Research conducted by Aberdeen Group showed that 41% of sales teams won't hit their quotas. This is in spite of all of the time and effort put into strategy, planning and quota development. Here are 3 reasons why these teams won't hit their goals and how to determine if yours will hit theirs.
1. They don't have a clearly defined sales process. By sales process, I do not mean entering and tracking information into the CRM. A sales process is a clearly identified series of gates that move an opportunity from a prospect to a close. Each of these gates has clearly defined metrics that determines what the salesperson needs to accomplish in order to move the opportunity forward. Harvard Business Review found that companies with a definable sales process had a 19% increase in revenues compared to those that didn't have a process.
2. Sales leaders focus on managing the numbers instead of their sales team's behaviors. At Sandler, managing behaviors is called a cookbook. A cookbook is a set of actions or behaviors that, when undertaken daily, delivers a predictable and measurable outcome. For example, this could mean the number of meetings required, new prospect calls made, referrals asked, among other behaviors. This gives the sales person a plan and a road map to attain it. HBR also found that sales leaders who identify and manage behaviors, and coach their teams to execute them effectively, had 29% more revenues than teams that did not.
3. There isn't goal alignment. Company goals and quotas are set without creating alignment with each of the sales person's goals. Sales people are not involved in the discussions resulting in a lack of emotional investment. Remember, most sales people don't wake up in the morning to hit "your goals," they wake up to accomplish their own goals. The company is just the vehicle to do this. Goal alignment will make accountability not only easier to accomplish, but also longer lasting.
Of course there are more factors involved including attracting and hiring the right talent. But by focusing on the 3 points above, you will give your team a better chance to hit their goals with more predictability and if necessary, an actionable course correction strategy along the way.
Aberdeen Research found that 78% of Sandler trained sales teams WILL hit their quotas. What are your chances? Remember, sales and sales leadership training is expensive, but what is it costing you to go to market in 2020 with an untrained sales team?
Your goals mean nothing if you don’t evaluate where you are. Download our free worksheet and review your goals for 2018.
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