Whether you’re a startup or a lean organization, if your sales team is small, you have your challenges cut out for you. One challenge tends to be market readiness, i.e., the need for company recognition (branding) and communications. The other challenge is that often each sales person is “doing their own thing” to close deals. Closing deals is always a good thing, but inconsistency is definitely an area for improvement. The challenge is that it’s hard to manage the sales team for consistency, if the sales manager is also selling.
In a perfect world, there should be one process that combines the team’s experiences, presentations, and objection handling. Often this is done in the sales training process, where each new member is trained on the typical sales cycle and the process that supports the sales cycle. This onboarding should include:
- How to select strong prospective companies
- Buyer personas and pain points –
gatekeepers, influencers, decision maker - Value proposition(s) and solution(s)
- Decision making processes, typical pipeline conversion rates, target numbers
- The timing of the personal sales contact –
video calls, phone calls, personal visits - Objection handling and sales escalation
- Supplemental marketing campaigns –
emails, literature, webinars, case studies, white papers
Smart leaders know that consistent onboarding and a defined sales process help the sales team become more effective right up front. This sales cycle should be monitored, analyzed, and adjusted on a regular basis to maximize sales productivity and to ensure satisfied (and profitable) customers.
