The power of an effective sales process cannot be understated. From increased productivity to improved staff engagement, the benefits are far reaching. And the best benefit of all? More revenue.
Yes, developing an effective sales process can help you create more revenue – if that’s not a motivating factor, we don’t know what is!
But how? – you may be wondering. Good question.
Imagine you’re a novice salesperson. It’s your third day on the job, and you make a sale. You’re ecstatic! You think things can only improve from here. Yet, the next day you make no sales. Nor the next week. Then, in your second week, you close another deal. You’re ecstatic once again! Only the next day is followed by no sales, and the cycle repeats itself. Success is sporadic and unpredictable.
If someone was to ask you what you were doing right, would you know the answer? Or would you shrug your shoulders and say, “it’s just luck?”
Unless you were tracking your every movement, you’d have no way of knowing what actions contributed towards the sales. And neither would your sales manager. Making it almost impossible for you to recreate the same situation that led to the sale in the first place.
Now imagine you had been following a clearly-defined, tried-and-tested sales process since you started. Not only would you have probably made more sales, you’d also be employing consistent techniques with every customer – leaving less room for ifs, buts and maybes.
Do you see the difference?
Employees who follow a company-wide, unified sales process are far more likely to make consistent sales than those who don’t. Now amplify this impact across your whole organisation. If everyone follows the same sales process, then you have consistency on your side. Consistency and persistency make for increased revenue and better pipeline forecasting.
Of course, this is only possible if 1) Your sales process is effective, and 2) Everyone is following it (no exceptions). Not always easy to achieve, but definitely possible – with hard work, commitment and perseverance.
The main point is that having an effective sales process leads to increased efficiency and productivity, which in turn lead to more revenue.
This is backed up by research. According to a survey by Harvard Business Review, organisations with an effective sales process in place generate nearly 20 per cent more income than those without.
“We discovered that sales forces were most effective at managing their sales pipelines if they had invested time in defining a credible, formalised sales process. In fact, there was an 18% difference in revenue growth between companies that defined a formal sales process and companies that didn’t.”
Our clients see similar results when they develop effective sales processes. Many of them come to us and say they didn’t know how they coped before! If you’d like to take your revenue to the next level, then we’d encourage you to create a sales process and see the results for yourself.
