Sales Strategy documents often run the risk of becoming outdated and never being read after the first iteration. This is true for IT Strategies, GTM Strategies and also, Sales Strategies.
Here’s a Gartner-inspired modern take on the Sales Strategy & its foundational pillars.
There are three pillars of the modern Sales Strategy:
- Why does Sales exist
- How will Sales stay aligned to Business Goals
- What will Sales do to achieve its goals
Demand / Why
This section encompasses the demand for the “sales service”. This cannot be filled in by anyone in Sales, Marketing, Product or any other individual department. It’s only the CEO coupled with his Strategy Council that can give the right inputs for this section.
Business Context
This is quite simply a snapshot of where the business is in terms of
- Company’s Industry
- Target market(s)
- Revenue
- Profitability
- Market share
Goals
How does the business define success? This section details the S.M.A.R.T goals against each of the metrics listed in the Business Context section. This section requires a hard discussion about the trade-offs that come with metrics that may run counter to each other. E.g. if the goal is to increase market share, how much of profitability is the business willing to give up on to achieve that goal?
Product(s) & USP
Most vendors believes that their offering is unique. Every buyer, who’s been in the market for long enough knows that it isn’t true. This section captures what’s truly unique about the offerings by going beyond just product or service features.
Competititon
For each of the products in the company’s portfolio, an analysis of:
- The competitors
- Market share
- Positioning
The inputs for this section come from the CEO, Product & Marketing teams.
Predictability / How
This section details how the Sales Department and the Company’s leadership will ensure alignment. Behaviors are driven by KPIs, and predictability is brought about through standardized processes.
Compensation
How do you drive the right behaviors where Sales is incentivized to close as much as possible any given quarter or year, and not to sandbag deals? The right compensation design will drive the right sales behaviors.
Metrics
This section details all the relevant metrics through which the Sales Department progress towards its goals will be measured. Sample Sales metrics could include:
Revenue
- Closed revenue as a percentage of the target (monthly/quarterly/yearly)
- Pipeline coverage of target (monthly/quarterly/yearly/forward looking)
Opportunities
- Number of new opportunities (weekly/monthly)
- Target account penetration percentage (monthly/quarterly)
Activity
- Number of meetings booked by SDR (weekly/monthly)
- Number of outbound connected calls (daily/weekly)
Sales Process
If Metrics & KPIs drive behavior, standardized processes bring predictability in desired outcomes (revenue attainment). This section details the following:
- Sales methodology (best-fit based on the average contract value & complexity)
- Pipeline stages (mapping internal activities to buyer journey)
- Entry & exit criteria for each pipeline stage (bringing uniformity in reporting)
The pipeline stages & the entry/exit criteria need to be implemented in the CRM so that the Sales Reps know what information is required for them to advance an opportunity to the next stage. Most commercial off the shelf CRMs provide this capability.
Sales Methodology
Having a uniform sales methodology is critical to understanding the approach that’s working and to finetune it. It also helps in ramping up new hires and helping them become productive as quickly as possible.
Work / What
This section details the service(s) that the Sales Department will provide.
Target Market (ICP)
This includes the Ideal Company Persona, namely
- Company Size (employees, revenue)
- Company Stage & Type (industry, growth rate, location)
- Other criteria such as tech stack, integration and other qualification triggers
Then for each Individual Persona within these companies, the details for the applicable buyers from Gartner’s research[1].
- Initiator: Starts the buying process or shows initial interest
- User: Uses your product regularly
- Influencer: Convinces others the product is needed
- Decision maker: Gives final approval for the purchase
- Buyer: Owns the budget
- Approver: Final approver who pushes the initiative on a larger scale (typically someone in the C-suite)
- Gatekeeper: Blocker in getting a product implemented or approved
The information required for these include:
- Who they’re (Job titles, Department, Team size, Education)
- What they care about (Responsibilities, KPIs, Jobs to be done, Challenges)
- How do they get influenced (Ecosystem – software, purchase process, vendors, Community – social media, podcasts, communities)
- What gets them to move (triggers such as growth, tenure, tech change)
Messaging & Channel
Based on the buyers’ ecosystem & KPIs/Challenges as documented in the ICP section, the appropriate messaging will be drafted, & refined in this section. E.g. technology, marketing & sales professionals are more active on LinkedIn than other Channels while medical practitioners are more engaged on Facebook & physical events. Through the metrics defined in the Control section, both the Messaging fit & Channel fit will be determined over time.
Technology
Most organizations’ Sales technology stack consists of a CRM, Dialer & Data Provider. The purpose of this technology stack is primarily to give management visibility into the pipeline, activity etc. While is important, often times the Sales Reps’ needs are neglected.
This section lists the foundational technologies required to get started as well as other potential capabilities that should be experimented with so that Sales Reps jobs to be done can be automated.
The goal of the Sales tech stack shouldn’t be just to give management visibility, but to make it easier for Sale Reps to sell more (easily).
Sample technology pillars include the following:
- Data (Insights, ICP Contact Detais)
- Outreach Automation (Email, LinkedIn)
- CRM
Technology that has fast become standard is AI-powered automation to scale up personalized outreach.
The above is a summary of the various sections of a modern Sales Strategy. Which of these elements are missing in your strategy / plan? Get in touch for a free assessment and advice on how you can explore making your sales department more productive resulting in a more consistent predictable revenue stream.
Sales Strategy Assessment
Here’s a 12-question assessment that’d help identify your own maturity against the framework described in the post above.
[1] https://www.gartner.com/en/sales/insights/b2b-buying-journey