Business readiness: Sales Strategy

What is a Sales Strategy?

A sales strategy document outlines your company’s sales objectives and targets with the steps and processes to achieve them.

It covers:

• Objectives: Short and long-term sales goals and targets of your company for a predefined period
• Timelines: Milestones and sales process lifecycle to be followed by your company to achieve your sales objectives
• Strategies and Tactics: Strategies and steps formulated by your company to achieve your sales objectives
• Sales Team: Structure and size of your sales team, their roles and responsibilities, training, sales quotas, compensation structure and performance incentives
• Channels: Key sales channels and partners used by your company
• Customer and Market Focus: Target customers and markets of your company
• Budget: Expected expenses that your company will incur to achieve your sales goals and objectives
• Performance Assessment: Methods and KPIs used to track and evaluate the performance of your sales strategy

Why is a Sales Strategy important for business today?

A sales strategy document enables your company to:

• Define and communicate the short and long- term sales objectives and timelines within your company
• Implement a sales strategy that is most suited to your target market and train your sales teams accordingly
• Plan the allocation of budget to achieve your sales objectives
• Map out your sales lifecycle and understand customer acquisition and retention strategies
• Develop a baseline estimate of resources required to sell your business offerings

Why is a Sales Strategy important for an event tomorrow?

A sales strategy document is important for an event tomorrow, as it helps:

• Understand the sales process of your company from lead generation to conversion and retention
• Assess the roles and responsibilities of your sales team, their performance and efficiency in meeting targets
• Identify key target markets and your company’s customer base
• Assess historical sales targets, strategies adopted and the timelines to achieve them
• Understand the reasons behind any volatility in sales performance
• Analyze the financial and operational risks in your company’s sales strategy
• Benchmark the sales goals and targets of your company against those of competitors

Pros of addressing a Sales Strategy

• Facilitate the acquisition of new customers and retention of existing customers
• Position your business offerings to different customer segments effectively
• Monitor and track expenses related to sales strategy implementation
• Realign your sales strategy by periodically tracking sales goals and preparing for any volatilities
• Helps plan the structure and size of the sales team and assign them targets as per their capabilities and potential
• Improve decision-making by outlining your company’s sales goals, strategies and timelines

Cons of not addressing this topic

• Increase in risk of customer loss due to lack of clarity on retention strategies
• Difficult to track marketing and sales performance as performance metrics are not defined
• Restricted ability to identify and analyze your target market and customer base
• Potential duplication in the sales team efforts with lack of clarity on strategy and relevant coordination required to achieve goals.

ALSO LEARN ABOUT

• Business KPI
• Business Projects
• Business Processes
• Top Customers
• Marketing Plan
• Project Planning Documentation