S&P Consulting Firm’s Post

▶ My business insight story Situation: Lack of overall sales leadership - Part 2 2. Establish a Cross-Functional Sales Leadership Team 1) Purpose a) Create a Sales Leadership Team that includes the Head of Sales, team heads from both the Wholesale and D2C Sales teams, and key stakeholders from marketing, product management, and customer support. b) This team should meet regularly to discuss market trends, share insights, address challenges, and align strategies. 2) Action Plan a) Regular Strategy Meetings: Schedule bi-weekly or monthly strategy meetings to discuss sales performance, customer feedback, and competitive analysis. Use these meetings to identify opportunities for collaboration between teams and align on shared goals. b) Joint Problem-Solving: Encourage collaborative problem-solving sessions where both teams can present their challenges and work together to find solutions. c) Define Clear Roles and Expectations: Ensure each member of the Sales Leadership Team has a clearly defined role and understands their responsibilities in executing the overall sales strategy. 3. Implement a Performance-Based Sales Structure 1) Introduce a Shared Incentive Program a) Develop a compensation and incentive program that rewards both individual and collective achievements. For example, introduce bonuses for hitting combined sales targets, cross-selling between teams, or successfully managing joint accounts. b) Align incentives with KPIs that encourage collaboration rather than competition, such as joint account growth, customer satisfaction scores, and market share increase. 2) Action Plan a) Redesign the Incentive Program: Work with HR to redesign the current incentive structure, ensuring it is transparent, fair, and aligned with company objectives. Communicate changes clearly to all sales staff. b) Training and Development: Conduct training sessions to help sales representatives understand the new performance metrics, how they can achieve them, and the benefits of collaborative efforts. 4. Elevate the General Manager's Role in Sales Strategy 1) Encourage Active Involvement a) While the acting General Manager may not be currently engaged, it’s crucial to emphasize the importance of their involvement in the sales strategy to ensure alignment with overall business goals. b) Recommend a briefing or consultation process with the General Manager to gain their insights and secure their buy-in for proposed changes. 2) Action Plan a) Organize Regular Updates: Set up a structured schedule for regular updates to the General Manager on sales performance, challenges, and strategic initiatives. b) Highlight Strategic Importance: Present the sales issues in terms of their impact on the company's bottom line, customer satisfaction, and market positioning, demonstrating why the General Manager’s involvement is critical. continue...

Sales Team Leader vs. Sales Manager: Key Differences in Leadership and Strategy: 1. Scope of Responsibility: Sales Team Leader: A team leader typically manages a smaller group within a sales department. Their focus is more on directly supporting and guiding individual team members daily. They help set individual sales goals, provide training, and assist in overcoming immediate challenges. Sales Manager: A sales manager oversees the entire sales department or larger groups within the sales team. They are responsible for developing overall sales strategies, monitoring department performance, and aligning the team's efforts with broader organizational goals. They focus more on strategic decision-making and overall performance. 2. Decision-Making: Sales Team Leader: Team leaders have limited authority in decision-making. Their decisions usually revolve around managing team dynamics, motivating individuals, and addressing minor operational issues. Sales Manager: Sales managers have greater decision-making power and are responsible for major decisions regarding sales strategies, budget allocation, and managing key performance indicators (KPIs). They influence the overall direction of the sales department. 3. Reporting Structure: Sales Team Leader: Team leaders often report to the sales manager or other senior management. They focus on daily reporting on their team's progress and immediate challenges. Sales Manager: Sales managers report to higher-level executives, such as a director of sales or a vice president. They provide strategic insights and reports on the department’s performance and outcomes. 4. Focus: Sales Team Leader: They focus on tactical aspects—day-to-day operations, ensuring team morale, handling sales processes, and addressing individual sales team members' needs. Sales Manager: They are more focused on the strategic aspects of sales—long-term planning, meeting revenue targets, and aligning the sales team with business growth objectives. 5. Involvement in Sales: Sales Team Leader: They are often more hands-on and may be involved in direct selling, working alongside the team to achieve targets. Sales Manager: While a sales manager may still be involved in key accounts, they are generally more removed from day-to-day selling activities, focusing on overseeing and directing the sales team’s efforts.

