Getting a position as a sales leader is an exciting experience. However, being a sales leader means that you’ll be facing plenty of challenges. Your main job as a sales manager is to build a sales department that delivers what management requires of you in terms of revenue and margins. In addition, you need to be a good coach for your salespeople, so they can reach their full potential, or otherwise, you’ll never reach your goals.
The last couple of years has had a strong impact on sales across industries. There have been major changes with remote selling, virtual conference, etc., and these changes are not going away any time soon. For this reason, sales leaders must know how to effectively lead their teams through continued periods of uncertainty and reflect on their long-term approaches.
To help get the ball rolling, we’ve listed the top priorities that any sales leader should address in order to succeed.
Write Winning Proposals
Love them or hate them, sales proposals are an integral part of a thriving business. While some people may view these documents as unnecessary, they are one of the most powerful instruments in a sales leader’s arsenal of deal-closing tools. A sales proposal is a document in which you present products or services to potential buyers. It contains details of the sale with all the benefits as well as the price and helps build relationships with customers.
When writing a sales proposal, you must be brief and don’t waste unnecessary words on irrelevant things. The information needs to be specific and convince customers to buy from you. Ideally, it can be anywhere from four to seven pages long, where you detail a solution to your customers’ issues.
It should demonstrate your knowledge of their needs, provide beneficial pricing, and outline the next steps in the sales process. To stay ahead of the competition, you should focus on what is unique about your company and secure sales. Once you finish writing your sales proposal, review it, check for grammatical errors and style, and make sure everything is perfect before sending it.
If you’re unsure of how to write a solid sales proposal, search for comprehensive proposal templates that you can use as an example when customizing your own to suit your needs and showcase your unique brand.
Promote the Hybrid Sales Model
The hybrid sales model can be described as a blend of virtual and in-person selling techniques. As a result of the pandemic, many traditional sales teams had to adapt and quickly learn to interact with consumers virtually. Slowly but surely, both buyers and sellers came to recognize the benefits of virtual selling and buying.
As a sales leader, you must be proficient in all sales models and skills for your sales team to move forward, become productive and make better decisions. You need to adopt the traits of a great leader, which means learning how to communicate effectively, being a great listener, and being organized and resourceful.
Examine Your Sales Funnel
Too many businesses fail to fully understand their sales process and identify opportunities. Building a sales funnel helps sales teams track their prospects through each step of the sales cycle until they finally convert into customers.
The sales funnel or pipeline is a valuable tool for sales leaders as it provides a bottom-up view for use by the organization to predict future sales, predict cash flow, and align expenses with expected revenues. Opportunities must be created throughout the entire funnel to be able to predict revenue and reach strategic decisions.
With the sales funnel explained, it is important to start managing the sales channel in the right way. To optimize your sales funnel, you must keep certain things in mind. Targeting your marketing efforts and marketing channels to the right audience is important, so determining your target customer and focusing content marketing and other sales strategies on that market are key.
Also, whether you’re creating a landing page to attract website visitors, running a social media campaign, or engaging in other marketing efforts to let leads discover your brand, you need to get them there to start the sales funnel process.
Review your sales funnel as it will help the sales team focus on the most effective revenue-producing activities and meet their goals.
Proper Talent Management
As a sales leader, you must ensure that all of your staff is satisfied or you risk losing them to another company. The factors that motivate employees vary from one person to another but your priority should be to keep them happy with their roles, duties, and compensation.
Provide training both for new hires and existing reps and give them the resources they need to learn new skills, obtain certifications, and always strive to provide opportunities for development and growth.
Bottom Line
Being a good sales leader is more than hiring and managing the right team of people. You should adopt leadership traits, learn to write winning sales proposals, review the sales funnel, and support your employees.
