You must improve how your sales & marketing organization operates...

What can you do? Who can you call for help?

Hire a big name strategy consulting firm. This is good for your ego and may look like the ultimate justification if the project fails. Will it be worth the outlay? One of our clients talks about “the most expensive slides he has ever seen!”. Their partners are senior and bright. Will they do the legwork or will smart rookies learn your business, at your expense?

Implement CRM technology. Some level of information technology and automation is required in today’s world. Will it be enough? Can it really change how your people think and behave? Is software the process or should the process dictate functionality? Do you know how to overcome your sales force’s natural resistance to using it?

Launch a training initiative. It feels good, like taking tangible action. Will it really fix your overall problem? Is it enough? Do you know how to make the learning stick?

Call that independent consultant you hired a few years ago. You feel secure. You know him and he did pretty well. How aware is he of new innovative approaches? Won’t he just reproduce what he’s been doing for the past ten years? What about your subsidiary in Norway, your reseller network in Spain and your headquarters in North America? Can he cope?

Tackle the issue yourself. Yes, you have good people. You need the very best, maybe those who are actually generating most of your revenue. Is it the best use of their talent? Are they not too close to daily operations? Or too distant, if they come from staff functions? Can they translate your strategic goals into practical customer interactions? Do they know of other models implemented with success by other companies? Will they have enough credibility and influence to inspire lasting change in work practices? Will they dare challenging established beliefs?

Client Testimonial “We have appointed SalesLab to help us enhance the way we execute across European countries, with the aim to renew with high growth as we were experiencing a slowdown. They are quick to find out what must be improved, thoughtful in the alternative solutions they propose, and practical as they drive improvement in sales execution. They collaborate as credibly with executives, management, as well as marketing and sales teams. With them, we increased our win rate, improved how sales teams operate, and strengthened line management practices. Given the business we’re in, this is worth millions of euros in incremental revenue. What I enjoy the most is the versatility of their partners, be it devising revenue generation initiatives, designing organisational models, implementing sales methodologies and processes, or providing personal feedback and advice. This is a rare competence, even from in house senior managers.” Pascal Coubard, Sales Director France

Your marketing & sales execution is a systemic issue Addressing one single issue, even by throwing a lot of resources and money at it, will only have a marginal effect on your business results. You may invest in sales skills training but if your value messages or your sales processes are not effective enough, your margins will not increase much. You may deploy CRM technology but if your demand generation activities do not generate a strong enough pipeline, or if your resellers do not effectively follow up leads, your sales will not increase much. You may rebalance your sales model between sales channels, but if each customer interaction does not have enough impact, your market share will not increase much. As you can see, drastically increasing your revenue, market share, margin or sales productivity, is a complex issue. People you may call on for help must adopt a holistic approach, even if you don’t address every issue at once. They must have wide and deep expertise on many topics. This is what SalesLab partners do for a living, day in day out. See “Your levers of sales productivity” section of this web site for more insight