Planning Your Sales Activities
Sales planning has many different levels, each one a crucial link in the chain between your goal and the achievement of it.
The planning process is important because, unlike many technical functions, the sales function is both open-ended and unstructured: • Open-ended - because there are always more opportunities to pursue; • Unstructured - because in most organisations the sales function's job is to bridge the gap between the two givens in the job - a territory and a target - in many organisations whatever the salespeople do to meet target is acceptable, as long as they meet target.
This type of organisation, the sales driven, "if it moves sell it something" company, is typically also deal-oriented rather than customer oriented, has difficulty maintaining profitability (some jobs are more profitable than others) and usually lacks differentiation so ends up competing or price thereby putting even further pressure on margins.
Many sales people are uncomfortable with planning, feeling that sales is about people and relationships rather than plans.
Our experience, however, is that the people most successful in selling, plan at several levels: • Territory Plan - this is an assessment of the effort and relative time required in each phase of sales for each target market sector.
The territory plan lends itself to basic modelling of the activities and effort required in each phase both as a tool to direct resources and as an indication of the effectiveness of the activity on the territory; Planning your sales activities • Prospecting Plan - split by the two key activities - List Building and Contacting Prospects.
Many companies fail to recognise the difference in these two activities and as a consequence end up spending too much time in ineffective canvassing on an inadequate list when they should be spending more time in building the list • Account Plan - for anything other than a small, low-value sale, an account plan is a useful tool to help the salesperson manage his/her way to a sale.
There is a section on account management, particularly Key Account Management, but for the moment it is worth pointing out a simple six step process which everyone can use in account planning, whether you have a formal account management system in place or not The Account Plan Process can be broken down into several areas: • status • outlook • objectives • strategy • actions (tactics) • controls (indicators) Lets look at each one in more detail; Status Many salespeople can ascertain their status by asking the following questions: • Where are you in the sales process: qualifying/ building the case/ getting the order? • Who and what do you know of the account: who likes you/ who does not? • What are the roles of the individuals in the account: how do you know/ what is the need? • What is your solution: how does your solution match the need/ how does it compare to the alternatives (both direct competition and inhouse)? • What gaps are there in your understanding of the account? • What is their Decision Making Process? (note: this is not what you have to do, this is what customer has to do to give you the order).
• What contacts have there been already in this account?
The planning process is important because, unlike many technical functions, the sales function is both open-ended and unstructured: • Open-ended - because there are always more opportunities to pursue; • Unstructured - because in most organisations the sales function's job is to bridge the gap between the two givens in the job - a territory and a target - in many organisations whatever the salespeople do to meet target is acceptable, as long as they meet target.
This type of organisation, the sales driven, "if it moves sell it something" company, is typically also deal-oriented rather than customer oriented, has difficulty maintaining profitability (some jobs are more profitable than others) and usually lacks differentiation so ends up competing or price thereby putting even further pressure on margins.
Many sales people are uncomfortable with planning, feeling that sales is about people and relationships rather than plans.
Our experience, however, is that the people most successful in selling, plan at several levels: • Territory Plan - this is an assessment of the effort and relative time required in each phase of sales for each target market sector.
The territory plan lends itself to basic modelling of the activities and effort required in each phase both as a tool to direct resources and as an indication of the effectiveness of the activity on the territory; Planning your sales activities • Prospecting Plan - split by the two key activities - List Building and Contacting Prospects.
Many companies fail to recognise the difference in these two activities and as a consequence end up spending too much time in ineffective canvassing on an inadequate list when they should be spending more time in building the list • Account Plan - for anything other than a small, low-value sale, an account plan is a useful tool to help the salesperson manage his/her way to a sale.
There is a section on account management, particularly Key Account Management, but for the moment it is worth pointing out a simple six step process which everyone can use in account planning, whether you have a formal account management system in place or not The Account Plan Process can be broken down into several areas: • status • outlook • objectives • strategy • actions (tactics) • controls (indicators) Lets look at each one in more detail; Status Many salespeople can ascertain their status by asking the following questions: • Where are you in the sales process: qualifying/ building the case/ getting the order? • Who and what do you know of the account: who likes you/ who does not? • What are the roles of the individuals in the account: how do you know/ what is the need? • What is your solution: how does your solution match the need/ how does it compare to the alternatives (both direct competition and inhouse)? • What gaps are there in your understanding of the account? • What is their Decision Making Process? (note: this is not what you have to do, this is what customer has to do to give you the order).
• What contacts have there been already in this account?
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