Strategy archives

Last week, Kestio spoke to you on the Koban blog about the importance of an optimized sales model for increasing the effectiveness and ROI of your sales actions.

But once you've defined this model, you still need to translate it operationally into a suitable tool for monitoring the process on a day-to-day basis. And this part of the process can seem rather abstract to people who are not used to working with a CRM.

As you can imagine, this week we're going to be talking about CRM and, more specifically, how to translate your pre-defined business model into a tool like Koban.

1. A CRM tool for a segmented, usable database

You've defined your customer/prospect segments very well, but now you need to be able to exploit them. To do this, you need a tool that allows you to centralize your data and then carry out a clear and precise segmentation.

That's all very well in theory, but how does it work in practice?

A good CRM allows you to centralize your entire database on a single platform and segment it by "status". The most common statuses are "customers", "prospects", "competitors", etc. The special feature of Koban, for example, is that you can customize your statuses according to your environment and strategy, making your database clearer for you and your employees.

For example, you can create categories such as "hot prospects", "cold prospects", "former customers" or any other that you feel will be commercially useful.

TAGS: tags can be added to each file to segment your database more precisely. Tags are like labels that you place "on the head" of your customers / prospects. For example, you could create a "business sector" or "potential" tag category. In this way, you'll be able to identify all customers whose tag is equal to "Gold" or "Bronze". Very practical for launching highly targeted and personalized sales and/or marketing actions .

2. A CRM tool to organize your business

You've got your strategy, you've got your segmented, usable database. Now it's time to take action!

Indeed, you've defined a list of actions according to your segments, the objective now is not to forget to do them...

Any self-respecting CRM allows you to create customizable action types according to your strategy. You can create as many as you like: task, phone call, e-mail, physical appointment, phone appointment, videoconference, demo, customer visit...

Koban's little extra: you assign a color to each type of action. This way, once you're in your agenda, you get a very visual rendering that gives you an idea of what your day will be like! Of course, you can also access your colleagues' diaries if you need to make an appointment for them or assign them an action.

3. A CRM tool to save time and automate low value-added actions

We all agree on one thing: the aim is to save your sales force as much time as possible, so that they can concentrate on the most profitable customer segments. To achieve this, CRM and marketing have their part to play.

Are you interested in automation?

SALES AUTOMATION

You've defined high-potential segments and others with less at stake, which you'll be able to easily identify thanks to your centralized, segmented database.

The aim is to let sales people take care of the most interesting segments and leave the rest to .... automation (or marketing to be more precise).

To do this, your CRM will enable you to set up automated scenarios (usually consisting of a series of pre-defined e-mails) designed to arouse your contact's interest, maintain contact without pestering, and initiate conversion.

This frees up a lot of your sales reps' time, and above all avoids cold calls, which are very often a waste of time (and therefore money). Not only do responses go straight to the assigned salesperson, but the results of your "prospecting" e-mails go straight back to the prospect's file (when he/she read the e-mail, whether he/she clicked, etc.). So, if the web surfer has shown enough interest, marketing teams can easily or automatically pass the lead on to a sales rep, who will have all its history.

EVERYDAY AUTOMATISMS

In addition to automated scenarios, you can set up a number of time-saving automations that will help you avoid forgetting reminders or appointments. Yes, a salesperson's brain is very full, and it can happen to forget...

To give you an example, you could set up an automatic action in the salesperson's diary at the end of each appointment, such as "send product sheet". Or schedule recurring visits to your "Gold" customers every 4 months. The time slot will be blocked in the diary, reducing the risk of forgetting or constantly rescheduling!

LEAD SCORING

Well, now we're going to move on to a little more advanced functionalities, but they're worth their weight in gold! To explain very briefly, you can track your website (record visits to your site) and award points to each page of your site.

In this way, web users visit your pages and acquire points as they browse. The aim? To gauge his or her interest and find out if he or she is "ripe" enough to be passed on directly to the sales force.

Below a defined threshold of points, the customer will only receive e-mails via an automated marketing scenario. On the other hand, above the defined score, the web surfer will be assigned to a dedicated sales representative because he or she has shown a strong interest in your products / services!

These are just a few examples of what you can do and automate in a CRM tool like Koban. They illustrate the importance of supporting your business model with features like these to increase your profitability and productivity on a daily basis.

To find out more about CRM and to help you with your projects, find all our methods and tools here :

¹: And for those of you who would like to (re-)discover the first article, written by KESTIO and published on the KOBAN website, click here: What is a business model and how to build it?

KESTIO and KOBANKESTIO supports SMEs in their sales development via an online sales coaching platform for executives, managers and sales people, while KOBAN helps them to deploy their sales strategy and actions effectively, generating maximum ROI, via a high-performance CRM solution.

This meeting gave rise to an idea (which became a desire, and then a reality): that of combining our skills and visions to help you define and implement your business model!

And what if these hours were simply being misused (at least in part)?

One of the reasons for this is the lack of structure in the sales chain, which can lead to a loss of efficiency and sometimes significant hidden costs. At Kestio, we know all about this, as we had to face up to this problem ourselves, before making the necessary adjustments to optimize our sales process.

Here's how, and with what results.

1. What does it mean to "optimize your sales process" and why do it?

This means seeking the best cost/result ratio at every stage of your sales process, to achieve optimum performance!

There are at least 2 reasons to do so:

The current economic context is an incentive to optimize the return on investment of each action implemented: tight market conditions, no "natural" growth and therefore a greater sales effort to be made, a trend towards lower sales prices and higher distribution costs... The companies that do best are those that manage to preserve their margins, and optimizing marketing costs contributes directly to this!

Many companies still haven't really organized their sales function. Studies show that, on average, at least 40% of a salesperson's time is spent on "administrative tasks". ¹. In other words, 40% of your sales payroll is not focused on what creates the most value, namely exchanges with prospects and customers! When you consider that sales people are (sometimes very) expensive, and difficult to recruit and retain, it's essential that they focus on their core business...

2. A real-life example of sales process optimization

Here's an example straight from our own experience at KESTIO, to illustrate how a seemingly innocuous activity can quickly become very costly if we don't take this approach to reducing its impact.

