Sales Management is the way toward building up a sales team, planning sales activities, managing sales activities, and actualizing sales systems that enable a business to reliably hit, and even outperform its business targets.
Sales Management is the coordination of individuals and assets to viably deliver the ideal objective.
These long haul objectives can be a wide variety of objectives, however, some of the objectives are to expand sales volume, commitment to benefits, and constant development.
To accomplish these objectives, the sales team and the sales manager have tremendous duties to perform.
The management of sales operations is the duty of a sales manager.
The Sales Manager has a lot of responsibilities such as sales demand & forecasting, building up sales targets, planning, leading & managing sales team, recruiting sales team, remuneration, and sales assessment evaluations.
In the event that your business gets any income whatsoever, a sales executive’s methodology is a flat out must.
With regards to boosting sales, regardless of the business, the key to achieving good results and recording great success lies in how effective and efficient the sales manager is.
The primary duty of a sales manager is to manage the sales team and make sure all sales processes are in place.
Other than helping your organization achieve its business goals, sales management enables you to remain tuned in to your industry as it develops.
What is Sales Management Process?
Sales management process is the processes involved in the sales activities to achieve better sales results.
The primary aim of the sales management process is to drive in more sales.
It is the process of planning, staffing, analyzing sales efforts, designing sales strategy and execution to achieve a goal and get better sales results.
The sales manager has the most important role to play in any organization. The sales manager is primarily involved in the sales management process
He/she is to make sure the sales team achieves good sales results.
The sale management process comprises of different processes; we are going to have a look at each of the process;
Planning of Sales Process
The first thing you need to do as a sales manager is to know who your target audiences are.
You need to know the product you are going to be selling and how it will benefit your audience.
You also need to know the geographical location of your target audience and other important information about your target audience.
You need to know whom you are going to be selling to, the channels your target audience would be present and the method you will be using to sell your product to them.
Sales planning is an essential element in the sales management process.
A sales plan is a strategy that sets out sales targets for your business and recognizes the means you will take to meet your objectives.
A sales plan helps you to:
- Set sales target for your business
- Define those sales targets.
- Choose sales strategies to meet your target audience.
- Create sales tactics for your sales team
- Motivate your sales team to deliver good results
- Financial plan and clear up steps you’ll take to accomplish your objectives
- Review your objectives intermittently and improve ways to make more sales
Hiring Sales Team
As a sales manager, you cannot do the sales job alone, hence you need to hire sales people that will help you in achieving your goals.
After you have designed your sales plan, the next course of action is to hire a team of salespeople that will work with you to achieve your sales plans.
You need to hire the right people who will help you to execute your sales plan.
You need to hire people who have previous knowledge and experience on how the industry works.
You need to also train them to know more about your product and to have good knowledge of the industry.
When you want to hire a salesperson, there are some factors you should consider before hiring.
Here are some of the factors;
- You will need to hire salespeople that are familiar with the cities if you will be having different locations.
- You need to hire salespeople who are able to speak different languages depending on your target audience languages.
- The salespeople you will hire should be willing to travel if your business will be in different locations.
- The salespeople you will hire should be flexible and willing to adapt to certain conditions.
Design your Sales Strategy
This is where you design and plan out your sales strategies with your sales team.
The plan should be clearly written, understood and achievable.
Set the month to month or quarterly targets. Be that as it may, dependable guarantee that you are reasonable about the objectives.
Ensure that the objectives that you set are in accordance with the plans of the organization.
The plan should be made clearly known to every member of the team.
When designing a sales strategy, there are five major steps to take;
Build your road map
Building a road map is knowing your target audience and developing a plan on how you are going to reach out to them.
It is knowing who your customers will be and the ways you are going to connect with them.
Building your road map is also knowing where you want your company to be at a particular point in time.
You need to come up with a specific plan on how you are going to lead your sales team to take your company to the next level.
Every single step needs to be clearly outlined.
These plans will set as a road map that will lead you and your company to the height you desire.
Without a clearly defined plan, you may never achieve any significant results.
