Hope is not a plan, and yet, ‘work harder’ and ‘do more’ (in less time) is the frequent mantra of sales managers to individuals on sales and customer success teams. These unrealistic expectations lead to employee attrition and lower productivity while managers are still left without clearly understanding what’s required to hit revenue targets predictably. To address this, sales teams need to focus on sales as a science and creating a culture where experimentation is constant.
Personal Sales Equation
Whether you’re an SDR or LDR driving to setup meetings or an AE out to close revenue, you need to know your personal sales equation in order to hit your goals. Start with your main goal and increase that by 1.5X to 2X. If you strive above the goal, you’re more likely to exceed it and your risk of missing target goes way down. Now consider your average deal size and the deals currently in your pipeline. Finally, look back on your conversion ratios for the last few months (e.g. Prospecting Calls to SQLs; SQLs to Discovery Calls; Discoverys to Proposals; Proposals to Closed Deals). You need to ask yourself questions like, “How many prospecting calls would I have to make in order to find a qualified lead?” These variables will help you determine your required activity level to achieve your goals.
[shortcode_button url=”#personal_planning” class=”fancybox-popup” align=”center”]Download Personal Sales Equation Templates for SDRs and AEs[/shortcode_button]
The Scientific Method of Sales
As you progress through your month or quarter, you should be checking your personal sales equation every few days. Then, using the scientific method, identify ways you could improve and try new things to improve your results. These experiments will roughly follow this process. You should be asking yourself how you can improve your personal performance every day — and don’t be afraid to borrow best practices from your peers!
- Make an Observation.
- Form a Question.
- Construct a Hypothesis.
- Conduct an Experiment.
- Analyze the Data, Draw a Conclusion, Adjust Your Hypothesis.
- Rinse and Repeat.
Get more free resources and read the next post in this series, Develop Your SaaS Growth Model, to learn about how to set your growth targets and build your resourcing plan for the coming year.
About SalesSmyth
We created SalesSmyth because we knew there had to be a better way for growth stage companies to build their sales organizations. We’re sales leaders and consultants, so we’ve seen firsthand the effects of building a sales team by the seat of your pants: higher burn rates, lower valuations, and less control over the future of your company. So we ask ourselves the question that drives us, “What can we do to help entrepreneurs build high performing sales teams that lead to explosive growth?” We are on a mission to deliver torrents of revenue by designing, training and equipping sales organizations to do their very best work.