THE INITIAL CONTEXT :

For some time now, Kestio has been operating with 3 sedentary sales reps in charge of appointments 1 (qualification of needs) with our prospects.
Of all their telephone appointments, the rate of appointments "not honored" by them is around 20% (which is a good rate, compared with averages observed elsewhere).
With 10 appointments scheduled per day per sales rep, this means a potential of 30 customers per week (2 per day x 3 sales reps x 5 days per week) to contact again, just to set up a new appointment...
This represented (until we changed our process) 1 to 2 hours of work per week for each sales rep, or in total, for 3 sales reps, up to 24 hours per month (or 3 working days, therefore) devoted to a task with no added value!

When you know how much it costs to employ an experienced salesperson, and calculate what this simple expense item represents on an annual basis, it's a sobering thought...

THE SOLUTION IMPLEMENTED :

That's why we decided to set up an automated workflow system: a prospect who doesn't turn up for an appointment automatically receives an email proposing 3 new slots, and if necessary a reminder a few days later.

Today, this system enables us to reposition 80% of missed appointments, while the remaining 20% are the subject of a telephone call made by a specialized service provider.

The implementation of this simple workflow has enabled us to save several thousand euros a year, while creating better working conditions for our sales staff, who now devote most of their time to doing the job they love and are good at.

And this example is just one of the many elements on which you can act to benefit from a positive leverage effect!

To identify all the potential areas for improvement, we need to ask ourselves, for each action implemented, what is the right level of effort to produce in relation to the expected result and the potential generated.

3. How can you implement such an approach within your company?

To do this, start by reviewing each stage in your sales chain (prospecting, qualification, sales proposal, closing...) by analyzing the tasks attached to them in the light of this key question: "For the same result, what is the most efficient (fastest, least expensive...) way of carrying out this task?".

On this basis, you will be able to build an effective business system by applying this method:

Identify potential areas for optimization. For example: sales staff time spent on administrative tasks.
Share best practices within the team. For example, sharing a tool that gives prospects real-time access to the slots available in salespeople's diaries, without having to see the detailed content of their diary.
Define an optimized process. For example: build an automated workflow to follow-up with prospects who have not been able to keep their telephone appointments (using the tool mentioned above).
Test and improve the defined process. For example: improve the wording of the standard reminder e-mail. Please note: only one element of the process is modified at a time, so that the impact of each modification can be analyzed.
Generalize and disseminate the optimized process to the whole team, for implementation and feedback (continuous improvement loop).

Proceeding in this way for your entire sales process will enable you to build an optimized sales operating model and thus reduce any losses linked to uncontrolled factors, ultimately improving your sales results.

Focus on high-impact, easily achievable points of improvement (in short, optimize the optimization process itself!) 😉

As you go along, you'll improve the efficiency of your entire sales chain, so you can spend more and less, while increasing the interest of the tasks entrusted to your teams!

Do you want to optimize your sales force's time? In this webinar, you'll learn how to target your sales force and use the right tools to increase your number of sales meetings per month by a factor of 2:

¹: An IKO System study of salespeople's working hours in 2013 put the proportion of their time spent on what they called "non-sales" at 59%!

It also has an impact on employee commitment. Against a backdrop of generational renewal of sales teams and managerial change, how can you ensure that you set ambitious, realistic and motivating objectives for your sales force over the long term?

Setting sales targets: a strategic issue

Let's clear up a common misunderstanding first.

No, setting individual sales targets doesn't just mean setting the sales figures that each salesperson must achieve in order to be eligible for commission!

On the one hand, the criteria taken into account to evaluate their effective contribution to the company's objectives can be multiple: margin generated, percentage of sales achieved on a particular offer or target, number of new customers signed up...
On the other hand, their level of commitment can also be measured by the means used to achieve it: number of new prospects identified, number of telephone or face-to-face appointments made, number of sales proposals sent, conversion rate...
Lastly, objectives can include a collective component and encourage cooperation, in addition to individual performance: variable remuneration can be made conditional on prior achievement of a collective sales threshold, or working time devoted to internal projects can be taken into account...

It's a real strategic issue, involving choices whose impact is not only financial, but also managerial : employee commitment and the way teams operate partly depend on it.

5 best practices for defining sales objectives

1. Involve the sales team in the process

The most common pitfall in this area is to repeat the previous year's model and apply it identically, without questioning its effectiveness. It's a good idea to include a phase of consultation with sales staff on the subject: get their opinions, their feedback on the system already in place, and any suggestions they may have for improvements. Present them with your own ideas for change before implementing them, to test their reaction to the options envisaged.

Taking this feedback into account will ensure that sales reps adhere more closely to the objectives you present to them later on.

Consulting them does not mean involving them in the final decision, but it is useful to know their perception and to integrate it into your thinking, among other criteria that are part of a more global vision of the company.

2. Define operative variable elements

As we saw above, there are potentially many criteria that can be taken into account when defining sales objectives.

Don't forget that each of these criteria will then have to be regularly monitored, and will come into play in the calculation of the variable part of salespeople's remuneration. You're going to have to make some choices, otherwise you'll end up with a veritable gas factory!

Select your criteria (preferably at least 2, and no more than 4) and define their weighting according to the importance you attach to them.

The profit-sharing system you propose must guarantee the motivation and commitment of your sales staff over the long term. You could, for example, combine a performance target (sales of €500,000 for the year) with a resource target (making 8 appointments with prospects per week, etc.).

3. Perform a preliminary simulation of the proposed system

The best way to ensure that the selected criteria work and to check the overall coherence of the planned system is to test it. Discovering during the course of the year that the system is not working satisfactorily could have serious consequences for the company.

Using the figures available for year N, run simulations to check that :

the data needed to establish the variables is available (already tracked in your current monitoring system, or if not, easily/quickly accessible)
multi-criteria, weighted calculation is easy to perform (no gasworks)
the results obtained are consistent (no major discrepancies with the current system)

And make sure that these results are stimulating for your sales force! Set yourself a target of 70% to 80% of the team (minimum) achieving their sales targets, and receiving satisfactory bonuses.

Discover the KESTIO webinars, where we discuss

all topics related to sales performance with our experts:

Fabien Comtet, CEO

Dominique Seguin, General Manager

Nicolas Boissard, Marketing Director

4. Establishing "fair" criteria

To ensure that objectives are perceived as "fair" and generate lasting support, they should be defined according to criteria that depend directly on the actions of sales staff : number of appointments won, number of deals won...

