salesmology.com . : uniquely simple sales management

At least that’s what I thought, originally.  What I’ve learned in the past two months (relearned I should say; knew it, forgot it, hard headed - dang it) is that the act of planning is not intuitive and doesn’t come easy.  You have to MAKE YOURSELF or your team members do it.

BUT (big but) once it’s done, high level planning is one of those things that reveals its usefulness first upon completion.  The simple act of pulling thoughts out of your head, organizing them and capturing them on “paper” is very beneficial for a few reasons:

1. you will “feel” more ready to take on the world and will, therefore, actually be able to perform better as your heart will be more in it (emotions and cognition are inseparable), naturally;
2. you will be better equipped to handle change, surprises, the unknown because you will have a roadmap so despite an unexpected turn or pothole your confidence will make you more capable of zigging and zagging;
3. you will be more likely to focus on the critical and will have established for yourself a ‘guardrail’ to ensure you stay on the right path by avoiding wrong turns (hair brained requests, new ideas that lead to a cliff, distractions that seem good at the time but just get you off task in the end…)

Honestly, who the heck wants to get started.  Hardly anybody.  So, recognize that; deal with it and get going.  The alternative is unhealthy work habits: a lack of confidence that you’re even ON a path, much less the right path; zagging when you should have zigged (or just stayed steady straight on down the road); and attacking everything and anything that seems right at the time only to kick up a bunch of dust but actually make no forward progress.

Strategic planning is like medicine - tastes horrible, but sure can be good for you…

 I bet you plan your vacations.

Here’s an example of a communication to a high performing national accounts management sales team.  It is a group of highly charged, well-intended experts who haven’t yet discovered the power of a solid plan.  Over the coming months, we will follow their progress as their “next level” is discovered.

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The below diagram will serve as the “skeleton” for a sales plan.  To reiterate, I believe each of you are doing many of the right things to grow your portfolios but what I don’t think we’ve done well at yet is executing to an overall plan that has been communicated thoroughly.  Our overall effort has been one of “winging it” from month to month or quarter to quarter with achievements being made through sheer will, expertise and hit / miss partnerships with the field and corporate support alike.  So, I want us to strengthen the way we do our jobs – going from a “super power rocket with tiny directional fins” to a “laser guided missile on a pre-planned course to success.”  Corny maybe, but you get the point. Read the rest of this entry »

In order to accomplish beating a pre-defined goal for a set period, think of the impact of ” purposely tricking yourself and your team” such that you make your goal for the entire timeframe in a shorter period of time.  I’ll explain how, with the following numbers as an example - a 12 month period from January 1 through December 31 to achieve $1,000,000 in sales.

achieve 100% of sales plan with 20% of your time left…

If the sales plan pays incentive for going over goal, versus paying incentive for each sales dollar regardless of percent to plan / goal then a good way to achieve reaching that $1,000,000 BEFORE the end of December (the twelfth and final month) and avoid the stress associated with getting too close to the Finish Line before getting to the goal, is to move the end date forward.  Simply introduce a reason to make the twelve month, full term goal in less than twelve months - for instance, ten months.  That way, those last two months aren’t spent in panic mode while trying to pull out all the stops to make it to the goal and therefore get paid.  Rather, those two months are spent adding dollars over goal and planning for the coming year - maybe even enjoying the holiday season!

sales-mol-ogy (seylz-MOL-oh-jee) - noun: the science of simplified, practical application techniques and principles for highly effective 2 to 50 person revenue generation teams.