Building a Sales Process for Your Team
A sales process is a series of actions used by your sales staff to turn leads into customers. Building a sales process is critical to your company’s success, and it’s probably the single most significant thing you can do as a sales manager to influence your team’s ability to sell. If your sales staff isn’t following a sales process, you need to take action right now. Fortunately, building a sales process from the ground up isn’t as difficult as it may appear. We produced this guide on how to establish a sales process, from the bottom up, to assist your sales reps with a clear and successful path to follow.
- “If you can’t describe what you are doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing.” ― W. Edwards Deming
Outlining the Sales Process
Gaining a thorough understanding of what your sales team is currently doing to convert leads into customers is the first step in developing a sales process. What is the first thing your sales people do when they meet a potential buyer, and what is the last thing they do when the transaction is closed? You can start filling in the blanks with those end-points in mind.
Take a few of your recent leads and ask your reps the following questions to help with this process. Their responses can aid you in comprehending the exact tasks that your team is now engaged in during a transaction.
> How did the lead come to be?
> What method was used to distribute or assign the lead?
> What was the sales rep’s first point of contact with the lead (email or phone)?
> Which documents, files, or other stuff was provided to the lead?
> When were those resources made available?
> How did the sales representative present your firm’s solution? What did the salesperson do to prepare for that presentation (i.e., on-site visit, webinar, phone call)?
> When and how did your firm’s proposal arrive?
Navigating the Sales Process Stages
So, what should your salespeople be doing as the consumer progresses through the buyer’s journey? This method is divided into six steps, the first three of which we’ll discuss today.
- Prospecting
Prospecting, also known as lead generation, entails locating new customers to bring to the top of your sales funnel. People who have indicated interest in the product or service you’re selling, or who might reasonably have interest based on their demographics, industry, or other characteristics, are examples of potential buyers.
- Qualifying
The qualifying step is when your sales staff make direct contact with a lead for the first time. The representative’s purpose during the initial phone contact or email is to gather information about the lead and decide if they are a good fit for your product or service.
- Presenting
The moment for your sales staff to present a compelling, individualized case for how your product or service will meet the prospect’s immediate needs is during the presentation.
- Handling objections
Price, timeliness, and fear of change are just a few of the reasons why a prospect could be hesitant to commit, even if they’re interested in your product.
During the objections stage, a sales representative tries to answer any remaining issues a prospect may have after hearing your pitch.
- Closing
Closing is the process of converting a prospect into a customer in the last stages of a transaction. Delivering a proposal based on orally agreed-upon parameters, obtaining buy-in from all decision-makers, and finalizing pricing discussions are examples of this. You’re ready to ask for their signature and start the hard job of keeping them as a client now that every obstacle has been removed.
- Nurturing
Nurturing a customer is 1) providing appropriate post-sale support so that they are eager to continue purchasing from you, and 2) identifying chances to upsell to improve the value of the business relationship. Customers who have been well-cared for may also give a large amount of recommendations, making them a valuable lead source in and of itself.
Bringing it All Together
It’s important to give your sales process a logical framework now that you’ve decided on your key tasks. Here are four different sales process styles to get you started.
- Sales process map
The most natural approach to structure and visualize your sales process is to arrange your phases into vertical columns. The top of each column in a sales process map is designated with a stage, and the individual stages are listed below it.
While the steps mentioned in each column represent the sales activities that your team needs to perform, sales process maps can also contain arrows connecting each column to indicate the stages of the buyer’s journey that the client is now in.
- Sales process checklist
A checklist sales process is organized from top to bottom in a chronological order, with actions outlined beneath each sales stage. You can go on to the next level after checking off each completed step in a particular stage. This structure is excellent for straightforward sales processes with few moving elements.
- Sales process flowchart
While a checklist or column layout might work well for small sales transactions, a step-by- step chronological procedure isn’t necessarily the best way to monitor more complicated sales. A flowchart can be a better way to represent your sales process if each customer decision might lead to different “paths” for your sales agent.
What happens if a lead doesn’t progress past a particular point, for example? Is the lead lost forever, or will you try to contact with the prospect at a later date to see if they still require assistance in finding a solution?
You may add “Plan B” stages to a sales process flowchart to avoid the dead ends that might occur in a more basic sales process.
- Buyer-aligned sales process
At the end of the day, each sale reflects a convergence of the buyer’s and seller’s interests. When you incorporate the buyer’s journey into your sales process, it reminds your salespeople to think about what the customer wants at each stage.
Put yourself in your customer’s position and add the important commitments and decisions that the buyer must make along the route once you’ve decided on your own sales process stages. You’re doing it properly if both sides of your buyer-aligned sales process closely match one other.