As far as possible, exclude external factors or third-party intervention: in the context of new business models, in particular, marketing can intervene in all or part of the sales cycle, so it needs to be distinguished from actions directly attributable to salespeople.

As far as possible, adopt a qualitative approach: sending out as many sales proposals as possible, for example, doesn't have to be an end in itself; combining this with a notion of conversion rate allows you to measure the quality of your work more accurately.

Depending on the situation, it may also be important to take into account certain disparities (between junior and senior salespeople, geographical territories covered, account development and pure conquest, etc.) to reward not only the results achieved, but more broadly the efforts mobilized.

5. Two-step communication

Once your system has been established in a coherent, efficient and "fair" way, don't neglect the (crucial) stage of presenting it to the members of your sales team!

Plan your communication in two stages:

A collective presentation to the team, to explain how the system works, to inform the team of the criteria taken into consideration, and to highlight the overall coherence of the system with regard to the company's objectives (financial, strategic, etc.) and the reality on the ground.
A one-on-one discussion with each member of the sales team, to clarify their individual objectives in detail, and answer any questions they may have.

Sales people need to have a clear idea of the level of variable remuneration to which they are entitled, and be able to translate these objectives into action priorities and concrete organizational elements.

You should also specify how key data will be monitored (weekly reporting, CRM tracking, etc.) and how often results will be evaluated.

If the defined system meets this set of best practices, and is regularly monitored and effectively managed once implemented, you have every chance of ensuring that your sales staff are actively involved in achieving their objectives and achieving results!

In our webinar, discover 4 keys to regaining control in a difficult situation:

But are you sure you've taken all the components of an effective sales strategy into account when you draw up your annual strategy?

Does it include all the "go to market" components of your product or service offering, i.e. a coherent guideline that aligns objectives, means, allocated resources and the resulting operational organization?

A reminder of the key points that will ensure you have defined an efficient sales strategy and give you every chance of achieving your objectives.

Results targets and monitoring indicators

You've set yourself performance targets (and rightly so!). This means you need to monitor and control their achievement throughout the year, to make sure you reach them. How can you do this?

By defining the associated measurement indicators, and therefore the corresponding KPIs for evaluating them: "Outputs" indicators for the expected results, and "Inputs" indicators for the activities required to achieve them.

Resources

Closely linked to the customer or prospect segments targeted, the resources devoted to winning over and retaining customers are also a key element to be precisely defined: preferred sales channels and expected revenue flow per channel, marketing and communication resources deployed, expected lead flow to achieve the level of sales activity defined in relation to the final objectives.

Priority targets, based on potential criteria

The sales team's scope of intervention is a key input. Segmenting your customers and prospects is a must. Are your customers classified according to sales or margin criteria? Is there an assessment of their development potential over the year?

Discover the KESTIO webinars, where we discuss

all topics related to sales performance with our experts:

Fabien Comtet, CEO

Dominique Seguin, General Manager

Nicolas Boissard, Marketing Director

The level of sales effort required for each of these segments

Efforts are then allocated by determining the coverage and sales pressure on these segments.

In this way, the different types of action to be taken in the sales process (calls, discovery visits, support visits, training visits...), and the allocation of resources and sales time per action to the different segments will be adjusted. Not defining it at strategy level means that each sales rep will decide how to allocate his or her efforts according to his or her own criteria... Are you willing to take that risk?

Optimal sales organization

The formalization of strategy also includes sales organization choices : should teams specialize in different segments, or rather rely on different types of collaborators depending on the stage of the sales process?

Customer visits cost money, and time spent in pre-sales has an impact on sales profitability.

This is why some companies, for example, entrust the detection and qualification of opportunities to sedentary teams, and the discovery of needs through to contractualization to a field salesperson.

If all the points raised have been addressed when you define YOUR sales strategy, you've laid a sound foundation and created the right conditions at the outset to give yourself the best chance of success. The next step is to translate this sales strategy into operational action plans, and to manage these effectively to ensure that objectives are met.

To stay competitive and maximize your chances of converting leads into future customers, it's important to optimize the return on your sales assets. Find out how in this webinar...

Articles that may interest you

To prevent your salespeople from interpreting it in their own way, gradually moving away from it, or even completely freeing themselves from it, it is necessary to translate this sales strategy into operational directives and to effectively manage their implementation.

To achieve this, pay attention to these 4 essential points.

Build an individual sales action plan with each salesperson

Defining a clear business strategy and presenting it to your team is necessary, but not enough to ensure its effective implementation during the financial year. This is the purpose of business action plans defined at the individual level.

They are generally co-constructed by the salesperson and their manager, and reassessed or updated at regular intervals : annually, half-yearly, quarterly or monthly (we then speak of PAM, for monthly action plan).

This co-construction is the key to the commitment of each salesperson. The choice of frequency can be made according to the sales cycle of your products and services, or according to the management method adopted.

Some companies, for example, define annual action plans and then weight the objectives monthly or quarterly according to the seasonality of their activity.

Thus, a digital services company can achieve 50% of its annual turnover in a single quarter, during which the majority of its subscriptions are renewed.

Each salesperson must have an operational action plan containing the key data necessary for their daily activity, on points such as: targeting , intensity and nature of sales actions , in order to have the means to achieve the defined objectives .

Make sure that this individual action plan reflects the business strategy well

This commercial action plan is the operational breakdown of the commercial strategy defined beforehand. It must therefore reflect it and transcribe it on an individual scale, taking into account the allocation of commercial efforts on your targets , whether in coverage or in commercial pressure, and the commercial organization for which you have opted.

If the sales strategy determines, for example, that 35% of the overall turnover must be achieved on segment A of the customer base and 25% on segment B, two different translations are possible in the individual action plan of one of the sales representatives:

either he will have to achieve 35% of his turnover on segment A and 25% on segment B (within the framework of an organization with a distribution of the customer portfolio by geographic zone, for example);
or he will have to achieve 100% of his turnover on segment A, with other salespeople in charge of segment B (in the case of an organization with salespeople specialized by customer segment).

Hence the importance of defining the action plan on an individual scale, in order to ensure that the concrete application of the commercial strategy will not give rise to multiple, or even divergent, interpretations!

