Building
an Effective Sales Team
Feedback
to Grow On
By
Jeffrey Hansler, CSP
Each
year hundreds of companies with revenues of two million
dollars per year go out of business. Each year
thousands of companies that never achieved revenues of two
million dollars per year go out of business. Why?
Many times, it's because these companies failed to build an
effective sales team.
An
effective selling team pays for itself, helps the company
grow and provides an opportunity to do this at a profit.
An effective selling team brings feedback from its customer
base. The feedback helps the company plan its
marketing and products for the present and the years ahead.
Realize
that an effective team is part of a healthy company.
It provides a service to the company, but it must be cared
for as well. Like your heart, it keeps you going, but
you've got to take care of it.
Building
an effective sales team does not include starting from
scratch and hiring five bodies to "go out and
sell" or "take orders". Although you
may have a product that "sells itself" for the
moment, all too soon that moment will go away. Use the
time to build a team that can help you sell once the
competition finds out what a great product you have.
To
build an effective team, ask your customers what services
they desire and how they found out about you. Look at
the logistics of your operation. Create a compensation
system that will guide a person to work with your system,
deliver to the customers what they want, and go out and find
new opportunities. Most importantly, hire people with
the qualities that will excel within that system.
It
would be nice if this were an automatic process, like the
rhythmic beating of a healthy heart, but its more like tooth
care. They need strokes every day, and a shot of
attention on a regular basis. Take care of your sales
team and they'll take care of you day after day.
#
# # # #
Jeffrey
Hansler is a professional speaker, author, and consultant.
He is a frequent speaker at association events and is the
author of Sell Little Red Hen! Sell! He can be reached at jhansler@oxfordco.com.
Click
here for a .pdf version of this page
Click
here to access our article request form to secure
permission to use or reprint this article
©
2004 Jeffrey Hansler All rights reserved |