Investing in your Sales Team! The continued restructures and downsizing continues with the next run of Pharma companies reducing headcount globally. Reevaluating resources is an absolute must, but how many are stopping to evaluate the potential of investment into the growth engine that is SALES? Pharma sales teams are still the key point of contact between the customer and the company and remain key during the critical stages of a products lifecycle. The upward curve benders when deployed well. A sales team on form requires effort because they have expectations, one is financial the other is growth, both are very closely linked. So how does an organisation maintain a sales performance cadence above the benchmark? SIMPLE - Revisit your sales development model. You may find it is needing a refresh. What we are observing is the industry is adapting to the changed environment yet the traditional sales development tools are still being used. This keeps your curve bending growth engine trapped in the past. START HERE! 🚀 Clearly link the required, and importantly relevant sales Capabilities, Skills and Competency measures. Have no more than 4 capabilities underpinned by again, no more than 4 skills. Then apply a compentency rating to each skill. This will give you a maximum of 16 individual points of measurement. Every person will have points of strength and areas of growth. Identifying them makes life as a Sales Manager far more effective as they can effectively focus of Coaching to Growth. 🚀 Link your Reward and Recognition to the above, acknowledging those who have worked on their growth areas, demonstrating a healthy change from baseline along with company aligned behaviours. Role Models will become evident quite quickly. 🚀 Revisit your Sales Incentive Plan. Way too much subjectivity has crept into these over the years, making it hard to distinguish between high performers and underperformance. The risk many are exposed to is this completely DEVALUES high performers and the effort they’ve put, so why should they continue? The flip side is your underperformers are getting rewarded for their underperformance. Bring back objectivity to your incentives. You can link the objective measures from your sales development as one component along with sales and market share etc. Linking all of the above will very quickly start to show where to focus, to reignite your sales team. Sales Leaders will be critical here. Putting the investment behind your role modelling, curve bending, growth drivers will deliver for customer, company and Salesperson. Why wait to be overtaken? Need a little help, we have simple tools and models to get you out in front. Connect with us at Rock8 Science #salesgrowth #salesdevelopment #salesincentive

Cultural intelligence in multi-territory sales is any commercial leaders competitive edge - especially once your company sets out for the world. In today’s global market, cultural nuances aren’t just obstacles—they’re opportunities. For CROs leading multi-territory sales organizations, success hinges on cultural fluency. Failure to align sales tactics with local customs and buyer behaviors will erode market share, lengthen sales cycles, and inflate CAC. Yet, many sales teams are still operating with a one-size-fits-all strategy, risking irrelevance in competitive markets. So how do you turn it around and what are the key drivers for multi-territory sales success? After expanding all over Europe, my learnings are the following: 1. Localized Go-to-Market Strategy Sales teams need the autonomy to adapt product positioning and tactics to local dynamics. Measuring success through Territory Growth Rate (TGR), Win-Loss Ratios, and CAC by region is key to identify local levers to adapt the business to. 2. Cultural Competency as a Strategic Asset Equip teams with culturally close candidates and then provide them with ongoing, region-specific training. Track results using KPIs such as the local Conversion Rates (CVR) and Time-to-Close to see where more on the ground work is necessary with your team. 3. Cross-Functional Alignment As mentioned in one of my last posts, align marketing, product, and customer success teams for seamless execution for the specific personas and peculiarities of the region you are selling in. Small changes per region often go a long way. 4. Leverage Local Partnerships Local partners accelerate credibility and market penetration. Monitor Partner-Influenced Revenue and Channel Growth to assess impact and make sure to move quicker than your competitors into that partner network The Challenge for most companies: Not only saying that the company culture is diverse and that cultural intelligence exists, but actually taking active measures to establish and emphasize this. If your sales leadership isn’t adapting to cultural differences, you’re running behind the curve. Cultural intelligence is a competitive necessity. Leaders who understand this are driving faster growth, lower churn, and higher customer satisfaction. Personally, I also think these people see the bigger picture and profit massively personally from building out their cultural intelligence.

Subject: Unlock the Power of 30+ Years of Sales Experience Across Industries Dear LinkedIn Connections, With over three decades of sales and business development experience, I’ve navigated evolving markets, shifting customer needs, and dynamic business environments across multiple industries. This journey has armed me with the skills to drive growth, build strong relationships, and deliver results. Here’s how my extensive experience can bring value across industries: 1. Manufacturing & Engineering My expertise in complex sales cycles, B2B relationships, and strategic account management can lead to improved client retention and high-value contracts with OEMs and industrial clients. 2. IT & Technology My skills in solution selling and product launches can help companies communicate technical solutions, drive market share, and accelerate time-to-market. 3. Construction & Infrastructure I excel in project-based selling, contract negotiation, and vendor management, ensuring seamless project execution and revenue growth while managing long sales cycles. 4. Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals My consultative approach and knowledge of regulatory environments enable me to manage relationships with healthcare providers and secure long-term contracts, delivering solutions that matter. 5. FMCG & Retail With expertise in consumer behavior and volume-driven strategies, I’ve helped companies penetrate new markets, increase product visibility, and boost profitability. 6. Automotive My background in automotive sales, account management, and cross-selling has forged long-term partnerships with manufacturers and suppliers, driving growth for key components and systems. 7. B2B & Enterprise Solutions I’ve honed skills in structuring complex deals, managing multi-layered sales cycles, and ensuring stakeholder alignment, leading to consistent business growth. What I Bring to the Table: - Strategic Sales Leadership: Proven success in achieving targets, entering new markets, and managing change. - Customer-Centric Focus: Building long-lasting relationships by delivering tailored solutions. - Adaptability: Experience across industries enables quick adaptation to new business models. - Mentorship & Leadership: Developed high-performing sales teams that consistently exceeded targets. I am confident my experience and passion for sales and operations can significantly impact any organization. If you’re seeking a seasoned professional to drive growth and lead teams to success, please contact & let’s connect! Best regards, Kamarsu Raja Rao 7382754039 [email protected]