Define precisely the activities to be carried out with your sales representatives

To avoid any risky improvisation on the part of your sales representatives, define precisely with them and for each one:

the targets on which they will work (type of accounts, meeting precise targeting criteria, or even list of named accounts, and types of contacts targeted within the accounts)
the type of commercial actions to be carried out , at each stage of the sales process (leads to be processed, calls, physical meetings, quotes or commercial proposals, follow-ups, etc.), in the front or back office
the frequency and intensity of these actions , by customer segment (for example, 8 calls and 3 annual meetings on prospects attached to customer segment A)

From a more qualitative point of view, also specify the sales methods to be implemented at each stage of the sales process (for example: company pitch, type of questions to ask in a discovery interview) and the results expected for each of them (data to be collected during a discovery meeting, elements to be validated to qualify an opportunity during a sales meeting, etc.).

Regular meetings between salespeople and their managers are essential to convey these guidelines and monitor their implementation. In particular, they help identify gaps with expectations, address difficulties encountered in the field and refine the sales tools used (call script, interview guide, standard report to be recorded in the CRM, etc.).

The frequency (monthly, quarterly, etc.) and the degree of "formality" of these follow-up meetings are to be defined according to the level of support that you deem necessary; the latter may vary depending on the management culture of the company and the level of seniority of the sales representatives, in particular.

Analyze the indicators regularly and adjust the device if necessary

As a manager, you are responsible for ensuring that the business strategy is respected and that objectives are achieved . To do this, it is important that you have a global vision of your company's business situation in real time in order to manage actions without waiting to know the final result of the financial year.

Equip yourself with the appropriate management tools , including dashboards, so that you can analyze KPIs (key performance indicators) and monitor the actions taken by your salespeople. This will allow you to identify the necessary adjustments and implement them, if necessary.

Managing your team's sales pipeline , in particular, is a key element in ensuring the reliability of future revenues . The number, value and quality of the opportunities identified, their creation date and their level of progress in the sales process are all parameters to analyze.

Similarly, if your sellers' conversion rates show significant differences on the same product range, this should alert you and prompt you to look for the cause.

Finally, sales made and turnover (in volume, in value, by type of product/service, by customer targets, etc.) are of course essential indicators of results to be measured.

Your business strategy indicates how you want to structure your development . The analysis of the steering indicators allows you to validate its deployment and adjust the operational action plans, without waiting to know the result in terms of orders taken or customer invoicing!

Respecting these 4 points of vigilance will allow you to effectively manage the deployment of your commercial strategy at the operational level and thus optimize your chances of achieving the objectives you have set for yourself.

To stay competitive and maximize your chances of converting your leads into future customers, it is important to optimize the performance of your sales assets. Find out how by watching this webinar:

Pour cela, elle doit être expliquée clairement, et traduite non seulement en objectifs chiffrés, mais également en activités et moyens concrets permettant de réaliser ces objectifs.

Voici 5 conseils pour vous assurer que votre stratégie commerciale sera pleinement appliquée sur le terrain.

Distinguez la stratégie commerciale de la stratégie globale de l’entreprise

Petit test : demandez à un dirigeant si la stratégie commerciale de son entreprise est claire pour ses équipes. Sa réponse sera sûrement un « oui » sans détours. Puis, demandez à l’un de ses commerciaux s’il sait pour quelle raison il doit réaliser 5 rendez-vous par semaine. La plupart du temps, il ne saura pas vous expliquer son objectif !

Cet écart de perception entre dirigeant et commerciaux tient souvent à un simple manque d’explication et de partage de la stratégie commerciale et du plan d’action qui en découle.

Bien sûr, il est important de présenter la stratégie globale pour donner de la perspective et relier l’action des commerciaux à la vie de l’entreprise dans son ensemble : lancement de nouveaux produits, projet de développement à l’international, objectifs de croissance… sont autant de sujets qui concernent votre équipe commerciale.

Pour autant, assurez-vous de bien la distinguer de la stratégie commerciale à proprement parler et de faire un vrai focus sur la seconde, tout en la rattachant à la première. Et surtout, faites en sorte de traiter l’ensemble des questions qui animent les commerciaux en leur donnant les éléments concrets qui leur permettront d’agir efficacement par la suite.

Faites le lien entre l’objectif de CA et les activités commerciales terrain

Pour cela, prenez le temps de faire le lien entre l’objectif de résultat commercial défini et sa traduction concrète pour les commerciaux : en objectif de résultat individuel d’abord, puis en niveau d’intensité commerciale à fournir, c’est-à-dire en nature et fréquence des activités commerciales à mettre en œuvre.

Par exemple, 1 journée par semaine consacrée à la prospection, 5 rendez-vous obtenus par journée de prospection, ou 3 rendez-vous clients réalisés par semaine…

Partagez le raisonnement qui vous a amené à fixer les objectifs commerciaux

Détaillez les étapes du processus de vente et expliquez les hypothèses qui ont été prises (nombre de leads, taux de transformation, ventes réalisés…) pour amener aux objectifs présentés. Ainsi, vous leur donnerez du sens et les points de référence.

Autre point essentiel : au-delà des chiffres et hypothèses de calcul, prenez le temps de définir les actions commerciales attendues d’un point de vue qualitatif.

Selon le contexte, par exemple, le terme générique de « rendez-vous » peut recouvrir des réalités très différentes : 30 minutes d’échange téléphonique de découverte, 1h30 d’atelier de travail en approche « vente-conseil », ou encore 45 minutes de démonstration en ligne d’une solution… Fixez les objectifs de ces actions en conséquence et définissez les compétences à mettre en œuvre pour les mener à bien.

Traduisez les « objectifs de vente produit » en « actions commerciales client »

De la même manière, n’oubliez pas de traduire les objectifs de vente par produit (généralement fixés par la Direction Marketing) en actions commerciales « orientées clients ».

C’est une chose de dire à vos commerciaux qu’ils doivent avoir vendu 10 000 exemplaires de l’un de vos produits phares dans les 6 premiers mois de l’année, ou de fixer comme objectif que l’une de vos gammes représente 40 % du CA généré… c’en est une autre d’y parvenir pour les équipes concernées.

