Among all the other rituals of the season, the New Year brings with it the season of goal setting, both organizational and personal. For individual sales professionals, I have always believed that they were lucky in as much as their goal is set for them by their companies in the form of quotas or targets. One less thing to think about, although many will tell you that when they see their goals, it is not one less thing to worry about. But having my own company, and realizing the work that goes into setting targets, I long for the days when I was just given a number. For companies the challenge is a bit different, impacted by whether they are a public company or private, their sector, size and a number of other factors, are they targeting growth in market share or both.
However, in both instances, companies and individuals, I believe they spend way too much time on setting goals, and not nearly enough time on the means to achieve said goals. This isn't a Zen thing where the journey is "more" than destination or arriving. It is based on the practical reality that most tend to feel that having a goal is half way there to achieving it. Yes, it is important to set goals, near term and long term, but having a game plan, a playbook that will help you get there is more important.
When you ask most sales people how they plan to achieve their goal, they will tell you that they will work harder, work smarter, leverage their relationships, or other clichés. When you drill down for specifics, you get the nervous laughter or smile. Very few talk to you about reviewing their territories and adjusting. While not exhaustive, here are some things to consider, no let me rephrase that, here are some things to execute.
Start by reviewing you account base, intimately know your top clients, and fire the bottom 10%. No really, these bottom 10% suck up you most valuable resources. Understand what your churn rate, not only who is likely to disappear from your base in 12 months, but why. Is it attrition, which needs to be replaced; is it mergers and acquisitions which could leave you flat or down in revenues, and again a need to replace. How much of the churn can be made up from the base, with existing buyers or new pockets within client companies, how much will require the acquisition of new logos?
Segment you territory at least by size of company and type of products/offerings bought. There could be a host of other factor, but these two allow you to plan your time and resources. In a very general way, small clients and small buys will deliver smaller sales in less time than a large company will with "formal buying processes" buying bigger dollar amounts. You may find that it makes sense to have two small opportunities in your pipe for every large one, or you may not, you really won't know until you do the exercise.
Another output you get from the exercise above is a clear picture of what your best prospects look like. As you do this over time, you will also learn which and when some of you existing clients may grow, and how to leverage that; conversely which may fall off and when. For example, a simple indicator may be time to payment. If you notice that a client who extends their payments from 15 days to 30 days, generally reduce order size within three months, you know that you have to prepare for that by finding the volume elsewhere.
You can combine many of these data points to discover the Yield Per Call, based on the nature of the account, volume or dollars per call, and more. The aim here is to have a blended pipeline that will allow you to get to your goal, and your company's goal in the most efficient and profitable way.
Similar examinations should be used at the company level. Regardless of whether the goal being set is arrived at from a bottom up, or a top down approach, how your organization will deliver the goal can't be left unplanned. Often targets are set with little consideration for how they will be met. Sure, there are some movement of deckchairs, but few benchmark territories to help them make tangible adjustments to size, resources, team deployment, and other factors. Do you grow the territory to take advantage of the situation, or do you shrink it forcing sales people to go deeper into their accounts and territories. Or do you do what I hear people say and do all the time: "well you know, after all, Harry has been in that territory for ages".
Planning your goals and setting them is not easy, but planning the means of hitting goals set is paramount.
What's in Your Pipeline?
| Tibor Shanto - | 
| Tibor Shanto, Principal with Renbor Sales Solutions Inc., and author voted #1 by readers for top article of 2009 by Top 10 Sales Articles. Renbor has helped dozens of organization with sales execution - - from filling their pipeline with real prospects - - to driving real revenue. You can read Tibor's blog The Pipeline at www.sellbetter.ca/blog. For more information on helping your team sell better, write to:
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, or call 416 671-3555. You can also follow Renbor on TwitterRead More >> | |
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9 Steps to Achieving Your Sales GoalsRochelle Togo-Figa
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You hit the nail on the head AGAIN!
I don't care who makes the goal or if the goal is achievable or not.
Without a plan only luck could possible get you there.
I have been asked to achieve what I feel is a pretty "Stretchy" goal.
So I sat down and did a gap analysis and proposed that I will agree to the stretch goal but here (1,2,3) are the reasons I feel it is somewhat unachievable and these are the things I am doing right now in into the future to "Mind the gap!"