7 Ways to Make Your Sales Team More Effective

Sales managers know the more time their team spends with customers, the more they can increase revenue. Managers also know, however, that a large part of a sales professional's job is spent on other work. How can managers help team members increase effectiveness? Here are five ways to do that.

Use Sales Tools

Sales professionals spend a lot of time doing administrative work. Most would like to use more of that time working directly with customers. Digital sales tools can be an efficient way to automate repetitive tasks, such as data entry and mileage tracking. Customer relationship management, or CRM, software has become a must-have digital tool in the sales world. It is a dashboard to view customers' profiles, history, order status and outstanding issues. Other sales tools can provide marketing automation, video conferencing, analytics and sales intelligence.

Create a Good Training Plan

While many companies implement training for new hires, most do not offer continuous training. In the early days of employment, new employees may not retain everything from the onboarding process. Consider programs that will keep employees' sales skills sharp and up to date on the latest information in their field.

Communicate Frequently With Team Members

Communication between managers and team members can be hard to schedule and often doesn't happen frequently. It's important to check in with salespersons regularly, though. Meet with each team member one on one so you can address needs or questions they may have. Be sure to ask them what you can specifically do to make them more productive. You may find that multiple employees share a common roadblock, so this is your chance to get in front of any problems.

Create an Accountability Network

It is common knowledge that if you want to accomplish a goal, sharing your goal publicly is an excellent motivator. You will want to keep up with your progress, knowing others can hold you accountable if you start to lose focus. Using accountability with your sales team can motivate employees to stick to goals. It's easy to privately make excuses for not trying very hard, but it's more difficult to use those same excuses with colleagues. An accountability network can have a positive impact; encourage members to support each other's goals and help out if possible.

Implement a Schedule

Everyone will need to stay on top of the goals they set with their accountability network, and the first step to doing that is setting a schedule. Schedules may look different for each person and company, but it's possible to find a daily or weekly plan that shapes the work flow. For example, cold calls could take place on Monday, current customer follow-ups on Wednesday and team meetings on Friday to wrap up the week. Whether rigid or loose, having a schedule in place helps with communication and managing expectations.

Batch Similar Tasks

Grouping like tasks together is an efficient work method because it prevents you from having to shift gears. For example, when you make several sales calls in a row and then do data entry afterward for those calls, it lets your mind stay in sales-call mode and then data-entry mode without having to move your focus repeatedly. Despite popular belief, single-tasking is proven to be more efficient than multi-tasking.

Acknowledge the Wins

Everyone is probably guilty of remembering mistakes and bad calls more than the wins. Why not take the opportunity to turn this mindset around? Make sure you celebrate with your team when goals are achieved. Whether they are personal or company-wide, accentuating the positive boosts morale. It can even improve employee retention. Acknowledging the wins doesn't have to be complicated or expensive. Simply congratulating a team member publicly can go a long way in making that person feel good, and it can motivate others to keep up the good work.

Even the best sales teams can use a few new techniques every now and then. Giving your team the right tools can go a long way to increasing productivity.