Dear sales manager, we are in the third quarter and your team is not making target. What now! The first thing that comes to mind is, are all the team members not making target? or are some members so far behind that the good work of a few cannot cover the gap. Remember, we get judged as a team, team is essential in sales. Every salesperson has a season, but the team must cross the line.
The easiest remedy for this is structured incentives, assuming that sales commissions are 10%, of that the individual incentive should be 7% and 3% should be team.
This translates as, when the individual team member makes budget they receive 7% commission, when the team makes budget, we all (team) receive 3% commission. For those leading the pack this guarantees 10% commission. For those falling behind, the team commission helps to sustain the momentum. Getting the very best out of your team means paying attention to the slowest runner.
Always remember that it costs money and time to recruit, time is an enemy we cannot control, and money spent on recruiting can be saved with better management, orientation and rigorous sales training. If you applied a well-structured recruitment framework, then trust your judgement, every team member you have has the potential to be a star.
The next critical questions are;
Who set the budget?
What insights were used to set those targets?
Are your competitors making budget?
Now some might ask, how on earth would you know if your competitors are making their budgets? But you should! As a sales manager, you have a top 15% tier of clients that are responsible for your continued success. These are large institutional relationships that change the weather in your industry. Those clients hold onto suppliers that impact their business, if those clients are nervous during your one-on-one meetings, then look around, chances are – there is going to be a significant shift in the market, or you are not providing an adequate service.
Pay attention to mergers and acquisition transactions. Do not neglect your role in the service chain, set appointments with the deal makers of your industry, keep your nose to the ground when it comes to market shifts. When we set budgets, we have to be confident that we will retain all the market share we currently hold. And we have to target some of the competitor’s business. In most instances market growth is marginal in line with GDP – if you are in retail you would need to assess the consumer credit demand ratio as a percentage of GDP. New clients do not just come out of the woodwork; they usually come from competitors. Assess the competitor’s offer, what can you do better, are you making the offer at the right time, in line with the client buying cycle.
Setting budgets has to be based on market analysis. What elements of the market show potential for growth? Once again consider a direct offer to take market share, study your competitor. Pull the industry analytics over the past 3-5yrs, look for the peaks and drops. Are any of those climate conditions prevalent in the current market, how did they impact you in the past, how can you reposition to avoid the full measure of the negative impact. You must love stats! Sales managers, statistics is your friend, data driven decision making is essential.
Innovation is the star pupil for sales teams, if a good solid stream of product enhancements is released then access to new markets is possible. Innovation can be improving the existing and creating add-ons. Add-ons (accessories) are a cheat sheet, because they are completely dependent on the core product and have little impact on the existing value chain. Add-ons should be created in partnership with the sales team feedback; these are little presents that help the client feel treasured. An example of add-ons are the gadgets that we buy to protect our cell phone. Before waterproof designs, we had waterproof covers, they lasted 5years. Then we got cell phone stickers for our generation X, because who wants to look like everybody else!
Add-ons work in every industry, it is easier to see them in retail, however they are also visible in management service industries. Service industry add-ons today are driven by AI support, often using a platform standard offering to improve the analysis that would have taken the executive hours to digest. The only rule here is that your core offer should be worth it, then the client will be willing to listen to your support service offering.
The crux of the matter is, if you missed targets for 3 quarters, do not defend the loss, fix it!
