5 Things You Can Do To Improve Sales Team Performance

An experienced, well-equipped and determined sales team can lead any business to success. The problem many companies face is that they have poor sales team performance.

In many cases, it doesn't have to do with experience or determination. The reason lies in the lack of understanding, empowerment and engagement.  

Today, 75% of companies say that closing more deals is their top priority. If you are among them, showing trust and giving the necessary tools to your team can give your business a giant push forward. Consider these five ways to improve sales team performance. 

1. Learn More About Your Sales Team

Being a sales rep isn't a profession. It's a calling. To be successful, these experts need to feel the buyers' pain points and offer suitable solutions, while guiding them down the sales funnel. All that requires determination, passion and hard work.

Unfortunately, many business owners don't understand the variety of challenges these sales professionals face. From that comes a lack of respect and encouragement, resulting in poor sales team performance. That's one of the reasons for a high sales rep turnover rate, compared to other industries (35% vs 13%).  

If you feel unhappy with your team's sales performance, start by learning more about your team. As you work on your involvement, you can uncover various factors to help improve the team's performance.

• Ask them to take personality tests. You'll be surprised how much you can learn from them.
• Ask for feedback about sales teamwork. Regular feedback can help you gain insight into the way your company functions.
• Engage in team-building activities to spend more time with your employees and get to know them.

Sales is a tough profession, which doesn't always pay off as well as people prefer. There is a reason why your sales reps chose this vocation. Find out as much about it as you can. This information can help you empower your team.

2. Increase Sales Performance by Encourage Strengths

All sales reps have certain professional strengths and weaknesses.  When you want an employee to increase sales performance, focusing attention on their weaknesses is counterproductive. 

​According to Gallup, building on employee's strengths is much more effective than trying to improve on their weaknesses. It's up to the employer to create a work environment to cultivate the sales rep's strengths.

A supervisor's understanding of his/her reps' strengths has an impressive effect on the company's bottom line because managers play a crucial role in maximizing employee output. You can empower the sales rep to discover and develop their strengths. Once you do that, adjust their role to exploit these strengths fully.

• Don't assume a sales rep knows his or her strengths. People usually take them for granted.
• Find ways to apply each rep's strength to achieve a team's goal.
• Help sales reps set goals according to their strengths.

Teams that focus on their strengths every day show 12.5% greater productivity than teams that don't.

3. Support Teamwork

To boost sales team performance, sales reps need to come together as a united group. This could be problematic for experts, who are used to working alone. As you get to know each team member's strengths and weaknesses, you can figure out the best way to bring these people together.

• Start with yourself. Bringing sales reps together as a team starts with you. As a leader, you should explain your plans, desires, strengths and weaknesses related to the company's operation and success. You need to set clear goals, and acknowledge achieving them is only possible with teamwork.
• Always listen. Problems with teamwork often arise because people don't think that they are heard. Make yourself available to your sales reps. Try to listen carefully before offering a solution. Sitting on a problem for 24 hours can help you resolve it quickly.
• Have fun. One of the biggest advantages of working on a team is having fun. Bring your sales reps together with engaging team-building activities.

If you manage to promote teamwork within your company, it doesn't mean you should stop celebrating individual achievements. To encourage better output, you should treat each sales rep as an individual.  

4. Ask For Feedback...And Listen To It

The best way to discover a problem in the workplace is to ask. If your team isn't performing as well as you expect, ask your sales rep why they think it's happening.

The information you can acquire simply by asking could change your entire approach to team building, workplace environment and much more.

Don't hesitate to ask your sales team for ideas. They may already know how to solve the problem. Listening to your employees and trusting their professional opinion could help you achieve many business goals in addition to improving sales team performance.

5. Promote Engagement And Involvement

One of the top reasons why employees are unhappy with their work is the lack of meaning. When sales reps don't see a meaning in what they do, their performance suffers.

Employee disengagement costs the U.S. more than $550 billion a year in lost productivity. Even when scaled down to one company, the losses could be devastating. To increase engagement, employees should be invested in the company's mission, vision, value and goals.

It's up to the leader to show the sales team why its work is highly meaningful to the company. You should help sales reps understand that the work they do contributes to the company's success directly.  

• Give your sales reps more flexibility.
• Maintain a sincere relationship with your reps.
• Ask for feedback.
• Clarify goals.
• Work at creating an enjoyable work environment.
• Encourage collaboration.
• Show gratitude.

When sales teams understand which goal they are working toward, they are more likely to demonstrate top-notch performance.

Start Improving Sales Team Performance Today
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The success of your sales team doesn't just depend on its professionalism and experience. A big part stems from your attitude.

By getting to know your team better, encouraging its strengths, improving the workplace environment and promoting engagement, you can improve the sales team's performance tremendously. Work with your sales team as much as you can. Such an effort can bring an impressive ROI.

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