SALES UP!
BOOST YOUR BUSINESS
Sales Up is a series of proven steps FutureTide has successfully used to develop sustainable sales teams for our clients over the last 25 years, applying techniques learned from a range of industries and companies of all types and sizes.
SALES UP STEPS
The Sales Up steps ensure the creation of a sales team that gives you an abundance of financial return whilst giving them a career. The best sales people join the best companies, companies they feel will be successful and that they will feel around to have helped build and to be part of.
UP 1!
The Right Effort
Building a stable and productive sales team needs both effort and money and does not happen overnight. Budgeting financially and estimating the correct time frame for this is critical. So our first step will always be to sit down with you and determine the REAL effort and time frames against your targets and planned return on investment.
UP 2!
The Right Products
Sales people will never sell products or services they do not believe in or that are not priced right. The broader the product and service set the better. But they have to be competitive, well delivered, priced and packaged. Getting this right is critical and needs to be revised.
UP 3!
The Right People
This is a critical and obvious step in the process but what is the right person? By our definition it is a willing, able and ambitious person who wants to make a great income regardless of their experience and background. We have yet to find that exclusively hiring people from an industry, or head hunting to work. Hiring ambitious people that fit your needs, works. The investment in training in the industry and sales is part of your cost but gives much greater returns.
UP 4!
The Right Structure
Sales is as much about selling the right product at the right price, as it is about the support that sales people have in their sales and the way the sales team is structured. Often companies opt for telesales people, or sales administration as part of what supports the sales people from the get go, but these facilities need to be earned. Growing sales teams is critical and only the structure assures that.
UP 5!
The Right Incentives
Sales people need to work on a production oriented basis ONLY. Which means a low basic package and high commissions. That means having the right product mix for both once off sales as well as annuity income so that they can earn immediate commissions and also build up annuity commissions. The more they sell the more they should make.
UP 6!
The Right Management
Sales people need to be managed with the right amount of carrot and stick; they get knocked around more that any other job does in a company, and most often hear the word “no” than the word “yes”. They need to be both encouraged, pushed and cared for in equal measure. They must be able to discuss their challenges and obstacles regularly as well on a one-on-one basis.
UP 7!
The Right Training
Training of sales people is an ongoing thing and should never cease; three day workshops don’t work but one hour of training each morning is most effective. Training can be a combination of technical and products subjects along with sales techniques and the soft art of sales with lots of practical application.
UP 8!
The Right Systems
Production morale is the basis of a great sales team so tracking sales performance on a daily, weekly and monthly basis is crucial. Stats and graphs need to be displayed openly and all sales people need to know their own production as well as that of others to foster a competitive environment. Tracking and focusing on the correct sales output is critical as focussing on the wrong activity just creates busyness.