What Makes Open Book Selling Different from Other Sales Coaches?

Depending on your situation and where you are headed, we have a number of ways we work with organizations:

• Sales Fundamentals – Create or update the sales process along with impactful messaging that empowers salespeople
• Effective Sales Management – Work alongside an existing sales manager on sales management best practices, proper meeting rhythms and structure, coaching skills and provide tools that once implemented will create successful salespeople and drive sales results.
• High Performance Sales Team – Facilitate the sales leadership and management team through the sales fundamentals, effective sales management, sales team evaluations, resulting in the creation of a well -defined roadmap for sales success with the client.
• Sales Focused Organization – Advise and facilitate the sales leadership and management team to implement the right sales management solution, refine their sales fundamentals, complete sales team evaluations, and create a comprehensive sales playbook, while defining a short- and long-range roadmap for sales success with the client.

Our team has years of combined experience coaching, advising, consulting, and training sales teams. Successful business owners themselves, our team has the experience needed to help your business grow and thrive.

When and where it makes sense, we provide sales leaders who will evaluate your entire sales organization. This includes your people, systems, and strategies. Our sales leaders will manage and coach your sales organization to drive better results while working to fully develop a sales focused organization. We also provide sales coaching, training, management, and leadership to mid-sized businesses with outside sales teams.

Find out how we can help you in many areas of your business here.

What Makes Us Different from other Sales Coaching Teams in Ann Arbor?

We guarantee your satisfaction. Our only focus is your success. We believe that we must meet you where you are and provide value every step of the way from that point. We guide you through an experience that helps you discover new approaches, opportunities and solutions that once implemented yield success and avoid the frustrations of missteps and lackluster performance and results.

We’ll help you identify the reasons for the lack of an effective sales process and provide a sales manager/leader who is laser focused on improving your sales processes and team. Whether you need a little or a lot of help, we are there to help you see the whole picture, evaluate people, processes, or systems, and remove barriers to change that once implemented will yield performance and results.

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Whether you are satisfied with the effort, focus, and results of your sales process, many clients we work with aren’t ready to act – simply because they don’t know where to begin. If you’re open to a brief call, let us know and we can take the first step together. We've worked with many businesses with sales leadership, hiring, managing a sales team, and sales coaching in Ann Arbor, and we can help you too. Not located near Ann Arbor, Michigan? We also offer virtual services and can work with you no matter where you are.

Call us at 248-468-7400 or contact us and we’ll reach out to you right away!

How 1:1 Meetings Can Transform Your Sales Team

Are you meeting with your team at certain intervals and for various purposes? Whether you answered yes or no, you might consider some of the following:

• 1-2-1 Meetings (weekly/bi-weekly)
• Team Meetings (bi-weekly/monthly)
• Team review meetings (quarterly/annually)
• Call recordings
• Joint sales calls/ride-alongs
• Role plays
• Team training
• Coaching – individual/small group/whole team

This probably seems like a lot, so consider what will work best for you, your organization, and what you’re trying to accomplish. One of the most important in the list above is 1-2-1 meetings – a chance to look at individual results, pipeline health and level of activity.

1-2-1 meetings also serve to review three critical areas: the recent past, the current work, and the near future. Meeting with your team members individually on a regular basis is a fantastic way to get to know them, check in with them, figure out where they are winning & struggling, and where to help them be masters at their game. During these meetings you will learn about specific calls, whether they are following an established process or not and where conversions in the sales process are occurring or if there is a sticking point. You may learn that their activity is too low or that some major element is missing. What you learn will be instructive regarding recording calls, joint sales activities, etc.

You may discover that the entire team struggles in a specific area such as talking about budget or money. If that’s the case, then you can offer team training on this, then follow-up with coaching. Your 1-2-1 meetings will serve to probe deeply into the salespersons’ progress and how to help them individually.

Team meetings can happen with less frequency and can serve to celebrate, plan, share information, train. You may also review team progress on corporate goals, review sales methods, innovative ideas, etc. The purpose of these meetings can vary but will not usually be so personal and serve to unify the team, their direction and the progress that is being made.

Annual and quarterly meetings should serve a different purpose such as developing goals for the year or reviewing the results of the previous quarter or year. Instead of both, you may choose a semi-annual meeting with a specific agenda, one that may include hearing from a sales professional (trainer, coach, advisor, etc.). Since meetings, their purpose, agendas, and frequency are so important to individual and team success, plan what makes the best sense for your organization, the sales environment & team, and what you are trying to accomplish. If your first shot at this doesn’t work, don’t give up --  be persistent and then if revisions are needed, make them.

