Sales Activity Tracking
This article on sales activity tracking is part of a 4 article series by guest author Stephen Pearson from the Cambridge, Ontario branch of Franklin Covey Co. Canada. If you are not familiar with Franklin Covey it was found by Stephen Covey he is best known for his original best selling book titled “7 Habits Of Highly Effective People”. Now here is the article....
This is the second article of this 4 article series on executing your sales strategy. If you have not read the first article titled Executing Your Sales Strategy, you may wish to start there.
What steps do you need to take to maximize your probability of successfully achieving your sales strategy and goals? Franklin Covey has spent almost 10 years researching and developing a process to dramatically increase a team’s ability to execute on their strategy. The result is a simple, 4-step process called “The 4 Disciplines of Execution®”.
The 4 Disciplines of Execution® are:
1. Focus on the Wildly Important Goals (WIGs)
2. Act on the Lead Measures
3. Keep a Compelling Scoreboard
4. Create a Cadence of Accountability
Here again is the example we are using for this article series
The scenario includes a fictitious company called Company eMarketing. Lets assume this company is launching their new, breakthrough service. This service is ideal for companies in the technology sector who utilize the internet as a core part of their business activity, or product/service. The pricing and scope of eMarketing's new service makes it appropriate for companies of 100 employees or larger, or revenue of $1 million/year. The ideal decision makers for considering this product include such titles as: VP of Product Development; VP of Operations; VP of Software Engineering; or a variation thereof. eMarketing wants to achieve $500K in sales in year 1; $1 million in year 2; and $4 million by year 5. They have selected team of 5 key sales reps to train on how to position and sell this new service, and to reach key technology sectors in Ontario, Quebec and BC.
So, eMarketing has the basic elements of a general sales strategy: Target price; target market; target decision makers; revenue/sales targets & benchmarks; target locations; timeframe; skilled & trained sales team to execute the strategy and the allocation of various resources to this project.
Of course there are many other pieces that may go into a sound sales strategy, but for the purpose of this simple example the main bases have been covered here.
The Execution
2. Act on the Lead Measures
Once each of the 3 teams understands the key hurdles and goals they need to overcome and achieve, respectively, to be able to fulfill their top 3 WIG (which relate to eMarketings Corporate WIGs), then they need to break these goals down into activities that will have the most influence on each goal. We call these activities “Lead Measures”. Lead measures are those actions, activities, or steps that will have the most “predictive” influence and impact on the WIG. Do these actions or activities and the team will move closer to the WIG. Don’t do them, and the WIG will not be achieved.
For example, the sales people must reach out to the targeted decision makers in a way that is meaningful and gains their interest, trust and attention. Perhaps this translates into marketing events in the target regions; number of calls and emails to each potential decision maker; number of completed meetings? The sales team will need to decide what their highest leverage activity is, and what the measures are to monitor progress and lead measure activity and achievement.
By outlining the specific tasks required to achieve the goal and setting targets for each this will ensure your team is working on the right activities. By outlining the targets for these activities you will be able to track your progress. Instead of only following lag measures (sales) you will be tracking lead measures (activities) that impact sales. This will ensure the activities are being completed at a pace that will ensure success and achievement of your sales and new customer generation goals.
To read the next part in this four part series check back in a few days or subscribe by email to this blog to have the next article automatically delivered to your email.
Stephen Pearson is an Associate Client Partner with Franklin Covey C. Canada. He services the Ontario market including but not limited to Kitchener, Cambridge, Guelph and Waterloo helping companies to instill behaviors in their employees that help with goal and objective achievement.
To learn more about achieving goals and objectives follow his blog at http://franklincoveystephenpearson.blogspot.com or check out their website at www.franklincovey.ca. If you want a copy of Stephen Covey's book The 4 Disciplines of Execution
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I hope you have found this blog article on sales activity tracking informative.