Increasing sales is crucial to lead a successful company. Efficient sales operations can boost sales productivity. Tracking specific sales effectiveness metrics will reveal broken processes and performance improvement opportunities.
A business can increase sales productivity by tracking these seven metrics:
“Between 50 and 69 percent of sales reps met their quota.”
1. Pinpoint the quota attainment
Quotas gauge the effectiveness of a sales rep. Tracking the average percentage of individuals who were able to reach 100 percent of their quota helps a business identify top performers. A Harvard Business Review study of sales leaders indicated 54 percent of participants reported between 50 and 69 percent of sales reps met their quota. A total of 26 percent of sales leaders reported 70 percent of their employees achieved the quota.
2. Identify total revenue per individual sale
Entrepreneur noted businesses should also track revenue per sale. Tracking this data can determine which techniques practiced by top sales reps are capable of bringing in higher profit with each individual sale.
The total revenue of an operation will rise when a business tracks and rewards this metric. Salespeople who regularly bring in higher revenue per sale can also share advice and help other employees improve their performance.
3. Track the quality of leads found
Leads provide a business with the opportunity for growth. Recognizing quality leads and knowing where to focus resources is a crucial component to increasing the number of successful sales.
Retaining customer loyalty is just as important as converting leads into clients. Pinpoint when spending falls or plateaus. A business should examine and address this pattern to make sure growth continues.
4. Determine the lead to sale rate
Tracking the leads that turn into sales is another important metric to track, according to Forbes. This can indicate overall effectiveness of a sales rep. Knowing which sales techniques are essential to bringing more clients on board will encourage the growth of total sales productivity.
When tracking conversion rates, a business should note the individuals who consistently succeed in converting leads to clients. These individuals can assist fellow employees achieve successful lead to client conversion and lead to company-wide success.
Businesses should examine why the conversion rate varies among staff. Consider the different times of the year or the week or day conversion is most successful and develop a sales strategy based on findings.
“Spending money to turn leads into customers may be effective, it should also not cut into total revenue.”
5. Find custom acquisition cost
According to Forbes, identifying how much it costs to attract a customer is another valuable metric a business can use. This can help an operation determine how efficient a sales rep is and how effective the team is as a whole.
A good indicator that a business needs to engineer a new strategy is if the money spent to acquire customers continues to rise. In addition, businesses need to reevaluate their sales and marketing strategy if the money’s use does not have a positive impact on sales productivity. Spending money to turn leads into customers may be impactful, but it should never cut into total revenue.
6. Monitor total sales of each product or service
Entrepreneur emphasized the importance of noting which products or services are selling successfully. A business can then focus energy on promoting what consumers want to buy and re-evaluating the sales method or marketing channel of an unsuccessful product.
If one product or service does not sell well among customers, a business can harness the power of social media to research consumer preferences for products and services offered. Gaining insight directly from those who have the purchasing power will help an operation determine how to move forward with a more effective sales strategy.
7. Know prior activity before a successful sale
Businesses should identify the events that took place before a sale. This data can be used to track any patterns that occur when consumers make purchases. Tracking this metric allows an operation to figure out the root of a successful or failed sale attempt. Entrepreneur noted a sales decrease potentially may happen due to a lower number of sales per call. A change to the phone script used to speak with customers may help.
Improving a sales strategy starts by identifying both successful and unsuccessful patterns among a team. Knowing which metrics to track can boost a company’s productivity.