Lastly, one of the best recipes for success with meetings is to put them in an electronic calendar and send invitations for each attendee. If you need to change because there is a schedule conflict, select a near day and time – no cancellations. If you don’t act like meetings are important, others will follow suit.

Read more about managing a sales team in Ann Arbor on our website!

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Want to achieve results that matter and/or grow your high-performance sales team? We've worked with many businesses to help them manage their sales teams in Ann Arbor, and we can help you too. Not located near Ann Arbor, Michigan? We also offer virtual services and can work with you no matter where you are.

Contact us today to schedule your complimentary discovery session! Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form and receive a free Sales Focused Organization checklist.

Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Managing a Sales Team: Empowering Performance

If you want to make a difference in leading, managing and bringing about desirable results for your sales team, what are some of the most important things to consider?

Let’s assume most of the following are in place:

• You have a CRM that is being used by your team
• You have established solid KPIs to track progress and performance
• You have a defined sales process with key milestones
• Your team understands the importance of these items and has knowledge of them

So, what now? Are you meeting with your team at certain intervals and for various purposes? Whether you answered yes or no, you might consider some of the following:

• 1-2-1 Meetings (weekly/bi-weekly)
• Team Meetings (bi-weekly/monthly)
• Team review meetings (quarterly/annually)
• Call recordings
• Joint sales calls/ride-alongs
• Role plays
• Team training
• Coaching – individual/small group/whole team

This probably seems like a lot, so consider what will work best for you, your organization, and what you’re trying to accomplish.

Read more on our website!

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Want to achieve results that matter and/or grow your high-performance sales team? We've worked with many businesses with managing a sales team in Ann Arbor, and we can help you too. Not located near Ann Arbor, Michigan? We also offer virtual services and can work with you no matter where you are.

Contact us today to schedule your complimentary discovery session! Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form and receive a free Sales Focused Organization checklist.

Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

How to Use Sales Leadership to Train and Manage Sales Athletes

Do you have a sales athlete that isn't living up to their potential? 

Are small or bigger elements being missed?

Are they avoiding a critical area such as talking about money or budget?

Have you tried:

1. Let them know that you want to work closely with them to make gains and/or find area that once addressed with result in better outcomes
2. You may consider freeing their schedule of some responsibilities to allow more focused time on specific activities that will support desirable outcomes
3. Meeting with them weekly or more frequently to check in and course-correct along the way

As a sales leader, it’s no fun to resort to extreme measures, and none of what we have addressed is designed to lay blame or be utterly critical. If we make the comparison to top athletes in a sport and we want top sales athletes, we must adjust just as any sporting organization will do regarding their talent. Sometimes we may find that there is no culture fit with a given individual within our organization or that one person can ‘spoil the barrel’ for others. In many ways the solution is to evaluate, spell out expectations, support talent in achieving them, and cut your losses when supportive efforts don’t work.

None of what we have described above is easy and it does not happen overnight. If you have challenges getting your sales team to perform, maybe it’s time to consider a Sales Coach. Sales coaching isn’t one size fits all. Your sales coach may work exclusively with a few salespeople or with the team. They may work solely to support the sales manager to be more effective in their sales coaching role, or to complement their efforts as a sales manager. Engaging with a sales coach may begin with an assessment of your current sales team – one that identifies areas that will produce the greatest return on investment. If you are even a little open to the idea of sales coaching, what’s the harm in a conversation - one where you can determine if there is a good reason to explore whether sales coaching is or is not a fit for your organization… one where NO is OK.

Sales Leadership for Your Ann Arbor Business

As business and sales coaches in the greater Ann Arbor, Michigan area, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales efforts on track. If you’re not happy with your organization’s sales results, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results.

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Want to achieve results that matter and/or grow your high-performance sales team? We've worked with many businesses with sales leadership in Ann Arbor, and we can help you too. Not located near Ann Arbor, Michigan? We also offer virtual services and can work with you no matter where you are.

Contact us today to schedule your complimentary discovery session! Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form and receive a free Sales Focused Organization checklist.

Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

How to Manage Poor Performance in Sales Athletes

You’re an existing sales manager, a new one, or someone who has been promoted to a sales management or sales leader position. You have an existing team and will likely hire more salespeople, and you’ve been charged with hitting a 20% year over year growth in sales results.

