800-CEO-READ Blog

Why Have a Sales Strategy, Anyway?

How many business plans have a well-crafted sales strategy? Very few. Most of the time it is buried in a marketing plan. If we don’t have sales, we don’t have revenue or profits, and we don’t have a company. Selling is the most important job in an entire company. Yet, I’ve been told that the average tenure of a VP of Sales is 18 months. That’s not enough time to accomplish anything. Sometimes companies hire only experienced salespeople, in the expectation that they will figure out the territory and the organization. Huge mistake. Every organization has a different approach, different products, and different clients. We must give salespeople the tools to succeed. They must know the sales strategy and the culture of the company. They need more than a boot camp about products and benefits. Knowing how to get things done in a company is one of the most powerful tools a salesperson can have.

If you’re at a headquarters office, you have the opportunity to be in direct contact with the people who influence decisions, and you begin to know who to count on and who to avoid. It’s much tougher when you’re in the field. You need to ask specific questions about who is responsible for what, and take the time to build relationships on the phone. However, there is nothing more important than a personal visit to headquarters. If you are new to a company, make sure that you have in your hiring agreement that you will travel to headquarters within 60 days of your hire.