Salespeople, like athletes, need planning, practice, and coaching to compete — and win!
What do salespeople have in common with great athletes? Both need practice and coaching to reach the top of their game and stay there.
In sales, producers with a good sales manager in their corner find it easier to optimize their performance.
Unfortunately, many agencies can’t afford a full-time sales manager. Until an agency has 8-10 full-time salespeople and revenues of about $1.5 million-$2 million, a full-time sales manager usually doesn’t make financial sense. But someone — the principal, office manager, or lead salesperson — needs to fill the sales manager’s role to maximize growth and profitability.
Establishing an effective sales management program in your agency doesn’t need to be complicated or time-consuming. Using our three-step approach (planning, monitoring, and coaching), any agency, large or small, can boost production and help create a lively sales culture.
SALES PLANNING
Like most good things that happen in business, successful sales management starts with planning. Above all, that means planning where to get leads. The best salespeople invariably have the best and most leads.
One of the problems (and opportunities) of sales planning is that there are so many different ways to generate leads: referrals, directories, mailing lists, door knocking, associations, membership lists, cross-selling, friends, relatives, professional networks, seminars, trade shows, advertising, flyers, and lead-generation software.
Planning helps you sort out which lead generation methods might work best for the salesperson and the agency. The sales manager’s job is to brainstorm the possibilities with the salesperson, or at least to review and critique the salesperson’s plan for generating leads. Together they should be able to narrow the choices to those with the best chances of penetrating the markets that interest the agency and its carriers.
Once a prospecting strategy is chosen, the sales manager needs to help the salesperson set specific sales goals for the year. Since the number of contacts a salesperson makes during the year largely determines the number of sales and revenue they generate, it’s essential that salespeople track their hit ratios in order to set goals. For example, a salesperson using a prospecting program logs the number of leads generated, calls made, contacts made, and x-dates collected. Compiling daily and weekly averages of the results forms a measuring stick for the producer and each lead-generation method attempted.
A similar tracking method should be applied to sales: log the number of quotes, appointments, and sales made. Again, break them down into daily and weekly averages. After a track record is established, it’s fairly easy to figure out hit ratios that are useful in setting goals. A salesperson can see how many leads they need to create enough contacts, or how many quotes or appointments they must make to reach a certain number of sales. The ratio will vary depending on the lead source and product line, but salespeople who routinely track their hit ratios will be in a much better position to set and achieve their financial goals.
Other variables must be considered when setting sales goals, such as the average commission per sale, the amount of time not available for selling, and the amount of time needed to service an existing book of business.
Using a basic worksheet, it’s possible to determine how many client calls a producer must make to reach a specific sales goal in a given year.
MONITORING PROGRESS
Even the most experienced salesperson can get off track. A common mistake is to stop prospecting as sales activity picks up. Eventually, the sales activity peaks and then falls off in correlation with the drop in prospecting. A good sales manager can help producers balance both activities and maintain a steady flow of sales.
To avoid peaks and valleys in production, break down every step in the sales process into a discrete activity and set goals for each one. Salespeople will have better success if they set targets for the number of leads needed per contact, contacts per x-date, x-dates per quote, quotes per appointment, and appointments per sale.
Sales managers can help by checking with producers weekly to make sure that they’re tracking their ratios and reaching their goals. If a salesperson falls behind, the sales manager can suggest a change of strategy and help keep the salesperson focused on reaching each goal. It’s easy for a salesperson to get confused and feel lost when production falls off. The surest way to get out of a sales slump — or maintain a hot streak — is to do the little things that add up to big results.
Monitoring how producers use their time is one of the best ways that sales managers can help. Prospecting time should be nonnegotiable because it’s too easy to stop. And when you stop prospecting, sales stop. But that’s not all - the sales manager needs to help producers plan & prime time from making appointments to completing paperwork. Good time management is a big part of any salesperson’s success. A good sales manager shows producers how to divide the work week into blocks of time for prospecting, calling leads, making appointments, making follow-up calls, doing paperwork, and planning personal time to avoid burnout.
COACHING
Coaching is the fun part of being a sales manager. There’s nothing more satisfying than helping your salespeople realize their full potential. As coach, the sales manager shows the producers how they can do better and keeps them focused. And a good coach never stops coaching in good times or bad.
Though weekly sales meetings are essential to successful coaching, frequent or daily contact is also important. It only takes a moment or two every day to do an attitude check, and ask about activity level, and let the producers know you’re interested in them.
Sales meetings offer a more structured way to provide training and motivation. Some sales managers prefer to hold meetings on Monday morning; others prefer Friday afternoon. Some very successful sales organizations do both.
A sales meeting is also a good time to review prior results and discuss accounts coming up for renewal and how the staff might work together to retain or enhance the account. Getting salespeople to share their objectives for the week and swap success stories as well as problem areas can be motivational and therapeutic.
Once a month, shift gears a little by meeting with the marketing people, either agency staff or carrier representatives, to discuss appetite and coverages. Or perhaps bring in a speaker to talk about sales psychology or make an educational presentation.
Beyond holding meetings, sales managers need to take a hands-on approach to be successful. Routinely making joint calls with salespeople is a great way to get to know them and show you care. Before making a joint call, get together with the salesperson and determine the purpose of the call. Define each of your roles. Try to anticipate problems that might arise, and rehearse transitions to keep the call on track.
During the call, it’s essential that the sales manager follow the plan and not try to take over. Afterward, review the call with the salesperson. Both the sales manager and the producer should share their observations and reach agreement on which, if any, corrective measures should be taken to improve performance.
Individually, sales managers must take time to learn each producer’s individual style. People should be coached according to how they sell and how they approach life in general. Positive rewards — an occasional pat on the back and help through tough times — are important motivators.
Tough times sometimes result in a sales slump or call reluctance. When these situations occur, the sales manager must determine the cause and establish highly individual goals and rewards to the get the salesperson back in the ballgame.
Some people mistakenly believe that only the motivational role comprises sales management. But coaching and motivation must be based on the disciplined planning and monitoring steps to succeed. Sometimes you find your plans are too aggressive or not aggressive enough. If you don’t set goals and monitor results, you might never realize whether this aspect of your sales plan needs to be adjusted, and no amount of coaching will correct the problem.