Many of you may consider sales planning as something that is forced on you from headquarters as "Filling out forms to satisfy the home office"...and only after completing the forms can you "Get back to work."
In many organizations, typically what happens is this...every year you are asked for your sales plan for the coming year by a certain date. You eventually sit down at your dining room table and write a summary of how you are going to perform your job over the coming 12 months. From this comes a strategy for obtaining your sales results for the new year.
Strategy
Strategy and tactics are used in professional selling just as they are used in a battlefield maneuver. Strategy could be defined as the "big picture" and the tactics as the actual professional selling that happens to accomplish the sales objective.
Unfortunately, the exercise of developing the strategy for your sales territory that we just described is only a "snap shot" of the selling situation at a particular time.
The problem here is obvious: You can not predict the reaction of your customer to each situation so far in advance. The same is true of what people typically refer to as strategic planning (very narrow and well defined plans or "road maps" for achieving a company's mission over a 5/10 year period). That is why "strategic planning" is out of style and "vision" is in today.
However, strategies for each major account or for a whole sales territory can and should be identified, as well as being continually updated as conditions change. Such a method allows you and your company to have a clear direction (i.e. a compass versus a road map) of where you are going with the flexibility to adjust the course of your plan based upon changes that are constantly occurring out in the marketplace.
Tactics
Tactics, in selling, are the implementation of your major account strategies. They involve interacting with a customer...an activity that can not be completely planned in advance because the exact reaction of the customer can not be predicted.
Setting Objectives
Effective planning of strategy and professional selling (tactics) are only part of the job. A third element, the one that makes selling "go", is setting sales objectives. These objectives can be territory objectives, market objectives, objectives by a certain geographical area, and MOST IMPORTANT OBJECTIVES BY MAJOR ACCOUNT.
After setting good measurable objectives, it is necessary to identify the steps in obtaining the objective.
To illustrate, let's take an example:
Sales Objective: Obtain $1,635,000 of new business from XYZ Company through combined sales of XXXXX and YYYYY in 2017.
Such an objective meets the test of:
- Having economic value.
- Requiring an action on the part of the customer.
But is the sales planning job compete?
Not if we consider what has to happen before this objective can be met...such as:
1) Identify the decision maker in the XYZ Company.
2) Identify what the prospect is now planning for the coming year: resources, budget, etc.
3) Identify the competition and its position with the account.
4) Identify areas of the prospect's need for improvement.
5) Make a sales presentation.
6) Ask for the order.
All of these six steps become sub-objectives of the main sales objective stated above.
Each of these sub-objectives or sub-goals may become the immediate sales objective for a specific sales call on the prospect....by knowing strategy you are going to use during the sales call, and any anticipated obstacles that may arise during the sales call.
Once you have completed the above, two additional steps are recommended:
1) Set specific dates to accomplish each sub-objective.
2) Commit the plan to your sales manager for approval.
Sales by Objectives: --- YouTube videos of what to do and what not to do during the sales process.