The bottom line is, you need to have a destination and build a road that is going to take you to that destination.
Approach your target audience in the right ways
You already know your target audience and you have developed a plan to reach out to them, now is the time to implement those plans.
Now is the time to reach out to your target audience through those plans you have developed.
There are different ways you can use to reach out to your target audience.
Some of the ways are cold emailing, reaching out via social media, ads, sales calls and other marketing campaigns.
You can reach out to target audience via LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, blogs, websites, etc.
Captivate and impress your target audience
This is where you need to pitch your product to get the attention of your target audience.
You should be able to impress your potential customers in order to get them to buy from you.
Most of your target audience may not know about your product, you need to be able to create a clear awareness of your product or service.
They need to know what your product is all about, the value and benefits they will gain from using your product or service.
You need to be confident, be very clear about your wants, be able to create a genuine connection with your target audience.
You should also research individual potential customers and know what they want.
Provide useful and interesting content to your potential customers and be able to prompt them into making purchases.
Schedule a meeting
This is where you will be able to give a sales presentation or demonstration.
A meeting with individual potential customers or a group of potential customers will further help to provide a thorough understanding of your product or service.
This is where you will know if a potential customer is going to buy your product or not.
This is where you present your product or service.
Your potential customers need to know how your product or service is going to benefit them.
This stage is extremely significant in light of the fact that the stage will decide whether they will be keen to buy your product or not.
You ought to be exceptionally prepared so you can exhibit your item to your lead and have the capacity to persuade your lead to make a buy.
You have to indicate how your item addresses the issues of your potential customer.
On the off chance that you are introducing to an organization proprietor, have the capacity to exhibit how your product will support the organization.
What issues and problems can your product or service solve?
All these ought to be plainly laid out and clarified amid the presentation.
Always follow up
It may take more than one meeting before a potential customer will finally make a purchase, hence you need to constantly follow up.
Some potential customers will say no 4 times or more before agreeing to make a purchase.
It is the duty of a salesperson to always follow up on a potential customer in order to ensure that a purchase is made.
You can schedule a follow-up meeting, send follow-up emails and make follow-up calls.
All these will further prompt your potential customers into making a purchase.
In your follow-ups, create innovate ways that will lure your potential customers into deciding to make a purchase.
You can create a sense of urgency by creating limited offers, provide instalment payment method, offer discounts, coupons, or free service usage for a month.
Anything you can think of that will further prompt your potential customers into making purchases should be applied.
Sales forecasting and analysis
Sales analysis is analyzing sales pattern and the industry trend.
Sales forecasting is predicting how much sales you can make at a specific period of time.
It could be the number of sales within a month, 3 months, 6 months or a year.
With sales analysis, you will know how your current efforts and activities affect the success of your business and what you need to do to increase sales.
You will know the areas that are lacking behind, if you need to hire more salespeople or areas that need to be improved on.
Successful sales analysis involves utilizing sales metrics, or quantifiable pointers, that reveal to you how every part of your sales activities is performing and whether you are accomplishing your objectives.
With the standard deals channel, you ought to have the capacity to quantify the accompanying four measurements:
- Number of sales deals in your pipeline
- The average size of sales deals in your pipeline
- The average numbers of sales deal won
- The average time spent to win a sales deal.
By forecasting future sales, you can change your sales plan and explore different avenues regarding new techniques and targets audience, just as remove things that are not working out well for you.
Analyzing sales efforts
Analyzing sales efforts entails analyzing each sales effort, ideas, and all sales activities.
The result of each sales activities should be measured.
This is to help reduce or avoid any major mistakes that might happen.
Analyzing each sales effort also help to figure out the best sales process and the best decision to take.
As a sales manager, you should always conduct meetings with your sales team to review their performance so that you can know how well they are doing.
Reports of each sales activities should be created and properly documented.
With these reports, relevant decisions will be taken about the direction and future of the company.
Benefits of sales management process
Envision just indiscriminately approaching your day without appropriate arranging.
You will not be able to complete tasks and know what exactly you should do.
A proper planning will give a clear definition of each sales activities that needs to be done and how they should be done.