Pour mettre toutes les chances de leur côté – et du vôtre -, assurez-vous de leur donner les moyens de réussir, en définissant le plan d’action commercial correspondant et surtout en le rattachant à ce qui fait le cœur de l’activité quotidienne de vos commerciaux : vos clients !

Définissez les cibles de clients à prospecter en priorité, décrivez leurs attentes et les points forts de votre offre au regard de ces attentes et dressez l’argumentaire commercial à développer… Bref, traduisez la « stratégie produit » en outils commerciaux opérationnels, rattachés à la réalité des clients auxquels votre équipe commerciale est confrontée.

Valorisez les moyens à la disposition de vos commerciaux pour réussir

Dans la même perspective, valorisez les ressources que vous mettez à la disposition des commerciaux pour leur permettre d’atteindre leurs objectifs : budget, temps, ressources humaines, outils…

Ces ressources peuvent être de diverses natures : achat de fichiers de prospection segmentés et qualifiés, campagnes marketing de génération de leads, nouveau site web attractif, fonctionnalités CRM performantes, session de formation de coaching commercial…

Dressez la liste de ces ressources avec deux objectifs : d’une part, les faire connaitre à vos commerciaux pour qu’ils s’en emparent activement, et d’autre part, booster leur motivation en leur montrant que l’entreprise investit pour leur donner les moyens d’atteindre les résultats visés.

Inspirez-vous des victoires de l’année précédente et capitalisez sur les réussites

Enfin, rattachez la stratégie commerciale et les objectifs des prochains mois aux victoires remportées sur l’année écoulée.

What lessons did you learn?
How are they used in the current strategy?
How can you duplicate them or draw inspiration from them to build a scalable model based on variables observed on a certain scale?

Repartir de vos précédentes réussites commerciales est une bonne façon de faire apparaître la cohérence de votre stratégie et d’établir une continuité positive. C’est aussi un moyen de valoriser la contribution de vos commerciaux et de diffuser les bonnes pratiques en interne.

Tous ces éléments favorisent une bonne appropriation de votre stratégie commerciale par vos équipes, vous garantissant ainsi une mise en œuvre effective qui lui permettra de porter ses fruits.

To go further and learn more about targeting and building a customer file, you can also watch our webinar:

Si oui, cet article devrait vous faire changer de perspective.

Le meilleur moyen de devenir le principal instigateur de votre réussite commerciale, c’est de structurer un système commercial dont l’équilibre repose principalement sur votre stratégie et sur votre organisation, pour minimiser l’impact des aléas conjoncturels sur votre activité.

Quinze années d’accompagnement des entreprises dans le développement de leur performance commerciale nous ont permis d’identifier 6 principaux leviers pour y parvenir.

Voici lesquels, et surtout, comment les activer.

1. Définissez une stratégie commerciale porteuse et structurante

Bien souvent, les entreprises structurent progressivement leur activité commerciale au cours du temps et au gré des opportunités. Si cela peut dans certains cas porter de bons résultats, ce n’est pas gage de durabilité pour votre réussite commerciale.

Le risque à procéder ainsi, c’est de se rendre trop dépendant de la conjoncture, ou du talent individuel de vos commerciaux : quid de vos résultats, si la demande baisse brusquement sur votre marché, si un nouveau concurrent se montre ultra offensif sur les prix, ou encore, si votre meilleur commercial quitte le navire ?

En tant que dirigeant et/ou responsable commercial, votre meilleur moyen de vous préserver de ces aléas est d’ agir stratégiquement sur les variables sur lesquelles vous avez la main. En particulier, sur 2 axes :

Le type d’activités commerciales menées (génération de leads, prise de rendez-vous, découverte…)
Les ressources allouées à ces actions (temps, personnes, budget)

Une stratégie commerciale d’entreprise n’est pas le fruit de plans d’actions individuels auto-définis par ses commerciaux, c’est le contraire !

Donnez une ligne directrice claire, traduisez-la en objectifs chiffrés (nombre de leads générés, nombre de rendez-vous réalisés, nombre de ventes, proportions de nouveaux clients…) et enfin, déclinez-la en plans d’action individuelsavec vos commerciaux.

2. Développez les compétences et le niveau d’engagement de vos commerciaux

Pour atteindre vos objectifs commerciaux, recruter des vendeurs compétents est un bon point de départ, mais votre rôle ne s’arrête pas là ! Les entreprises qui réussissent le mieux sont celles qui considèrent le développement des compétences et l’amélioration continue de leurs équipes commerciales comme faisant partie intégrante de leurs responsabilités managériales.

Lorsque vous recrutez un commercial, il maîtrise généralement les techniques et méthodes de vente, mais cela n’empêche qu’il a besoin d’accompagnement sur au moins deux aspects :

La connaissance de votre offre (produits/services, gammes…) et de son positionnement spécifique (prix, cibles, identité de marque…)
L’évolution constante des modes de vente (social selling, inbound marketing, vente conseil…) et des outils utilisés (CRM, applis…)

Plus vos équipes seront formées et compétentes sur ces différents plans, plus elles seront efficaces et autonomes dans la réalisation de leurs objectifs.

Un autre élément déterminant pour votre activité dépend directement de votre mode de management : le développement de l’engagement de vos collaborateurs.

Dans ce domaine, 2 points sont particulièrement importants :

Partagez régulièrement avec votre équipe la stratégie commerciale définie
Pilotez activement et effectivement sa mise en œuvre : co-définition des plans d’action individuels, suivi des indicateurs d’atteinte des objectifs, identification des points d’amélioration…

Sur ce dernier point, évitez de vous enfermer dans une posture de « contrôle » : privilégiez une approche de type « coaching », basée sur un dialogue régulier et constructifavec vos commerciaux pour les soutenir dans la réalisation de leurs objectifs. Plus efficace qu’une évaluation périodique fondée sur la seule analyse de leurs chiffres, elle est aussi beaucoup plus favorable à leur engagement vis-à-vis de votre entreprise et à leur motivation !

3. Identifiez et déployez le processus de vente optimal

Menez une réflexion permanente sur les (meilleurs) moyens d’obtenir des contacts de clients potentiels pour votre entreprise et de convertir ces leads en ventes effectives. Identifiez et analysez les étapes successives menant à une vente, afin de définir le meilleur traitement à leur appliquer pour en améliorer l’efficacité et en faire baisser le coût.

