I was tempted to title this post “how engineers and math majors will rule sales”. Back in the old days, when men were men and ships were made of wood, sales was managed by one number – – quota performance. If you were a sales rep you either made it or didn’t. Getting there was a combination of voodoo magic and Zig Ziglar sales panache . Management was Mad Men style account banter and Micheal Scott-esque supervisory skills.
Then, in “modern times” (sometimes defined as anytime starting minutes after you receive venture funding) the words metrics and scaleability get imprinted on the management psyche (and your bonus objectives).
It does make sense. The web, and sophisticated CRM systems now provide a ton of metrics – – not just after the deal closes, but along the way where it can be applied to making decisions and taking actions that can really affect the outcome of a quarter in a positive way !! No voodoo here !
So as a starting point, you need to have a set of metrics, based on best practice, that you know will work. Trish Bertuzzi of the Bridge Group, an uber-guru of Inside Sales created this great diagram of sales metrics for inside sales. It’s called the Periodic Table of Inside Sales Metrics (click to download), and it answers a key question for sales managers- – – what numbers do I need to hit to know I’m on track.
Why is this important ? Well – – why experiment ? Why spend a year or two “figuring out” the metrics. We’re in the new employment economy. There are no style points for “creating a great team”. It’s performance and metrics baby……