The clearer your objectives are, the more you would figure out how to accomplish them.
Below are some of the benefits of sales management process;
- Salesperson would realize what is anticipated from him and would set his targets likewise
- Salesperson would be consoled as he has an unmistakable arrangement to pursue, and would not have to go about it indiscriminately.
- Salesperson would have an individual or plan to fall back to if something goes out of order.
- Sales manager would realize better what’s in store of his group.
- Sales manager would almost certainly define clear objectives for his group.
- Sales manager would most likely break down the execution of his business group.
- Sales manager would almost certainly foresee deals better dependent on past information
- Top management can set long haul objectives dependent on the business plan.
- Top management will almost certainly get an unmistakable perspective on the execution of the organization.
Sales Management Strategies
Sales management strategies are ways to improve revenue and profitability.
As a sales manager, you assume a vital role in the accomplishment and success of your sales team.
A sales team that is performing well will generate high revenue for the company but a sales team that is performing below expectations will make the company lose sales and revenue.
To help you succeed as a sales manager and lead you in the right direction, there are some strategies you should utilize.
These strategies include;
Find the best sales people
For you to succeed as a sales manager, you should have a team of qualified and experienced salespeople.
Find the right salespeople to hire, train them and retain them.
There are some very experienced and qualified salespeople, look out for them when hiring.
Set your priorities right
As a sales manager, you have to put the time and efforts in helping your sales team succeed and hit their targets.
Which means, as opposed to being in the field yourself and making it all work out, you’ll be entrusted with guaranteeing that your sales team produce results.
Working intimately with your sales team and training them is critical to improving their sales efforts and achieving your objectives.
Developing an achievable plan with your sales team
If your sales team isn’t investing enough energy with clients, at that point they will experience considerable difficulties making any deals.
This sounds evident yet it is anything but difficult to fall out with your general objectives. Successful sales managers help their sales team manage their time and focus on revenue-delivering sales activities.
Your group most likely realizes what their standards are nevertheless they might be uncertain of how to contact them. As a sales manager, your main responsibility is to enable them to build up an arrangement so they can achieve their objectives.
Identify barriers
Set aside some effort to make sense of what the barriers are in your organization’s sales procedure. This will enable you to think of an arrangement to push ahead.
Take a gander at how your business group is investing their energy and on the off chance that it is advantageous. Be that as it may, don’t fall into the snare of just concentrating on the negative. Praise your sales team when they are progressing nicely or producing results.
Leverage on technological innovations
Be vigilant for new innovation that could enable your group to be progressively profitable. Think about how well that product will incorporate with your present instruments. For instance, cloud-based CRM can enable your group to make more deals and can make it simpler to work together.
Whatever you pick ought to incorporate consistently with the primary instruments your group is now utilizing. Consider what your organization needs and what is critical to you and that should help control you toward the correct frameworks.
Do not look for who to blame
A typical issue on most sales team is that salespeople can fall into the snare of accusing their lack of results on poor leads.
The issue is on the grounds that they don’t care for the leads they have, they don’t invest much energy effectively seeking after them. Focus on producing results instead of looking for who or what to blame.
Search for indications of inconvenience in your sales team
As a sales manager, you have to dependably be thinking ahead and paying special mind to indications of inconvenience.
Focus on even little changes in the conduct of your sales team since they could show more concerning issues. By being proactive in helping your group improve their execution, you will counteract more concerning issues not far off.
Welcome input, suggestions and feedback
In the event that you need your sales team to acknowledge responsibility, you must create an open ground for suggestions, inputs and feedback.
Focus on sales cycle
Improving the business cycle is a standout amongst the most vital things a business group can do. It is anything but difficult to fall into the snare of just concentrating on hitting your numbers. In any case, the business cycle is the one zone you have authority over so you ought to be mindful so as not to dismiss it.
Praise the successes and make sense of why they were wins
It is essential to commend your team’s successes and it is considerably progressively imperative to make sense of what they did that worked. Praise any member of your team that achieved good results and let the other members of the team know what he or she did to achieve the result.