Hey Business Leaders / Sales Leaders, there is only one maxim for your role: “THE SALES REPS ARE YOUR FIRST CUSTOMERS” Why and How? Just scroll down!   You have one key role and that is to ensure that marketing and customer success departments are  perfectly aligned to sales team and vice versa.   A successful sales leader practices key three tactics for inter-departmental effectiveness – Regular engagement with his peer department leaders; Is aware of each departments’ capabilities and shortcomings, and Drives result-oriented internal meetings that best support his sales team.   Let’s look at each of the above three points in detail:   Interdepartmental Engagement Practice: You have the responsibility to build trust of sales team among rest of the company. You have to ensure that the promises made by sales reps are implementable and are implemented as committed. You do this by being absolutely honest and being bold to support your sales team. You are transparent about the revenue forecast, flexible to adapt to new situations, and you are also fair to all the departments.   Sales Team Capabilities Practice: As a sales leader you must educate marketing and sales operations other department heads about the sales intricacies, internal and external sales bottlenecks, market updates and end-customer/ channel partner needs and demands. You must also update about what sales tools and what support is required to win each deal for the entire sales funnel. It is a great idea to take key personnel of other departments to key customer meetings. This enables other departments to offer course correction and re-align themselves with sales team.   Sales Review Meeting Practice: A successful sales leader does not dwell in the past. The data in the CRM is historical in nature and prospects do not buy on the basis of CRM data. Your focus is on the future only. In every sales review meeting, your primary job is to solve for immediate problems of the sales reps by taking help of other departmental heads. You have a single mind-set of promoting your outlook and vision for the future.   You have two obvious objectives – i) making the numbers and ii) leading the sales team successfully and consistently.   As a sales leader you have to balance the demands of non-sales departments on one hand and support your sales team to the best of your and the company’s capabilities.   A sales leader’s role is always is in churn. Balance is what you need to seek.   There are certain sales leader’s productivity practices too which must know and practice.   Please follow me for daily insights on how to top-grade B2B selling.   #sales #productivity #leader #b2b #startup #india #salesforesight #smb #sme #salesdirector #b2bsales #b2bsalesmanager #businessowners #salesleaders #HumanResources #Management #Entrepreneurship #Leadership

Title: Navigating Success: Why Direction Trumps Speed in Sales Leadership In the fast-paced world of sales, it's easy to get caught up in the race for speed—closing deals quickly, hitting targets at lightning speed. But what if I told you that our direction is more important than our speed? That in sales leadership, it's the path we choose, the strategy we employ, and the relationships we build that truly define our success. Here's why direction trumps speed in sales leadership: 1. **Strategic Vision:** Sales leadership isn't just about moving fast; it's about moving in the right direction. A strategic vision guides our actions, helping us navigate the complexities of the sales landscape and stay focused on our long-term goals. 2. **Building Sustainable Relationships:** Speed may win the race, but it's the quality of our relationships that sustains success over time. By prioritizing the direction of our relationships—fostering trust, understanding needs, and providing value—we lay the foundation for long-term partnerships that drive sustainable growth. 3. **Quality Over Quantity:** In sales, it's not just about how many deals we close, but the impact those deals have on our customers and our organization. By focusing on the direction of our efforts—targeting the right prospects, delivering tailored solutions, and providing exceptional service—we can achieve greater outcomes with fewer resources. 4. **Adaptability and Agility:** Speed without direction is like a ship without a compass—bound to drift aimlessly. In sales leadership, adaptability and agility are essential for navigating change and seizing opportunities. By maintaining a clear direction while remaining flexible in our approach, we can steer our teams toward success, no matter the challenges we face. 5. **Continuous Improvement:** Sales leadership is a journey of growth and development, not a sprint to the finish line. By prioritizing the direction of our efforts—learning from our experiences, refining our strategies, and investing in our teams—we can continuously improve and achieve excellence in our roles. So, sales leaders, let's remember that our direction is more important than our speed. Let's focus on the strategic vision, the quality of our relationships, and the continuous improvement that will drive sustainable success in sales leadership.