For the purpose of this discussion, let’s say the expected growth is in top-line revenue. Depending on your organization, the focus may also be on other KPIs, such as gross profit, net profit, and/or other important KPIs such as net new accounts, average revenue per sale or account, and more.

One of the first things a manager may do is to take stock of what is and isn’t in place, and then determine the level of effectiveness for each area or element. This may include a CRM, meetings, goals, individual performance against goals, and more. When it comes to salespeople and performance, it would not be unusual to find some at the top, middle and bottom of performance metrics.

A manager with this scenario may wish to keep the good success elements and people going without disruption and see if they can raise the level of performance of the less well performing people and or elements. Below are a few items that could be explored with those on the sales team who are not performing optimally:

• Take a close look at their ‘book of business’ in your CRM
• Summarize their results, pipeline, and their level of activity
• Look for areas where the KPIs are not likely to support success and desired results
• If the results and pipeline are weak, is there enough activity?

Read the full list on our website! 

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Want to achieve results that matter and/or grow your high-performance sales team? We've worked with many businesses with sales leadership in Ann Arbor, and we can help you too. Not located near Ann Arbor, Michigan? We also offer virtual services and can work with you no matter where you are.

Contact us today to schedule your complimentary discovery session! Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form and receive a free Sales Focused Organization checklist.

Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

How to Hire High-Performing Sales Athletes

Have you been frustrated trying to hire the right person for your job opening?

Do you want to hire a high-performing sales athlete?

Consider these items as you look for a qualified candidate:

• Know what you’re looking for, what the position is and the KPIs it must impact once a successful hire is made
• Predetermine the characteristics that a suitable candidate must possess
• Create or revise an up-to-date job description 
• Determine your compensation plan
• Have a territory and/or ‘book of business’ plan

If you think about these items in the context of a sports athlete, it will help you come to a clear understanding of why they are crucial for a successful sales focused organization with top notch sales performers. Take ice hockey which has three basic positions – goal tender, forward and defense. 

Can you imagine hiring someone who is capable offensively for a goaltender position? It’s no different in sales – are you looking for business development, a hunter, or a farmer? What specifically must they accomplish to yield success for the company? The clearer you are about the role you expect someone to play, the responsibilities and the expectation that go with that role, the better set you will be for success.

With some of the complexities of developing Sales Athletes, maybe it’s time to consider a Sales Coach. Sales coaching isn’t one size fits all. Your sales coach may work exclusively with a few salespeople or with the team. They may work solely to support the sales manager to be more effective in their sales coaching role, or to complement their efforts as a sales manager. Engaging with a sales coach may begin with an assessment of your current sales team – one that identifies areas that will produce the greatest return on investment. If you are even a little open to the idea of sales coaching, what’s the harm in a conversation - one where you can determine if there is a good reason to explore whether sales coaching is or is not a fit for your organization… one where NO is OK.

Read more about sales leadership on our website!

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team, sales leadership, and an effective sales management solution? 

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! 

Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Creating High Performance Sales Athletes

We all want top performers in our sales environment, right? It starts with a successful hire, someone who has the right ingredients, talent and/or potential. 

In order to hire the right person, we have to know what we’re looking for and be able to define our needs before we hire talent. Let’s say we’re looking for someone to manage customer accounts and create opportunities to grow customer accounts. This is hugely different than a position where we’re looking to add new business, grow a territory, break into a new market, or something else. This all has to be in place before we advertise that a candidate is wanted for a specific position and that interested parties should apply. 

Below is a list that may help with acquiring top candidates and growing them into sales athletes:

1. Know what you’re looking for, what the position is and the KPIs it must impact once a successful hire is made
2. Predetermine the characteristics that a suitable candidate must possess
3. Create or revise an up-to-date job description 
4. Determine your compensation plan
5. Have a territory and/or ‘book of business’ plan
6. Know how you will work with the salesperson (meetings, ride along, joint calls, reporting, etc.)
7. Have an estimate for how long it may take a new salesperson to get up to speed and deliver results
8. Know how you will handle subpar performance
9. Define the role for the position clearly
10. Define the responsibilities for the position clearly
11. Have clear expectations for the position
12. Manage all of the above early and often

Examine this list and note the items you are well-prepared for and those that you are less than well-prepared for. It’s not a disaster to make changes – even with an existing team or salesperson. Make the adjustments, announce them early, and declare that we’ll climb into this change together.