Motivate your sales team
As a sales manager, it is your duty to motivate your sales team in order to improve their effectiveness and efficiencies.
You can motivate your sales team by creating compensation plans for any member that meets their targets. You can create commissions for any member that is able to make a certain amount of sales at a specified period of time.
When you motivate your sales team, they will be more energized and willing to meet set targets and work harder.
Sales Management Case Studies
Case Study 1: Five ways for sales managers to stay inspired
John Lennon is the Sales Director of a main pharmaceutical organization. He has been in the business throughout the previous 10 years and has been a star in his different deals and promoting jobs.
His ongoing advancement, discovers him overseeing administrators. His authority style has dependably been one of pace setting and showing others how it is done. Having quite recently experienced a business compel scaling down John has received a persuasive administration style.
What exactly does it mean to inspire?
John has buckled down throughout the most recent a half year to win the hearts of his business supervisory group and deals compel. He has attempted to interface with all individuals from the groups.
He has met up close and personal with each rep in the business drive and has likewise met with a significant number of the key assessment pioneers. Positive remarks like this is the first run through a business executive has met with me combined with unlimited solicitations to meet with clients has been an empowering sign for John that this methodology has merit.
As he has developed from a director to a pioneer, John perceives that the most ideal approach to accomplish remarkable outcomes is to move his group. He has persistently driven himself to accomplish. Because of his drive and eagerness, he has immediately been advanced into jobs of more noteworthy obligation.
He has created inventive deals programs and directed energizing deals gatherings that leave reps feeling exceptionally energetic. He sets aside the effort to perceive his kin by sending empowering notes and delivering persuasive discourses at deals gatherings.
John is the sort of leader that can spur the general population around him to accomplish exceptional outcomes.
How does John organization inspire him?
Sales manager are in charge of gathering organization income targets, inspiring their groups and guaranteeing consumer loyalty. Strangely, most expansive associations make it troublesome for these individuals to have any kind of effect.
They trouble sales managers with help individuals who muddle basic leadership, set up barricades and avert advancement. Truth be told, the basic leadership control shifts from these pioneers to help positions that have little contact with the clients.
In John’s case, there are a few non-performing salespeople in the group, whom John would want to fire. HR and lawful order that these reps are put on an act improvement program for something like a half year. Which John knows will just keep on negatively affecting deals execution. In spite of John’s improvement of some creative projects, John and his group routinely face organization and barriers.
John has discovered that even the littlest activities require discourses and endorsements which constantly channel his vitality. Thus, associations accidentally sap the excitement and vitality of their top managements, them abandoning them baffled, wore out and prepared to leave.
Who does John share His dissatisfaction with? Where does he go for motivation?
John’s boss is always busy. He is only available when there is a major issue or when sales are down. In his present position, his manager is never again an alternative. John’s manager has his own issues to manage. He anticipates that John should distinguish the issues and understand them. The exact opposite thing John needs is to give the idea that he isn’t over his business.
His Peers Early in his profession John had numerous companions with whom he could talk about his disappointments with. Presently they are incredulous and fight with him for assets and acknowledgment. His Direct Reports John needs to shield them from greater issues.
His Executive Coach This is the best spot to begin. John’s mentor can furnish him with a non-judgemental sounding board. All dialogs are held in certainty. His mentor is a companion, spark and tutor. John receives the rewards of having a mentor. He leaves sessions empowered, enlivened and increasingly certain to handle his most basic issues.
There are 5 Ways to remain motivated in a high-pressure condition:
- Hire an official mentor – Coaching gives administrators progressing learning, center, and individual responsibility for improvement and motivation. It is by a wide margin the most ideal path for administrators to remain engaged and propelled.
- Read uplifting books – There are numerous initiative books and self-improvement guides out available. Locate the one that addresses you. Honing your abilities by consistent perusing animates new thoughts and fortify the great things you are doing.
- Take mental breaks – Take a day away from work to broaden your end of the week. Take one day for yourself and think about your needs and individual objectives. Getting viewpoint causes you to remain engaged and enlivened.
