Structuring a successful sales team may seem simple, but it’s not as easy as it looks. This is because, in order to assemble a team full of talented, motivated, engaged professionals that generate results, commercial managers must carry out a series of processes.
Among the main duties of managers here are:
- Hire good employees;
- Train sales representatives;
- Offer the right tools;
- Monitor the results;
- Give feedback;
- Manage the team;
However, in order to meet all these requirements and build a team focused on high performance, management usually faces some challenges.
So, in this article, we’re going to talk about the main challenges to building a successful sales team.
What do you need to know about the challenges of building a successful sales team?
First, before listing the most common challenges faced by commercial managers, I would like to share a quote from Aaron Ross, author of the book Predictable Revenue, which based the methodology of the same name that helped boost Salesforce sales and expanded to the entire market.
Ross often says this: “Identify where you are and what you need”. This phrase can be used at different times and even in the challenges of building a successful B2B sales team.
This is because, in order to have a qualified team and engaged employees, it is necessary to know the current situation of the company and the sales structure. This involves not only the sales force, but also methodologies and strategies, processes and operations, technologies and tools.
From this initial discovery, the next step is to know where you want to go, that is, the company’s objectives, in terms of sales, new customers, recurring revenue, profitability and other sales KPIs.
Between the present context and future objectives, there is the field of what you need to do to evolve from one scenario to another.
This is where the challenges we mentioned come in to assemble a successful sales team, in order to achieve the expected goals. Let’s go to these particularities!
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Dimension the team for the commercial operation
Scaling the number of professionals needed for a successful sales team is certainly the biggest challenge. Especially because, if the company wants to sell, for example, R$ 50 thousand per month and has an average sales ticket of R$ 1 thousand, it is necessary to do 50 monthly deals.
From there, it is possible to list other data such as:
- Commercial cycle;
- Conversion rate;
- Hours employed by the team in commercial processes, whether by commercial intelligence in lead generation and data mining, by sales representatives for qualification or by closing salespeople for proposals, negotiations and closings.
With this, it is possible to have an idea of how many sales each group of professionals (IC, representative and closer) manages to execute with their work. Then, it is possible to size and scale the commercial operation, visualizing how many groups of professionals are needed to reach those sales goals.
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Evaluate and define the professional profile of contractors
There are several skills, abilities and attitudes to be evaluated to form a successful sales team. Therefore, this point is also a challenge for management, since it is necessary to identify the profiles that have more to do with the organizational culture and are aligned with the business objectives.
In addition, it is also important to measure which soft and hard skills are needed to achieve the best sales performance.
In hard skills, we can mention sales skills, knowledge of methodologies, processes, strategies, prospecting methods, how to approach customers, experience in overcoming objections, active listening, rapport creation, sales pitch development, among other details.
As for soft skills, skills related to time management, planning, organization, problem solving, resilience, emotional intelligence, empathy, etc., should be taken into account.
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Provide a good career plan and professional perspective
After knowing the size of the sales force and the necessary skills of the sellers, it is important to engage professionals to believe in the company and embark on the goals and missions of the business.
For this, management must provide professional planning, with adequate remuneration, benefits for achieving goals, development plan and professional growth. Thus, it is possible to attract and retain talent, avoiding a high turnover rate.
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Onboarding the successful sales team
Before effectively starting to manage the commercial team, it is necessary to carry out all the integration processes, introducing professionals within the company and making them feel at home.
The next step is to explain the products and services sold, the work routines, the company’s culture and what will be required of them in terms of deliveries, deadlines and objectives.
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Choose the technologies that need to be used
A successful sales team needs tools and technological innovations to achieve high performance. There are the most varied platforms that are required for work, such as Big Data, automation, CRM, artificial intelligence, videoconferencing, analytics, among others.
With a good group of technologies employed, it is possible to increase the productivity and efficiency of processes, generate greater intelligence and guarantee better results.
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Define customer prospecting strategy and tools
It is not possible to have a successful sales team without a well designed and structured strategy. Only with the development and planning of targeted processes, with the action plan for commercial activities and sales pitches ready, it is possible to have a successful team.
Another important point here is to choose the ideal prospecting list generation, validation, qualification, customer relationship and pipeline tools so that everything works out.
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Stipulate metrics and measure performance
Another indispensable step for the sales team to be successful is the constant measurement of the performance of each professional and the team in accordance with the established goals and indicators. Thus, it is possible to verify potential for improvement in the results of each one and collectively. Which will help improve performance and generate more sales.
Extra: Decide on Outsourcing Customer Prospecting
Finally, it is worth mentioning that companies should analyze the possibility of outsourcing customer prospecting. In this way, the sales team is focused on receiving real business opportunities, holding meetings, making proposals and forwarding negotiations to closing.
Count with ASB Marketing to increase your sales
If you want to implement demand generation strategies in your business, it is of paramount importance to start with planning.
In this scenario, understand your audience, online behavior, preferences and, especially, make an analysis of your competitors and current demands of the market.
Then understand how your sales process works and what characteristics need to be changed to meet your ideal customer profile.
In addition, it is essential to keep in mind that demand generation does not only occur by paid media, on the contrary, inbound marketing actions (attraction marketing) and demand generation generate very advantageous results for organizations when well employed.
Finally, you can count on an experienced marketing and sales company to support the implementation of these strategies, such as ASB Marketing.
With the best innovative methodologies and tools, ASB Marketing finds its ideal customer and qualifies them through fully automated and personalized email cadence.
When the lead arrives at the purchase decision phase, we only passed on to your commercial team to close the negotiation. With this, we guarantee increased sales, reduction of trade cycle, cost optimization and support in long -term business expansion.
Do you want to know more? Go now and see how ASB Marketing can help your business!