Learn how a sales coach can help with your sales leadership strategy on our website!

Sales Leadership, Management, and Coaching for Your Sales Team

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team, sales leadership, and an effective sales management solution? 

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! 

Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

When Should You Consider a Sales Coach for Your Business?

A major reason for working with a coach is scotomas – blind spots. If you’ve ever experienced a blind spot, you know that it literally didn’t exist until you became aware that it did. We’ve all experienced blind spots, and coaches point out blind spots in athletes during every practice, drill, or game. This concept is just as true in sales coaching, whether it be for business development, sales force management, strategic selling, or simply about sales conversions. A coach will see and notice things others can’t see – at least until they’re pointed out. Needing a sales coach is nothing negative, in fact it’s a positive - a safety net - providing opportunities for greater success.   

Inviting a coach to your sales environment and team doesn’t mean an instant fix. Successful sales coaching takes time, as success is built on the relationship formed between the coach and management, the sales team, and its individuals. That relationship can function at the top of your organization (alignment, strategic direction, etc.), with sales management, the sales team and at the individual salesperson level. The sales coach will advise, mentor, train, and coach in the gap areas that lie between current performance/results and those that are desired. A good coach will advocate for the success of the organization and provide resources that result in positive change for the organization’s sales team – its culture, function, activities, meetings, pipeline, and results.   

Sales coaching isn’t one size fits all. Your sales coach may work exclusively with a few salespeople or with the team. They may work solely to support the sales manager to be more effective in their sales coaching role, or to complement their efforts as a sales manager. Engaging with a sales coach may begin with an assessment of your current sales team – one that identifies areas that will produce the greatest return on investment. If you are even a little open to the idea of sales coaching, what’s the harm in a conversation - one where you can determine if there is a good reason to explore whether sales coaching is or is not a fit for your organization… one where NO is OK.   

Read more on our website!

Sales Management for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales efforts on track. If you’re not happy with your organization’s sales results, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results.

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

What's the Difference Between a Sales Coach and Consultant?

In recent months, we’ve written about many sales topics and why it makes sense to be process-oriented, thoughtful, intentional, and employ KPIs to enhance your sales efforts and results.

Where does a sales coach come into play and where can your sales organization benefit from a sales coach?

Before we try to answer this question, it’s important to make a distinction between a coach and a consultant:

• A consultant possesses expertise and can be considered a subject matter expert (SME). They will often provide a report or recommendations that they think will lead to a desired outcome. They are often not involved in the implementation and outcome of their work.
• A coach, by definition, means to train or to teach. A good coach will understand people's strengths and weaknesses while promoting and maintaining motivation for those that they work with. Unlike a consultant, a coach will be there through thick and thin to ensure that success is realized.

A major reason for working with a coach is scotomas – blind spots. If you’ve ever experienced a blind spot, you know that it literally didn’t exist until you became aware that it did. We’ve all experienced blind spots, and coaches point out blind spots in athletes during every practice, drill, or game. This concept is just as true in sales coaching, whether it be for business development, sales force management, strategic selling, or simply about sales conversions. A coach will see and notice things others can’t see – at least until they’re pointed out. Needing a sales coach is nothing negative, in fact it’s a positive - a safety net - providing opportunities for greater success.  

Read more on our website!

Sales Management for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales efforts on track. If you’re not happy with your organization’s sales results, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results.

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Improving Individual Sales Performance

It’s really easy to put people on the defensive, so with leadership and management, sales team members must understand that they are important players and that asking for information about their results, their pipeline, and activity are the norm. 

The reason for gathering this information is critical to the success of the organization and so is the impact of their individual sales effort – success reaching a sales goal. Information sharing between salespeople and management/coaches should happen on a regular schedule. 

If information sharing hasn’t been a part of your sales efforts, then when it’s first introduced, it may feel foreign and awkward both at the salesperson and at the management levels. We suggest standing appointments at regular intervals – schedule the whole year in advance! Persistence in holding information sharing meetings will win out in the long run.  

For management, information sharing meetings (also known as 1-2-1’s) with salespeople can be magical and facilitate building a relationship, to probe, to support, and to learn of individual successes and challenges, and whether all salespeople have the same struggle. One such area may be talking about money, which can be a challenge for many salespeople. If all your 1-2-1’s suggest this is the case, then a team workshop on how to talk about money with prospects will be valuable. Once the workshop has been held, the learnings that came with the workshop can be reinforced through healthy dialogue during 1-2-1’s.

