There is a purple pill called Nexiom that some people believe is a wonder drug. It solves several problems. It does wonders for people that have experienced distress. I wish I could pass out a pill to each and every sales person out there including your entire management team to create instant success. Unfortunately, there is no “Purple Pill” that you can buy to drug your sales team. There is no “Purple Pill” that will improve effectiveness, there is no “Purple Pill” that will increase profit, there is no “Purple Pill” that will generate more revenue, there is no “Purple Pill” that will increase market share, but there is a proven process that sustains continuous improvement that can help you achieve all those objectives.  It’s actually very simple, and not that difficult of a methodology.  It’s called a Sales Effectiveness Process.  This is simply a structure for continuously improving sales force performance through focus, discipline, and process built on a platform of accountability.

Nowadays, salespeople must be problem solvers able to generate solutions for customers in their time of need. Therefore, they must possess a great deal of knowledge about their customers' business. They must actually define what those needs are because the customer may not know, nor take the time to explain if they do know. Customers want us to have the knowledge and intelligence to comprehend and analyze their problems before showing up at the door. Customers will listen and buy from the salesperson that finds the "pain" and takes it away.

That often means you may need to go back to the basics; to revisit sales best practices. In our industry today the sales environment leans toward a more multifaceted atmosphere, salespeople must become strategists with a plan. This plan requires more knowledge about the business, better relationships and better solutions. Some old school salesmen may believe they know what it takes. They have the experience. They've been around a long time. They also may be wrong. The world has changed. To improve competitive advantage we must do things differently. We can't afford to be complacent. Complacency destroys competitive advantage. As sales professionals, we can't become full of ourselves, no matter how long we've been in the field, no matter how much experience we have.

Going back to basics and revisiting best practice means initiating targeting, goal setting, action planning and customer profiling. Targeting is the process of selecting high potential customer accounts to receive intense sales focus.  Goal setting translates that high potential into achievable numeric objectives, i.e. revenue and margin growth.  Action planning means we have to define the activities that are required to achieve your expected results. It’s about strategizing, figuring out exactly what it is going to take to succeed at every individual account you target. That is why it is important that we understand the customer's customer and the customer's industry. Be more knowledgeable and conscious of our customer's problem. We are no longer selling a product, we are selling a solution to make their life easier, happier, better, less complicated, or more fun. By understanding the customer's business and his customers, we help them make a profit through cost reductions, improved efficiencies, increased value and increased sales. Solutions come in many forms and may have nothing to do with our products. That's okay. Look for the pain regardless of what it is and focus on the solution. Customers don't want products; they want profits - or ways to make profits. They want satisfaction, feelings of comfort, pride, praise and self-esteem. They are people just like us. Well, maybe they don't have the same crazy genetics that we have as salespeople, but they are just as smart, just as caring and have similar personal needs and feelings.

Once you understand basic sales best practice and you have trained your entire sales force, it’s really about execution. Execution involves the day-to-day activities of the salesperson.  For most industries, this entails both planned, proactive tasks and opportunistic, reactive events that the salesperson uncovers by doing the right things in the right place at the right time.  It’s critical that the progress of the tasks in the target action plans is carefully monitored to avoid surprises.  A sales effectiveness process will circumvent the most common mistake made in sales today, trying to manage results. We have to manage activities because it’s the activities that produce results. Once the results are in, the horse is out of the barn and everything we do from that point on is reactive. If you proactively manage the activities, the expected results will follow.

“Sales is a profession that requires professional sales people.” Every company needs aggressive, creative and resourceful salespeople to have their products specified, accepted and used by customers. Without informed and capable field salespeople, no company could hope to compete in the marketplace today.

I believe that good salespeople, the kind who can help a company really grow, don’t just happen to come along by chance or fate. There is no such thing as a “born salesperson,” because selling ability is much more than an intangible given that a person either has or doesn’t have. Granted, selling does require certain attributes in a person and some people are naturally born with these attributes and some aren’t. Also, the person must be intelligent, able to grasp ideas and details easily, retain them and recall them for use whenever necessary in selling situations. These factors and many others relating to personal and emotional characteristics are contributing elements in the makeup of the professional salesperson. However, these attributes alone do not make a sales person nor do they guarantee success. It takes more than that. A sales person must have adequate tools, resources and leadership to maximize their effectiveness.

Take the time to evaluate your entire sales process. It just might be the best investment of time that you make this year.

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