Managing the Business of Sales | Sales | Training Programs

Program Name

Managing the Business of Sales

Anyone with the responsibility for maximizing sales results from an account, a territory or a portfolio of channel partners, and/or those who manage such roles

This program provides a unique way in which to take business and planning fundamentals to the profession of salesperson – and in a manner that sales people will embrace.

Central to the program is the belief that the sales pipeline is the very core of what selling is all about.  In a totally unique way, the program reveals that the traditional sales funnel should rarely be actually shaped like a funnel.  Using the ground breaking work of Martyn Lewis from Market-Partners, participants are shown how this traditional view of the sales funnel and pipeline could not only disguise what is really happening in their businesses but also be a detriment to performance, forcing time to be spent in the wrong sales activities at the wrong time.

New sales pipeline metrics are introduced so that participants can focus their selling activities into the areas that will not only replenish sales pipelines, but keep them flowing for maximum short and long term results.

Five 75-minute live virtual modules, typically delivered one per week, and each followed by a Work Assignment of about 45 to 60 minutes

• Utilize a consistent and highly effective series of business processes to plan, review, and determine optimal selling activity for short and long term success
• View their sales territory as a series of sub-businesses that each may demand different investments of their time
• Synchronize selling activities to the relevant customer’s buying process
• Develop pipeline plans that illustrate the optimal shape, size, and flow for each of the different businesses that comprise their overall territory
• Review their actual sales pipelines against their own plans to determine optimal selling activities to build and maintain pipelines to meet short and long term sales goals
• Diagnose different selling scenarios by reviewing the dynamics of their own pipelines to determine the optimal areas for investment of their selling activities
• Positively influence the three pipeline levers of velocity, conversion ratio, and average deal size to maximize results
• Use pipeline management approaches to plan and forecast sales results
• Know when to optimally apply opportunity management and account/territory/portfolio management methods to sales opportunities
• Plan and prioritize their activities for maximum impact on their results

• Sales results
• Sales effectiveness
• Sales forecast accuracy
• Win rates
• Deal sizes
• Sales velocity
• Superior sales qualification skills and time management

Module 1

• Understanding the role of the sales professional
• Planning for results
• Balancing the need for short-term results  with the required longer term investments
• The need to plan
• The sales pipeline as the basis of managing the business of sales
• The customer’s buying process
• Considering the total pipeline as a portfolio of sub-pipelines
• The sales funnel, and why it is rarely shaped like a funnel
• Planning the optimal sales funnel
• The pipeline planning tool
• Building a pipeline plan for short and long term results

Module 2

• Comparing the actual pipeline to the optimal plan
• The planning cycle
• Reviewing the pipeline for quantity
• Understanding pipeline size
• Understanding pipeline shape
• Setting the plan to build and maintain the quantity of sales opportunities across the pipeline

Module 3

• Reviewing the pipeline for quality
• Synchronizing the sales pipeline and selling activities into the customer’s buying process
• Testing to understand where the customer is in their buying process
• Influencing the customer’s buying process in terms of velocity, completion ration, and deal size
• Selling actions to influence the pipeline levers by stage of the buying process

Module 4

• A four step pipeline review process
• Setting selling plans based upon pipeline analysis
• Time management and pipeline planning
• Pipeline management in practice
• Selling accelerators

Module 5

• Managing the business of sales
• Best practices
• Overcoming barriers and hurdles
• Keys to successful implementation
• Forecast accuracy
• Market dynamics
• Developing a personal implementation plan

None.

Participants should bring a copy of their current sales pipeline which could be from a CRM system, or a simple listing of their current sales opportunities. Such a pipeline report would ideally segment sales opportunities by stage of the sales pipeline.