How to Create a Simple Sales Plan | Maximising Team Responsibility.

There are plenty of people out there that want to tell you how to create a sales plan.

Loads of graphs, spreadsheets, software platforms…

Any number of things that will give you what you want.

And make it look pretty too.

Whatever you want…

But…

99.9% of them, you can dismiss.

You can dismiss them because, invariably they miss out on 3 critical things that can make or break your plan, namely the:

• Appetite your sales team has to succeed
• Motivation your sales team has to take responsibility to do the work
• Degree to which the sales team embrace personal accountability for their results

Because, without these three things – all you have is a pretty excel spread sheet!

BUT more importantly – they fail to make this abundantly clear – 

As a Sales Leader – you have an accountability for the numbers – but you do not have responsibility for the numbers.

As a sales leader – you facilitate, serve, smooth the way, jump the hurdles, have the conversations, lend your weight when needed to support your team – 

But the truth is – these numbers sit with your team, not you.

So, when someone tells you how to create a sales pla, if they don’t support you in the above….

Don’t Listen to Them!!

Instead, when it comes to how to create a sales plan, try this instead…

Any sales leader can do it.

It takes as long as you want it to take, and depends on a bit a preparation before you launch it, but it’s one of the most useful tools in my sales tool box for

• Forecasting sales
• Planning success pathways
• Building a teams motivation and confidence…and engagement

And it’s yours today – totally free!

How to Create a Sales Plan

There are two stages in this process

Stage 1 – prep work by the sales leader

Stage 2 – building the sales plan with the team

Taking each one in term – if this starts to get confusing – give me a call – Carol on 0779 002 1885 and I’ll talk you through it

Stage 1 – prep work by the sales leader

Look at the performance stats for each rep for the last year.

Shove into an excel spreadsheet the following data broken down per month per rep:

• Total leads by channel
• Total order by channel
• Total Rev by channel

So now you can work out the following, by month, by rep

• Conversion rate by channel
• Average order value by channel 

Send that to your sales reps so they can each review their own performance and and ask them to start building a narrative around WHY they got the results they got.

As well as sending them their own stats, include their team mates stats too, that means not only are they looking at their performance, they are also looking at their performance against their colleagues. Compare and contrast type of opportunity.

When you send this info out – book in a group meeting to get peoples views collectively.

Give them an opportunity to ask questions, and generally stimulate group discussions, share your thinking, different lenses to look at the data through.

Get the insights flowing around WHY the results are like they are…

No blame, nothing to fear, just an open reflection and shared insights.

Stage 2 – building the sales plan with the team

Then set the task – ask them…

Based on what you see before you – what can you commit to deliver this year and what assumptions have you made to get to those numbers?

Give them a week or two to digest it – all the while keeping your door open for questions.

Then set a date for a group review. 

It’s a stand up and explain – the methodology, the reasoning, the shared assumptions, the conclusions, the degree of certainty / uncertainty.

Do it as a group as the group learning with be huge – and as part of the ‘how to build a sales plan’ journey, it gives everyone a chance to sense check, challenge and course correct. And all before this gets cast in stone!

Give the team the message that no numbers are final, and they can change their mind and alter the numbers right up until X date.

Do this because the discussion above will have them now look at their numbers through different, brighter and sharper lenses.

Again, during this period, keep and open door, let them find you, have the discussions. Let your sales reps steer the course.

The ‘And What Happens Before Method’ Sense Check

Get your sales reps to test their numbers by using the phrase – what happens before you get to this number?

At which point they give you a set of events / outputs/ needs, so you ask…so what happens before to make that a possibility?

And so it goes on.

Until you have a sales plan…broken down, by month, by sales rep.

A sales plan that is not just numbers, but has some solid strategy and needs hard-baked into it.

It’s a sales forecast, a sales process plan and a full blown map of how the nest year will plan out, with full risk mitigation.

You take their thinking back to first principles.

This means they reverse engineer all the critical numbers, milestones and events that will lead to their success…based on what happened in the last 12 months, and their certainty that their skills will have improved since 12 months ago,

Now, your both getting somewhere near to having a set of realistic sales numbers AND a plan, that you can both buy into and which the sales reps can take total ownership of.

Accountability Not Responsibility

As a sales leader, CEO, CSO….you have an accountability to deliver the numbers, but you’re not responsible for delivering the numbers.

This is a tough thing for some organisations to grasp.

Responsibility will always sit with the sales reps, the accountability to ensure they have everything they need to thrive and deliver sits with the leader.

So, as that is the case – give your sales reps the opportunity to build their own plan – because they need that ownership to commit, to stretch and to engage at the highest level

So, now you see, no matter how good YOU are at building a sales plan, if your sales reps aren’t totally committed to those numbers and that plan – it really is just a vanity project.

11 Benefits of Using This Method to Create a Sales Plan…

1. Your team will take ownership from day 1.
2. Sales meetings become very specific, very quickly.
3. The exchanges become peer to peer support sessions – best example of servant leadership ‘tell me what you need’.
4. You can spend more of your time being a sales coach.
5. They know how you think and you know how they think – better quality conversations
6. Motivation and drive should spike, and stay high
7. Your sales reps have now started to think strategically
8. You’ve created a high growth environment
9. You’ve been able to talent spot your next set of promotions to Team Leader, Manager, Field Sales
10. They track their own numbers and performance – daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly
11. You can spot the sales reps who need help and support quickly 

Which means you get to do your job – to lead, spot what’s coming over the horizon and help your sales team tool up to make the numbers happen.

Downsides?

None!

Unless you you count that finding out who is super motivated to engage and who is dead set against engaging on this sort of activity is a down side. I don’t, you might.

Simple Sales Plan

This is the ultimate simple sales plan, and one I give to anyone who asks me how to great a sales plan, because it ticks every single box.

It:

• Engages the team
• Puts them in control
• Gives them a voice
• Brings the boardroom on to the sales floor
• Conveys trust and ownership
• Helps them think strategically

Flexes to meet the sales reps very personal needs – whether they are a targeted 5 top quality calls per day or a hardcore 40 dials before lunch kind of rep

Fosters responsibility and commitment – to you and their team mates – it’s a collective win or a collective lose, and you know, the better the plan the better the outcome.

It’s grown up and evolved…and designed to give you sales success with the minimum amount of friction!

It’s responsible and the responsibility sits in the right place, versus you having to chase fog up a hill for 12 months because you decided to submit ‘your numbers’ without consultation.

It’s a sales plan that’s done ‘WITH them’, not ‘FOR them’

Try it!

I think you’ll like it and be surprised at the buy in you get – let me know what you think and how you get on

And, if you need any help – Carol on 0779 002 1885….happy to chat it through with you, alternatively I run this as a section in a training program on Smart Sales Forecasting – Saying No To Fluffy Forecasts where we look at all aspects of sales forecasting, sales planning, sales process plans and getting the most from your sales pipeline.

Plus, if you want to get more insights for how to drive your sales performance in the right direction then check out our Sales Insights Audit

Alternatively, if you want to book some time in on a more regular basis – there is currently a sales coaching special offer – might be what you’re looking for

Happy Selling!

P.S. seeing as you’re interested in sales growth – check out our Sales Improvement Workshop – it helps reps sell how buyers want to buy whilst kicking out the competition at the same time!