When sales leaders look to get the best performance out of their teams, one topic that often arises is sales culture. Some businesses overlook sales culture because they believe it is less important than other factors in determining their success. However, having the right sales culture will promote growth, development, learning and ongoing high performance in a way that few other aspects of a sales team can.
Sales Culture Consulting
When we talk about sales culture, we’re referring to the mix of values, attitudes and behaviors that drive sales operations and describe how people interact and communicate with one another to reach a greater understanding. Quite simply, when a sales leader understands what motivates their salespeople, they can get the best out of them.
Of course, a healthy sales culture does not magically appear; a lot of effort and calculation goes into building a positive one, and sales management consultants can provide some tried-and-tested approaches to getting this right.
According to a PricewaterhouseCoopers study, 87 percent of directors report that an inappropriate tone at the top leads to corporate culture problems, and 79 percent also say the tone that is set by middle management plays a role. That’s why getting sales culture right, from management all the way down, is so important to the business as a whole.
How Does Sales Culture Consulting Work?
Measuring your sales culture can be a pretty challenging task. After all, it’s not something that is quantifiable like monthly revenue or call volume. Nevertheless, its effects can be felt deeply throughout your organization, and when you’ve got it right, you will notice a difference in the bottom line.
Objectives Of Sales Culture Consulting
Sales culture consultants aim to create an atmosphere that will foster creativity, hard work and good communication. Because sales agents are likely to work harder when trying to reach a goal, sales culture consultants will help businesses create incentive programs that will motivate employees.
Make Smaller Obtainable Goals
A good sales culture acknowledges that people work not only for financial gain but also for recognition and being a part of a successful endeavor. While most sales organizations do reward salespeople with prizes and other incentives for meeting larger goals, some overlook the importance of creating smaller and more easily attainable incentives that will promote morale along the way and keep them working toward those bigger achievements.
Most salespeople can mentally calculate how likely they are to meet a quota based on their progress so far, and many will give up when they see they aren’t likely to get there in a given time period. These smaller incentives can go a long way toward keeping everyone motivated to keep aiming higher, no matter how likely they are to reach the top goal.
Create A Customer Profile
One of the first things that sales culture consultants will do is help you gain a clearer picture of your Ideal Customer Profile and how you can focus your efforts on people who fall into this group. By prioritizing these potential customers, your salespeople will have a better idea of where to spend their time and energy. This reduces the type of frustration that can really eat away at morale.
Improve Sales Productivity
This is another goal. When salespeople do not feel appreciated, their productivity can drop pretty quickly. Making the effort to improve the sales culture in an organization shows your salespeople that you care about them, and this can make them feel more connected to the success of the company – and more interested in helping to ensure its success.
Communicate Within The Company
Setting up frequent interaction between the sales team and sales management is another goal of sales culture consulting. This helps to keep everyone on the same page and gives all parties involved the chance to voice their opinions and concerns about the issues that impact their ability to meet their quotas.
Sales Culture Consulting Benefits
Sales culture consulting can improve everything from how much your salespeople sell and how productive they are to how long they stay with your company.
A Columbia University study showed that organizations that have a healthy sales culture experience just 13.9 percent employee job turnover, while those with poor sales culture see an average turnover of 48.4 percent – that’s a pretty hefty difference!
A positive sales culture can promote learning and growth, and it accepts mistakes as another valuable part of the learning process. It fosters creative minds and innovations that more oppressive environments tend to discourage.
It can also promote collaboration and communication, making salespeople feel more comfortable sharing tips and strategies that can benefit the company as a whole.
Moreover, when a company invests in improving its sales culture, it can benefit the entire organization as a whole. A strong sales department tends to lift up other departments along the way, which is good news for everyone involved.
Speak To An Experienced Sales Management Consulting Firm
Businesses cannot afford to overlook the importance of a positive sales culture because it goes hand in hand with high performance. If you would like to help your company develop the right sales culture to get the best out of your team, speak to the experienced sales management consulting firm at RCG Workgroup to find out how their sales culture consulting process works or schedule a consultation online.