Learn more about improving your sales team on our website!

Sales Management and a Sales Coach for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales process and efforts on track. If you’re not happy with your organization’s sales results, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results. 

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution? 

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Creating Sales Athletes and Improving Sales Performance

In recent months, we’ve written about pipeline(s), CRMs, a common language for your sales team, KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators), and sales results. 

Great athletes and other performers such as actors and musicians have coaches, and often have more than one. Why not take this approach with your salespeople? Sales leadership, sales management and sales coaching all play an important role in creating sales athletes. Sales leaders and managers can set the stage for success where sales coaches can get into the nuances of sales.

Some of the approaches we discussed last month can be applied at the salesperson level with answers to the following three questions:

1. Are the results you are getting on target with your individual sales goals (YES or NO)?
2. If NO, how strong is your pipeline (with a good number of viable opportunities at all stages of the sales process)?
3. If the pipeline is weak, what regular activities is the salesperson is engaged in?

Read about how to improve your sales management strategy on our website!

Sales Management and a Sales Coach for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales process and efforts on track. If you’re not happy with your organization’s sales results, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results. 

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution? 

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Improve Sales Performance at the Organizational Level

Enhancing sales performance can take place at the organizational level, the management level, the sales team level and at the salesperson level. This isn’t about placing blame; it is about accurately assessing what is and isn’t working as well as it should.

The outcome of your analysis could result in efforts that will both reveal issues and enhance performance that drives results. Some of these include:

•    Clarity around corporate goals, targets, and strategy
•    Is the focus new business or follow-on business, or both?
•    Review of or revision of your defined sales process with stepwise stages
•    Expectations around lead generation and follow-up
•    Role clarification
•    Ride along sales calls (joint/multi-person)
•    Call recordings and review
•    Team training sessions
•    Book reviews (sales methodology)
•    1-2-1 meetings and coaching
•    Role plays
•    And much more

In the final analysis, at all levels of the sales organization, performance can be adjusted for better outcomes. Enhanced performance will show up when answers to the first 3 questions above confirm that the necessary changes have been successfully implemented.

It’s as simple as that! Well, it’s not always simple and it can be a lot of hard work to transition a mediocre sales performance to a great one. Read more on our website!

Improve Sales Performance with a Sales Coach for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales performance, process, and efforts on track. If you’re not happy with your organization’s sales results, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results.

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Sales Performance with Results that Matter

In recent months, we’ve written about pipeline(s), CRMs, a common language for your sales team, and KPI’s - Key Performance Indicators.

Does that cover everything your business needs to succeed? The answer is NO!

With KPI’s we may be able to detect areas that are and are not performing. We may also be able to determine whether each area is ‘systemic’ or something related to an individual salesperson. Using your sales ‘elements’ – topics that we’ve covered in recent months – we need to interpret the information/data we have.

Three questions that will set the stage for un-complicating the complicated:

1.    Are the results you wish to attain being met (YES or NO)?
2.    If NO, what is the state of your pipeline (sales team and sales individuals)?
3.    If the pipeline is weak in any way, is it at the team level or individual salesperson level?

With these 3 questions answered, you will have important information that can direct your focus on interventions. This can be transformative!

Learn more about improving sales performance on our website!

 Improve Sales Performance with a Sales Coach for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales performance, process, and efforts on track. If you’re not happy with your organization’s sales results, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results.

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Sales Process and KPIs

Sales success is multi-dimensional and has many facets. A client we worked with a number of years ago was super-frustrated with the results they were achieving. Their sales had plateaued and had been stuck at the same level for about 6 months. This was not only frustrating, but unfortunate as they had a goal to increase sales by 25% and their efforts to do so were landing well short. Our early evaluation of their sales efforts indicated that the following were in place:

• Goals or targets
• A defined sales process with stepwise stages
• Contacts, leads and prospects 
• A method of tracking their efforts and results in their sales process steps 
• Data to review 

Analysis of their KPI’s affirmed the effectiveness of their marketing, including that they had a good number of inquiries, phone calls, and web-generated inquiries. 