Quelles interactions avez-vous avec vos prospects ?
A quel moment interviennent-elles ?
Quel est le meilleur moyen de rendre ces interactions commercialement contributives ?

Ces questions vous permettront de définir les moyens, outils et méthodes à mettre en œuvre et le système offrant le meilleur rendement. Notamment, quel « mix » vous adopterez entre actions marketing et commerciales, ou encore entre ressources internes et prestataires externes.

Un point qui est loin d’être anodin : sur le terrain, on observe un rapport pouvant aller de 1 à 20 entre les différentes méthodes d’acquisition de leads ! En fonction des entreprises et du mix adopté, le coût de revient du « rendez-vous 1 » (entretien commercial de découverte) varie de 20 € à 400 €, par exemple.

Discover the KESTIO webinars, where we discuss

all topics related to sales performance with our experts:

Fabien Comtet, CEO

Dominique Seguin, General Manager

Nicolas Boissard, Marketing Director

4. Créez une dynamique commerciale à l’échelle de toute l’entreprise

Assurez-vous que tous vos collaborateurs se sentent investis d’une responsabilité et d’un rôle précis dans le développement commercial de votre entreprise.

Concrètement, cela consiste d’abord à les sensibiliser au sujet en leur faisant prendre conscience de l’impact de leur travail sur le succès global de l’entreprise : par exemple, l’efficacité du service logistique a une incidence directe sur le nombre de livraisons facturées dans le mois, celle du Marketing sur le nombre de leads transmis aux commerciaux…

Puis, définissez avec les différentes composantes de l’équipe (service commercial, logistique, administratif, relation client…) les actions et moyens à mettre en œuvre pour participer efficacement à la réussite commerciale de l’entreprise.

Cela peut consister à : garantir la qualité des services délivrés, optimiser des process, diffuser une image valorisante de l’entreprise auprès de ses clients…

L’essentiel est de développer et transmettre en interne une culture de type « Everybody sells ! » (tout le monde vend). N’oubliez pas de formaliser et documenter ces engagements d’équipe (charte qualité, process interne, pitch d’entreprise, bonnes pratiques de relation client…) : cela vous permettra de les diffuser efficacement, de les « ancrer » et de les faire évoluer dans le temps .

5. Utilisez les outils digitaux qui simplifieront (réellement) la vie de vos équipes

Plus que jamais, la connaissance client est au cœur de l’effort commercial et représente un précieux capital. C’est pourquoi l’apport des outils digitaux dans ce domaine peut s’avérer déterminant pour l’efficacité globale de votre système commercial.

On pense en premier lieu aux outils CRM, qui permettent l’historisation des données relatives à vos clients et prospects, et le suivi des actions des commerciaux.

Mais il peut s’agir également d’applications dédiées à l’efficacité commerciale, telles que :

les trackeurs d’email comme Tilkee ou CloseMoreDeals qui vous informent en temps réel des ouvertures et pages lues sur vos propales envoyées par email,
les outils de génération de leads, tel que Swabbl, qui exploite les contacts des membres de votre équipe sur les réseaux sociaux,
ou encore les outils de scoring d’intérêt, comme GetQuanty, qui analyse le comportement de vos visiteurs web pour les transformer en leads qualifiés.

Il faut y ajouter les réseaux sociaux et leurs extensions dédiées à la prospection, comme LinkedIn Sales Navigator et enfin, les solutions digitales de Business Intelligence, parmi lesquelles Sparklane.

L’attention des éditeurs de ces solutions se focalise depuis quelques années sur le Marketing automation, et le suivi des interactions en ligne avec vos prospects.

La tendance actuelle est donc de migrer d’une logique originelle fondée sur la « gestion des contacts » vers une orientation « génération et qualification des leads », qui représente un enjeu majeur pour vous aujourd’hui.

6. Placez vos clients au cœur de votre réussite commerciale

Enfin, dernier levier essentiel à la solidité et à la résilience de votre système commercial : faire en sorte que vos clients deviennent vos premiers ambassadeurs !

Dans ce domaine, une question doit constamment guider vos choix stratégiques et animer vos collaborateurs : « Est-ce que l’expérience que le client est en train de vivre avec notre entreprise va l’amener à nous recommander ? ».

Inspirez-vous d’entreprises passées maîtres dans l’art de rendre leur solutions « virales », comme Trello, Uber ou Sellsy. Elles travaillent systématiquement sur la question des usages de leur solution en partant des attentes de leurs cibles et mettent tout en œuvre pour satisfaire leurs clients, et inciter ces derniers à les recommander à leur propre réseau.

Grâce à « l’effet recommandation » ainsi généré, elles facilitent considérablement le travail de leurs commerciaux : la barrière de la « confiance » et de la « légitimité » étant déjà franchie auprès de leurs prospects, ils peuvent se concentrer sur l’étape de la transformation et du closing, s’économisant au passage les parties « génération et qualification des leads » et « démonstration de l’intérêt de la solution » !Un gain de temps et d’effort commercial considérable, qui représente aussi une économie financière (on en revient à notre 3 ^ème levier… ! 🙂 ).

L’activation pleine et entière des 6 leviers que nous venons d’évoquer vous permet de rester à l’initiative et de limiter l’impact des facteurs externes sur vos résultats. Elle appelle une animation continue de la part d’un dirigeant doté d’une vision globale et prenant la pleine responsabilité de ses succès comme de ses échecs. Autrement dit, vous aurez recours à un 7^èmelevier qui sera votre « baguette magique » : le leadership commercial !

Pour aller plus loin, découvrez dans notre webinar, animé par Dominique Seguin pour apprendre à Négocier zen, les clés d’une démarche raisonnée.

Designed to fit seamlessly into your day-to-day business life and support you in your development

¹ But these are not the only commercial merits of customer loyalty for software publishers: not only does the duration of the subscription determine the level of profitability of the service, but its effect can be literally multiplied, by relying on two proven commercial weapons: Up Selling and Cross Selling.

