Seven Must-Dos; Planning for 2012
In order to get the most out of your territory and strategic accounts, you need to have a good plan that covers the 7 Key Steps:
- Analyze your business/ territory/strategic account
- Understand what drives customers to buy
- Clarify your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT)
- Determine your objectives
- Develop strategies to accomplish your goals
- Engage the resources you need
- Create and work your plan
These articles explain how to do it:
How to Write a Sales Territory Plan
How to Write a Strategic Account Plan
They will enable you to make better use of your time and resources and produce better results, including:
- More Opportunities
- Shorter sales cycles
- Larger deal size
- Higher win rates
Good Selling!
Ron
Five Reasons you Need a New Plan
Here are the top 5 reasons you need a new territory/strategic account plan for the New Year. Without it, you will:
1. Miss important opportunities
2. Lose sales you could have won
3. Take longer to win business opportunities
4. Be forced to sell at a lower selling price and reduced profit margin
5. Waste time and resources
Why create a new plan? Things change! You need to take into account:
• Changes in the economy and regulatory environment
• Changes in your industry/geography/vertical market
• New products/new technology
• How to improve your approach
• Incorporating new skills and tools
Good planning enables you to maximize the results from your territory/strategic account. By adopting and implementing good planning and selling methods, one of my clients:
• Increased Bookings by 43%
• Boosted Margins by 10%
• Improved Market Share by 53%
• Increased Productivity per Salesperson by 50%
• Grew Win/Loss Ratio by 131%
Having a plan enables you to manage a great deal of complexity. This includes understanding the market, focusing on the customer problems you can solve, selecting your best solution, and managing the internal and partner resources necessary to meet your objectives. It enables you to make the best use of your time and resources by connecting strategy to key tasks.
Using the plan, you make sure the tasks get implemented the time frame required to win. Through it, you give appropriate attention to the critical path – the steps that have the most impact on producing the result on time. Without a plan, it is easy to omit a key element and dramatically compromise your results. Further, it enables you to respond effectively to quick changes in your territory and accounts.
The bottom line is that you need a good plan backed with persistent effort to maximize your results in your territory and win competitive business opportunities.
How to Write a Strategic Account Plan
How can you write a Plan to Penetrate and Grow a Strategic Account?
In order to gain the insights you need to create a winning plan, you must ask the right questions. Use this checklist as a guide. Use your plan in your strategic account reviews and to manage your account team.
1. Analyze your Target Account’s Business
Start with what is going on in your account’s business.
- What are the key trends in their industry?
- Who are their top prospects and customers?
- What are the top issues facing their customers?
- What are the critical trends in the geography?
- What is reflected in their financial reports and news about them?
2. Understand what is Driving the Account
You must understand their objectives and challenges.
- What are their strategic initiatives?
- What are the characteristics of their high-payoff customers/prospects?
- Are there verticals that they are winning in more than others? Why?
- What “pain” or business issues do they solve?
- What is their competitive position?
- What is their purchase history and decision-making process?
3. Clarify your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT)
Conduct a SWOT analysis that examines how you can help this account.
- What Strengths can they benefit from? For example, a unique business model or capabilities.
- Which Weaknesses do you need to respond to? This includes the strengths of competitive and alternative solutions.
- Which Opportunities in the marketplace will you take advantage of… and help them take advantage of? How do you uniquely meet their compelling needs?
- What Threats in your selling environment will you defend against? Consider competitive moves, changes in technology, industry and regulatory standards.
4. Determine your Selling Approach
Consolidate the above insights the critical strategies and actions necessary to succeed.
- How do you help them accomplish their strategic objectives?
- What is your unique selling (value) proposition?
- Based on your SWOT, what are the critical few strategies to win in the account?
- What type of opportunities will you concentrate on?
- How can you leverage your differentiators? (Sales approach can be a differentiator.)
- What is your strategy to leverage current successes?
5. Engage the Resources you Need
Enroll the people and gather the knowledge you need.
- Which internal resources have the skills/connections you need?
- Who inside the account can help you win?
- Are there external resources that can support you (partners, people “in the know”)?
- What additional product/industry information do you need? What sources can provide it?
- How could you improve your selling and account management skills?
6. Create and Work your Plan
Use your plan as a guide to proactively produce your intended results.
- What are the high-leverage actions?
- Which resources are needed for each task?
- What are the due dates and key milestones?
- Do you take action and update the plan on a regular basis?
- Are you engaging your management, internal and partner resources?
If you don’t plan your work, you can’t work your plan. Winging it is the best way to lose a big opportunity you could have won!
Good luck and Good Selling!
How to Write a Sales Territory Plan
As published in Selling Power Blog, August 18, 2011
What are the critical steps in writing a successful Sales Territory Plan?
You may be wondering, “Where do I start?” The key is asking the right questions to harness the insights you need to create a winning plan. Use this checklist as a guide.
1. Analyze your Territory/Business
Start with what is going on in your territory/vertical market.
- What are the key trends in your geography/ market?
- Who are your top prospects and customers?
- What are customers buying?
- Based on your conversion rates, how much business do you need in your funnel?
- What is the gap between what you need in your funnel and what you have now?
2. Understand what Drives Customers to Buy
You must understand why they are buying or not buying your products.
- What are the characteristics of your high-payoff customers/prospects?
- Are there verticals that you are winning in more than others? Why?
- What “pain” or business issues do you solve?
- What compelling events drive the purchase?
- Are there specific products/services that you are selling more than others? Why?
- Why do they not buy your products/services?
3. Clarify your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT)
Conduct a SWOT analysis that examines:
- What Strengths will you build upon? For example, a unique business model or capabilities.
- Which Weaknesses do you need to respond to? This includes the strengths of competitive and alternative solutions.
- Which Opportunities in your marketplace will you take advantage of? How do you uniquely meet your buyers’ compelling needs?
- What Threats in your selling environment will you defend against? Consider competitive moves, changes in technology, industry and regulatory standards.
- What is your unique selling (value) proposition?
4. Determine your Objectives
Consolidate the above trends into a few powerful objectives. Write specific, measurable goals (i.e. ‘I will add 5 new accounts in this vertical market’).
- Which vertical markets or geographies will you focus on?
- Based on the characteristics of your high-payoff customers/prospects, which accounts/opportunities will you concentrate on?
- What products/services/capabilities do you need to highlight in your plan?
- At your average selling price, how many opportunities do you need to add to your funnel?
5. Develop Strategies to Accomplish your Goals
Generate the top strategies to succeed.
- How will you further penetrate current accounts?
- What is your strategy to leverage current successes?
- What will you do to generate new leads?
- How will you improve your conversion rates?
- Where do you need to improve your selling process?
6. Engage the Resources you Need
Enroll the people and gather the knowledge you need.
- Which internal resources have the skills/connections you need?
- Who inside the account can help you win?
- Are there external resources that can support you (partners, people “in the know”)?
- What additional product/industry information do you need? What sources can provide it?
- How could you improve your selling and territory/account management skills?
7. Create and Work your Plan
Use your plan as a guide to proactively produce your intended results.
- What are the high-leverage actions?
- Which resources are needed for each task?
- What are the due dates and key milestones?
- Do you take action and fine-tune the plan on a regular basis?
- Are you engaging your management, internal and partner teams?
“It’s not the will to win that matters…everyone has that. It’s the will to prepare to win that matters.”
- Paul “Bear” Bryant
Creating and implementing a well thought-out plan greatly improves your probability of success!