- Exercise and eat well – A portion of sound living, including normal exercise and diet help, revive your batteries and are demonstrated pressure busters. Individual wellbeing is normally one of the main things that pass by the side in a chaotic way of life. Ensure you are getting enough rest.
- Take an administration seminar On-going improvement is a decent wellspring of motivation and learning. Outer courses furnish pioneers with a chance to communicate with like-minded administrators and addition alternate points of view.
It is essential that you stay motivated as a sales manager because your team needs your energy as a source of inspiration and motivation.
Case Study 2: Sales Management for Sprint Sport
Sprint Sport had in the mid-1970s. Quick development in the Sprint shoe advertises fuelled an interest which the major manufacturers experienced issues in meetings. These permitted wholesalers like Sprint to move toward becoming set up through the import of Far Eastern item. Run, at first, adjusting the London region, accomplished ceaseless development in deals, productivity, client base, and item extend amid the most recent 6 years.
The table below shows Sprint progress in the last 6 years
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| Sales | 550 | 780 | 1180 | 1340 | 1350 | 1420 |
| Profit | 125 | 180 | 320 | 340 | 320 | 310 |
| Stock | 65 | 87 | 128 | 165 | 256 | 402 |
| Outlet | 750 | 900 | 1000 | 1300 | 1450 | 1950 |
Before the end of the 1980s, the market for running shoes had crested. Value rivalry wound up exceptional, as driving makers began to vigorously limit to keep up high generation volumes. Run had at first attempted to adapt to the changing business sector by expanding its item go.
In any case, this had prompted a generous increment in stocks without accomplishing the ideal improvement in benefit. In the quick moving focused mentor showcase item rapidly ended up obsolete and old, and Sprint was confronting consistently more noteworthy discounts against certain stock things.
The organization had likewise endeavored to build the inclusion of the market by expanding the business constraints and the numbers of outlets on which they called. This had the grievous impact of expanding the number of outlets that were not creating noteworthy deals volume.
Dash Sport had constantly sold to the free games shop and footwear outlets in the South East by means of a business power of five. By 1985 the organization were thinking about a re-association of the salesforce into the three fundamental locales – Greater London, overhauled from the North London workplaces; a South East task with a little office at Ashford in Kent; and a South West branch situated in Reading, as a result of the long voyaging time and high costs of the London deals group when visiting outlets outside the Greater London territory.
The table below shows the turnover for Sprint in the last year and number of salesforce.
| Footwear shops | Sports shops | Salesforce | |
| London | 810 | 650 | 3 |
| South East | 145 | 150 | 1 |
| South West | 160 | 180 | 1 |
| Total | 1115 | 980 | 5 |
In the most recent year, 80 percent of outlets had been approached each month, recommending that the normal montage rate for every deal agent was around 2700 every year: or 12 calls for every working day; producing a normal closeout of £105; costing all things considered £8 in deals delegate time; and returning a gross benefit at a bargain of £42.
Expanding the item run implied that the business delegates invested a more drawn out energy before the clients, with a normal client contact ascending from 10.5 minutes, 3 years beforehand, to 13.5minutes in the present year.
The most extreme powerful selling time in most of autonomous stores was around 10minutes, as the owners viewed this as the compelling furthest reaches that they could spend far from serving in the outlet.
By the present year, the issue of directing the salesforce had turned out to be impressive. In spite of the fact that the aptitudes that the business delegates utilized were genuinely essential, the administration knew that the more drawn out serving agents were more successful than those that had as of late joined the organization.
Turnover of the business staff was running at 25 percent for every annum and keeping and preparing the business agents would be especially imperative.
The development in the salesforce implied that the overseeing chief could invest less and less energy with individual individuals from the business group. A few contenders had settled the issue of managing expansive quantities of little records by presenting a telesales activity, which decreased the requirement for deals delegates to approach such records.
Be that as it may, the Sprint the board still couldn’t seem to set up strategy in regard to this issue. The normal deal shrouded some significant limits. Dash found that, by and large, 80 percent of its turnover was accomplished from 25 percent of its client base, with a large proportion of its client base giving a couple of offers.
