Managing a sales team can offer a wide range of opportunities that help to develop your team’s skills further in selling and prospecting all of which can improve processes and help land a sale. Not only are you able to help your team succeed, it will also enable them to be more productive, collaborative and motivated.
To help you on your sales management journey, we have compiled our very best tips on developing a top-performing sales team.
Set Goals for Each Team Member
Sales thrive on goals and meeting those KPI’s. For an individual, small goals can give them the motivation to develop their skills. For some, bigger goals help to see the bigger picture and can strive towards the bigger goals they set.
Every person in your sales team will have a different set of goals to be working towards. You should be able to talk with your team, go through their goals and plan goal completion dates. Having unified goals as a team is also very important as you can all work together to get them complete.
When writing your goals, you should always use the SMART framework.
S - Specific
M - Measurable
A - Attainable
R - Relevant
T - Time-based
Personal Development Plans
A professional and driven individual should very much want to develop existing skills while learning new ones. With personal development, you can achieve this by evaluating your team’s strengths throughout their career and offer advice when needed.
These plans allow your team members to look forward to growing as a professional in a top-performing sales team while being motivated to get to that next step. Using the SMART framework, you will able to set measurable and time-based goals.
Celebrate Successes
Success can look like many things, hitting KPI’s, completing a course or even hitting one of those personal roadmap goals. Team members are more likely to feel motivated in their role when their wins, no matter how big or small are celebrated.
Have Regular 1-2-1’s
Your team are more likely to talk to you about problems when it is a 1-2-1. Each individual will feel more comfortable talking about the good and the bad which will help to build a relationship from these meetings.
Constant problem-solving and development sessions can help remove any worries that may be obstructing personal development performance. These meetings can be helpful to those who need a little more support in their role.
Hire Effectively
As a manager, your team’s performance is how you hit those goals and KPIs. You want a team that is skilled and willing to contribute ideas. To sustain a high-performance team, hiring effectively will help this as well as always being on the lookout for fresh, new talent that fits into your top-performing team.
Don’t hire for the sake of hiring. Make sure you are hiring the right people for your company who fit the job well. Skills, knowledge and experience play a huge part in recruitment, the right attitude and willingness to learn can be powerful as well.
Sandler Sales Management Training
Sales management is one of the toughest jobs in any organisation. You are often stuck between the goals and expectations of leadership and delivering on them through your team with little or no direct influence on sales.
Your ability to hire the best salespeople while accurately evaluating their performances affects your team’s ability to succeed. Outstanding sales performance requires a realistic sales plan, which includes dedicated goals and strategies for accomplishing them.
With Sandler’s Sales Management Training, you will learn to effectively and supportively debrief your salespeople, grow your sales through networking, and manage a territory, while developing the best practices vital for managing, maintaining, and maximising business with existing customers.
Find out more about Sales Management Training here!