Sales reps: the new champions of customer loyalty

First, let's take a quick look at how the role of the salesperson has evolved since the advent of the SaaS model. As we've seen in previous articles, the role of the salesperson has evolved considerably in recent years:

Marketing and customer service (via sponsorship operations) now provide them with the bulk of leads, and even take charge of nurturing them to maturity.
But above all, their role no longer stops at the solution sales stage, and now extends far beyond!

Following on from the traditional "sales funnel", we could now add a second, inverted funnel: that of amplifying, at the customer's premises, the sales generated by subscription sales, by activating a decisive lever: development within the account itself.

In other words, salespeople have become the new champions of customer loyalty!

Or, to be more precise, the successful commercial exploitation of the solution's long-term implementation on the customer's premises, largely carried out by the Customer Success Managers with the support of the Support team. And to do this, they have two main weapons at their disposal: Cross Selling and Up Selling.

Cross Selling and Up Selling: 2 sides of the gold medal

Whatever the sector, the business model of today's software publishers is very often based on the following pricing model:

Monthly subscription cost (per user) x Number of solution users

For a publisher, there are two ways to improve sales with a customer:

1. An "Add-Ons" logic: adding new functionalities outside the initial scope

This is known as CROSS SELLING.

For example, in addition to the "standard" ticketing administration functionalities (reservations, multi-price management, ticket editing, etc.), a ticketing software publisher can offer optional modules covering additional functionalities, such as Marketing (sending SMS or emails to customers, for example) or CRM (managing and tracking customer data).

This enables it to extend the number of potential users of its solution at its customer's premises, in this case from the reception/ticketing team to the sales, marketing and even administrative teams.

2. Up Grade" logic : adding options or superior functionalities within the same scope.

This is known asUP SELLING.

In the context of a ticketing management solution, for example, the editor will offer pre-sales management via a network of external distributors, multi-channel sales management or dematerialized ticketing on cell phones... In the context of an email marketing platform, this could involve specific functionalities (automated scenario) or simply managing a larger mailing base (greater number of contacts).

This enables the publisher to increase the subscription price, and thus generate higher sales for a constant number of users.

In the first case, this means extending the scope covered by the solution.

In the latter case, the aim is to offer more advanced services (to increase the depth of the offering, so to speak) within the current scope. In both cases, this means being able to offer modules or functionalities that complement those already in place.

The challenge is to identify the strategic features that will win over customers and open the door to new markets.

And there's a strategic point to bear in mind: it's up to you to assess your ability to "step outside" your core business and respond correctly to customer requirements for less-mastered functionalities! This requires you to define and implement a suitable strategy: internalizing skills or partnering with an expert player/publisher, for example.

If this aspect is well managed, the impact of this customer capitalization on your^MRR2 and the resulting competitive advantage can prove decisive. More than ever, customer loyalty has become a business function in its own right!

1 : Read our article on this subject:

Defining the right business model: a major challenge for software publishers!

2: For "Monthly Reccurring Revenue".

Adopt a tool adapted to your business and your expectations: choose a CRM... To better understand the usefulness of CRM and choose the right tool, watch this webinar:

That's why sales people devote a lot of time and energy to them, with success rates that are unfortunately often very low.

So, what are the secrets behind the success of publishers who win tenders?

1. They maintain a privileged relationship with their key accounts

The first key to success in responding to invitations to tender is to initiate and maintain a quality relationship with your key account prospects.

If you've been working - as we hope you have! - on your business modelyou know who your gold, silver and bronze customers are. And you've thought about allocating your sales resources (work time and account assignments) according to this ranking, i.e. giving priority to your gold, then silver, and finally bronze targets. From then on, your sales people began to identify the key contacts within these accounts and to establish lasting relationships with them.

The aim is to create and establish trust, so as to gather valuable information about the company's internal organization and current strategic issues.

Marketing can effectively support them in this task, by producing "made-to-measure" content to nurture a personalized relationship that logically "adds value" with their interlocutors (articles or infographics corresponding to their centers of interest, for example).

It's also a good way to keep on top of their minds and make sure you're "on their radar" when they choose which companies to consult for a new project!

2. They know the bidding "playing field" inside out

It's this long-term relationship of trust that enables sales reps to work on another decisive point in improving their conversion rate with key account customers: account "mapping". This is one of the key elements of the Méthode de ¹, and an essential point if you want to control your sales process and stop making your sales results depend mainly on "luck" or uncontrolled external factors, as Caroline Jurado, CEO and founder of start-up Linkky, points out in her testimonial about our collaboration.

Internal organization, influencers and decision-makers within the account, apparent and invisible relationships, specific or collective internal issues, priority objectives, sector constraints and market context...

All these elements of detailed knowledge of a prospect enable us to identify his or her expectations (whether conscious or not...) and target the offers that best correspond to them.

And also, as we'll see later, to build the discourse to which he'll be most sensitive.

A step not to be neglected, with one point to bear in mind: the mapping of an account is never "fixed". Not only does it evolve over time in line with internal movements, but it also differs for each deal. The sales manager may have been your best in-house promoter when it came to implementing a CRM solution, but may turn out to be a fierce opponent when it comes to implementing new marketing tools, if the latter challenge his team's working habits, for example!

3. They make sure they're always one step ahead

Another decisive factor in any key account sale, but even more so when it's part of a call for tenders: having privileged, priority access to information!

The legal framework for calls for tender is highly regulated, and once the consultation has been launched, many constraints are imposed on sales staff: a single contact person, a duty of confidentiality regarding other companies consulted and their position, a ban on direct contact with decision-makers, extreme formalism in the call for proposals and responses...

In fact, the only effective way to influence the outcome of an invitation to tender by refining the relevance of your commercial response is upstream of its official publication!

Bear in mind that if you discover the invitation to tender on the day you receive it in your mailbox, you're already at a serious disadvantage, as you have very few commercial levers on which to act, and not the most pleasing ones (price...).

Those who have understood this devote a great deal of attention and energy to points 1 and 2 above, not least for this reason. If there's a relationship of trust and regular exchanges, chances are you'll hear about a consultation while it's still in the project stage... And it's then - and only then! - that you'll be able to obtain key information from the various internal contacts most familiar with the matter.

4. They know how to make a difference...

If you have integrated the first 3 points into your sales methods and sales organization, then you have the tools you need to differentiate yourself from your competitors: you have an idea of the budget envisaged, the internal organizational constraints impacting the project, the key contacts and their expectations, the arguments of internal "opponents" to the project...

