How to Simplify Sales Planning
Posted by Ron Snyder in Sales planning | 1 comments
You need tools, including apps, that enable the user to do their job easier, faster, better.
Let's take the case of sales planning apps, for example those that enable a salesperson to do good territory or strategic account planning.
The app itself must be easy to use. It must provide specific functionality that gives the user unique insight into their territory, accounts and enable the user to:
- Create strategic plans
- Gain insight into their target market
- Identify sales opportunities
- Prioritize their accounts and opportunities
- Identify and develop important relationships
- Establish competitive differentiation
- Take meaningful action to implement their plan
Further, it is important to have the app reside within the CRM/Sales Force Automation tool of choice, making it easier to:
- Actively work the plan
- Enable team participation
- Coach the sales team
- Share best practices
- Respond to change quickly and effectively
- Report on and track progress
If your sales people had a tool like this, wouldn’t they do a better job and improve their results?
4 Ways to Get the Most from Your Sales Plan
Posted by Ron Snyder in Sales planning | 0 comments
The best salespeople I know have a sales plan, check it regularly and update it often. In our dynamic world, this has become imperative- to respond to the changes in our industries, territories, accounts and competition.
1. Check/Update It Often
Have it with you or have it easily accessible (i.e. via mobile access). Keep it up-to-date so that it reflects the changes in your selling environment. Reviewing the plan helps you see what you are missing; key players, articulating important aspects of your offering, responding to important opportunities and threats.
2. Have It in Your Sales Force Automation System
This enables you to easily refer to, review and update the plan. It also makes it visible to other members of the team so they can help you achieve your objectives.
3. Review It with Management
Getting management input helps you catch something you missed and keeps the plan fresh. Further, this enables you to get management support to get access to the resources needed as identified in your plan.
4. Use It in Your Quarterly Business Review
Rather than either starting from scratch to prepare your quarterly business review, or starting with an out of date plan from last quarter, using your current plan saves time. Many of our clients present their quarterly business reviews out of our territory and account planning apps, saving additional time.
7 Steps to Ensure Software Adoption (A Software Adoption Manifesto)
Posted by Ron Snyder in Other | 1 comments
Wouldn't it be nice if you could just buy a new tool and not have to do anything else to have your team use it and produce dramatic improvement in performance? Unfortunately, members of the team are already busy and having them do anything different takes effort on their part and yours. Resistance within the organization- especially the user base- and poor management of the process are the two biggest reasons software implementations fail to produce their intended results.
However, the effort is well worth it as it can dramatically:
- Increase sales
- Improve predictability / forecast accuracy
- Enhance sales efficiency and effectiveness
- Drive team effectiveness
Five Reasons you Need a New Strategic Account Plan
Posted by Ron Snyder in Territory planning | 0 comments
Here are the top 5 reasons you need a new territory plan or strategic account plan for the New Year. Without it, you will:
1. Miss important opportunities
2. Lose sales you could have won
3. Take longer to win business opportunities
4. Be forced to sell at a lower selling price and reduced profit margin
5. Waste time and resources
Why create a new plan? Things change! You need to take into account:
• Changes in the economy and regulatory environment
• Changes in your industry/geography/vertical market
• New products/new technology
• How to improve your approach
• Incorporating new skills and tools
Good planning enables you to maximize the results from your territory/strategic account. By adopting and implementing good planning and selling methods, one of my clients:
• Increased Bookings by 43%
• Boosted Margins by 10%
• Improved Market Share by 53%
• Increased Productivity per Salesperson by 50%
• Grew Win/Loss Ratio by 131%
Plan2Win Nominated Sales Productivity Tool of Year
Posted by Ron Snyder in Other | 0 comments
We are very excited that Plan2Win Software has been nominated for the Sales Productivity Tool of the Year award!
It is exciting to be considered with a group including:
- Salesforce.com's Data.com (formerly Jigsaw)
- InsideView
- Xobni
How to Write a Sales Territory Plan
Posted by Ron Snyder in Best Practices | 1 comments
As published in Selling Power Blog, August 18, 2011
What are the critical steps in writing a successful Sales Territory Plan?
You may be wondering, "Where do I start?" The key is asking the right questions to gather the insights you need to generate a winning plan. Use this checklist as a guide.
1. Analyze your Territory/Business
Start with what is going on in your territory/vertical market.
- What are the key trends in your geography/ market?
- Who are your top prospects and customers?
- What are customers buying?
- Based on your conversion rates, how much business do you need in your funnel?
- What is the gap between what you need in your funnel and what you have now?
Five Reasons you Need a Strategic Account Plan… to Win
Posted by Ron Snyder in Territory planning | 0 comments
Here are the top 5 reasons you need a good territory/strategic account plan. Without it, you will: 1. Miss important opportunities 2. Lose sales you could have won 3. Take longer to win business opportunities 4. Unnecessarily lower your selling price and reduce your profit margins 5. Waste time and resources Good planning enables you to optimize the results from your territory/strategic account. By adopting and implementing good planning and selling methods, one of my clients: • increased Bookings by 43% • boosted Margins by 10% • improved Market Share by 53% • increased Productivity per Salesperson by 50% • grew Win/Loss Ratio by 131% Having a plan enables you to manage a great deal of complexity. This includes understanding the market, focusing on the customer problems you can solve, selecting your best solution, and managing the internal and partner resources necessary to meet your objectives. It enables you to make the best use of your time and resources by connecting strategy to key tasks. Using the plan, you make sure the tasks get implemented the time frame required to win. Through it, you give appropriate attention to the critical path – the steps that have the most impact on producing the result on time. Without a plan, it is easy to omit a key element and dramatically compromise your results. Success Story: Account Management I managed a $20M opportunity for HP, selling to another Fortune 100 company. The sale took 18 months and involved a wide range of internal resources and customer representatives. My detailed strategic account plan enabled me to: 1. Identify our competitive advantages. 2. Articulate our value proposition and clearly describe how it met their needs. 3. Make sure our sales, division people, and executive sponsor were on the same page. 4. Manage meetings between a wide range of people from the customer’s and our organization. 5. Respond effectively to competitive threats. 6. Keep the sale on track. I could never have managed the effort, kept everyone engaged and won the business without a clear plan that I updated on a regular basis. The bottom line is that you need a good plan backed with persistent effort to win a complex, competitive business opportunity. Self-Assessment
- Consider companies you regard as successful, well-managed, high-performing organizations. Can you imagine how they would have performed without a solid business plan?
- Reflect on times when you did not have a plan and/or did not work your plan. What did you miss? What were the consequences?
- Are you a skilled planner? If not, how could you improve your planning abilities?
- Think of the best planner you know. Ask them how they do territory and account planning.
