For more than a hundred years, this has been the question that general and commercial directors have asked themselves in order to create a theoretical model of their sales systems and be able to establish metrics that can give them visibility over the achievement of their future results.
This same question has been asked by hundreds of gurus, who in many cases have established models and systems of commercial planning that have truly provided systematic commercial management to many successful organizations. This question has also been answered by hundreds of pseudo-gurus who, in our opinion, with varying degrees of success in their postulates, have at least contributed content that has helped develop the market for professional self-help books.
Currently, technology has provided us with countless tools that give us visibility into the performance of sales departments. From simple web-based applications to the parameterized modules of the most prestigious software factories, we are offered a wealth of information that can even “infoxicate” us due to the sheer volume of data we can handle. This reality indicates that commercial performance is no longer a black box where salespeople are the only providers of the company’s results, and no one knows how much they do, how they do it, when they do it, and where they do it
Where is the answer that heads this post?
In our opinion, it is to understand the sales department as a line in a production chain.
Initially, we have the productive capacity of the salespeople, depending on each sector and the product or solution being sold, each member of the sales department will be able to make a maximum number of visits. This figure is the same as the production capacity of a machine in manufacturing the units it produces.
Starting from the sales representative’s productive capacity, the Commercial Director must direct it towards those processes and clients that will contribute to the results of the current fiscal year. He must plan for each period the number of visits or actions he must take for maintaining the portfolio, acquiring new clients, cross-selling, launching a new product, retaining clients, or recovering a client won by the competition.
As in any factory, the quality department must ensure that the process is reliable and the product meets all specifications. The sales department is no different; the sales director must establish the quality indicators that should govern their team, so that activities reliably achieve the desired results.
Information systems or CRM must provide visibility into the cause/effect relationship of the sales teams so that each period, the adjusted monitoring of each team member can be carried out. After each monitoring, the “maintenance” department enters the factory to make adjustments to the machines so that they have the necessary productivity. In sales, these adjustments are made by the sales manager in the individual follow-up meetings each month, where they review the results obtained, relate them to the activity carried out by the salesperson, and establish the action plan with the corresponding adjustments for the next period.
Once the basic production process in sales is established, billing forecasts for the next 6 months can be made, which may vary by 2% or 3% from the final period result. This situation is identical to that of a production manager, who knows how many units will be produced by the end of the period.
This information allows the sales director to make decisions on how to optimize sales processes, how to establish changes in the orientation of the salespeople’s activities, or how to improve the quality of management. Ultimately, if we implement a sales model focused on productivity, our sales team will be destined for success.
Ten benefits of a productivity-oriented business model:
- Transparency of the sales department’s performance to achieve commercial objectives.
- Improvement of at least 20% in the sales team’s activity compared to teams that do not have a productivity-oriented commercial model implemented.
- An alarm system the moment unwanted results appear.
- Improvement of the planning and orientation of sales activities.
- Possibility of establishing continuous improvement processes for the sales team.
- Improvement in the quality of commercial forecasts with a deviation of between 2% and 3%.
- Establishment of performance indicators aimed at the success of the team and the improvement of each person in the sales department.
- The ability to establish commercial optimization actions at the most appropriate moment and without being dictated by urgency.
- The possibility of having information systems that truly aid commercial development and not just report on the seller’s activity.
- A model that helps the marketing department establish campaigns and actions that directly accelerate commercial performance.
| David Galve | General Director www.linkedin.com/in/davidgalve |  |
