Articulate Sales Operations Strategy Well

Are you ready to articulate your sales operations strategy well at business meetings?

Sales Operations Strategy

Having a successful sales operations strategy is critical to the success of most businesses so it is important that you are able to articulate your sales operations strategy well at business meetings.

How strategic are your sales operations?

There are two types of activities, operational and strategic. The title “sales operations” would suggest that all activities within are operational. Or to put it another way, getting sales stuff done. In many companies lots of stuff gets done. People can be extremely busy and even work to exhaustion. However, as we all know, in sales it’s all about results. More than that, it’s about the right results. The problem is that in many companies, a huge amount of sales time is wasted because people are working on the wrong things. If salespeople are doing what they have been asked to do right, but they are working on the wrong things, then the company has a strategy problem, and that means that your sales operations are strategically misaligned.

Correcting sales operations misalignment

Sales operations misalignment needs to be corrected and the way to do this is to have greater clarity both from the business leaders and the sales leaders. Everyone needs to be on the same page. The way to achieve this is through improved communication. 

Improved communication

Communication can always be improved.

No matter how good we are individually and as a company, communication can always be improved. Communication can be improved but it doesn’t just happen. It needs a kick start. Then it needs oiling. Then it needs to be ‘run in’ and maintained. For all these necessary things to happen, there needs to be some purpose and backing. Someone needs to feel that it is important enough to devote some time and resources.

Get more sales by doing what most salespeople do not do

Anyone with any experience of time in a sales office will be familiar with the upbeat, floor walking, highly focused and animated style that we salespeople tend to exhibit when we are in the zone. This fast-paced environment that we value so much is great for motivating us to chase targets, but there are other times when we need to slow down and think. To get more sales we need to slow down and have proper thinking time. This is something that many salespeople and even leaders do not make sufficient time for. The pace of work is so fast and relentless they feel unable to either find the time, or know how to analyse the situation, or feel confident in voicing their opinions, especially if their opinions differ from the accepted viewpoint.

Making best use of non-selling time

One piece of sales advice that I was given was “time not spent talking to a customer is time wasted.” Generally, I’d say that is good advice because it serves to remind us of what is important – the customer. However, to serve our customers well, we need to take time out to think how best we should do it and discuss our thoughts with others. That is what articulating strategy well is all about.

Articulate strategy well – applied to sales operations

The purpose of Hargreaves Marketing is to help businesspeople articulate strategy well, using verbal, written and visual communications. We apply this concept to all types of strategy. Sales operations is an interesting case. After all good sales operations are smooth running operations and so if everything is running smoothly, then everything must be alright? Right? Well, obviously not right. Sales can decline to an existential level even when operations appear to be running smoothly. The other scenario is when everything is not running smoothly. In this case, sales operations are unable to keep pace with the demands of the sales workload. Either way, the solution lies in the ability of people to articulate sales operations strategy well to clearly show how what they are doing fits in with the aims of the business.

Reframe

When people at different levels and in different roles articulate strategy well new levels of understanding are developed. People get the opportunity to see each other’s point of view. Discussions take place. Debates are had. Agreements are eventually reached. Things move forward. However, generally all this does not happen instantly. It is an ongoing process.

Creating the process

As an outsider, I am ideally positioned to help across your organisation in ways that an internally based colleague would find difficult to do.

Find out more:

Call Adrian Hargreaves:tel:07866795858

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