators do you have?

Often the IT department tells you they will deliver this information but it never comes or it comes on their terms. Don’t be held hostage. The need to view and access sales representative information on sales performance data for actionable insight is a must.

Expect detailed, rolled-up information that gives you the power to make decisions and realistically report to higher management on why things are the way they are.

 

4.    When do you need the numbers? At the end of the quarter or the month when it’s too late to do anything about them? Or now? Today. Everyday.

Managers who are actively engaged with their team and coaching based on the criterion you or your sales training or operations group have established will see who is engaging and getting better well before the results come in.

Chronic underperformers will be called out continuously as they will be measured against the leading indicator criterion. Are they making the calls? Are they calling on the right prospects? Do they understand the product or service? Can they deliver the latest marketing message? Are they at least working toward getting better?

Managers gain the opportunity to spend time with the people who need help. They can gauge and adjust to positive changes and have the knowledge and documentation to take action with those who will not or can not perform to expectation.

 

5.    Are CRM, SFA, or other competing IT priorities trumping your opportunities to improve team performance?

Clearly CRM and BI tools have helped with efficiency but it’s still hard to link it back to growth and the optimization of the sales talent.

Analysts and consultants know that tracking, measuring, monitoring and coaching drives 15 percent to 30 percent productivity improvement in your “B” and “C” players but sometimes IT, HR and others prevent you from doing what’s right. Be sure you have the right analytical tools to get your job done.

About the Author:  Patrick Stakenas is founder and CEO of ForceLogix Technologies Inc. (TSXV:FLT), provider of leading Sales Performance Management Solutions. Patrick has more than 25 years experience with Fortune 1000 companies and through leveraging core resources and technology he has lead companies to achieve record revenue and profit growth. Throughout his career, his focus has been on driving revenue organically and relying on his management groups to gain the most out of their sales teams.  Patrick is active in charitable organizations and is on the Board for The Depaul, Sales and Management Business School, in addition to being a frequent guest lecturer on sales performance, CRM, and enterprise technology. He has an Executive Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business and a BA in Business Management.

Sold Out: Top 5 Strategic Performance Management Tips for Salespeople

Strategic performance management for sales teams enables the proper alignment of measurement and tracking of individual and team goals to corporate goals. In addition, this strategic approach supports career development, planned turnover, and succession planning. Here are five sales performance management tips to drive revenues higher and higher:

1.    Automate to motivate

By automating your sales teams’ performance management you and your salespeople get daily performance tracking. The strategic impact is that managers can focus on improving employee and company performance rather than on filling out documentation and sales productivity rises.

2.    Consistency Counts

A consistent, accurate compensation plan provides security, trust, and motivation for salespeople. To really succeed and drive sales upward, tie your compensation plan to your performance management system to track if compensation is driving the behaviors you desire.

3.    Align Sales Goals

Your business will benefit when salespeople are focused on appropriate leading indicators which are aligned to corporate objectives. Use technology to automate and objectively align salespeople to the rest of the organization.

4.    Measure, Track, Report

Technology tools which measure competencies and define success are useful in helping salespeople develop their long-term goals and strategies. Organizations that take this step will be far ahead of their competition.

5.    Coach, Coach, and then Coach Again

Make sure your managers have the data they need to coach and that they understand how important coaching is to achieving sales goals. The Conference Board of Executives cites a 17 percent improvement in revenue when salespeople are consistently coached. Make sales coaching a priority.

Automating sales performance management isn’t quite like putting your car on cruise control, but it does provide steady leadership and guidance to ensure your sales force is maximizing every opportunity to drive revenues higher.

About the Author:  Patrick Stakenas is founder and CEO of ForceLogix Technologies Inc. (TSXV:FLT), provider of leading Sales Performance Management Solutions. Patrick has more than 25 years experience with Fortune 1000 companies and through leveraging core resources and technology he has lead companies to achieve record revenue and profit growth. Throughout his career, his focus has been on driving revenue organically and relying on his management groups to gain the most out of their sales teams.  Patrick is active in charitable organizations and is on the Board for The Depaul, Sales and Management Business School, in addition to being a frequent guest lecturer on sales performance, CRM, and enterprise technology. He has an Executive Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business and a BA in Business Management.

Sales Force Management: Don’t Sell Yourself (or your team) Short

Generally speaking, every team in the NBA recruits the best basketball-playing talent money can buy.

So why has one team, the Los Angeles Lakers, been in the league championship finals for seven of the last 10 years? Yes, they had Shaq, and they still have Kobe, but players come and go.

The constant is the coaching: Phil Jackson.

Sales teams are very much like ball teams. To succeed consistently, they require the same oversight—tracking, monitoring, measuring, reviewing, ranking and sales coaching of the qualities and skills that turn talented players into great ones.

By deploying the right quality assurance model and the right tools, you can measure and monitor individual salespeople’s performance and guide them to a championship season every quarter of every year.

Consider the business process improvement methodology developed in the 1950s by the noted statistician and consultant, Dr.  W. Edwards Deming, known as the Deming Cycle or PDCA:  Plan, Do, Check, Act.

1. Plan: Establish the objectives and processes required to achieve the desired results
2. Do: Implement the process
3. Check: Monitor and evaluate the process by testing results against the objectives
4. Act: Apply actions necessary for improvement if the results require changes (i.e., coach)

In sales, “planning” can include laying out the sales strategy or methodology and tools identified to support good performance. Using tools such as SalesForce Optimizer, you can develop a concrete plan to measure and monitor pipeline or call activities, compensation goals, or sales competencies.

“Doing” is the daily or weekly execution based on the planning stage. This includes investigation into the quality of the sales calls or activities.

The “checking” step includes tracking the proper leading and lagging indicators including customer feedback, to determine if, not only sales goals are being met or exceeded, but why. With ForceLogix Enchanced Coaching Edition, you’ll be able to capture ride-along data, track sales behaviors, and rate critical skills such as product, sales, and marketing knowledge which have a direct bearing on performance.

In a sales performance environment, “acting” means coaching the salesperson, teaching them the proper process to correct a technical or intrinsic flaw. With an application such as SalesForce.com Optimizer for App Exchange, a salesperson’s SalesForce.com data is completely integrated with the skills you’ve been coaching them on. You (and the sales rep) can view the impact coaching has had on their sales-to-forecast, call activity, and how their sales pipeline is—or isn’t—filling up. You get actionable data on which to “act.”

Quality control originally focused on testing and blocking the release of defective products. Quality assurance for sales is about improving and stabilizing the sales team to avoid, or at least minimize, issues which contribute to poor salesmanship in the first place.

Consistent data recording and assessment of leading indicators leads to sales integrity. If the processes, methodologies or specifications don’t reflect the true quality requirements for the sales team, the end result cannot be guaranteed.

By applying process and technology to measure the inputs, throughputs, and key sales performance indicators upon which revenues depend, your company can implement genuine sales measurement and sales management methodologies and begin to see significant returns to top and bottom line.

About the Author:  Patrick Stakenas is founder and CEO of ForceLogix Technologies Inc. (TSXV:FLT), provider of leading Sales Performance Management Solutions. Patrick has more than 25 years experience with Fortune 1000 companies and through leveraging core resources and technology he has lead companies to achieve record revenue and profit growth. Throughout his career, his focus has been on driving revenue organically and relying on his management groups to gain the most out of their sales teams.  Patrick is active in charitable organizations and is on the Board for The Depaul, Sales and Management Business School, in addition to being a frequent guest lecturer on sales performance, CRM, and enterprise technology. He has an Executive Management Certificate from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business and a BA in Business Management.