Developing a Winning Sales Organization

I know what you're thinking. You're sitting there smugly saying to yourself, "Another stupid infographic from a company that knows nothing about my business. My company is different...we know how to sell...if only we could just fix our marketing, everything would be fine."

While having a misaligned marketing organization can impact sales negatively, the simple truth is that it's the job of the sales team to sell.

And now you're thinking, "My sales team isn't that bad. We had a pretty good year and I'm sure things will pick up now that we have that new [sales manager] [CRM system] [sales methodology] [sales guru] — fill in the blank with whatever magic bullet you're pinning your hope to. Effective selling is not achieved via any one special ingredient. No sales training event will transform your mediocre sales team into a revenue rocket. Building and maintaining a high performance sales organization takes planning, meticulous attention to detail, and a commitment to doing lots of little things consistently over a long period of time.

These 10 Key Imperatives for Sales Growth are the bare minimum of what winning sales organizations do to create and maintain above-average sales performance. If your sales organization hasn't mastered all 10, we should talk. Vicendia Partners can help you determine what you're doing right, what you're doing wrong, and most importantly...what you're not doing at all. We'll help you quickly identify the processes & people that are crippling your sales performance and help you fix it for good.

Now you're thinking, "I don't want to talk to a consultant. I hate consultants." Good. We do too. We are sales and marketing practitioners—not consultants. So call us at (630) 217-5948. We would love to talk to you.

10 Reasons to Hire a Business Consultant

Business consultants are an important part of our business culture. Most companies have discovered that hiring consultants and outside experts can save time and money. It also can increase competitiveness and professionalism.

Consultants work best for those organizations or individuals who know what they are seeking and have clearly defined projects or objectives.

The following list provides 10 reasons why you might want to hire a business consultant:

1. To provide a “shortcut” to know-how, knowledge, and information that does not exist in the organization.
2. To provide a professional service that does not exist in the organization, or that is needed for a specified period of time.
3. To provide solutions to specific challenges and situations.
4. To validate ideas that have already been created in the organization.
5. To analyze, diagnose or criticize (constructively).
6. To facilitate the search for ideas and solutions with existing team members.
7. To facilitate, create and implement methodologies and systems that enhance efficiency and organization.
8. To access a network of business or government contacts.
9. To bring in an experienced “outsiders” evaluation and point of view.
10. To present, teach or implement “new” business ideas and procedures.

Vicendia Partners has engaged with companies for all of these reasons and more. Give us a call at (630) 217-5948 and we'll be happy to just chat about what your company could gain from spending some time with us.

Five Deadly Sins That Stall Growth

Be honest. 

Are your sales and marketing teams helping you to meet your business growth targets as well as they could?

If you're like many directors and business owners, you probably don't think so.

In today's blog I want to share 5 B2B sales and marketing "sins" that stall revenue growth. These problems are frequent in all B2B markets, and are vital to resolve if you want to keep on growing.

Misalignment

One of the biggest problems B2B organizations frequently face with their sales and marketing is a lack of alignment. Sales and marketing traditionally don't get along very well—sales place the blame on marketing for not providing enough leads, or providing poor quality leads, and marketing places the blame on sales for not closing the leads they generate. 

Poorly aligned sales and marketing departments are rarely successful. If your company is serious about growth, you need to get them on the same page and close the loop. You need an agreement between the two teams as to who is responsible for what, and to appropriately pass data between the teams. 

Your marketing department needs to know which of the leads they supply to sales are closed, and for what value, so they can determine which marketing efforts are successful. Likewise, your sales team needs to know where their leads have come from, and details of any interaction the lead has had with the company before their first sales call, so that they can have more productive discussions with prospects. 

An unclear sales process

A good sales process is well documented, and repeatable. Your sales team should know exactly how to approach each prospect depending on where in the sales pipeline they are, and have a series of actions they take at each stage to qualify or disqualify them. If you don't have a documented sales process, invest resources in developing one.

Untrained sales teams

A big issue amongst sales teams is often a lack of training. Sales teams are rarely given time to learn, as any time spent away from selling is often deemed an unnecessary cost. In reality, this couldn't be further from the truth. Poorly trained sales people are costing your company sales. Your sales team can always be improved, and trained. Make time for regular sales training, commit to it, and I promise it will pay dividends.

Outdated software

What software do your sales and marketing teams use? Modern marketing automation software is vital for effective B2B marketing in the digital age, and a CRM system like Salesforce can vastly improve the productivity and performance of your sales team. Integrating a new sales or marketing system can appear to be a lengthy or expensive process if you have a large team or lots of data, but it'll pay dividends in the future.

The right sales and marketing software maximize the time your teams spend performing the core aspects of their role, and reduces time spent doing administration, development, and other tasks that aren't directly growing the business. Be honest—are your teams underperforming due to not having the right tools? Your competitors are using this software, and if you're not, it's allowing them to close more sales at a lower cost.

Poorly defined success metrics

Poorly defined success metrics are open to abuse, and are often detached from key business goals. Make sure that the metrics you are using to measure the success of your sales and marketing efforts are directly aligned with your business goals. 

It might be worth taking a look through my blog on the Sales Velocity Equation, which goes into more detail on the metrics your sales and marketing teams should be measuring.

The good news is that if your company is struggling with one or more of these growth-killing sins, Vicendia Partners can help. Give us a call today at (630) 217-5948.

What are the biggest sales and marketing problems your company experiences? Have I missed any key ones you'd suggest? Share them in the comments below.

Sales Velocity...It Matters!

If there is one tool that has contributed the most to my selling career it is the Sales Velocity Equation from the TAS Group, and my friend and former colleague, Donal Daly. He describes his Sales Velocity Equation as, "The formula for sales success." I wholeheartedly agree.

Put simply, the Sales Velocity Equation focuses on the four levers of your business that influence the amount of revenue generated in a specific period of time (month, quarter, year):

• Number of deals (#)
• Average deal value ($)
• Win rate (%)
• Sales cycle length (L)

As you can see, making small changes to one or more of the levers of your business can have dramatic results in revenue. In the past, sales leaders believed that simply increasing the number of leads or deals in the pipeline was the best way to juice revenue. But I've found that focusing on increasing the other size of your average deal, increasing the close rate, and shortening the sales cycle are better and sometimes easier to influence, and have a much greater impact on revenue generation.

Don't believe me? Well, watch this neat little slideshow from my friends at The TAS Group and maybe you'll be convinced enough to give it a try. And if you're ready to put it into practice, give us a call at (630) 217-5948 and we can help.

Sales Velocity Equation from The TAS Group

WIll You Make Your Numbers in 2014?

According to the CSO Insights 2014 Key Trends Analysis, further penetration into existing accounts and improved customer loyalty both landed squarely in the top ten objectives for sales organizations this year. The same study reported that 94 percent of firms raised revenue targets for 2014, despite the fact that sales rep quota attainment was down five percent from 2012 to 2013.

Clearly, sales organizations will be feeling the pressure to hit their revenue numbers this year, perhaps more than ever before. If you are like most B2B companies, you expect much of that revenue to come from your existing customer base. But that’s easier said than done. Despite most sales teams’ best efforts, sustainable organic growth is a challenging proposition.

Take a peek at this organic growth infographic to gain fresh insights on driving revenue to make your numbers. If any of these facts give you pause, we should talk. Give us a call at (630) 217-5948.

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