The Sales Department is the Face of Business: How to Manage Sales and Employees

Companies are expanding their market share, and new players are entering the market to occupy already crowded niches. As a result, competition is growing in all areas. This creates an urgent need to rethink business processes and teamwork. The company must function perfectly, and risks and costs must be minimized.

If you do everything as before, you will lose in the race with competitors. The result is that you need to change, and this is a matter of survival.

Let's imagine the structure of a company: there are several departments that are responsible for a specific task. These structures are interconnected, if one stops working, the entire system suffers. For example, the sales department closely interacts with marketing, production, logistics and contractors (depending on the business). And most importantly, it works with clients.

If sales managers and employees from other departments lose contact with each other, we get:

• slow work process;
• difficult communication;
• low level of service;
• high stress levels;
• slow revenue growth.

The sales department is the face of the business, it communicates with clients, immerses them in the product and leads them to a purchase decision. The success of a company with a sales department directly depends on how automated the processes within it are.

Automation is not about replacing live people with robots, but about working with the focuses and priorities of each role in the company. By helping to automate routine processes, you increase the efficiency of employees in those tasks where their high expertise and professionalism are necessary and valuable. The system will take care of reminders, deadlines, and data accumulation. Thus, communication between departments will become more objective and “to the point.”

Thanks to automated business processes, marketers and managers receive detailed reports in figures every month. Production and logistics provide information in a timely manner, and the sales manager quickly orients the customer and closes the deal. Thus, a well-coordinated teamwork appears, which works for a single result.

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What does digitalization of the sales department give to business?

Globally, you solve three big problems at once:

1. Record traffic. Often, companies do not understand where customers come from: which channel works, how to distribute the budget, which channels are used to make sales, what is the warmth of customers from one channel or another. Sales may and will be, because the advertising campaign was launched correctly, but it is difficult to determine the most effective sales channels.

As a result, you will not be able to draw conclusions and distribute the marketing budget wisely either. In addition, you will not be able to evaluate the work of the marketing department and individual employees. But the most important thing is that you do not develop.

Without reflection, analysis of marketing activities and their results, you will have nothing to rely on. It turns out that by investing in marketing, you are not buying experience and not investing in the development of the company. By acting in this way, you provide revenue only for the next few months.

2. Process traffic. Digitalization of the department minimizes the likelihood of missing a potential client at any stage of the sale. The system helps the manager make the necessary contacts in time and not miss an important buyer.

In this case, the management always sees all potential clients at all stages of the funnel. It becomes easier to predict the results of the month, manage the workload of employees and delve into the nuances of any transaction without losing control over the entire flow.

3. Have a wide angle of view. When there are many clients and the sale takes place in several stages, it is important to see the full picture of the entire business process. The work of a large number of people must be coordinated, especially if there are weak points.

In addition, a wide angle of view opens up not only to sales channels and the number of closed deals, but also to the performance of managers . With the help of digitalization of the department structure, you can track the dynamics of a specific employee's development: see weaknesses and strengths, control and adjust work during the month. Results are measured in faces and numbers, from this your team grows and sales dynamics do not decrease.

How a Digital Sales Department Works in Practice: A Manager’s Perspective

The manager's job is to make sure everything works and produces results. Situations are different, so a CRM system is a powerful tool in the hands of a manager: you see everything.

You see processes through and through in real time

Instead of manually collecting reports or waiting for weekly summaries, a manager can see at any time what stage each deal is at, what tasks are being completed, and which require attention. This reduces the risks associated with information loss and ensures process transparency, which is important for making prompt decisions.

You manage the team's resources

The system helps to optimally distribute the workload between employees, highlighting free capacity. Automated distribution of leads and tasks helps to take into account the current workload of each manager and distribute requests evenly.

You implement standards into the work process

The sequence of actions at each stage of the sales funnel is clearly spelled out for managers. The manager is confident that employees follow uniform rules, regardless of their experience.

You motivate employees

Automation gives the manager access to accurate and objective data on the work of managers. You can evaluate the effectiveness of a specific employee and motivate him or her using clear KPIs.

The system independently tracks the implementation of plans, achieved results and offers motivation mechanisms: bonuses and premiums. It is also possible to identify the strongest employees and analyze their work methods in order to share best practices with the rest of the team.

