If you’re a sales leader with a solid team and strong revenue, you may be wondering how to scale your success. How can you land bigger deals, take on higher volume and advance your entire sales organization to the next level? Bill Bartlett, a coach and facilitator with more than 40 years of sales experience, has put together a list of six ideas to scale a sales team. These ideas are based on SMART goals, which are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely. He says that when you follow these best practices consistently, you can successfully scale your sales team, and by extension, your organization.
We outline Bartlett’s suggestions in this issue of Promotional Consultant Today.
1. Prioritize the high performers. Make time on your calendar for one-on-one conversations with each one of your strongest sales reps. Meet with them first, and then branch out to the rest of your team. Find out what works for them, what challenges they face and what they would like to do differently. Remember that a truly effective coach uses questions, not lectures, Bartlett says.
2. Standardize your sales process. In order to scale your sales team, you can’t have 15 different people following 15 different roadmaps. As a sales leader, it’s up to you to systematize a sales process, Bartlett says. Take time to identify and record what works best and then make sure everyone is working off the same roadmap.
3. Track behavior. When you’re aiming to scale, numbers are important, but so is behavior. This is because it’s much easier for sales professionals to adjust their behavior than their revenue outcomes. Bartlett says that is essential to have a clear fix for the unique daily, weekly and monthly behaviors that make it possible for each sales rep to most effectively meet their goals.
4. Focus on learning. Consider how much time your sales reps spend on professional development. Think about what new techniques they are learning each week. Focusing on doing and never learning means people aren’t investing in their growth. When there’s no growth for individual reps, there’s no growth on the sales team, Bartless says. Make learning a part of your team culture.
5. Develop thought leaders. Certain top performers can help you and the rest of the team to spot new trends in the marketplace and identify new techniques for connecting with likely buyers, Bartlett says. Make the most of the competitive intelligence these people uncover on the front lines by letting them share it with the rest of the team.
6. Hire effectively. This means hiring to sustain or improve the workplace culture you want, Bartlett says. Make sure the people you bring onto your team fit your current culture or what you aspire it to be. Always look beyond skills and background. Sometimes the best candidates may not have the strongest resumes, but they end up fitting right in with the team. When this happens, the entire sales team benefits.
When you’re ready to scale your sales team, the key is knowing what has worked well and then taking it to the next level. Make the most of your efforts by following the six best practices above.
Compiled by Audrey Sellers
Source: Bill Bartlett is the president of Corporate Strategies & Solutions Inc., an authorized Sandler Training center located in Naperville, Illinois. He is an acclaimed coach and facilitator with more than 40 years of sales success.
