Optimising sales strength
Optimizing the sales strength of the company involves much more than just improving the skills of the sales force. We have identified 7 areas of excellence within which a company needs to perform in order to achieve sustainable results. The starting point, is to set up a customer driven and well researched market strategy, which is translated into a specific sales strategy outlining objectives for products or product families, customers or customer segments and sales channels.
Once the market strategy is set a company needs to examine and analyse its customer portfolio: does it provide the foundation for the kind of growth or profitability the company is looking for? When the answer is no, the development of the customer portfolio needs to become a priority to be managed and led actively by the sales management. Furthermore optimising sales strength means that a company needs to ensure that their targeted customer portfolio and market segments receive the appropriate focus and activity to ensure excellent customer interactions and secure results.
A key element in managing long term success and optimisation of sales strength is ensuring that the sales organisation has the competences it needs in place when it needs them. This requires active competence management, i.e., definition of competences needed, measurement of gaps, development of learning paths and development activities as well as active coaching and follow-up from the management.
Selling in the 21st Century is hard work and needs to be recognized in the organisation as a key driver behind growth and profitability. If sales does not receive the recognition it deserves, optimizing and sustaining sales strength will be a difficult task to achieve.
Mercuri International can provide tools, methods, models, processes and key activities to assist most organisations to engage with and succeed in each of these areas of excellence.