Increase Sales Revenue Through
Leadership, Commitment & Guts

Not only is sales productivity down, but it’s also taking longer for companies to get new sellers up to speed.  Almost 50% of companies say that it takes longer than seven months for a new seller to contribute to revenue.¹

Salespeople Reaching Quota

Plus…

• There’s too little in the sales pipeline.
• Sales cycles are too long.
• Sales teams’ turnover is too high.

We can’t even write about it anymore. Sigh. Tale as old as time. Why is that?

Well, for the most part, the reasons haven’t changed either. Companies often function in silos, with sales, marketing and operations working separately instead of together toward common goals. Company leaders — from the c-suite and down — often aren’t invested in what it takes to increase sales through true sales transformation. (Hint: It’s not a quick fix.) But most of all, very few have the guts to do it better.

The truth is the stats are never going to change, and most companies are never going to improve sales performance unless they transform themselves big time. We’re not talking a huge, shiny, one-time, Tony Robbins-style event. Too many firms have been there, done that and then moved on to the next shiny thing and changed nothing. Motivational speeches fizzle quickly.

Transformation is a new way of operating and doing business. It means everyone is working toward common, measurable goals. Everyone is held accountable. Everyone is literally speaking the same language. Everyone is skeptical of the status quo and the way things have always been done. Everyone is challenging themselves in new ways every day.

"Everyone is challenging themselves in new ways every day."

Transformation on every level takes sustained focus and energy. Everyone in the organization must be willing to do the hard work. You don’t lose 100 pounds overnight. You don’t get rich quick. You don’t become a stellar sales organization after a single two-hour training seminar.

Broadly speaking, the secret sauce to sales transformation comes down to organizational readiness for change and aligning around outcomes. More specifically, it requires a mindset that all areas of the company — sales, marketing, product development, operations, HR and so on — are aligned with and supportive of sales initiatives. Best-in-class companies make improving sales outcomes a company-wide priority.

Transformation also entails carefully planned and executed sales trainings in which every level of the company — starting with the CEO — is present and engaged. Successful organizations, in our experience, bake success into their sales trainings before, during and after they occur. Download some great resources to get started.

“The secret of getting ahead is getting started.” —Mark Twain

Sales transformation begins before the sales training event even takes place. The discovery phase is especially important; what companies think they need is often just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Companies will say, “We need to ramp up our sales,” or “We need to shorten the sales cycle,” or “We need more superstar sellers.”

This can’t be accepted at face value. Your sales transformation and training partner must dig for more. Your outcomes are critical, but so is spending time planning how you’re going to get there.  It’s important to define the key processes as well as the skills and behaviors that need to change in order to solve your issues and get your organization to the outcomes you want to achieve.

Pre-work sets the stage for success

The key to improving sales skills is to identify the exact behaviors that need to be changed and ensure these are addressed in the training sessions. By the time the trainers are standing in the room, facing your sales org, the training material must be on point and consumable for your entire client-facing organization. Relevance and customization are critical. Your sales messaging framework should be “created by you and for you," because relevance and customization don’t come in pre-packaged, off-the-shelf content.

Companies have attributed their successes to this pre-work and planning. Take PrimeRevenue, which has seen its sales pipeline triple since it undertook its sales transformation. The hard work done up front gets the credit, says CEO P.J. Bain. “The prep time that went into preparing the program was unbelievable,” he said. “We spent time really digging into complex issues about delivering our message to clients in a way that buyers really understand our value.”

“I have never worked a day in my life without selling. If I believe in something, I sell it, and I sell it hard.” — Estée Lauder.

Now we’re at the sales training event that everyone has been waiting for. OK, maybe not everyone; there will be skeptics. Events often open like this:

Experienced and vocal seller: “I’ve heard this all before. I don’t need this.”

Trainer (in our case a highly skilled former SVP of sales): “What makes you good at sales?”

Seller: “Um…”

Trainer: “It’s grit. You are good despite the lack of tools your company — until now — has provided you. You’ve had dumb luck, and it’s not repeatable. You’re hitting the target, but you’re not sure why. Today, we’re gonna start to slay the dragon in a different way.”

OK, let’s slay it. During a sales training, there are three essential ingredients: relevance, emotional connection and application.

“Fortune favors the bold.” —Virgil

The sales training is over, and now it’s back to reality. New reality or old reality? It’s up to you.

If you are setting out on transformation, eventually you do have to transform. A decision not to transform means you’ll continue to accept your company’s status quo. That may mean lackluster, or worse, declining sales and a sales force that’s likely disjointed and disengaged. Your reps can revert to their old ways of selling and cling to the decades-old sales story. Or, you can become a transformed, unified selling machine. You can be a trend setter among sales organizations and blaze a new path that exceeds your wildest sales quota. Your call.

You have to work to sustain the magic of the sales training event and launch of your organization’s new sales mandate and mantra. You and everyone must invest in the program — lean in, stick with those commitments to action.

Being accountable

Leaders and front-line managers must hold themselves accountable to the program, to the tools, to the shared language and vision, to the transformation mindset. And then leaders and managers must hold everyone else in the organization accountable, too.

For example, a leader or manager should say:

If you want to squelch adoption of the new sales program, the surefire way to do it is to make it seem optional:

Goodness, this isn’t a buffet. There’s no choice. It’s all or nothing. It’s imperative. It’s urgent, and leaders must convey that sense of urgency.   

Here are some great ways we’ve seen leaders and managers at client companies keep the new, transformative sales program top of mind among sellers:

• On group calls, ask a team member to recite important aspects of the program, such as required capabilities, performance-based objectives and metrics.
• Within the inside sales pit, display signs with words and acronyms that reinforce the program. (See, this is how your marketing department stays on board, too.)
• Make sure your team receives regular ongoing emails — not only from c-suite executives, but also from front-line managers —underscoring the methodology and reporting big wins that have been a direct result.

Finally, it’s important to measure results and report them back to the organization. Be transparent, otherwise your big deal sales quota is a meaningless target. You can hire the best consultants that money can buy, but without 1) a plan that makes your efforts relevant, 2) a shared definition of success and a way to reinforce it and 3) a way to track your measurable results, you’ll be wasting your money for sure.  

We couldn’t have said it better

You could also hire the best consultants that money can buy, do the hard work alongside those partners and, in the process, transform your company. Like Actifio did.

“For any company to be successful, you have to be mission driven. In order to pull that off, you have to have organizational alignment,” said Jim Sullivan, president of Actifio, which has seen gains in profitability, gross margins and customer satisfaction. “The single biggest thing that this project allowed us to achieve was organizational alignment.” 

The sales data doesn’t have to stay the same year after year. Transformation is within reach. Heck, you could be a trend setter. You could be the organization that gets to say things like:

• We consistently meet and exceed our sales goals.
• Our sales pipeline is full.
• We close deals quicker than ever before.
• Our customers need us.
• Our teams are skilled, passionate and engaged.

Do you have the guts?

Remember, no guts, no glory.

¹ 2017 CSO Insights World-Class Sales Practices Report