Know-How Exchange : Strategy

The salesperson manages their accounts (or territory) and the sales manager manages the sales people.

Together they establish attainable goals and work toward those goals. The manager is there to support as required. When sales goals are not being made, the manager is there to find where the breakdown is, and get sales back on track.

A book I love, is by Ron Marks-- Managing for Sales Results. It's practically a step by step guide.

I believe there are a couple of things you should be looking at:
Target your Accounts - Research indicates that companies who build a process around selecting who should be the focus of their attention are 47% more likely to reach their goal.

Build a process around selling - define the actions of your sales team. They will moan and complain but a process eliminates wasted energy and misspent time.

Coach and manager your team based on the targets and process. Be brave. You will be called a micromanager and worse. But, anything else leaves you an observer of your team as opposed to a manager of the team.

I have much on my website that you might find useful. Feel free to mine it for info. And, if you want to chat about some of the things we can do to help you... give us a call.

I agree mostly with Frank-- but with some additional thoughts.

There is no doubt you should inspect what you expect. Sales people want (really) do want to be held accountable. But I don't think pros want to be micro managed. In fact I resent it. I'm here to sell not generate reports. Course I'm always a 1099, and have told micro managers "want a report-- buy a salesperson". You hired me because I know the territory and market, so let me do my job. I will do reporting as it benefits forecasting inventory and other factors. But a report for the sake of a report-- good luck getting it from me.

By same token, leave me out there alone - those are the lines I rarely have stellar numbers.

Your salespeople should target accounts-- the manager targets niches. Review all with the individual. Are you on the same page, same goal?

Micro manage the poorer performers and give those performing less attention. That doesn't mean let them run free. The best managers I have worked for kept me accountable, but also kept out of my way. There is a fine line but one you'll only learn with experience and it is probably different with each individual. Too much attention and I call them ankle nippers-- you are running for the touch down and they're grabbing your ankles, holding you back.

The book I referenced and the book "Execution" talks about setting a process. You don't make quota? X will happen. You may not get fired, but you will have my attention. Read deep into Frank's advice of targets and process.

当我运行一个销售会议I ask for a SOFT report, Successes, Opportunities, Failures and Threats. Let the cummulative knowledge of the group coach a salesperson who's hit a bump in the road. It's great team building.