You make decisions faster

Again, you have all the current results of the work in front of you: you see progress or deviations from plans. Based on this, your actions will be more accurate and timely – it is difficult to control the process if you do not have a complete understanding of it. Efficiency is the key to success.

You and the company are less dependent on the human factor

Everyone is familiar with the situation when one person went on vacation and the previous pace of work stopped. It turns out that a lot depended on one employee. Errors related to people's subjective perception of information, mood and well-being also occur.

Automation of many routine tasks frees employees for more complex and important work, reducing the likelihood of errors and misunderstandings due to the fact that they have to keep a lot in their heads. For the manager – peace of mind, since the quality of the department's work does not depend on the mood or level of training of individual employees, but is based on clear and proven procedures.

In addition, the direct responsibility of managers is to sell. The more an employee is in operational tasks, the less sales.

You adapt more quickly

Modern CRM systems allow you to easily adapt processes to changing market conditions. The manager can quickly make changes to processes, test new approaches and instantly see the results. In addition, partners who help you set up and maintain the system will always keep you informed of current market trends and automation.

Agree that in the current conditions, lagging behind changes is a defeat. It is important to promptly respond to demand, customer behavior and the competitive environment.

You see the company's vulnerabilities

Let's imagine a situation: a team of managers of a large dealership makes 20 transactions per week.

However, it is important for the manager to understand that most of these transactions are the merit of one employee. The CRM system automatically indicates and identifies such trends and patterns, and you will not have to attract additional resources to conduct analytics.

Let's look at an example in numbers: the head of the sales department did not have a clear idea of ​​the current status of deals for a long time. The only source for him were daily planning meetings, where managers reported on sales results and negotiations with clients. There were 10 employees subordinated, and planning meetings took about an hour of total time. 5 hours per week. In addition, employees came to the head directly to discuss proposals and feedback from customers. As a result, the average deal cycle was 45 days.

After the implementation of the CRM system, the cycle was reduced to 30 days, a difference of 33%. With a single system that constantly supplies and updates information, the manager could track the stages of the funnels without having to hold meetings every morning. He saw the indicators and adjusted the work of managers.

In addition, digitalization of the process helped to see how much money is at all stages of the sales funnel. Thus, the company's finances in the context of the month became more transparent, and therefore manageable.

What are the "buts": resistance from employees and management

As with any new technology, employees and some management may be wary of implementing a CRM system.

And even if the team understands the need to install the system, adapting to new programs and tools becomes a separate problem.

The problem with the team is solved quite simply: the digitalization of business processes is followed by training events, as well as support for several months after installation. In addition, to facilitate the onboarding process of employees, you can use a specially compiled "knowledge base", which will contain all the instructions and training materials.

However, it also happens that training does not help to successfully implement a CRM system. Such cases include situations when a company has a high staff turnover, which is why the onboarding process stretches out for months.

There is only one way out – to make a final decision that you are rebuilding the process and integrating the CRM system. If you listen to everyone, this step will be postponed indefinitely, accordingly, you will lose time, money and nerves.

The main question: how do you know when it’s time to be modern?

To truly understand whether automation is necessary, determine whether these statements apply to you:

• We lose clients due to late callbacks and lack of reminders;
• We do not have a clear idea of ​​the current status of transactions and the work of managers;
• Our managers spend a lot of time on routine tasks such as sending emails and reminders;
• Marketing, sales and logistics departments often work with disparate data, which leads to errors and delays;
• We can't pinpoint which marketing campaigns are producing the most results;
• Our clients often complain about poor quality of service and long response times;
• We cannot accurately forecast sales and plan resources;
• We want repeat purchases;
• We are planning to scale and expand the company.

Conclusion

Remaining inert and ignoring modern solutions is a road to nowhere. Digitalization is the creation of a convenient and automated space for employees and you. If you configure the system in accordance with the processes of your company, you will get a tool that will help you manage and see everything that happens in it.

However, any decision must be justified. You should not build processes for the sake of processes just because many people talk about it. This is a vicious circle in which you can lose a lot of time, money and life energy.

Based on the objective needs of your business, design a business process map in advance with the contractor so that everyone clearly knows when and what results need to be achieved.