Without these KPIs, a way to measure them, and review them, coupled with a defined sales process, it would have been much harder to detect the cause of their sales plateau and how to correct it. Are these elements in place for your sales success? What are your KPI’s, how are you using them and what is missing that making informed adjustments is a reality? Are your KPI’s specific to the needs of your sales team and its success? What adjustments could you make to enhance your sales management efforts, being able to assess what is and isn’t working, or to drive performance and results for your organization? 

Sales Management and a Sales Coach for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales process and efforts on track. If you’re not happy with how your organization’s sales function is doing, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results. 

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution? 

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

How KPIs Provide Feedback for Your Business

In recent months, we’ve written about pipeline(s), CRMs, and a common language for your sales team and its efforts. Let’s take a look at the importance of KPI’s – Key Performance Indicators. Which ones are you using: are they leading or lagging ones and how do they help with managing or enhancing your sales performance and efforts? 

In the most basic sense, KPI’s provide feedback:

• About results
• About results as compared to a goal
• About the strength of your pipeline
• About the level of sales activity with your sales team and its members
• About the effectiveness of your sales process
• About how well your sales process is being followed
• About where sales process elements are not being executed well
• About how well each sales team member is doing, what they are doing well and where their performance could be positively impacted 

Sales success is multi-dimensional and has many facets. A client we worked with a number of years ago was super-frustrated with the results they were achieving. Their sales had plateaued and had been stuck at the same level for about 6 months. This was not only frustrating, but unfortunate as they had a goal to increase sales by 25% and their efforts to do so were landing well short. 

See what our early evaluation of their sales efforts indicated on our website!

Sales Management and a Sales Coach for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales process and efforts on track. If you’re not happy with how your organization’s sales function is doing, coaching can be a great option. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, pipeline(s), language, and KPI’s you’re using. So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your entire sales function will lead to better results. 

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution? 

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Why Common Sales Language is Important for Overall Sales Management

It’s important to think about the types of customers a sales department has – a one-time customer, a current customer, a recurring customer, or a past customer. Or in some cases, the customer is a partner that your organization supports. Your offering compliments your partner’s ability to fully serve their customers.  

Having a common sales language helps with communication, sales management, and coaching sales team members to enhance their performance. Defining terms like “contact,” “lead,” “suspect,” “prospect,” or “opportunity” will enhance the communication and efforts of a sales team to be effective, efficient, and successful.

Take stock of your sales language. Is it specific to the needs of your sales team and its success? Are there terms that lack clarity or are not common to the entire team? Are there terms you should add because they would help with ongoing sales management, assessing what is and isn’t working, or to pursue a new channel that aligns with the strategic direction of the organization?

Read the full article on our website!

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

Is Your Sales Language Too Confusing?

As you may have experienced in the business world, many businesses are equipped with buzz words and acronyms – these are understood by others in the same industry, and they may have very specific internal meaning. They become common language for that company and its employees. Some companies even have departments that develop or use their own language, terms, and acronyms. The sales department is no different and developing an internal sales language that is common to all is critical to success.

With sophisticated CRMs and multiple pipelines to manage and record in these CRMs, internal sales language that is understood and common to everyone in sales becomes an important undertaking. It will not happen automatically.

Take the word “customer” – we often hear this term used to represent a:

• Contact
• Lead
• Suspect
• Prospect
• Paying customer

Which is it for you?

It’s important to think about the types of customers a sales department has – a one-time customer, a current customer, a recurring customer, or a past customer. Or in some cases, the customer is a partner that your organization supports. Your offering compliments your partner’s ability to fully serve their customers.  

Read the full article on our website!

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales effectiveness and improvement analysis (SEIA) report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We’re here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

 

Implementing and using a CRM

Organizational communication and management of expectations are crucial to the successful implementation of a CRM. 

 

Making the transition from no CRM or another CRM to a new CRM is fraught with challenges.

Here’s how we recommend tackling those challenges:

• Take a long-range approach and communicate early and often. Open up communication channels and identify power users and or support people.
• Set expectations and support them.
• Break implementing a CRM up into small bites that can be managed and accomplished. A simple expectation of mandating the use of a CRM to capture all sales information can be very problematic for many salespeople, particularly seasoned salespeople who have relied on other methods to record and track their sales efforts. Patience and persistence will be rewarded.

Information in VS. Information out

The old adage: Crap in = Crap out is very much at play. Your talented salespeople have been turned into data entry and data management people. Sometimes it’s new data or it’s cleaning up old information and there could be a lot of it. Quality of data is critical to reports and the value that comes from them.

