Here is a task for the marketing leadership, guaranteed to yield. Spend time examining your true sales cost and begin to think in terms of marketing opportunity.
All too often I see marketing management using numbers and metrics derived from legacy accounting and reporting mechanisms or personal preferences of leaders no longer with the firm to take the firm's temperature. Worse yet, they are using systems with known bias and gaps for gaming by sales teams because they do not have the technology skills or commitment from IT to seek better software and practices. The worst is how the salesforce incentives do not match the business strategy (long term or short term!).
A Day in the Jumpseat: An Investment in Your Business
I recently spent a day with a sales professional for a high tech medical product. I was fascinated with how much time was spent engaging with documenting information for headquarters and how little time was spent with the actual client. "Miles" shared with me how he wakes at 5am to input sales orders and daily talleys of client/prospect activity and engagement on his home office computer. Living in one of America's largest cities, he then gets on the road to 'beat the traffic' to his first call of the day. I kept thinking how rushed the client appointments felt to me. When I inquired about the rushing, Miles said it was so that he could meet the daily quota of prospect visits. Increasing prospect visits was the new big target for headquarters, which could land Miles a Rolex watch during a new sales incentive program. Then there was the paperwork for the existing clients we visited. I was amazed at the paper forms he was constantly placing in front of clients for signature. They seemed very annoyed by it as well.
What internal demands are being placed on your sales professionals and what is the potential opportunity cost to your business? Is your sales team spending hours fulfilling internal process requirements instead of engaging in consultative selling techniques? Are they sitting in front of the computer versus working on the client relationships? Are they annoying your committed clients because your current accounting process has redundant documents signature requirements?
Opportunity is yours. Will it be opportunity cost or marketing opportunity?
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