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.

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.

What is a ‘Healthy’ Pipeline?

Your pipeline will consist of discrete stages, each with goals, activities/tasks and/or milestones that must be met before the next stage or step can be pursued. Each transition from one stage of the pipeline is considered a ‘conversion’. These transitions become critical to sales success because they can be analyzed numerically, and they provide important data and feedback to sales management. 

Let’s say your pipeline looks like this: Contact > Lead/Opportunity > Sales Qualification > Decision > Closed Won/Lost. If we analyze the conversions at each stage, we’ll gain insight into what is and isn’t working. Our analysis will be dramatically enhanced when we add specific goals and milestones that must be met before transitioning from one stage to the next. Many organizations will have multiple pipelines that represent different scenarios in sales – maybe the existing customer pipeline is different from that of a prospective one or there may be stages that are different for an inbound inquiry as compared to an outbound cold call.

Whatever your pipeline and criteria needed to transition from one stage to the next is, the labels and sales-specific language within your organization must be clear to the entire sales team and everyone in the organization. No plan is a plan to fail. A great plan that’s launched without clear communication will struggle to be as successful as intended. 

What is your pipeline, and how well understood and effective is it? What CRM are you using and how well does it reflect your pipeline and support analysis of your sales efforts? With today’s CRMs, Sales Managers/Leaders rely heavily on reports that can help bring to light training possibilities for their team, and to enhance the performance of individual sales team members.  

We’ve heard from many organizations that their biggest current issues are supply chain and staffing levels. These current challenges overshadow sales as a concern. This may be the perfect time to examine or re-examine your sales efforts, the process, stages, and pipeline(s). So don’t wait - proactively evaluating your sales will lead to stronger conversion rates and results. 

Read more 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 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.

Ready to Begin Your Journey to Effective Sales Management?

Thinking of your current sales management situation, read the statements below and ask yourself: are these in place and are they optimized?

If your answer is NO to two or more statements, then the sales management solution you have may be sub-optimal.

• You have a sales manager/leader in place - their primary role is to lead and grow the sales team, coach and train them, and develop a high-performance sales team
• The sales manager meets regularly with the business owner to ensure alignment of sales and organizational strategy
• The sales manager holds salespeople accountable to goals, territory management, and activity levels
• The sales manager meets at least 1x per month 1-2-1 with salespeople for feedback, coaching and support
• The sales manager holds team meetings at least 1x per month

Every sales-focused organization has room for improvement! If you aren’t implementing all the statements above, or only a few, you may need to adjust your mindset or priorities around sales management… it may be time to get some help.

Over the next few months, we’ll provide an in-depth look at key areas of a successful Sales Focused Organization including sales fundamentals, effective sales management, and a high-performance sales team. We will also make available to you a comprehensive checklist outlining specific focus areas toward building a sales focused organization that succeeds and thrives.

Want to get the best out of your sales team? Read the full article on our website.

Are you ready to begin your journey?

Are you ready to build a high performing sales team and a sales-focused organization?

Have you struggled in the past to develop the tools your business needs to thrive?

Whether you are satisfied with the effort, focus, and results of your sales process, 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 download of our Sales-Focused Organizational Checklist!

Effective Sales Management

Do you have the WRONG Sales Management Solution?

Consider these:

• Owner/C-Level managing sales
• Someone managing sales along with another key functional area of the business
• Salesperson is quasi sales manager
• No one is managing sales

We have learned that many companies suffer from the wrong sales management solution, and often they have someone trying to manage sales, while running another area of the business. For example, the owner or president continues to manage as the team grows, where among other things, they struggle to hold people accountable and have no time for real development or coaching. We have also found instances where the sales manager has their own territory and is also selling – it rarely works well, can undermine trust with other sales team members and creates internal competition that is not constructive.

For more information about solutions for sales management, read the full article on our website.

Are you ready to begin your sales management journey?

Are you ready to build a high performing sales team and a sales-focused organization?

Have you struggled in the past to develop the tools your business needs to thrive?

Whether you are satisfied with the effort, focus, and results of your sales process, 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 download of our Sales-Focused Organizational Checklist!