You may need a data person to clean up old data. You will likely want to set some standards to make sure that the language of your sales team is well understood – for example, when a word such as lead is used there should be a common understanding/definition of what that means.

The reports you count on from your CRM will be so much more valuable to your salespeople, management, and other departments when the foundations, structure and process elements are in place.

 

Read more about implementing a CRM on our website!

Are you ready to begin your sales management journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Whether you’re satisfied with the effort, focus, and results of your sales team, many people we speak with have been hesitant to act – simply because they don’t know where to begin. If you’re open to a brief call, let us know and we can take the first step together.

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales candidate assessment report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We are here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

The Importance of a CRM for Sales Management

Most companies use spreadsheets to keep track of their customers, correct? Some companies still use them, and many more have been employing CRM’s – Customer Relationship Management software. 

CRMs are often robust platforms that perform a multitude of tasks. Sometimes they are found in fully integrated ERP’s (Enterprise Resource Planning software) and in many cases CRM’s range from very basic to more complex systems. 

There are free versions and ones that are very costly. So, how do you confidently select and implement a CRM or change from a current one to a new one?

What is a CRM?

In its most basic form, a CRM supports and houses information. We can actually call it a database – one where data is captured, entered, and organized to help a sales organization carry out its strategies, sales function, and sales management.

Once information is recorded into the system, we can call up reports and information that can provide valuable feedback. This feedback can range from results to the health of a sales pipeline (discussed in our November post) and whether sales activities are at desired levels.

If you do an internet search for CRM’s, you will quickly become overwhelmed with the number of choices in the marketplace. Because choosing a CRM can be a daunting and time-consuming exercise, we encourage you to build in enough time to learn, evaluate, and make an informed decision. 

What CRM is best for our organization?

Depending on your business model there may be many or a small number of options for a CRM that meets your needs.  We encourage our clients to build a criteria list for what they think will best work with their business model. The other major factor is that any business that selects a CRM should expect to make changes and adjustments.

Read more about CRM choices on our website.

Are you ready to begin your sales management journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution?

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact form to receive a sample sales candidate assessment report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We are here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.

How Can Effective Sales Management Processes Help Your Business Grow?

We recently had a discussion with a client about what a pipeline is and is not. Looking online only added to the confusion for the client. Sales Pipelines have become increasingly important because they lead to a visual representation of your sales process – one that can be captured in your CRM (customer relationship management) software. Your sales pipeline will chart the process from a contact to a client or customer. Not all pipelines will be the same and they should be very specific to each organization. 

With many of our clients, we use the analogy of a section of PVC pipe – empty at the start. Representing sales activity, we insert balled-up athletic socks. When the first pair is inserted, nothing comes out the other end. We must keep inserting the balled athletic socks into the pipe, until the pipe is full and the first set of socks, representing closed-won business, comes through the other end. With this simple analogy, we represent the most basic elements in sales – activity, pipeline state, and results. Said another way, results will follow a healthy pipeline that is well supported by activity that is based on a solid strategy with great execution. 

Sales Management and a Sales Coach for Your Southeast Michigan Sales Team

In the day-to-day operation of a small business, it’s easy to become short sighted. You begin to take for granted that the way things are is the way they have to be, or always will be. It often takes an experienced outsider to remind us that we really can change things for the better.

As business and sales coaches in Southeast Michigan, we’ve helped many local businesses get their sales efforts on track. If you’re not happy with how your organization’s sales function is doing, coaching can be a great option. 

In some cases, we operate as a Fractional Sales Leader and other times we coach with an existing Sales Manager and sales team. We often work at all levels of the organization to help build a Sales Focused Organization - leadership, strategic direction, systems, sales management, departments, and individual contributors. We also assist in the recruiting and evaluation of “Qualified, New Business” Sales representatives.

Read the full article about sales management here!

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a sales-focused organization with a high performing sales team and an effective sales management solution? 

Whether you’re satisfied with the effort, focus, and results of your sales team, many people we speak with have been hesitant to act – simply because they don’t know where to begin. If you’re open to a brief call, let us know and we can take the first step together.

Call us at 248-468-7400 or fill out our contact us form to receive a sample sales candidate assessment report! Together, we can assess how your company is doing, what potential it has, how to realize this potential, how long it will take along with expected gains. We are here to help you determine the best way to achieve your goals.