The analysis is summarised in the table below;
| Customer % | Sales % | Cumulative % |
| 5 | 25 | 25 |
| 6-10 | 20 | 45 |
| 11-20 | 25 | 70 |
| 21-25 | 10 | 80 |
| 26-35 | 6 | 86 |
| 36-55 | 6 | 92 |
| 56-75 | 5 | 97 |
| 76-100 | 3 | 100 |
The future of Sprint
With the declining coach advertise, the Sprint the executives knew that in the long haul they would have a demonstration. They had recognized various key components. In the first place, Sprint skill was plainly as a wholesaler of relaxation attire.
Also, the organization was as of now situated in the South East of England which had 30 percent of the all-out populace, yet 40 percent of the complete consumption on outdoor supplies.
Inside the general South East, the organization just secured 65 percent of the land territory. In spite of the fact that Sprint had focused on creating deals through the free outlets this had been against the national pattern which had seen the proceeding with ascend in the significance of different chains.
This data is incorporated into Table below;
Changes in outlet numbers over the last 5 years.
| Outlet Type | 1 | 5 |
| Footwear Independence | 18000 | 11000 |
| Footwear Multiples | 1100 | 12000 |
| Sports Independence | 8500 | 6500 |
| Sports Multiples | 500 | 1500 |
Notwithstanding the vital different chains, there were various other circulation channels that the organization had disregarded. Among these were countless clubs purchasing group gear – footwear, apparel – from concurred providers.
Other critical buyers of brandishing hardware included occasion camps and sports focus. This market was hard to assess, however the possible esteem and quantities of outlets included is illustrated in the table below;
| Outlet Type | Number | Estimated Sales ($ million) |
| Holiday Camps | 135 | 6.0 |
| Sport centers | 900 | 3.5 |
| Golf clubs | 3200 | 12.0 |
| Football clubs | 45000 | 15.0 |
| Rugby clubs | 3000 | 2.5 |
| Sub-aqua | 800 | 1.0 |
A large portion of the outlets in table above are free, with the exception of the occasion camp part which is ruled by three organizations that are associated with 90 percent of absolute buys in the division.
In spite of the fact that the market for mentors had stopped to develop in genuine terms, different zones of games gear had not demonstrated comparable decays. The development in different regions of games gear, for example, skiing had been significant and was probably going to proceed soon. A portion of the key market areas are given in the table below.
The table below shows the market sizes for certain product over the past 5 years
| 5 | 5 | |
| Sports clothing | 160 | 220 |
| Sports footwear | 550 | 430 |
| Tennis equipment | 55 | 50 |
| Skiing equipment | 80 | 110 |
| Swimming and diving | 25 | 20 |
Amid the mid-1980s various organizations had moved toward Sprint to follow up for their sake to circulate sports gear in the United Kingdom. Degree 7, one of the exceptional French makers of creator skiing gear was anxious to improve portrayal in the South East of England.
It made a wide scope of skiing gear and attire. Schamasseun, an extending Dutch swimwear producer, was searching for market openings and offered its whole scope of outdoor supplies for the UK advertise. With its experience of assembling in the Far East, Sprint was additionally thinking about how conceivable it is
of having a scope of the item produced under its very own image name, yet were misty as the implications. Salesforce arrangement Sprint took the view that various variables may be in charge of the extremely high rate of turnover in the salesforce.
The enrolment approach, with its accentuation on youthful deals agents with restricted retail understanding, was a conceivable zone of concern. Disappointment in the data frameworks in giving powerful backup and backing to the salesforce was another.
This made conveyance and bookkeeping issues all the time. Preparing and salesforce association was additionally persistently evolving. Amid the most recent 3 years, the company had a team lead, supplanted the project supervisor with a business executive, and then had the salesforce answering to the general administrator.
Preparing had likewise changed from year to year, yet would, in general, be insignificant. At long last, persuasive strategies depended on a simple commission structure which constrained salesforce income to around a limit of £18,000. There were no other inspirational procedures utilized.
