What Factors Affect Sales Team Performance?
The performance of a sales team is crucial for a business’s success, as it directly impacts the revenue and growth of a business. The sales team often serves as the face of a company, as they are the team that often interacts with potential customers the most and bear the responsibility of fostering the relationship between the business and its clientele. The significance of their position is monumental, and it is important to be aware what factors affect sales as well as the performance of a sales team, including:
Sales Training
Training is of the utmost importance, particularly for those who are new to sales. Effective training equips a salesperson with the tools and knowledge to sell effectively and engage with the customer base through their consistent interactions.
Sales Process
An effective and well-defined sales process can provide a reliable structure to help streamline the sales process and increase the efficiency of the team.
Motivation
Creating and maintaining a positive work environment cultivates a happier, more dedicated team that is consistently motivated to do better. Providing incentives for their successes, recognition for their good performances, and opportunities for career growth allow salespeople the means to take pride in the work they accomplish.
Communication
Effective communication is key for reliable team performance. Salespeople should be able to provide consistent communication with potential customers, managers, and other members of the team.
Sales Goals
Creating sales goals that are both clear and achievable can allow salespeople to focus their efforts and measure their performance.
Sales Management
Sales managers should provide guidance, support, and direction to salespeople while monitoring and evaluating their performance. Management plays a large role in the performance of a sales team, and an effective manager can bring out the best in the people around them.
Technology
The use of technology, such as iDecide Interactive, can help sales teams streamline their processes, increase efficiency, and improve performance.
Market Knowledge
Sales teams should have a deep understanding of the market they occupy, their target audience, and the competition so they can identify opportunities and create effective sales strategies.
But the point of all this is to curate and leverage the information we need to be successful in the sales process. Tracking the right KPIs will make the things that are most important to your business more predictable. It will make your life less stressful, and help your sales team and sales managers know where to focus their efforts. So, let’s get into what the most important sales KPIs are, and what to do about them!
10 Proven Strategies To Improve Sales Team Performance
1. Hire the right people
Business owners, traditionally, approached hiring from the perspective of recruiting the top talent available. When it comes to salespeople, it’s important to recognize that top talent is the result of great training. When hiring new people into the sales team, it is critical to look for the skills and personality traits of someone who is receptive to training and coaching efforts.
2. Use an effective sales structure
The structure of your sales organization plays an important role in the effective ability of your salespeople to perform their jobs. It is not uncommon for sales structures to grow and change as the business evolves, so take the time to evaluate what style will improve sales performance the most. The three most common sales models are the assembly line, the island, and the pod and each have their advantages.
3. Refresh your sales strategy
Modern markets require organizations to be adaptable to changing consumer needs. The world moves quicker than ever, and there are an unfortunate number of sales strategies that are developed in January and see little change until December. Examine your sales strategy bi-annually, quarterly, or even monthly as the needs of the business demand.
4. Make decisions with sales performance metrics
Most businesses understand that they should be making data-backed decisions but find themselves drowning in what factors affect sales. Without a clear dashboard for reporting or key performance indicators (KPIs) it is difficult to gauge how to best improve sales performance. Instead of taking in more sales data, it is more effective to find and utilize the right data. Some metrics you should track include:
- Win Rate
- Sales Quota Attainment
- Sales Content Usage
- Sales Training Completion
- Sales Cycle Length
- Sales Pipeline Coverage
- Conversion Rates
5. Train your reps to win
Establish a comprehensive sales training program that not only guides sellers on putting your methodology into action but enables managers the opportunity to coach and inspect behavior as well. Sales training programs tend to sprawl, so it is often better to break key initiatives down into a simple set of objectives so that both the sales team and frontline managers can narrow in on what they need to change.
6. Coach your coaches
Sales managers, much like salespeople, need to be trained on how to enhance rep and team performance. These frontline managers need just as much investment and support as the reps to perform their jobs effectively. Clearly identify what good performance looks like in sales rep performance. Effective communication and support to sales managers enables them to carry the behavior forward, teaching the entire team means of how they can best improve sales performance.
7. Make personalization easy
Personalization plays an immense role in buyer engagement, but it can be a cumbersome process to consistently do. Consider your sales reps’ perspective: with large amounts of content to share and a short timeframe, reps need something simple and quick to personalize everything from emails to presentations. Enablement teams should focus on preparing foundational content, such as a customer deck, with many pivots for a wide variety of industries and personas. Having the option available in one place enables quick, accessible content that your team can use to better facilitate their relationship with their customers.
8. Elevate your customer experience
If a customer has difficulties engaging with a business, whether it is online or a result of certain sales processes, they will be more reluctant to buy your solution. Instead, invest in providing an exceptional customer experience. Showing customers that you care about making things accessible for them is a clear way to improve sales performance. While your individual reps can only control their one-on-one meetings with a customer, elevating your entire customer experience requires the alignment of your marketing, customer success, and other sales-adjacent teams to drive consistent, easy interactions across the customer lifecycle. These changes can take time, but they inspire customer loyalty in your product or service.
9. Put your people first
As you continue to increase sales performance across your teams, it is important to not lose sight of the people who have made it possible. From employee recognition to enhanced benefits and perks, your long-term success is dependent on the people around you. Speak to your employees and show an active interest in helping them grow and you will find yourself soaring to even higher heights.
10. Stay hungry
Success is not a permanent guarantee. Recognize the success your organization has had, but your competitors are always right behind you, waiting for an opportunity to pass you buy. Always keep looking for an opportunity to grow, change, and innovate on your products and services to surprise and delight your customers.
Improve Sales Team Performance With iDecide
With these proven strategies to improve sales team performance now laid out, there is a cutting-edge platform that can help you implement and execute them seamlessly. From refreshing your sales strategy, and making personalization easy to elevating your customer experience, training your reps to win, and receiving helpful data to improve, look no further than iDecide.
iDecide Interactive is a “choose your own adventure” presentation software that provides an engaging experience for customers. Avoid talking on and on or sharing boring videos, and wow your client with personalization, analytics, calculations, follow up and appointment setting, and real time updates. Sales reps can also duplicate presentations and receive results without rejection because they can choose to follow up with only the people who have seen the presentation.
Most importantly, iDecide AI driven, interactive presentations are easy to create. If you ever want help, you can utilize iDecide Assist that lets iDecide team members help you with a script and build it out on the iDecide platform. Learn more about how iDecide can help you write and create the perfect sales pitch here.
iDecide gives you access to prompt and efficient follow-up messaging with email or text to the client immediately after they have viewed your presentation with easy appointment setting options available.
You will increase engagement, boost your credibility, and monitor and deliver meaningful performance data quickly and easily. Let iDecide help you create your next sales presentation and close your next deal.
Mike Boccia has been in Sales and Marketing for over 25 years and really honed his skills as a licensed advisor in the financial industry. He’s been the keynote speaker at conferences and training events worldwide and is the founder and CEO of iDecide Interactive.
Mike Boccia is now an author, speaker, coach, CEO, and most importantly, a father to his 2 beautiful daughters.