***Are You An Edifier Or A Disintermediator?*** One of the challenges that many sales leaders experience, especially early in their sales leadership career, is striking a balance between leading the sales conversation and edifying their sales executive. Newer sales leaders in particular often want to make a powerful impression upon their sales person as well as their customer, and hence end up ‘leading’ the sales conversation, or seeking to position themselves as the customer’s ’white knight’. Whilst their intention is to help, through this process they disintermediate their sales executive and condition the customer to communicate with them in order to progress the deal. The end result? At the slightest obstacle or challenge, the customer bypasses the sales person and ends up going directly to the sales leader. ❌ Whilst I can give new sales leaders a little bit of slack on this, what is incredibly disappointing is that experienced sales leaders also do the same thing. And they wonder why they are so ‘busy’ - they end up being the sales leader, as well as the sales person. Sometimes, sales leaders do this on purpose! 🤷♂️ (insert ‘ego’ driven here!!). Exceptional sales leaders are crystal clear on their role in the sales team, as well as in the sales process. Their focus is on edification and not disintermediation. ✅ How do they achieve this? Here’s what they do- ✅ They ensure they are actively involved in the account and opportunity planning process. ✅ They drive the sales executive to lead the sales strategy & empower them to do so. They step back so the sales executive can step up. ✅ When it comes to customer engagement, the sales leaders asks what role the sales executive wants them to play, and what assistance they need. ✅ When in front of the customer, they stick to their agreed role, and constantly seek to edify their sales executive and not de-position them. ✅ They are ruthless and relentless in the edification process, knowing that this will lead to the sales executive developing independent thinking and confidence. They are not ‘rescuers’ As a sales leader, how would you describe yourself and the role you play? Are you an edifier or are you a disintermediator? What would your team say? What would your customers say? To be an exceptional sales leader, we must learn to be a master edifier, and encourage our sales team to step up and own the sales engagement. We become the support mechanism to the engagement. This may result in some short term pain, but I guarantee it will deliver long term bliss!! 😉 Here’s to a massive week 👊 #sales #leadership #salesleadership #exceptionalsalesleader #coach #mentor

https://lnkd.in/d5eM49_n I want to come back to this LN Sales Blog about Key Performer and their Winning Attributes in Sales: 1. Communicate Value: They have a value-based selling approach 2. Ask relevant, targeted questions and pro-actively listen 3. Practice Empathy as one of the most critical attributes - means for me - the old style (quantity out - orders-in ratio does not work for a lot of companies in consulting, solution sales or complex portfolio sales management) and empathy is difficult to be coached - it needs to be there - this is a recruiting issue! 4. Use a sales methodology to build a team of Top Performers. 5. Build a high-caliber pipeline with discipline and Know the right people - with the right message at the right time! 6. They stay open to coaching and Devolopment. This is a Leadership issue as well! 7. Deal with Adversity - Top Performers are resilient and look for the lesson - but this is also a Leadership issue. Sometime they need coaching (no blaming! as often performed). Mostly sales is a team approach - everybody wins, but also everybody lose. Not only sales - however sales is the major part at the front. 👉🏼 👉🏼 👉🏼 And: Every sales is unique - and should be at the place where he/she can perform best and last but not least: 👉🏼 👉🏼 👉🏼 Sales Performers need a Sales Manager = a Sales Coach and Supporter, not a Blamer. Sales Leadership also means to coach and remove obstacles within the organization.

Top 8 Skills Strategic Account Managers Need Compared to Traditional Sales Representatives I just delivered two sales growth sessions at the Strategic Account Management Association Conference in Miami , SAMA 2024.One of the best parts of this conference, aside from the amazing sessions are the conversations over breakfast, lunch and other networking opportunities. Market leading organizations sent their strategic account managers to this conference to sharpen their skill growing large strategic accounts. One of the tables discussed the difference between a salesperson and a strategi account manager so I wrote a short post. Strategic account managers (SAMs) and sales representatives (sales reps) both play critical roles in driving revenue and fostering client relationships. However, the nature and scope of their responsibilities differ significantly, necessitating distinct skill sets. Here are the top eight skills that set strategic account managers apart from sales representatives, highlighting the unique expertise required for each role.