Everything you need to know about sales strategy

The problem with a lot of sales organisations I have been involved with, is that they do not have clear and defined sales strategy. I have never understood how a business can grow without a sales strategy.

A sales strategy is simply a plan of how you will position and sell your product or service. This includes who your target audience is, how you will tailor your sales process to helping this audience and the style you wish to train out.

In this guide, you’ll find everything you need to know to get started with a sales strategy, including:

• What sales strategy is and why it’s important.
• The 3 different types of growth models and how they work.
• Tips, tools, and best practices to succeed with a sales strategy.

Read on so you can create a great sales strategy for your business.

What is a sales strategy?

A sales strategy is a plan in which to reach the company’s goals. What this means to you is that the business will have a vision in which to grow and reach it’s goals. Every business is at a different stage of development and a sales strategy will be based around how the company wants to grow.

Every part of the business should be geared towards this goal and every decision should be made with this strategy in mind. So for example if the business has identified a particular audience, the strategy will need to work around that customer and what they want from you.

A customer service led model will look to using customer service KPIs and measurements like Trustpilot in order to gain valuable feedback as where they are now and where they are going. Marks & Spencer are a great example of the customer service model and they recognised this as the thing that sets them apart from the competition.

A sales led growth model on the other hand has a different set of KPIs, focussing on efficiency factors such as conversion, revenue and unit sales. The training will include different sales styles and techniques and will have constant on hand coaching to help sales people.

A product led growth model is very different in the fact it focuses heavily on the product. It is what the company exists for and strives meet customer and market expectations, look at Apple for example. The product has numerous unique selling points and tries to have an edge over it’s competition.

You need to decide which strategy is best for you to take you forward. When you pick your strategy you need to communicate it clearly and every decision made needs to synergise with your sales strategy.

Why is a sales strategy important?

Share the benefits of sales strategy, consequences you avoid with it, and/or stats to support it. Here are greatest benefits of alignment and why they matter:

• Business consistency: Everyone in the business will be on the same page, each decision will have the strategy in mind. Marketing and sales will work closer to together and appreciate each other more.
• Clarity on audience: Everyone in the organisation will understand the target customer and what the business wants to achieve, as well as how to help the customer.
• Understanding of the customer journey: Everyone in the organisation will understand the customer journey and what they need to do to aid the experience.

How a sales strategy works

So how do we create a sales strategy. There are a number of points we must look at:

Refine your target customer

The first thing is to refine your target customer. Who are they? How old are they? Does your product or service suit their needs? How will you target them? Email? Call? These are basic essentials of building your customer profile. It’s important to get this right as it one of the fundamentals of building your sales strategy.

If you have a more reactive sales strategy through feedback you will refine your target audience. This could be through a data driven approach, or even your through your google adwords. Maybe you look at the demographics of your successful sales and see which verticals work best for you.

Create a training plan

The next step is to create a training plan of how you want your sales people to sell. This will also give the recruitment team ideas on what they are looking for when recruiting for each position. Your sales people need to know what and how they are selling to the customer and what sales process they follow for the customer journey.

Measure the success

You need to develop ways of measuring where the strategy is successful. So this will incorporate overall company indicators as well as departmental KPIs and individual KPIs. This also feeds into a number of other initiatives we have spoke about previously, KPIs are indicators that the individual is competent in their role and also involving everyone in the overall picture. This is key to keeping the company motivated.

Sales strategy best practices

The best practices are to be clear and concise throughout the planning of a sales strategy. Everyone involved in the company has to fully understand what the company wants to achieve. Communication is key, by staying true to your to strategy you will build rapport with your sales people. When you start to change your strategy without warning this is where problems start to occur.

Get started with a sales strategy today

Start your sales strategy today, using the steps above put your strategy together. It’s an easy process, then once you have put it together go over it and see what you could improve. Use it to your advantage and you will have your roadmap to being successful.

Contact us if you are looking into creating or developing your sales strategy for your business. We can help you become clearer and more effective in your approach.