From then on, you'll be able to "play your cards right" and determine the right offers and services to highlight, the type of support to offer the customer, your price positioning, and more generally, your sales tactics for this business.

Last but not least:

you'll be able to put together a speech that will hit the bull's-eye with your contacts.

The presentation of an offer in line with the customer's expectations has certainly enabled you to get past the pre-selection stage. That's a good thing. But it's no use if you're not the best at the oral presentation!

It's during this final stage, the one that determines the final outcome of the consultation, that the sales approach patiently put in place from the outset takes on its full meaning and bears fruit: the detailed knowledge of the account and its key contacts that your sales people have acquired over the preceding months will enable you to develop an original discourse around your solutions andfocus the spotlight on the points that will resonate most with your contacts.

Armed with your knowledge of their personal issues, you can even allow yourself the luxury of making your interlocutors "allies" during your presentation, by inviting them to express themselves, give their opinions and "co-construct" the choice of solution with you during your presentation.

What better way to make them want to work with you than to involve them in the choice of options and get them to plan the next stage of the project with you?

In any case, it's an approach that has enabled many of our customers to considerably improve their transformation rates and the amount of business they win!

Time is a precious resource. Are your salespeople short of it? In this webinar, Kestio explains how to save them 50% of their time:

Now it's time to put your strategy into action, and translate it into effective field practices to achieve your goals.

Not sure where to start? KESTIO guides you through the 5 key questions you need to ask yourself at this stage.

1. What's your marketing/sales mix?

The division of roles between marketing and sales is an issue that needs to be dealt with carefully and at an early stage: with the development of SaaS offerings and the increasing digitalization of sales methods (Inbound Marketing, Social Selling, Sales Automation...), the proportion of resources allocated to marketing is currently increasing (the 1:2 ratio between marketing and sales is being reversed).

It's absolutely essential that you have a clear vision of the stages in your sales funnel, and that you differentiate between those that are the responsibility of marketing and those that are the responsibility of your sales people.

2. Should you give preference to sedentary or field salespeople?

This is an essential part of your sales organization, and depends above all on the nature of your offer and its distribution method.

If you sell perpetual licenses with maintenance subscriptions, you'll most likely opt for a network of partners capable of managing installation and follow-up. And in this case, you'll mostly need field sales staff to go out and meet them.

And in many cases, you'll have to manage the cohabitation of these 2 models and determine all the more precisely the criteria for account allocation and the resulting allocation of sales forces between your field and office-based sales representatives.

3. What skills do your salespeople need to master?

It's also worth asking yourself what skills your salespeople will need to master. In direct relation to the first two points above, but also according to your customers' profiles, you'll be able to determine the sales methods, techniques and tools you'll need to implement.

According to the latest EY-Syntech study, the two main customers for software publishers in France today are the banking sector and industry. If this is your case, your sales people need to be well versed in "key account" sales methods, such as the "Méthode de l'Echiquier", and in complex sales.

The public sector comes^3rd in this ranking. If this is one of your priority targets, your sales force will need to focus all its efforts on mastering the tendering process and the sales techniques that go with it.

In a predominantly digital sales model, the role of salespeople is very different: as qualified contacts are identified and "nurtured" upstream by marketing, the role of Inside Sales is essentially to refine the qualification of needs, guide the customer in the choice of options, create ambassadors for the solution at the customer's premises, and map out decision-making powers.

Customer loyalty is also becoming increasingly important. We are therefore also seeing the emergence of new sales functions, such as Customer Success Managers (CSMs), dedicated to ensuring the quality of the Customer Experience.

In any case, a consultative sales approach - logically demonstrating the ROI of your solutions - is an interesting way of demonstrating your added value in your sector.

These are all factors to bear in mind when implementing an HR plan (recruitment, training, etc.) in line with your sales strategy.

4. Will you be developing your international sales?

Another decisive factor in theorganization of your sales force is the proportion of sales generated internationally, and whether or not international customers are strategic for your company.

While French software publishers still generate the vast majority of their sales in ^France2, the proportion of total sales generated outside France continues to grow, driven in particular by SMEs and start-ups that have been resolutely international from the outset, such as Criteo and Allegorithmic.

Once you've identified your strategic geographical areas, you'll be able to determine whether your dedicated sales force will operate from France or directly on site, and consider all the issues involved: whether or not you need to set up a physical office in another country, the country's social and commercial legislation, whether you should opt for an English-language "master version" of your solutions rather than a French-language one...

And from the point of view of your sales organization in the strict sense of the term: adapting your promise and sales pitches to different languages and local cultures,standardizing sales processes, sharing information between any subsidiaries, deploying an international CRM, setting up cross-border management and control...

5. What will your performance indicators be?

The last crucial point for your sales organization is its management, and therefore the monitoring and analysis of results. The choice of key performance indicators and their analysis depend on :

- Efficient management of your sales activity
- Calculating your sales force's remuneration (a sensitive subject if ever there was one!)
- The type of sales management adopted

And therefore, more globally: the achievement of the objectives you've set for yourself! The current evolution in sales methods is reflected in the choice of KPIs used in reporting.

Today, the 5 main indicators tracked by software publishers are :

1. Breakdown of sales by type : licenses, SaaS subscriptions or support/maintenance (on average today, almost 1/3 each!).
2. Booking new orders
3. Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) evolution
4. Sales by country
5. Churn rate (rate of non-renewal of contracts)

Two of these (MRR and churn rate) are directly correlated with the development of SaaS. In this new model, in fact, reducing and maintaining churn between 0 and 1% becomes an objective to be achieved to ensure the profitability of the system as a whole.

When you consider that customer acquisition costs are 5 to 25 times higher (depending on the sector) than the cost of customer loyalty...this is a good reason to pay particular attention to customer loyalty and the sales levers that support it!

Nevertheless, booking remains essential, as evidenced by the fact that 34% of software publishers choose this criterion as the basis for calculating variable remuneration for sales staff (compared with 26% for sales generated).

Scanning all these 5 key questions will enable you to define the best sales organization in line with your objectives and the strategy defined upstream. And to have a clear vision of how you're going to manage it and ensure its effectiveness over time!